The radicals have won at Brown University. Even as other elite schools are welcoming ROTC back, the corporation, the University’s highest governing body, has affirmed President Ruth Simmons’s recommendation to maintain its campus ban on ROTC.

With its decision, the corporation has isolated itself from its sister Ivies—and from its own students. It’s worth repeating that both the student body and the initial committee charged with considering ROTC’s return favored ending the campus ban. As Simmons conceded in her report, “If we were to base our conclusion on ROTC purely on the perceived majority consensus expressed in the Committee report, we would either step up our participation in ROTC or bring ROTC back to campus.” The Brown Daily Herald called for ROTC’s return in advance of the corporation’s meeting, as did the Boston Globe.