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The second phase of the student rebellion arose in reaction to the United States military intervention in Vietnam in 1965. Passionate debate of the issues took place, both in and out of class. Anti-war protestors participated in the Washington Peace March in October 1966, organized teach-ins on campus, and observed National Moratorium Day in 1969. President Richard Nixon's decision to send troops into Cambodia in April 1970 brought matters to a boiling point.

On May 1 the DePauw community was alarmed and shaken upon learning of an arson fire at the Air Force R.O.T.C. building. Two students were later tried and convicted on charges connected with this incident. A contrast to that isolated case of violence was the large peaceful demonstration on May 6 in the academic quadrangle. It was organized to protest the Cambodian invasion and the Ohio National Guard's firing upon student demonstrators that left four persons dead on the Kent State University campus two days before.

A third aspect of the student movement has been called a cultural revolution, affecting such matters as living arrangements, dating and sexual behavior, clothing styles and the like. Proms and other formal events lost favor with undergraduates, who chose to pursue personal fulfillment and sought relevance rather than tradition. A principal demand of many students was for relaxation of the university's social and parietal regulations, especially in regard to closing hours for women's residences and coed visitation privileges. After a series of confrontations with student groups during the 1968-69 academic year, the administration made significant concessions on these questions that virtually ended the university's longstanding in loco parentis role.

The board of trustees authorized the creation of a Community Concerns Committee composed of students, faculty, administration and trustees which was to approve "all basic policies and minimum standards, enforcement procedures, and responsibilities relating to the social activities and other nonacademic interests and pursuits of the DePauw students." The committee delegated to the Association of Women Students the authority to recommend closing, or lock-up, hours for women's residences and made each living unit responsible for implementation and enforcement of the new privileges.

Compared with many other college and university campuses at this time, DePauw experienced a rather calm, nonviolent student rebellion. There were no riots, building-seizures, or similar incidents. Yet the student movement left a permanent mark on the institution, which ended the era more committed to antidiscriminatory practices, freedom of student expression, and social autonomy. One major long-term result was the election of student representatives to the board of trustees.

In October 1975 Kerstetter resigned from the presidency and was appointed to the long-dormant position of chancellor, with responsibilities chiefly for development and fund raising. The board of trustees named Indianapolis businessman Thomas W. Binford acting president while the search for a new chief executive was conducted. Princeton graduate Binford, who was a successful financier but lacked experience in managing academic affairs, maintained an office on the DePauw campus several days a week during the next few months before resigning in August 1976 to return to his Indianapolis business enterprises.

At that point Dean Farber, who was given the additional title of vice president, assumed academic leadership of the university on an interim basis for the second time. At the end of the 1977-78 academic year Chancellor Kerstetter retired to his home on Cape Cod in Massachusetts. With his wife Leona Bateman Kerstetter, he presently resides in Sandwich, MA, where he is engaged in preparing a memoir of his DePauw years.

After an extensive search conducted by a joint faculty-trustee alumni-student committee, the board of trustees named to the vacant presidency Richard F. Rosser, dean of faculty and professor of political science at Albion College, a member with DePauw of the Great Lakes Colleges Association. Rosser, a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan with both a master's degree in public administration and a Ph.D. from Syracuse University, had retired from the Air Force after serving as professor and head of the department of political science at the Air Force Academy. Though a Methodist layman, he was the first nonordained president of DePauw. He brought to his new post in February 1977 a brisk, energetic, and forceful administrative style.

One of President Rosser's first tasks was to reorganize the administrative departments of the university. Dean Farber remained in office until his retirement in 1979, but Donald Dodge Johnson was brought from Lawrence University in the summer of 1978 to take over responsibility for academic affairs with the new title of provost. In January 1979 Fred Silander of the economics department was named dean of the university. After Silander was transferred to the post of vice president for finance in 1981, his place as academic dean was taken first by Mildred Wills of the education department and then by James Cooper of the history department, who had been serving as faculty development coordinator since 1978. Upon the resignation of Provost Johnson in 1983, Cooper was advanced to the chief academic leadership position with the title of vice president for academic affairs. Named to assist him were John Morrill of the mathematics department as director of academic planning and James Rambo of the Romance languages department as coordinator for special academic programs.

Other faculty members named to part-time administrative posts were the following: Robert H. King of the philosophy and religion department as assistant to the president; John White of the philosophy and religion department as faculty development coordinator; Amir Rafat of the political science department as director of foreign study and off-campus programs, succeeded later by Darrell La Lone of the sociology and anthropology department; Margaret E. Catanese of the economics and business department as coordinator for individual Winter Term off-campus projects; and Myra J. Rosenhaus of the philosophy and religion department as director of convocations.

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