Date of Award
Spring 5-2017
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.A.
Degree Program
History
Department
History
Major Professor
Guenter Bischof
Second Advisor
Allan Millet
Third Advisor
Connie Atkinson
Abstract
Dwight D. Eisenhower has been criticized as an anti-intellectual by scholars such as Richard Hofstadter. Eisenhower’s tenure as president of Columbia University was one segment of his career he was particularly criticized for because of his non-traditional approach to education there. This paper examines Eisenhower’s time at Columbia to explain how anti-intellectualism played into his university administration. It explains how his personality and general outlook came to clash with the intellectual environment of Columbia especially in the wake of the faculty revolt against former Columbia President Nicholas Murray Butler. It argues that Eisenhower utilized the Columbia institution to promote a Cold War educational agenda, which often belittled Columbia intellectuals and their scholarly pursuits. However, this paper also counter-argues that Eisenhower, despite accusations of anti-intellectualism, was an academically interested man who never engaged in true suppression of free thought despite pressure from McCarthyite influences in American government, media and business.
Recommended Citation
Cannatella, Dylan S., "Dwight D. Eisenhower and the Politics of Anti-Communism at Columbia University: Anti-Intellectualism and the Cold War during the General's Columbia Presidency" (2017). University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations. 2302.
https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/2302
Rights
The University of New Orleans and its agents retain the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible this dissertation or thesis in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. The author retains all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis or dissertation.