NOVEMBEE 8, 1901.] 



SCIENCE. 



737 



would almost certainly have brought the Uni- 

 versity into the politics of the State during the 

 elections of last fall. The failure of the board 

 to support the president on such an important 

 matter left him, on the other hand, no other 

 dignified course than to resign. The following 

 letter of resignation was indeed promptly sent 

 to the board : 



To THE Honorable Board of Regents. 



Gentlemen : I hereby place in your hands my resig- 

 nation of the Presidency of West Virginia University. 



I am moved to do this, and thus to give up some 

 of the most deeply cherished hopes of my life, because 

 I see no prospect of final success in my work. 



It is impossible to build up a university save on 

 the basis of sound morals and sound scholarship with 

 the generous cooperation of those engaged in the 

 work. I have asked the removal of certain men 

 known to you and to me and to the community 

 to be grossly deficient in one or all of these regards. 

 This demand your honorable Board has refused to 

 grant for reasons which I cannot deem sufficient. I 

 therefore ask you to relieve me of my responsibility 

 for the conduct of the University, this act to take 

 effect June 2, 1900. 



Respectfully, 



Jerome H. Raymond. 



The board refused to accept this letter of 

 resignation by a vote of five to four. President 

 Raymond's friends on the board thereupon per- 

 suaded him to withdraw the letter. 



As soon as the fall elections were over two of 

 the resignations which Mr. Raymond had asked 

 for were demanded by the board of regents (by 

 a vote of five to four). The men refused to re- 

 sign, and the subject was brought into the 

 courts. The right of the board to dismiss the 

 professors was sustained by the court by a vote 

 of two to one, the judge who voted against 

 the board being a relative of one of the dis- 

 missed professors. A private libel suit was at 

 the same time instituted by one of the dis- 

 missed men against the president. This suit is 

 still pending and is not expected to be dropped, 

 because the prosecuting attorney is as bitter an 

 enemy of the president as is his client. 



The last chapter of President Raymond's 

 career in West Virginia followed in the spring. 

 The legislature was in session, and appro- 

 priations had to be asked for by the board 



of regents. The report which they submitted 

 to the legislature is a strong, well-written 

 statement of how the University affairs were 

 managed. Nothing could, however, stem the 

 tide of feeling which had been worked up 

 against the president. The legislature ordered 

 an investigation into the affairs of the Univer- 

 sity. The essential points of the report which 

 was submitted to the legislature by the com- 

 mittee appointed to carry out this investigation 

 are contained in the following paragraph clos- 

 ing the report : 



Your committee was at great pains to investigate 

 the criticisms that have been generally made through 

 the state in regard to the executive head of the Uni- 

 versity. A great deal of testimony was before the 

 committee upon this subject. The president of the 

 University is to be commended for his zeal and energy 

 and devotion to the work of his office. We, however, 

 regard some of his views and policies as not suited to 

 the conditions as they exist among us. This together 

 with his youth and inexperience and want of tact in 

 dealing with men lead us to the conclusion that the 

 best interests of the University would be subserved 

 by a change in the presidency thereof. We are led 

 to this conclusion by the overwhelming force of the 

 evidence before us in our investigation, and we, 

 therefore, recommend that such change shall be 

 made. 



Along with this change, it is the further opinion of 

 your committee that there should be a complete re- 

 organization of the board of regents, and that in such 

 reorganization there should be no local regent ap- 

 pointed upon the new board. 



There can be no doubt that the report of the 

 committee reflected the prevailing sentiment in 

 the legislature. The investigation could, how- 

 ever, not have been very thorough since it 

 lasted but two days ; nor could the report sub- 

 mitted have been exclusively intended to im- 

 prove the management of the affairs of the Uni- 

 versity. This is clearly shown for instance in 

 the following paragraph. 



In view of the great prominence given in colleges 

 to physical exercise, the committee is of the opinion 

 that the instructor in the gymnasium, who now re- 

 ceives a salary of only eight hundred dollars, should 

 receive the salary of a full professor. 



The instructor in question was an under- 

 graduate student whose record of scholarship 



