666 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIX. No. 486. 



sity, but that there was harmony among all 

 concerned. I regard the present outbreak as 

 highly injurious to the future of the institu- 

 tion.' 



Judge Wm. Worthington, one of the most 

 highly esteemed of citizens and a patron of 

 the institution, wrote concerning President 

 Ayres that : " It is undoubtedly true that the 

 university has prospered highly under his 

 management, and that the teaching force 

 has been strengthened, the morale of the 

 faculty improved and the zeal and interest of 

 the students stimulated since he took charge. 

 What has been done is the more remarkable 

 in view of the animosity aroused by the acts 

 he was called upon to perform when he first 

 took charge, and the constant criticisms, en- 

 gendered in part by those animosities, to 

 which he has been since subjected. His en- 

 tire and sincere devotion to the interests of 

 the university can not be denied and have 

 borne good fruit which all may see." 



Hon. Wm. H. Taft, then Governor-General 

 of the Philippines, wrote from Manila, say- 

 ing: " Why, after Dr. Ayers has accomplished 

 that which he was employed to accomplish, 

 and has brought about such an excellent condi- 

 tion of affairs, it should now be thought 

 proper to dismiss him, I can not for the life 

 of me see. * * * It would seem to be a 

 time when those who have the interests of the 

 vmiversity at heart should sink their personal 

 likes and dislikes and recognize that the man 

 under whom the university has made such 

 distinct progress should continue at the head 

 of it." 



The matter was, therefore, postponed from 

 the summer meetings until November, when, 

 notwithstanding the foregoing and numerous 

 other protests from alumni, students and 

 citizens, all of which went unanswered, a reso- 

 lution was passed declaring the presidency 

 vacant, after June 30, 1904, President Ayers 

 being retained until that time. A few days 

 later President C. W. Dabney of the Univer- 

 sity of Tennessee was elected to the vacancy. 



The following are some of the salient points 

 in the situation : 



1. The lack of security of tenure of the 

 executive officer of the University of Cincin- 



nati, owing to the inability of the board of 

 directors to make contract, good for more 

 than one year, or in any other way to secure 

 him against sudden and unwarranted dismissal. 

 It is true a five-year contract signed by the 

 officers of the board of directors has been 

 made with President Dabney, but this docu- 

 ment has no value beyond the expression of a 

 moral obligation in written form. When 

 President Ayers came to the University of 

 Cincinnati in 1889 he also asked the board for 

 a written contract, and upon being informed 

 of their inability to make a contract for the 

 payment of money not in the city treasury and 

 upon the strongest assurances given him by 

 the board of directors and by other prominent 

 citizens, he concluded that he would be safe in 

 accepting the offer of the presidency without 

 exacting a binding legal document, which, it 

 was discovered, the board was not in position 

 to execute. 



2. The instability of the governing board, 

 which is subject to the fluctuations of muni- 

 cipal politics. 



3. That the administrative officer who came 

 to the university under very adverse conditions, 

 and performed a task seldom asked of an ex- 

 ecutive officer, and who, overcoming very un- 

 usual difficulties, carried out a successful and 

 satisfactory reorganization of the university, 

 was dismissed without recognition and with a 

 refusal to consider the existing obligations 

 towards him. 



4. The effect upon the educational work of 

 the university since the political powers have 

 assumed the direction of its affairs, thereby 

 carrying it into the maelstrom of municipal 

 politics, is such as to render uncertain and 

 unsatisfactory all attempts to carry out any 

 desirable educational program. 



5. The unceasing efforts of religious denomi- 

 nations to control the teaching of the uni- 

 versity and to establish in it religious condi- 

 tions which are not permissible in an institu- 

 tion supported by taxation, but which may 

 now be made effective through political agen- 

 cies. 



The careful student of the establishment, 

 government and development of universities 

 will surely find instruction in the foregoing 



