It took 51 years for Morris Judd to hear the flimsy accusations that wrecked his career. That's a welcome ray of sunshine. But why did it take so long to arrive?

On Friday, the University of Colorado Board of Regents voted to release a 1951 report about suspected subversives. Now we know what some have long suspected: that Judd and others were harassed and persecuted, derided and dismissed because they held beliefs the government hated.

They were persecuted for exercising the First Amendment and academic freedom.

In 1951, Judd was a CU philosophy instructor who had graduated at the top of his class and was much admired by his colleagues and students.

But Judd recalls being called into the office of former CU President Robert L. Stearns and "badgered with questions" about his former political affiliation. (Judd was a registered Democrat.) Judd declined to answer those questions. Stearns told him, "It will go very hard with you if you don't answer my questions."

And so it did. Stearns called Judd a boring teacher, and the regents dismissed him. One regent voted against the dismissal, saying the action was based on rumor and innuendo in the secret report.

The report released Friday reveals the flimsy case against Judd. One unnamed student who spoke to detectives Dudley Hutchinson and Harold Hafer said he'd seen Judd at Communist Party meetings in 1945 or'46. The source said Judd was "90 percent or better a probable Communist" during 1946.

That source said that he was "of the opinion" that the American Youth for Democracy met at Judd's home in March 1947. The AYD had been banned from campus for allegedly being a Communist front group.

The detectives reported that a student recalled Judd telling students that the United States was waging an "imperialistic war in Korea." And Professor David Hawkins told the detectives that Judd was not a Communist, that he was, rather, a Marxist.

Finally, the detectives report Judd's cardinal sin: that he refused to answer the detectives' questions. Judd said the questions were "irrelevant" and that "past political beliefs do not disqualify a person to be a member of the academic community." He was right. His rectitude didn't save his job.

Here's the short version of the evidence against Judd. Someone thinks he recalls seeing Judd at meetings several years prior. Someone else is "of the opinion" that a meeting took place at Judd's home. A student says he called the United States "imperialist."

Such were the innuendoes that ruled and ruined people's lives.

This week, Judd recalled the consequences of the witch hunt. "I suffered the loss of my academic career. This investigation was a horrendous violation not only of my rights, but of the tradition of academic freedom.

"That secret and unwarranted procedure has been compounded by the years of secrecy in withholding the report from the public," Judd stated.

After being summarily dismissed from the university, Judd worked as an office manager at a Greeley junk yard. "Generations of CU students lost the opportunity to study with him," Nina Judd, his daughter, told the regents Thursday.

The witch hunt was launched in 1951, after Congress revealed that Professor Hawkins had once been a communist. Within days, CU ordered an investigation of "subversives" on campus. In May 1951, Hutchinson and Hafer delivered a 126-page report. One month later, Irving Goodman, an assistant professor of chemistry, was summarily fired. Judd's dismissal followed.

In 1953, state legislators pressured the university to release the report, and some professors urged its destruction. In response, CU's president and Colorado's governor announced that the report would not be destroyed. Then, the regents placed the report in a bank vault, where it remained until this year, when the Camera sued for its release.

Last July, I invoked the Colorado Open Records Act in requesting a copy of the report. The university refused. In February, I asked for a partially censored copy — one with all names but five blacked out. The university refused. The Camera sued. (The judge's ruling was still pending on Friday).

It was only after being sued — and having been so urged by the Boulder Faculty Assembly, the CU Faculty Council, the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado, the Camera, the Colorado Daily, and Judd himself — that the regents relented.

The contents of the report have been a closely guarded secret since it was completed. Finally on Friday, the regents saw sweet reason. Why did it take so long? Why did they fight so hard? What lessons does this hold?

Those are unresolved questions. With evidence in hand, we'll have a fighting chance of finding answers.

Reach Clint Talbott at (303) 473-1367 or talbottc@thedailycamera.com.

May 11, 2002