Ex-Treasury Chief Calls Dartmouth President a ‘Wimp’

Former U.S. Treasury Secretary William E. Simon joined the Dartmouth College fray, calling the school president a “wimp” and supporting 10 conservative students suspended for a sledgehammer raid on anti-apartheid shanties.

Simon, who did not attend Dartmouth, accused the Ivy League college of unjustly suspending the 10 students affiliated with the conservative Dartmouth Review newspaper while not punishing anti-apartheid protesters who also broke campus regulations.

Simon, who was Treasury secretary under President Richard M. Nixon in 1974, initially scolded President David McLaughlin in a letter that accused the college of supporting a “double standard” and allowing faculty to “openly and shamefully” attack staff members of the Review.

In a telephone interview Wednesday with the Valley News, Simon said, “(McLaughlin) behaves like a wimp,” failing to please either liberals or conservatives “because of his cowardice.”