Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1908-04-04
College Boys and Summer Ball.

out tire SnO is not yet. Inc Name COL
leges long ago took the attitude which
they have ever since held, namely that
students who play baseball in summer
for money shall not therefor be
barred from the college mines any more
than if they spent their vacation
working in a hotel or selling books or
pitching hay. Many institutions out
side the State have refused to take
this honest and common sense view of
the matter, but through instincts of
snobbery or as the result of distorted
ideas as to "amateurism" have barred
from their mines those students who
had played on summer teams for mon
ey. Tho result Of this policy at such
institutions has been to encourage hy-
pocrisy and deceit, and the rule has
operated, when enforced, against poor
students and in favor of those OF
wealth. There has been a reaction at
some colleges against this rule and 1t
Is dlsOSclIlSI thoe eAAS N'Ae~A-'>
point of view in this matter will be
held throughout the country before
many years have passed.
In recent issue of the Boston Her.
aid the presidents and members OF the
faculties of various New England col
leges discussed the matter. Professor
John Edward Russell of the chair of
philosophy at Williams opposed the
present restrictions in an article of
two columns in length and after re-
viewing the matter from all points of
view reached this conclusion:
"Now, my contention is, that the
bona fide student, who has gained his
skill few weeks in summer to earn
money for his further maintenance in
college, is not a professional ball play
er in the meaning of the term in which
professionalism is harmful to college
athletics; ard to make such man
professional by a narrow construction
of terms is scarcely less to be con-
demned than international sophistry
in reasoning"
President Hall of Clarke University
declared himself heartily in favor of
the proposed change. He said that the
present system is very hard upon a
Door boy who is q good athlete and
has to work his way through college.
President Murphy of Holy Cross
takes the same attitude and declares
with emphasis: II see no objection
whatever to q college mans acceptance
of an opportunity for combining busi-
ness with pleasure during the summer
months. If he should find that play
ing ball might bring profit without
making him a professional ball play
err or bringing him under any contract
that might make him cease to be re-
earded as an undergraduate, l do not
see any objection"
| President Buckham of the University
of Vermont holds precisely the same
view and writes as follows: II assent
for the University of Vermont to the
action taken by Williams and Wes-
leyan in favor of permitting varsity
baseball players to play during the
summer months for pay without its
inpairing their eligibility for the base
bali team of the college attended. |
see no reason why student working
his way through college may not use
his skill in baseball playing to earn
money for maintaining him in his COL
lege course, provided that the player
has never been under any league con-
tract"
President Huntington of Boston Uni
versty says there seems to be no
good reason why q baseball player
should be barred from summer and
scn1i-professional teams on penalty o.
ceasing to be eligible to the team OF
his own institution"
Williams and Wesleyan have recent
w taken action when puts tneHl
sqnarely upon footing with the Maine
colleges in this matter. Judging from
the opinions expressed above, other
New England institutions are likely
to follow along this line and when THIS
is done the larger universities which
are more conservative" in this mat
ter and where there is more of the
snohbish English idea that man who
works in any way thereby ceases to be
an "amateur.' will revise their rules
and formulate new ones which are
more honest. more fair and more in ac-
cordance with the spirit of American
institutions.