July 5, 1912] 



SCIENCE 



21 



importance whenever members of the smaller 

 directing body take an active part in the pro- 

 ceedings of the larger corporation. (2) The 

 selection of professors and instructors is a 

 most important matter. In the past the selec- 

 tion has been intrusted to administrative offi- 

 cers who usually relied upon the judgment of 

 one or two men prominent in the sjjecial field 

 in which a vacancy had to be filled. In very 

 many cases one and the same man had thus 

 the power to fill the most important positions. 

 Such a procedure must naturally lead to con- 

 ditions somewhat similar to those found in 

 " politics." A personal element will be of in- 

 fluence in the selection of men for professor- 

 ships. There is danger that the man who is 

 most frequently consulted will, perhaps 

 against his own inclination, be forced to as- 

 sume the role of a political " boss," and that 

 the building up of something like a political 

 machine will result. Men of a certain school 

 will be preferred for the filling of the most 

 important positions. The committee having 

 in charge the selection of a professor should, 

 therefore, as a matter of routine, consult a 

 large number of representatives of a certain 

 field of science, preferably representatives re- 

 siding in more than one country, in order to 

 eliminate any personal bias, and to effect a 

 selection on the basis of merit. Such a com- 

 mittee should submit the names proposed by 

 the various experts to the senate for final 

 election. 



In the main I thoroughly agree with your 

 views. We are certainly sorely in need of a 

 revision of the prevalent methods of running 

 universities. It seems that in most institu- 

 tions the board of trustees do not look upon 

 the faculty as the living part of the univer- 

 sity, but as a lot of laborers who should be 

 placed upon the same basis as " hired help " 

 generally. There is certainly vastly too much 

 politics in professorial life, and there is too 

 much done to please certain interests, right or 

 wrong. In fact there are so many evils and 

 weaknesses that are so manifest in the ad- 

 ministration of university affairs and so de- 

 sirable to be corrected that one could write an 



elaborate thesis on the subject without seek- 

 ing for material. This must be a matter of 

 evolution and not of revolution. Tour article 

 is in the right direction. 



I think your plan of university control on 

 the whole a very good one; but you have not 

 stated how a university senate should be con- 

 stituted and elected. Further, it seems to me 

 that any nomination for professorship passed 

 by the board of advisers should not be subject 

 to the veto of the trustees. 



Your plan seems to safeguard very well the 

 interests both of the organization and of the 

 individual. 



I am in thorough sympathy with the plan 

 of university control as outlined by you. Two 

 factors which make for faculty incompetence, 

 in the medical schools at least, are self-inter- 

 est and the dread of unpopularity among col- 

 leagues. This is particularly true of the 

 clinical men whose business interests are not 

 always in accord with a university's interests 

 and for whom popularity is a business asset. 

 These two factors frequently stand in the way 

 of advances of benefit to a university. 



I find your plan excellent, and approve of it. 

 I beg to suggest that one indirect effect of the 

 present system has not been mentioned in 

 your indictment: namely, the policy of acad- 

 emic advancement of the man who draws the 

 largest classes, rather than the man who does 

 the best work. It has been my observation 

 that presidential favor is frequently curried 

 in this way, to the detriment of men whose 

 ideals will not permit them to lower the stand- 

 ards of their work for popularity. 



I heartily agree with your sentiments as to 

 a strictly democratic organization, where no 

 one man, or group of men, can set themselves 

 up as a dictator. The corporation, to my way 

 of thinking, should consist of several groups of 

 men chosen from different sources of supply. 

 It should consist of, say, fifteen members, se- 

 lected as follows: the university professors 

 should name three, the alumni organization 

 five, the state legislature three, the educational 



