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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVI. No. 919 



whole. If the mover is keen, he can print and 

 distribute his arguments. As the first step in 

 advance, I should accept your suggestion of 

 a regular joint-committee of faculty and trus- 

 tees. As the second step, I should abolish all 

 salaries of deans and directors. I should put 

 extra-faculty permanent clerks in training. 

 Meanwhile, if a faculty-member has to be dean 

 or director, I should excuse him in so far from 

 university work, but should allow him only 

 the professorial salary. I should aim through- 

 out at the realization, by every member of the 

 faculty in the widest sense, that he must be 

 both responsible and loyal to the university, 

 i. e., to his fellow faculty-members and to the 

 students. I should hope that in time the idea 

 of the " university " might include the trus- 

 tees; though it will, I fear, be long before the 

 professor ceases to regard the trustee as his 

 natural enemy, and the trustee to regard the 

 professor as a fool to be kept harmless. I 

 should hope, also, that in time the whole uni- 

 versity, faculty and trustees, might be capable 

 of combined action on definite educational 

 lines; even if this took a generation, I should 

 not mind. I dislike difference of title; and I 

 should hope that in time there would be no 

 difference, save of permanency of appoint- 

 ment. We should then have, perhaps, pro- 

 fessors elect and professors designate, and that 

 is all; perhaps we might even abolish titles 

 altogether. I do not believe in specially high 

 salaries within the university. A great deal 

 of this is, under present conditions, Utopian; 

 I do not think that I could myself live up to 

 my ideals; brutalities and jealousies warp one 

 even against one's will. But I think that with 

 some suffering and many relapses for a genera- 

 tion, the Utopia might be approximated. 



Tour general summary of university evolu- 

 tion from comparatively small colleges to their 

 present dimensions and complex interrelations 

 I have seen with my own eyes. I think that 

 every one who has helped in the evolution of 

 the American university to the present stage 

 expected a simpler organism than actually 

 came from their efforts; and perhaps some- 

 times we feel hardly willing to accept our own 



creation. As you say, there was comparative 

 order and simplicity in the smaller institu- 

 tion; but there is now complexity, and revers- 

 ing the order of the creation described in 

 Genesis, there is considerable chaos as a re- 

 sult of our creative efforts. But we are not 

 through yet, and in some such plan of repre- 

 sentative government as you have outlined, I 

 believe a glorious youth and maturity are be- 

 fore the American university. To answer the 

 questions in order: (1) This is practically the 

 system I have lived under. (2) This seems to 

 me an unnecessary complication. In No. 5 

 there would naturally be a chairman chosen . 

 for the group or groups meeting together. 

 (3) This is entirely practicable and works 

 well. (4) This is the kernel of the whole 

 matter, and by contrast brings out the real 

 difficulty in American universities. We are 

 too much " boss ruled," and have too little of 

 the true principles of self government; and 

 seK government is at the root of all perma- 

 nency in a free commonwealth whether po- 

 litical or educational. The method you pro- 

 pose, in part, I have lived under and know 

 that it is practicable. I have also lived under 

 a system in which over-lords were appointed 

 by a higher over-lord to rule over each prov- 

 ince — in a word " boss rule " ; and it destroys 

 the fine spirit of a university as it does that 

 of the state and the nation in political mat- 

 ters. I think that in no situation in life is 

 leadership more desired and appreciated than 

 in a university; but leaders, to be followed, 

 must be chosen by, not imposed upon, a faculty 

 group. (5) This is a logical sequence to (4). 



LETTERS PROM THE UNXVERSITY OF CHICAGO 



I FEEL very little sympathy for the type of 

 organization which you recommend. I spent 

 seven years in an institution which had a 

 democratic organization on its faculty, and I 

 am persuaded that that organization is defec- 

 tive in more ways than the organization at 

 such an institution as Harvard or Chicago. 

 It is defective first, because of the difficulty 

 which always arises when one tries to convert 

 a body of men to new and progressive policies. 

 It is very much easier to get the ear of one 



