Incidents The Third World Liberation Front (TWLF) rose in 1968 as a coalition of ethnic student groups on college campuses in California in response to the Eurocentric education and lack of diversity at San Francisco State College (now San Francisco State University) and University of California, Berkeley.
[6][9] After six assailants were arrested and suspended, the BSU held a press conference in order to elucidate the reasons for the classes they advocated.
[6] Individuals sympathetic to the six suspended students began protesting in the administration building at San Francisco State College, leading Summerskill to close the campus.
Despite demands from President Summerskill to evacuate the premises, the students remained in protest to keep a revered faculty member as a professor.
President Smith refused a demand by the California State Colleges trustees to assign George Mason Murray (the Minister of Education for the Black Panther Party), a graduate student and instructor in the English department, to a non-teaching position.
"[6][9] Mounting pressure from trustees and administrators, like SF State Chancellor Dumke, induced Dr. Smith to suspend Murray despite threats of a strike from the BSU, and led to the presentation of 15 demands from them and the TWLF.
Negative and violent interactions between police and students lead Dr. Smith to close campus for a week and faculty meetings ensued.
[1][6] Appeals by Professor S. I. Hayakawa to support President Smith's request to reinstate Murray were made to the faculty members, who were also considering striking as well.
[6] Whitson's essay for the San Francisco State College Strike Collection highlights and tabulates the demands and their outcomes during the agreement of March 20, 1968.
[12] The University of California, Berkeley housed an establishment of the Third World Liberation Front and saw the second longest student strike in US history for reasons similar to that of the TWLF at San Francisco State College: to address the Eurocentric education and integrate into academia conversations about identity and oppression.
[7] In February 1969, 13 students, including leaders of the movement Manuel Ruben Delgado, Ysidro Macias, and LaNada Means, were arrested for their part in the demonstrations and suspended.
The violence escalated to a point at which Governor Ronald Reagan had to declare a "state of extreme emergency," while the Berkeley President decided to prohibit demonstrations on campus.
The proposal was passed around the administration, from Chancellor Roger Heyn to professors to the Dean of the College of Letters and Sciences, Walker Knight.
[14] In August, the Mexican-American Student Confederation (MASC) to ask the university to withhold the purchase of table grapes in support of striking farm workers.
[14] In January 1969, the AASU, MASC, the Native American Student Association and the Asian-American Political Alliance coalesced to form Berkeley's Third World Liberation Front, with the establishment of a Strike Support Committee.
However, five days later, Chancellor Heyns and President Hitch conceded to most of the demands of the TWLF, which included the establishment of the Department of Ethnic Studies.