A group of dissident Morgan Stanley shareholders are calling on CEO Philip Purcell to spin off the company's institutional securities businesses as a separate firm. The new firm would be led by six "Old School" Morgan Stanley executives and, presumably, recapture the glory of the old investment banking days at Morgan Stanley -- the golden era before the company was forced to dirty its hands with businesses like retail brokerage.

In an open letter to shareholders, the eight retired Morgan Stanley executives (the so-called "Group of Eight") who have campaigned against Purcell for weeks released a detailed proposal that would, for all practical purposes, reverse the 1997 merger of Morgan Stanley with Dean Witter, Discover & Co.

The anti-Purcell faction has even created a Future of Morgan Stanley Web site that includes the full text of the open letter to shareholders, biographies of the "Group of Eight," and copies of advertisements that have appeared in the Wall Street Journal (in PDF format).