November 21st, 1963- The Boston Herald published an article about Dean Robert R. Watson, the faculty Committee on student Activities, denying Ononeze Anochie’s request for AAAAS, the Association of African and Afro-American Students which he was the president of, to be recognized by the university. Watson turned down the president of the organization on the grounds that recognizing a student association that only allowed black membership would be approving self-segregation and perpetuating the growing separatism between Harvard’s Black students and its non-Black students. Watson conveyed that should the organization be willing to open its membership to non-Black members of the student body, it would be possible to be recognized by the college.

In the proposal sent to Watson, the organization explicitly explained how having a student association solely for Black students would not be racist because of the need for such an organization on a campus where the population of Black students was increasing without a space for them to convene and organize. AAAAS’s president’s response to Watson was that non-recognition was due to the college equating the AAAAS restrictions on student membership with segregation was because the college placed the restrictions in the same category “white Anglo-Saxon exclusiveness” would be placed in.  Conveniently, Anochie’s response was labeled as “bitter”.