New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-12-29
Dean Briggs, of Harvard
Speaks Plainly at Ma
tional Collegiate Asso-
M
citation Meeting.

Dean lie Baron r. Briggs, Of Harvard,
president Of The National Collegiate
Athletic Association. made an unre-
served confession of faith in the future
OF intercollegiate athletics in his open
ing address before the association
when il convened for IT'S tenth annual
meeting in the belvidere of the Hotel
Aston yesterday morning. Dean Briggs
admitted that there were evils in college
sport, and he did not hesitate TO lay
bare what he considers the greatest
of all detrimental factors mutual dis
trust But for all that, he spoke con-
vincingly Of his belief that IN tho end
all would be we'll
II was a gathering truly represent
alive of the college athletic world that
faced Dean Briggs. To be sure. the
undergraduate who occupies the most
prominent place in college sport was
conspicuous by his absence, but in his
place were scores Of serious-minded
educators from 1873 institutions, each
bent on making another step forward
toward the ideals which led to the
founding OF the association, a decade
ago. IL was a convention educational in
character, with the men intrusted with
the enforcement Of collegiate athletic
regulations in conference the men
who shine on gridiron, or track, or dia-
mond.
A Single-llinded Purpose.
Nothing was more indicative OF the
high-minded purpose Of the convention
than the subjects on which the principal
speakers at the opening session adj
dressed a most attentive audience. IL
was significant, too, that the three men
who have been prominently before the
university public in the last month as
delegates 20 the now famous Yale Har-
ward Princeton eligibility conference on
athletic problems presented their views
on the ideals in college sports. Dean
Briggs. of Harvard; Professor Howard
/ McClenahan, of Princeton, and Profess
sor Robert y. Corwin, of Yale, each
had an opportunity 20 express his views
and each stated, though In language
dissimilar, sentiments that dovetailed
/ neatly together and showed a single
/ mindedness of purpose whose sole end
/ is the publication and uplifting of col
4 legate athletics in order that the boys
who take part in them may be better
men.
/ So also President Harry A. Garfield,
/ Of Williams College, and Professor Al
/ bert lie Fevre, of the University Of
/ Virginia, declared their faith in the
/ idealistic terms that found easy ex-
/ preston with Deans Briggs and Nc
/ Clenahan and Professor Corwin. Both
followed the vein of the earlier speak
ers and admitted that intercollegiate
athletics as at present conducted con
IL
the sound educational ideals of the
university, and though they differed
somewhat in the modes they recon-
mended for the salvation Of what all
considered TO be a most vital factor in
the development of the youth-namelJ,
the growth Of the physical man In cor
that in the end the goal toward which
they were striving was the same.
Attacked Deservedly.
Dean Briggs did not try to dissemble.
His first statement that came almost
fat footed was that intercollegiate ath-
letes are deservedly under constant at.
tack and he developed his idea in such
q way as TO illustrate some Of the at
tacks that have been made on athletics
in general and upon Harvard and Ed
die Mafan and other members Of the
Harvard football team in particular
/ This is what the Harvard dean said:
Now the evils Of intercollegiate ath-
letics are many and great; and OF these
evils the most comprehensive and the
most searching is mutual distrust Nor
does 1t help matters to know that this
distrust has at times been justified.
Every experienced man will be slow 70
/ affirm that the record Of his own col
lege-alumni, coaches, captains, man.
ayers, undergraduate public-is i'm
maculate, or even that every member
of his faculty has been open minded
20 receive athletic truth or open
mouthed 20 proclaim il.
Nevertheless we have suspected 9TH
ers more than ourselves; we have lis
tened too partially to unsupported COZ
lege rumor Of evil practices among our
rivals and have forgotten that whether
the beam or only the mote is ours we
must get rid Of II before We can taste
fully attack either the mote or the