Professor Barrett said he was the committee chairman of the History Department’s Curriculum Committee and was representing the department concerning these courses. He discussed the department’s process for course approval. The practice was to offer courses first as special topics and, then, if they demonstrated a following, transform them into numbered courses in the Catalogue.  That is where matters rested with these courses:  All had been offered at various times and had generated a following. Accordingly, in the fall of 2011 the History Department had approved all unanimously except for HIST 318, Charleston and the War for Southern Independence.  He stated that that course, with the current title, passed the History Department after a long and spirited debate by a vote of 7-6.  The majority, he noted, was slim, but in consonance with department’s practice, the majority rules.  To his knowledge never has a department decision made by the majority been contested by the minority at the next level of decision-making in the college hierarchy. 

He indicated he did not “have a dog in the fight” because his area of specialty was Europe. He said he had voted for the HIST 381 course because

1. Academic freedom: in his years at the college, the department had always deferred to the professor teaching the course. Academic freedom dictated the freedom to devise course titles.
2. Prof. Sinisi was the department’s specialist in this area; its sole academically trained person in Civil War.
3. Prof. Sinisi was the only published scholar in this area.
4. He has twice won the Grimsley Award
5. Never a hint or insinuation of racism in this or any of his classes.
6. The title had an element of agent provocateur.

He went on to note that in his opinion, for anyone in the department to contest the decision was an expression of disrespect for the views of the majority and a contempt for the democratic process within the department. That the majority was small or large was not relevant. To allow the functioning of bureaucratic processes, at some point the department had to make a decision, and once that was accomplished, things had to move on. To contest matters endlessly would lead to little getting accomplished. It was ironic, he thought, that Professor Knapp would cite the validity of a majority opinion taken from professors whom he had surveyed, yet at the same time the majority opinion of his own departmental colleagues was being ignored.

As to the argument that the proposed the course title would dishonor the college and hamper recruitment, he pointed out that well over half the department had joined the college despite the presence of the same title in the undergraduate college. Its alleged offensiveness failed to dissuade them from coming. That the South’s desire to become independent did not include independence for the slaves and free Blacks and was to perpetuate slavery was well known and not hidden by the proposed title. And he pointed out that the American Revolutionary War is often called the War for American Independence, and there was no inclusion of the then slaves or women in that concept of independence.

Bottom line: a qualified colleague asked for this title, it had the support of the majority of the department, and that it was a majority of one was not relevant.