Madison, Wis., Acts to Wipe Tarnish Off Liberal Image

The daily dose of government debate at the state Capitol and the shuffle of students between university classes can’t muffle the question.

Is Madison’s long, proud tradition of liberal politics, student activism and tolerance of widely divergent groups and views in jeopardy?

That is the question that lobbyist Ken Opin’s mother, who lives on the East Coast, asked him after reading news accounts about a rash of anti-Semitic vandalism in Madison this summer.

Political analysts also asked after U.S. Rep. Robert Kastenmeier, a Democrat and champion of liberal causes, was ousted by a conservative after 32 years in Congress.

And it’s the question aldermen asked after a Southeast Asian woman collecting aluminum cans to supplement her welfare income was arrested under Madison’s trash-recycling law.

Has this city of 180,000 changed?

“The world has changed,” said Mayor Paul R. Soglin, a Vietnam War protester whose political views and garb earned him the nickname “hippie mayor” during his first term in the 1970s.

After 10 years in the private sector, Soglin returned to office two years ago.

He has traded his beads, tie-dyed shirts and ponchos for tweeds and striped ties. And he doesn’t march past the Capitol with a throng of students to lobby for the latest cause in social justice. He strolls downtown and courts business interests.

“Madison is no longer the Emerald City,” said Orlando Bell, president of the local chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. “It has big-city problems, and it is going to have to find big-city solutions.”

Madison’s enthrallment with its proud liberal past allowed problems to go mostly unnoticed during the late 1970s and 1980s, Bell said.

“During the time we were in suspended animation, these problems have been knocking on our door,” he said.

The deepest blow to the city’s image this year was in the form of anti-Semitic vandalism. In one incident, brake lines were cut on a bus carrying children from a Jewish camp, and tragedy was narrowly averted. Police have guarded temples and synagogues during recent Jewish holidays.

“Anti-Semitism had finally hit home,” said the Rev. Frederick Trost, president of the Wisconsin Conference of the United Church of Christ. “People were astonished and shocked by it.”

Added Mary Rouse, dean of students at the University of Wisconsin: “It was a very painful reminder that discrimination occurs in every community.”

Added to that:

* The Nov. 6 ouster of Kastenmeier, whose incessant pursuit of civil rights, nuclear disarmament and openness in government became a symbol of the political climate here during the 1960s and 1970s. Both Democrats and Republicans say that political newcomer Scott Klug capitalized on dissatisfaction with Congress in general.

* The aluminum-can gleaner’s arrest under an anti-scavenging ordinance passed by the City Council. The charge was dropped in September, after one alderman declared during a council meeting that his colleagues had become more interested in giving tax breaks to rich companies than in protecting the interests of the poor.

* The attack on two white youths by black youths in September. Also, in November, a gang of about 20 young men and women attacked and robbed three people outside a tavern.

Instead of downplaying such incidents, city leaders condemned them as threats to the prevailing ideology and discussed potential solutions.

Clergy joined to assist the Jewish community and allay fears with impassioned sermons and sharply worded editorials.

The university instituted mandatory classes in race relations.

“The outpouring of community response has been decisive and overwhelming,” state Rep. David Clarenbach said. “Law enforcement, the religious community, minorities have spoken with one voice.”

Opin, the lobbyist, said the incidents did not surprise him as much as the reactions to them.

“I’ve been Jewish a long time, and I’ve encountered a lot of anti-Semitism,” he said. “I don’t think Madison is any different in its degree of anti-Semitism. . . . What’s primarily different is the community’s response.”

Even so, city leaders wonder if they have done enough. The NAACP is organizing a coalition of activists, similar to the one formed in Madison in the 1960s, to advance the causes of peace, civil rights, feminism and gay rights.

The university, with its 45,000-student body, is seeking to devote more of its resources to community problems.

“We have to renew our commitment to civil rights and human rights every day,” Rouse said. “People of all walks of life have come together. To the extent that you can take something that is ugly and painful and make it positive, we’ve done a great deal.”