Jonathan P. Baird lives in Wilmot.

The current round of student protests brings back memories. I started at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut in the fall of 1968. One of my early college memories is demonstrating against then-Republican presidential nominee Richard Nixon. Nixon had falsely claimed he had a secret plan to end the much-hated, racist and imperialist Vietnam War. With my Trinity chapter of Students for a Democratic Society, we conducted an evening march through downtown Hartford to the rally. There was no violence that night.

In the spring of 1968, before I arrived at Trinity, 168 students occupied the Trinity administration buildings to force consideration of a scholarship program for Black students. This happened in the aftermath of Dr. King’s assassination. College trustees agreed to the student demands. The situation resolved peacefully.

In May 1970, there was a national student strike after the Ohio National Guard killed four students at Kent State University. Many colleges, Trinity included, canceled classes. I remember watching the Kent State news with many shocked classmates. Students were livid. For over a week, normal classes were largely suspended and replaced by workshops on the Vietnam War, imperialism, racism and poverty.

Many of the workshops were held on the green near Trinity’s Long Walk. There was no encampment but the students were not met by riot police and there were no charges of criminal trespass. As a private college, Trinity could have responded that way but the administration’s response was peaceful, even gentle. Of course, there were counter-examples like Columbia and Jackson State but I think in the campus world, violent responses were more the exception than the norm.

While Trinity was only one small private college, it is hard not to compare the college and university response, then and now. Now colleges and universities opt quickly for more aggressive policing and stiffer penalties. Across the country, college presidents invite riot police onto campuses to break up encampments. The police often come in riot gear, behave brutally, zip-tie students and arrest them.

We saw this happen in New Hampshire with the treatment of Annelise Orleck, a 65-year-old history professor who has taught at Dartmouth for many years. Professor Orleck was at a peaceful protest for Palestinians in Gaza on the Dartmouth Green. She was knocked to the ground and arrested. She described elderly women professors being struck in their ribs by truncheons. 90 people were arrested at Dartmouth for criminal trespass and resisting arrest.

Reporting from the Concord Monitor has shown that a punitive response was planned in advance by college administrators at Dartmouth and UNH. It was coordinated with Gov. Sununu. Their game plan was to present the protest as organized by violent antisemitic outside agitators.

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The truth could not have been more different, both in New Hampshire and elsewhere. Violence came entirely from the police. To quote Sandy Tolan from Slate, “With few exceptions, the encampments have been overwhelmingly peaceful, well-organized microsocieties with posted community rules, medical and food tents, yoga and meditation, kite making workshops, teach-ins and Shabbat Services and Passover seders. These students and supporting faculty form a multi-racial interfaith community. They are united by their outrage at the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza by Israeli bombs supplied by U.S. taxpayers. They share a vision for freedom and justice for Palestine.”

There has been an effort to vilify protesters and to present constitutionally protected activity as crimes. This went on during the Vietnam War protest too but in comparing the two times, now it is worse. Crackdowns happen faster in 2024. Since 2017, nearly 300 anti-protest bills have been introduced in state legislatures, with 41 passing.

Five states have enacted laws that impose harsh penalties for individuals who block traffic or even sidewalks. Nine other states have such legislation pending. Some states have added laws that grant immunity to drivers who strike protesters. More than 2,950 people have been arrested at pro-Palestinian protests on at least 61 college campuses in recent weeks.

How did it come about that a nation that talks so much about loving liberty has evolved to have such a reduced notion of the First Amendment rights of free speech and free assembly? At the appearance of a protest at a public university, riot police must be called in immediately to squash dissent. It is like the fantasy of dangerous student radicals must be created to justify the repression.

Dissenting college students were a convenient foil for Nixon and now they serve that purpose for MAGA Republicans and Trump who indulge in unhinged rants about “radical left lunatics.” Trump called the police sweep at Columbia University “a beautiful thing to see.”

His demonizing student protesters and his verbal support for violence offer a window into how a second Trump administration would treat dissent. Trump has already talked about invoking the Insurrection Act if he regains power. There can be little doubt he would use the military against protesters. That would be crossing a line never crossed before.

While it is true the First Amendment allows for “time, place, and manner” restrictions, progressives and liberals should be worrying about something far worse. The use of repressive state tools against progressives and liberals is very likely if Trump regains power. Revenge against his enemies has been a constant theme.

On his social media, Trump has written: “Republicans are already thinking about what we are going to do to Biden and the communists when it’s our time.”

In assessing why student protest has been repressed so aggressively this spring, I would attribute primary blame to MAGA Republicans and Trump. The hateful and fascist-type rhetoric coming from that world promotes police state reaction. While Biden’s response has been weak and his support for academic freedom has been inadequate, Team Trump could not be doing more to chill First Amendment rights.

When it comes to the rights of free speech and assembly, the United States has been moving backwards. The harsh response to student protests is a bad sign. As was true of student protesters during the Vietnam War, today’s student protesters are acting as the conscience of the nation.