The Chronicle has an exclusive on FBI surveillance of Berkeley in the 50s-60s period. Unusually shitty writing on the Chronicle's part partially disguises what it has obtained: explosive evidence of illegal dealings and blackmail on the FBI's part.

I'll quote the most important revelations:

1. Hoover trying to destroy Liberal faculty members

According to the documents, Hoover became outraged over an essay question on UC's 1959 English aptitude test for high school applicants that asked: "What are the dangers to a democracy of a national police organization, like the FBI, which operates secretly and is unresponsive to public criticism?"

In response, Hoover ordered his aides to launch a covert public relations campaign to embarrass the university and pressure it to retract what he called a "viciously misleading" question.

The director also ordered his agents to search bureau files for derogatory information on UC's 6,000 faculty members and top administrators.

The resulting 60-page report said 72 faculty members, students and employees were listed in the bureau's "Security Index," a secret nationwide list of people whom the FBI considered potentially dangerous to national security who would be detained without warrant during a crisis.

2. Efforts to destroy Liberal Regents and President Kerr:

The FBI records show that after the Free Speech Movement staged the nation's first large campus sit-ins of the era, CIA Director John McCone met with Hoover at FBI headquarters in January 1965 and planned to leak FBI reports to conservative regent Edwin Pauley, who could then "use his influence to curtail, harass and at times eliminate" liberal faculty members.

Regents, Kerr also targets

The FBI also gave Pauley reports on the backgrounds of three liberal regents from San Francisco: lawyer William Coblentz, businessman William M. Roth and former Democratic National Committee member Elinor Haas Heller.

The FBI campaigned to get Kerr fired from the UC presidency, the bureau's records show, because it disagreed with his policies and handling of the Free Speech Movement protests.

When President Lyndon Johnson was considering appointing Kerr to be his Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare in December 1964, he asked the FBI to conduct a routine inquiry into Kerr's background. But the bureau sent the White House allegations that Kerr was "pro-communist" - even though the bureau knew the claims were false.

3. Trying to destroy the Free Speech Movement:

Following the violent 1969 People's Park protests in Berkeley, Herbert Ellingwood, Reagan's legal affairs secretary, met with DeLoach to discuss campus unrest. "Governor Reagan is dedicated to the destruction of disruptive elements on California campuses," Ellingwood said, according to the records.

The Reagan administration planned on "hounding" protest groups as much as possible by "bringing any form of violation available against them." Reagan officials might bring tax cases against them, Ellingwood added, and would also mount a "psychological warfare campaign" against protesters.

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