The Ypsilanti daily press. (Ypsilanti, Mich.) 1928-1962, 1943-04-19
Observations
Professors Find
Life Very Hard
in Washington
BY Charles p. Stewart

Don't be scientist. Don't wear
a scientists professional label
anyway You can almost escape
conscription by getting yourself
stigmatized as a professor.
or course, II a candidate wants
10 get into a straight military ser
vice, he can keep his intellectual
and scholarly qualifications dark.
and maybe sneak in surreptitious-
~, but he must not have an estab-
lished reputation. II he does sue
coed. he will presently be canned
out.
To be sure. there are a few per
feet wonders, who are recognized
and sought after for key posts in
ajor administrations, but not for
positions in any minor Jobs.
ContrariWise, the better your
education is for the berth you are
ho4sted into. the surer you will
he OF being chucked out OF il,
directly following the next en- j.
ing investigation
am not saying II is not sound
wartime strategy.
Maybe these boys are overly
theoretical.
Anyway, Director Prentiss ".
Brown is conducting purge OF
them at present in the Office OF
Price Administration
Not more than a year or two
ago, Leon Henderson was rated
as a wonder at that particular
stunt | contacted him and reck-
oned him as the real goods. He
talked like it and gave every
indication Of being a sure-enough
economist. However, he was a
professor.
He picked a professional stan.
Well. the game was young then.
obviously II wasn't developed
IN effective opposition to vigorous
;bootleg traffic" so soon.
Indeed. we didn't anticipate
wartime bootleggery. We thought
all hands would be dependable in
such an emergency.
But the question is:
Does il follow because OF con.
Ercssional enactment or because
OF administrative science? II It IS
science, then science IL no good.
II it is legislation, then that IS
what it bungling. They are in
competition. II Is a matter OF cal.
culation between the two. And
il is international. II il were only
our own proposition. it would not
be so easy.
And it would not be so easy IL 1t
were only a matter as between
the Allied nations also. But ul-
tima.ely it has got TO involve tho
whole world.
However, practical guys are the
ones now needed-not theorists.
That is why Price Administra-
tor Brown is clearing the latter
class out of his organization.
His office has been most severe
~ criticized among all our war.
time agencies. Early in its career
it was popularity regarded as a
perfect wonder Of capability. That
was because its then director,
Leon Henderson, had manned It
principally with professors. who
knew how to argue so learnedly
for each successive policy they
had just adopted that they con-
WINGED every body II was not
for quite a while that the public
began 10 notice that each OF these
succeeding policies was raising
Cain in actual practice.
Finally Leon was wished out OF
his Job and Prentiss Brown slid
into II.
Prentiss began by firing here
and there a professor, whose de-
partment was giving especially
unsatisfactory results, and choos-
ing some selection Of his own 10
take charge of II. Now. Prentiss
is not a professor but a practical
business man. Consequently his
appointees are business men also.
II will be a matter OF weeks be-
fore he gets his reorganization
completed, but by the time he
completes II, there is due 10 he
considerable unemployment in
the ranks of professordom.