THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 



317 



THE PEOGBESS OF SCIENCE. 



THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY 

 AND PRESIDENT REMSEN. 



The election of Professor Ira Remsen 

 to the presidency of the Johns Hop- 

 kins University has been received with 

 general approval, and will be particu- 

 larly gratifying to those who have been 

 connected with the University as stu- 

 dents or teachers and to men of science 

 throughout the country. The Johns 

 Hopkins University was incorporated 

 in 1867; the founder died in 1873, and 

 a year later Dr. D. C. Gilman was 

 elected to the presidency. When the 

 University opened its first session in 

 1876, Dr. Gilman had secured the ser- 

 vices of a small but notable group of 

 professors, of whom, since the lamented 

 death of Rowland, but two remain — 

 Professor Remsen and Professor Gilder- 

 sleeve. President Gilman and his asso- 

 ciates, freed somewhat from traditions 

 and from the need of conducting a 

 school for boys, erected at Baltimore a 

 true university, distinctly in advance 

 of any other American institution, ex- 

 cept possibly Harvard, then just becom- 

 ing subject to the influence of President 

 Eliot — like Remsen, a professor of 

 chemistry. In spite of the loss of a 

 great part of its endowment, due not to 

 carelessness on the part of the trustees 

 but to the dictates of the founder, the 

 Johns Hopkins University has main- 

 tained its position, and in the estab- 

 lishment of its medical school in 1893 

 has accomplished for medical education 

 what had been accomplished earlier for 

 university work. In the development 

 of the university. Professor Remsen has 

 always been President Gilman's chief 

 associate and adviser, and is his nat- 

 ural successor. Remsen was graduated 

 from the College of the City of New 



VOL. LIX. — 21 



York in 1865 and received his M.D. 

 from the College of Physicians and Sur- 

 geons, Columbia University, two years 

 later. Studying abroad, he was made 

 assistant in chemistry in Tubingen and 

 was afterwards professor in Williams 

 College, till his removal to the Johns 

 Hopkins University in 1876. He has 

 been given the LL.D. by Coliunbia and 

 Princeton; is the foreign secretary of 

 the National Academy of Sciences, and 

 a member of many scientific societies. 

 In his chemical laboratory and in 'The 

 American Chemical Journal,' Professor 

 Remsen has always upheld and for- 

 warded the best ideals of research. As 

 president of the Johns Hopkins Univer- 

 sity, he represents the highest type of 

 educational leadership. 



ACADEMIC FREEDOM HERE AND 

 ABROAD. 



Questions of academic freedom and 

 the relations of university professors to 

 authority are fully as troublesome 

 abroad as in this country. It might be 

 supposed that our system would work 

 badly. The faculties have very little 

 power, the authority being lodged in an 

 absentee board of trustees and a presi- 

 dent with almost absolute power; the 

 trustees being usually and the presi- 

 dents often men of affairs rather than 

 scholars. The state universities are 

 subject to political control, and the 

 private universities are generally de- 

 nominational and always dependent on 

 the charity of patrons. Yet thanks to 

 common sense and an appreciation of 

 the importance of individual freedom, 

 the university professor has in America 

 a reasonably satisfactory status. There 

 is little or no interference with the con- 

 duct of his department; his advance- 



