NOTES 493 



A Criticism of the Financial Operations of the Carnegie Trust for the 

 Universities of Scotland (Frederick Soddy, M.A., F.R.S., Professor of 

 Chemistry in the University of Aberdeen) 



Mr. Andrew Carnegie on July 7, 1901, signed a trust deed bequeathing ,£2,000,000 

 to the Scottish Universities, which was recorded in the Books of Council of Session 

 on July 9, 1901. The Trust Deed opens as follows : 



" I, Andrew Carnegie, of New York, and of Skibo, in the County of Sutherland, 

 having retired from active business, and deeming it to be my duty and one of my 

 highest privileges to administer the wealth which has come to me as a trustee on 

 behalf of others, and entertaining the confident belief that one of the best means 

 of my discharging that trust is by providing funds for improving and extending 

 the opportunities for scientific study and research in the Universities of Scotland, 

 my native land, and by rendering attendance at these Universities and the enjoy- 

 ment of their advantages more available to the deserving and qualified youth of 

 that country to whom the payment of fees might act as a barrier to the enjoyment 

 of these advantages ; and having full confidence in the Noblemen and Gentlemen 

 afternamed, ..." 



A list of Trustees follows, to whom the donor undertakes to entrust " Bonds of 

 the United States Steel Corporation of the aggregate value of Ten Million Dollars, 

 bearing interest at 5 per cent, per annum, and having a currency of fifty years." 



It is only with the first of these objects, the improvement and extension of the 

 opportunities for scientific study and research, that this criticism is concerned. 



In a document signed by Mr. Carnegie, entitled " Constitution of the Trust 

 referred to in the foregoing Trust Deed," the two objects of the Trust are referred 

 to under Clauses A and B respectively, and a third clause, C, provided for any 

 surplus income. 



Clause A opens : 



" One-half of the net annual income shall be applied towards the improvement 

 and expansion of the Universities of Scotland, in the Faculties of Science and 

 Medicine ; also for improving and extending the opportunities for scientific study 

 and research, and for increasing the facilities for acquiring a knowledge of History, 

 Economics, English Literature, and Modern Languages, and such other subjects 

 cognate to a technical and commercial education as can be brought within the 

 scope of the University curriculum, by the erection and maintenance of buildings, 

 laboratories, class-rooms, museums, or libraries, the providing of efficient apparatus, 

 books and equipment, the institution and endowment of Professorships and Lec- 

 tureships, including post-graduate Lectureships and Scholarships, more especially 

 Scholarships for the purpose of encouraging research, or in such other manner as 

 the Committee may from time to time decide. . . ." 



The two passages cited from the official copy, issued by the Carnegie Trust, of 

 the Trust Deed and the Constitution of the Trust referred to in the foregoing 

 Trust Deed, respectively, contain all that is germane to the present criticism. 



But a reasonable interpretation, and the one initially followed in the two larger 

 of the Scottish Universities, Edinburgh and Glasgow, would seem to be that the 

 money was given for the primary purpose of encouraging scientific study and 

 research, including, of course, medicine, and that history and other subjects 

 cognate to a modern education were legitimate ancillary beneficiaries under the 

 Trust, and, lastly, that the older subjects of a classical education were entirely 

 excluded from participating. 



Thus over the first period of ten years and nine months, up to September 30, 

 191 3, covered by the first two quinquennial and interim distributions, in Edinburgh 



