, 1905-06-19
PRESIDENT TISDEL
10 THE GRADUATES
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of life. 1t is an evolution, a growth.
1t is the result of many forces which
have their origin far back in history.
By a study of the past the university
brings about a clearer understanding
of that liberty which is the result OF
law and is based upon the functional in
history. 1t demonstrates that we are
to progress not by breaking with the
past but by using all that the past has
of inspiration and counsel.
There is perhaps 10 lesson which
the American people needs more to
learn today than this lesson OF obedi-
encc to law. Many prominent men in
this country have said in my hearing
that one of the most discouraging char.
acteristics of the present day is the
growing disregard of law. After all
allowance has been made for the eX-
aggrations of the press the situation
is almost appalling. There is organ,
lied wealth on the one hand and or
ganiZed labor on the other, each, we
are told, daily breaking established
laws in order to further its own selfish
ends. On the one hand we hear of
discriminating tariffs, of unjust re-
bates, of illegal juggling with stocks,
of unfair private car lines. On the 9th
er hand We hear how the laborer who
does not belong to the union is forced
from work by intimidation and violence
and lie who belongs TO the union order
ed to quit work because forsooth not
he but some stranger has a grievance.
In either case the individual is denied
what seems to be the most fundamen-
tai privilege of liberty, the right to
earn an honest living. In Chicago the
spirit of lawlessness has spread even
to the children of the public schools.
Readers of the Chicago Tribune dur.
ing the recent toamsters' strike will
remember oe of McCutcheon's signif.
cant cartoons. 1t consisted of two
companion pictures. In the first a
boy coming home with his school
books is being urged by the father and
mother TO stone the driver of a wagon.
The companion picture shows the same
boy grown to young manhood and
standing behind the prison bars talk,
ing to the same father and mother now
aged by SORROW bitter and cutting
commentary on the trend of industrial
life. Here is n of the great lessons
which the university as the conserva.
tor and interpreter of the past has for
modern democracy.
But to interpret the past is not the
only function of the university in re-
lation to the people. 1t also measures
the present and lightens the pathway
of the future. The character of The
modern man is wrought out in what
Goethe called the stream of the
world" Not in silence and in isolation,
not in monastic seclusion, but in the
noise and rush of our many-sided and
Intricate civilization is citizenship de,
veloped. The modern university must
come in contact with the stream of
the world, analyze its complex nature,
estimate its forces, realize its limita
tons and its powers. Graduates of the
universities must have a broad and
just knowledge of contemporary life
and n careful realization of its prob,
lens. The problems of labor and cap.
ital, the problems of education, the
problems of practical politics can only
be solved by a keenness and breadth
of sanity which it is the function OF
the university to develop.
Thomas Jefferson thus planned his
idea of a university:
"a ITO form the statesmen, legisla
tors, and judges, on which public pros
perity n individual happiness are sc
much to depend; (2) to expound the
principles and structure of govern,
ment, the laws which regulate the in,
~tercourse of nations, those formed
principally for our own government, II
a sound unnecessary restraint on in.
dividual action, shall leave us free to
do whatever does not violate the equal
rights of another; go to harmonic
and promote the interests of agricul.
ture, manufactures and commerce, and
by well-informed views of political
economy to givea free scope to the pub.
lie industry; (4) to develop the reason
ing faculty of our youth, to engage
their minds, cultivate their morals, and
install into them the principles of vir.
tue and order; (5) to enlighten them
with mathematical and physical sci.
ence, which advance the arts, and ad-
minister to the health, the subsistence,
and comforts of human life; Co and
generally to form them to habits of
reflection and correct action, render
ing them examples of virtues to 9TH
ers, and of happiness within them
OODA