436 AS UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT -IX 



them ; but in the whole course of my administration I con- 

 stantly sought to keep ample legislative powers in the 

 board of trustees and in the faculty. I felt that the uni- 

 versity, to be successful, should not depend on the life and 

 conduct of any one man ; that every one of those called to 

 govern and to manage it, whether president or professor, 

 should feel that he had powers and responsibilities in its 

 daily administration. Therefore it was that I inserted in 

 the fundamental laws of the university a provision that 

 the confirmation by the trustees of all nominations of 

 professors should be by ballot ; so that it might never be in 

 the power of the president or any other trustee unduly to 

 influence selections for such positions. I also exerted my- 

 self to provide that in calling new professors they should 

 be nominated by the president, not of his own will, but 

 with the advice of the faculty and should be confirmed by 

 the trustees. I also provided that the elections of students 

 to fellowships and scholarships and the administration of 

 discipline should be decided by the faculty, and by bal- 

 lot. The especial importance of this latter point will not 

 escape those conversant with university management. I 

 insisted that the faculty should not be merely a committee 

 to register the decrees of the president, but that it should 

 have full legislative powers to discuss and to decide uni- 

 versity affairs. Nor did I allow it to become a body 

 merely advisory: I not only insisted that it should have 

 full legislative powers, but that it should be steadily 

 trained in the use of them. On my nomination the trustees 

 elected from the faculty three gentlemen who had shown 

 themselves especially fitted for administrative work to the 

 positions of vice-president, registrar, and secretary; and 

 thenceforth the institution was no longer dependent on any 

 one man. To the first of these positions was elected Pro- 

 fessor William Channing Russel ; to the second, Professor 

 William Dexter Wilson ; to the third, Professor George C. 

 Caldwell ; and each discharged his duties admirably. 



Of the last two of these I have already spoken, and here 

 some record should be made of the services rendered by 



