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Joined by a few radical professors, S.D.S. organized a huge rally in the Cornell fieldhouse, at which 6,000 whites threatened to stage their own demonstrations. Black leaders flatly refused to reopen talks with either administration or faculty, and student opinion seemed to be swinging to their side. In a wild eruption of demagoguery, Black Senior Tom Jones shouted: "Cornell has only one hour to live!" In the past, he cried, "it's been the blacks who did all the dying. Now's the time when the pigs are going to die. James Perkins is going to be dealt with. The faculty is going to be dealt with."
As the speeches heated up, the crisis took on more menacing proportions. Perkins had declared Cornell in "a situation of emergency," and on his initiative, more than 350 armed men—mostly sheriff's deputies from nearby counties—were deployed to Ithaca, ready to move onto the campus. A wing of the local hospital was evacuated for expected emergency cases. Ithaca was seized with wild rumors, including one that students would try to take over the plant of a local small-arms manufacturer.
Simultaneously, Perkins was trying to cool things off. He suspended regular classes and urged students and faculty to discuss the crisis. Behind the scenes, the administration explained why it had given in to the blacks. "These were frightened and paranoid people in a fortress on this campus," one university official told the faculty. "A delay [in an agreement] would have meant bloodshed and death. The university can survive, even through concessions obtained by coercion and force, but not through murder." By Wednesday noon, the faculty was ready to reconsider its decision. In a complete reversal of the original ballot, the faculty now voted to back the agreement.
Disgust and Euphoria. The flip-flop disgusted some leading professors, who accused Cornell of "selling out to terrorists." At least a dozen pledged to suspend teaching until the campus was free of guns, a demand that Perkins seemed unable to satisfy. Three scholars resigned, including Allan P. Sindler, chairman of the government department and a onetime civil-rights leader at Duke, who charged his colleagues with a lack of "integrity, guts, common sense and dignity." In contrast, English Professor M. H. Abrams supported the reverse vote as the only rational course. "To stand on legality, to temporize, would be disastrous," he said. "The only thing to do is wipe the slate clean." Historian Rossiter attributed his own change of heart in part to Perkins' appeals. "There was pressure," he explained, sounding slightly brainwashed. "But it was the only thing we could do to preserve this university as a place of reason. I can live with ferment but not with violence."