The morning journal-courier., 1908-01-28
CONSERVATIVE HARVARD.

CONSERVATIVE HARVARD.
 Says President Eliot of Harvard University: T assert that it is perfect lv proper to enact laws which will give the teachers the authority to sort out the boys and girls, assign to each the trade to which he or she seems pest adapted, and that the law should then compel these children to be trained for these trades.
 There was time Gin certain quar- ters it still exists) when the universi- ty at Cambridge and the essence of conservatism were conceived as being synonymous. President Charles w. Eliot of Harvard may be considered a typical Harvard bred man, His view point within the last year or two on the football situation has been consid- cred conservative by those who still long for the good. old" days when New England college life had fewer luxuries and when, it is argued, the students were happier in their less ar tifitial life, and 1t has been considered very radical by all enthusiasts ard fol- lowers of the gridiron whose greatest lament would come did football de- cline into such a quiescent desuetude as 1t has at present at Columbia.
 Whether there seems to be ground for argument as to whether this and other assertions of President Eliot are radical there can be no doubt, but that the far-reputed and often much boasted Harvard conservatism, all ready mentioned, will receive severe jolt as the public comes to digest the above statement made last week at a dinner in Chicago at which were gath cred i've hundred representatives of ,ths manufacturing, commercial and educational interests of the Middle West is very certain Harvard of all universities has been the foremost and the most liberal in her development of the elective system of studies. with its shifting of the responsibility as to the preparedness of the student for this or that trade or profession more and more from the shoulders of the instructor to the scholar. The idea of the instructor not only choosing for the scholar the studies and the future profession or trade but the Idea that this choice will have the enforcement of the law behind it seems to be rad ically the reverse.
 It cannot be denied there are many teachers, especially in the secondary schools, that are admirably fitted for Knowing the particular abilities of their pupils and that are even better fitted, perhaps, to choose future walks in life for them than the parents in innumerable cases. Particularly is this the case where the parents are ignorant or where they do not take that heartfelt interest in the develop nent of their offspring that they should. But there are parents, thous-
 1e tx x,,1.A f,,4,, pathway of their children is contin- ually a matter of intelligent concern Even taking it for granted that teach. CTS can be found who are willing te take upon their shoulders the respon. sibility of choosing the future occu- pations of their scholars, is it to be supposed that these wide-awake and intelligent parents will allow them tc interfere with their supposed prerog- atives as parents? If the suggestion is to be in the form of law, it mus, as we'll It is as reasonable to think of children being compelled to follow 8 trade of another's choosing upon graduating from school as to think oi them being tabulated for this or that particular social set in city.
 President Eliot himself says his theory would conflict with the com. mon understanding of democracy anC Individual rights Continuing he says ''I find that nature often conflicts witf idealists' regard as to democracy. principles. and, when nature ant democracy clash. democracy is tn. loser" It certainly would be in thi, case 9tne losei"
 But Harvard's lack of con servatism does not end with he, president Professor Barrett Wendell of the English department at the bis university, has come out with tn startling statement, made before th' Twentieth Century Club in the sam' ritv the next evening; The uppe classes are absolutely the superiors 0 the people they have surpassed ant one is disposed to say that God. mad the reason
 Did Professor Wendell speak wing ed words of wisdom. then gone ar the foundations for all the assertion s@ often made that Rockefellers mil