Cal State system requires loyalty oath

By Robert Rogers
Staff Writer

SAN BERNARDINO -- For Neal Dach, college was a welcome environment after four years in the Army, including a combat stint as an ammunitions specialist in Iraq in 2003.

But after putting his life on the line in the country's defense, Dach's loyalty to the nation would have to be vetted again, this time to prove he was fit for a job as a $10 per hour laboratory technician at Cal State San Bernardino.

Dach opted not to sign a a loyalty oath required by all state employees, including those paid in the California State University system. The oath was included in the state Constitution by voters in 1952, at the height of the McCarthy-era hysteria, with the aim of screening communists from public jobs.

Today, it has Dach, an Iraq war veteran and senior biology major, working a normally $7 to $10 per hour job as a lab tech for free this academic year.

Dach is still befuddled. His noncompliance is religious; Dach converted to Jehovah's Witness in 2004.

"I was shocked they want me to sign a defense contract to prepare the lab for a lab (class), that makes no sense," Dach said.

As Dach's case comes to light, fresh scrutiny has been focused on the Constitutional provision, which requires that employees "defend" the constitution against "enemies."

Earlier this year, a Cal State Fullerton American Studies professor who described herself as a Quaker and a pacifist, was fired when she refused to sign the oath without including supplemental materials explaining her position.

In February, another Cal State instructor and Quaker was fired after inserting the word "nonviolently" into the oath, but was later rehired after the state attorney general's office drafted an opinion concluding the oath does not require employees to bear arms in the nation's defense.

But none of that has mattered to Dach, who said he appealed to professors and the campus offices before opting to work for free - and not be required to sign the oath - to gain the educational experience.

"Everywhere I went, I ran into a brick wall," Dach said. "I didn't just roll over and take it, but at some point I had to get on with getting the experience I need."

Dach makes ends meet with a combination of financial aid and the G.I. Bill, he said.
"Anybody that has a conscientious objection to signing this document can't work for the state?" Dach said. "It doesn't seem right."

Professors on campus, many of whom claim to not remember signing the document upon their hiring, said the oath was at best outdated, at worst an infringement on liberties.

Many professors and students have conferred on campus and in university Web chat rooms about the oath since news of the Cal State Fullerton professor's firing broke in the Los Angeles Times last week.

"It's a travesty of justice," said sociology professor Marcia Marx. "It's hard to believe it has been taken to this extent, and my sense is that professors and students are pretty outraged about it ... the communications have got around very quickly."

A spokeswoman for CSU Chancellor Charles Reed said the 23-campus system is obligated to follow state law. Reed's office could not provide statistics of how many professors had been fired or students denied jobs by the oath over the years.

Spokeswoman Claudia Keith stopped short of making a judgement about the policy, but did allow that reassessment of a 50-year-old provision may be due.

"It's a good question to ask whether it's still useful, or whether it has served its purpose," she said.

A spokesman for CSUSB said no professor or staff has been fired or denied employment for noncompliance with the oath, and added that leaders at the campus merely implement a policy set at the state level.

Cherstin Lyon, a history professor at CSUSB, said it's no surprise that loyalty oaths like the one in the state's Constitution endure, despite backlashes at universities and among civil liberties activists. Lyon said she reluctantly signed a similar loyalty oath in Arizona in the late 1990s before enrolling in a graduate program there.

"Anytime you're talking about loyalty, it's an extremely charged issue, and politicians are afraid to look unpatriotic," Lyon said. "Opposition to a loyalty oath can be spun in a very negative direction, especially in a post 9/11 environment where we've moved in a direction in many ways similar to the 1950s."

Lyon said reluctant complicity - as people sign to get on with education and careers - and a lack of applicants with the means and drive to engage in a costly stand help explain why such an oath can endure.

"There are a lot of people who this kind of oath would be a problem for, but they don't have much of a choice, they don't have the liberty to resist," Lyon said. "Not everyone is capable of making a stand, and a law as entrenched as this can often only be changed by violating it and taking it to court."

David Polcyn, chairman of the biology department, said he was aware of his student's predicament, which he called "ridiculous."

"It's absolutely ridiculous that something like this is keeping a student from getting what others have available to them," Polcyn said.

Polcyn also pointed out that the oath is not required to be signed by foreign students, a double-standard he said further undermines its validity.

"It's just an outdated, crazy thing," he said of the oath.

For Dach, the bitter irony of having to prove his loyalty with a signature after putting his life on the line for the country's military weighs heavy.

"It was my choice not to sign, but I felt I had to stand for my beliefs."

Dach said his protest will go no further than working for free, which he has been doing since last year.

After graduating this year, he plans to go to Harvard University, where he said a job as a research technician awaits.

"They don't have a loyalty oath there," Dach said. "I checked."