PLANS AND PROJECTS-1838-1905 503 



velopment. Many good things have resulted from these 

 gifts, but some vastly important matters have been ut 

 terly neglected. We have seen excellent small colleges 

 transformed by gifts into pretentious and inadequate 

 shams called &quot;universities&quot;; we have seen great tele 

 scopes given without any accompanying instruments, and 

 with no provision for an observatory ; magnificent collec 

 tions in geology given to institutions which had no pro 

 fessor in that science; beautiful herbariums added to 

 institutions where there is no instruction in botany ; pro 

 fessorships of no use established where others of the 

 utmost importance should have been founded ; institutions 

 founded where they were not needed, and nothing done 

 where they were needed. He who will write a thoughtful 

 book on this subject, based upon a careful study of late 

 educational history, may render a great service. As I 

 revise this chapter I may say that in an address at Yale in 

 1903, entitled, &quot;A Patriotic Investment, &quot; I sought to 

 point out one of the many ways in which rich men may 

 meet a pressing need of our universities with great good 

 to the country at large. 1 



Yet another project has occupied much time and 

 thought, and may, I hope, be yet fully carried out. For 

 many years I have thought much on our wretched legisla 

 tion against crime and on the imperfect administration of 

 such criminal law as we have. Years ago, after compar 

 ing the criminal statistics of our own country with those 

 of other nations, I came to the conclusion that, with the 

 possible exception of the lower parts of the Italian king 

 dom, there is more unpunished murder in our own country 

 than in any other in the civilized world. This condition 

 of things I found to be not unknown to others ; but there 

 seemed to prevail a sort of listless hopelessness regarding 

 any remedy for it. Dining in Philadelphia with my class 

 mate and dear friend Wayne MacVeagh, I found beside 

 me one of the most eminent judges in Pennsylvania, and 

 this question of high crime having been broached and the 



1 See &quot; A Patriotic Investment/ 7 New Haven, 1903. 



