Mark Potok

Mark,
I must say I was taken aback by your email (below). My essay was not "harsh," as you put it, but, if it was, I find slavery, rape and lynching, the topics I wrote about, to be "harsh".

Regardless, it is unclear to me how anything I wrote would justify, in your mind, the death threats I received, and Vanderbilt University's threatening my job. It is with these that the SPLC should be concerned.

If the SPLC is not concerned with me as an individual, it should be concerned with the precedent that was set: when the UDC defeated Vanderbilt, it established a strategy for defending every Confederate memorial in the country (involving death threats, legal intimidation, termination of employment, and defamation). In fact, if the SPLC had stepped in, Vanderbilt would certainly have won in the court of public opinion, and possibly in the actual courts; and hence we might have seen the beginning of the end of Confederate memorials.

Instead, the UDC victory has already been used as a precedent in at least one other court case. Congratulations.

---Jonathan Farley

P.S. I did consult a lawyer and, contrary to what you write, I did have several claims against Vanderbilt and The Tennessean newspaper for job discrimination and for libel. I did not pursue those claims at the time of the neo-Confederate attack because of the threat of arrest.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 22 Sep 2005 10:34:26 -0500
From: Mark Potok <mark@splcenter.org>
To: lattice@math.harvard.edu
Subject: Vanderbilt, UDC, etc.

Jonathan,

I've given some thought to your situation, and I really don't know what we
can do. We've already written a fair amount, as I mentioned, about people
harassed by neo-Confederate activists for not agreeing with them. I am not a
lawyer, but I seriously doubt whether you have a real claim against
Vanderbilt -- they didn't like what you said (which really was pretty harsh)
and they said so. The fact that Fox and the Washington Times reported on it,
repeatedly, doesn't seem surprising at all. I obviously didn't review all
the back and forth, but again, I tend to doubt there's any basis for a
defamation or libel suit -- certainly, you became a public figure the minute
you wrote that essay. For the Intelligence Report, I just can't see writing
a whole piece on this episode, having, as I said above, done the long piece
I mentioned to you on the phone ("Confederates in the Museums").

It is possible that Brian Willoughby, a colleague of mine here, might want
to write something for the Tolerance.org Web site or even Teaching Tolerance
magazine, of which he is managing editor. His direct line is 334-956-8355.
But I caution you that it really may be outside his bailiwick entirely.

If it's okay, I'd like to just keep your case in mind for the future, when
it really may make sense to incorporate your story into some larger article
or package of stories we're doing. I just can't see doing it as a
stand-alone article for the Intelligence Report. I think, too, that it's
virtually out of the question that we could somehow force Vanderbilt to
issue a public apology on this.

I'm sorry to disappoint you. Perhaps Brian can be more helpful.

Very sincerely,

Mark
_____________________________
Mark Potok
Director, Intelligence Project
Editor, Intelligence Report
Southern Poverty Law Center
400 Washington Ave.
Montgomery, AL 36104
(334) 956-8200