technology a disproportionately large share of the Nation's highest abilities, 

 without doing harm to the Nation, nor, indeed, without crippling science. 

 The very fruits of science become available only through enterprise, indus- 

 try and wisdom on the part of others as well as scientists. Science cannot 

 live by and unto itself alone. 



This is not an idle fancy. Germany and Japan show us that it is not. 

 They had fine science; but because they did not have governments "of the 

 people, by the people and for the people" the world is now at war. This is 

 not to say that science is responsible: it is to say, however, that, except as 

 a member of a larger team, science is of limited value to the national welfare. 



The uses to which high ability in vouth can be put are various and, to a 

 large extent, are determined by social pressures and rewards. When aided 

 by selective devices for picking out scientifically talented youth, it is clear 

 that large sums of money for scholarships and fellowships and monetary and 

 other rewards in disproportionate amounts might draw into science too large 

 a percentage of the Nation's high ability, with a result highly detrimental 

 to the Nation and to science. Plans for the discovery and development of 

 scientific talent must be related to the other needs of society for high ability: 

 science, in the words of the man in the street, must not, and must not try 

 to, hog it all. This is our deep conviction, and therefore the plans that we 

 shall propose herein will endeavor to relate the need of the Nation for 

 science to the needs of the Nation for high-grade trained minds in other 

 fields. There is never enough ability at high levels to satisfy all the needs 

 of the Nation; we would not seek to draw into science any more of it than 

 science's proportionate share. 



Through all ages of civilization far-seeing men and women and govern- 

 ments have been concerned with the necessity of providing for the leader- 

 ship of the future, as one essential factor in the survival, or progress, of 

 civilization. Provision for the leadership of the future is necessary because 

 high ability, adventurous talent, is not born only into families that can pay 

 for its development. It is a fact that a large proportion of the world's best 

 brains and finest spirits have attained or accelerated their development 

 through outside support, of the type that we should call scholarship or 

 fellowship assistance. This is a profound social fact: a large part of the 

 world's leaders in science and other fields of scholarship, in the creative arts, 

 and even in public affairs, has required a financial leg up, while working 

 toward leadership. 



Upon anv studv of the history of the development of leadership we may 

 be reasonablv sure that a large part of the men and women who in future 

 will lead us in all walks of life will need extraordinary boosts up the ladder 

 at some stages of their careers — boosts provided by individuals, institutions, 

 and governmental agencies, on the basis of a showing of very special ability 

 — in the form of scholarships, fellowships, and grants-in-aid. 



No nation has ever done as well as we have in equalizing educational 

 opportunity, nor, probably, in giving the most adequate opportunity to the 

 best; but it can easily be shown, and we shall show it, that we could do 

 better. And we also shall show how we as a nation can do better. 



Why we as a nation should be concerned to do better appears in the 



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