February 9, 1971: The SCCC Oriental Student Union Sit-In

SCCC's Oriental Student Union and their "posse on Broadway," February 9, 1971
Photo credit: Ben Yorita

“The time of the quiet Asian has passed.”

With those words, spoken on the date in focus here by Mike Tagawa, a sophomore at Seattle Central Community College (SCCC), that school’s Oriental Student Union (OSU) commenced a sit-in protest at the SCCC administration offices. The protest was staged to support the OSU’s demands that the Seattle Community College system hire five Asian-American administrators.

The protest began at noon when a crowd of about 200 gathered outside the SCCC Administration Center on Broadway on Capitol Hill. Roughly half were Asian-American, while the rest were black, Latino/Latina, and white students who supported the OSU’s demands.

The OSU, founded at SCCC in 1970, was largely inspired by the school’s Black Student Union (BSU), which during the 1968-1969 school year had staged similar protests to demand black studies courses and the hiring of black administrators and faculty. Mike Tagawa, the OSU’s 1970-1971 vice-president, was in fact a member of the SCCC BSU prior to the OSU’s formation. The other crucial OSU leader involved in organizing the protest was Alan Sugiyama, the OSU’s 1970-1971 president.

It must be noted here that the OSU’s action was not completely supported at the time among Seattle’s communities of color. Older, more conservative representatives of the city’s Asian-American community reportedly took issue with the OSU’s militant, Black Panther-inspired tactics. Meanwhile, although the Seattle Black Panther Party publicly supported the action, much of Seattle’s black community, including the SCCC BSU, reportedly did not. Such was the fragmentation among the American Left, in Seattle and nationwide, in the year 1971.

The OSU would again take over the SCCC offices, this time more forcefully, on March 2, 1971, and the pressure generated by that protest action would eventually lead to acquiescence by the school’s administration. Following negotiations facilitated by leaders in the local Asian-American community, SCCC agreed to hire an Asian-American administrator for the 1971-1972 school year. Not long after, SCCC hired Frank Fujii as a Department Head and Peter Kosi as Minority Affairs Director. Eventually, in 1990, the district would also hire an Asian American, Peter Ku, as president of North Seattle Community College. In 1998, Ku was promoted to chancellor of the Seattle Community College District.

Next month, the 40th anniversary of the OSU sit-ins will be commemorated on March 2 with a public event at SCCC’s Broadway Performance Hall, with Alan Sugiyama and Mike Tagawa as keynote speakers. For more information, see the website of Seattle’s Japanese American Citizens League.

–Jeff Stevens. Sources: John de Yonge, “SCC Trustees to Consider Oriental Student Demands,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, February 9, 1971, p. 7; John de Yonge, “SCC, Oriental Students to Negotiate,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, February 10, 1971, p. D; Stephen H. Dunphy, “No solution reached on Asians’ demands,” The Seattle Times, February 10, 1971, p. E 4; “Asian-Ancestry Community College Students Demand Official Voice,” The Facts, February 11, 1971, p. 1; Robert Marshall Wells, “Ku retires with legacy as steadfast promoter of community colleges,” The Seattle Times, June 13, 2003; “Oriental Student Union Sit-In,” Seattle Civil Rights & Labor History Project (http://depts.washington.edu/civilr/aa_osu.htm).

May 20, 1968: The UW Black Student Union Sit-In

Black Student Union supporters outside UW Administration Building, May 20, 1968

May 1968, whose anniversary we obviously indulge this month, was a political rollercoaster ride in more ways than one. Worldwide is the legend of that month’s philosophy-fueled and historically cathartic student-worker uprising in Paris. But equally important for us here in Seattle is the anniversary of the date in focus here, when the University of Washington was unfathomably shook by its Black Student Union, then freshly-formed and quickly meaning serious racial justice business.

As the students of the Sorbonne and elsewhere fantastically shook France’s political foundations, the UW BSU staged a surprise occupation of the offices of UW President Charles Odegaard to demand that the UW take steps to amend the overwhelming lack of minority representation on its campus. Among the BSU’s specific demands was a budget allocation for $50,000 to be spent developing an expanded black studies program.

At approximately 5 p.m. that evening, after spending most of the day demonstrating outside the UW Administration Building, some 25 BSU members and supporters entered Odegaard’s office suite on the Ad Building’s third floor, where a meeting of the UW Faculty Senate executive committee was taking place. By 7 p.m., the number of sit-in participants had grown to more than 50, and bags of groceries and a portable record player were brought to the group, signaling their intent to maintain the occupation as long as necessary.

The BSU took this action as a very risky last resort, after weeks of politely petitioning the University to develop a recruitment program for black students and an expanded black studies program. Prior to the sit-in, the University had politely expressed its alleged sympathy for the BSU’s concerns, yet ultimately ignored the issue. As several Seattle police cars and a growing crowd of UW community members anxiously waited outside the Ad Building, Odegaard, after four hours of intense negotiation with the BSU and representatives of the UW Faculty Senate, finally signed a policy statement committing the UW to the BSU’s demands.

BSU President E. J. Brisker claimed Odegaard’s signature as a victory because it “put Odegaard on record and made absolutely clear his position.” The Faculty Senate executive committee also signed the statement, and later that week the Senate body unanimously approved the statement during its regular meeting. Prior to the vote, Brisker read aloud a prepared statement, which was met with applause by the Senate. Brisker’s statement read in part as follows:

“… we would like the support of the Faculty Senate in three key areas. One, in the area of recruitment of non-white students. Two, the development of programs, i.e., remedial and tutorial, that will aid newly recruited students in making the difficult transition to university life. Three, the development of a Black Studies Curriculum which will enable both non-white and white students to learn about the culture and life style of such groups as Afro-American, Mexi-American, and Indian-American peoples.”

The UW BSU sit-in remains unique among examples of student direct action in that its long-term impact involved not merely changes to UW policy, but also the establishment of new departments, new administrative positions, and even new buildings on the UW campus. The legacy of the event remains on the UW campus today in the form of the Office of Minority Affairs and Diversity, the Ethnic Cultural Center and Theatre, and the American Ethnic Studies department. In addition, several of the sit-in’s young organizers have today become significant leaders in the local social justice community, including longtime King County Councilmember Larry Gossett, UW Vice President for Minority Affairs Emile Pitre, and multi-faceted community activist Aaron Dixon (then a Garfield High student and co-founder of the Seattle Black Panther Party and Garfield’s own BSU).

–Jeff Stevens. Sources: Dave Verbon, “Late-Hour Compromise Averts Sit-In Violence,” University of Washington Daily, May 21, 1968, p. 1; “Compromise Issued,” University of Washington Daily, May 21, 1968, p. 1; Robert Cour and Fergus Hoffman, “4-Hour Negro Sit-in at UW; New Talks Set,” The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, May 21, 1968, p. 1; Dee Norton, “Agreement Ends Student Sit-in,” The Seattle Times, May 21, 1968, p. 5; Don Hannula, “U. W. Sit-in ‘Just the Beginning,’ Says Black Student Union President,” The Seattle Times, May 21, 1968, p. 5; Dave Verbon, “BSU Working To Carry Out Its Obligations,” University of Washington Daily, May 22, 1968, p. 1; “Faculty Senate to Eye BSU Sit-In Resolution,” University of Washington Daily, May 23, 1968, p. 1; Mike Steward, “Senate Applauds Brisker,” University of Washington Daily, May 24, 1968, p. 1; “BSU Statement To Senate,” University of Washington Daily, May 24, 1968, p. 1; Aaron Dixon, “My People Are Rising: Memoir of a Black Panther Party Captain” (Haymarket Books, 2012).