Year: 1874

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to condemn the recent action of the
Board of Regents in discharging Pro-
fessor CARR from the State University
on personal grounds surveyed from an
individual standpoint. We, in COM
mon with every other impartial jour
nalist in the State, stand ready and
willing to hear and impartially con-
slider whatever defense the members
of the Board may offer in justification
of their action. That they must de-
fend themselves is as self-evident to
the Board as it is apparent to the peo-
pie. The dignified silence which some
of the Regents have announced it as
theis intention to assume, will not
answer the purpose-if the purpose is
to ignore the right of the people to
voice in the management of the State
University. The establishment be-
longs as much to the people as dis
trict school house, and those who pre-
side over its departments are as much
under the control of the people as the
district school-master. An article in
late number of the Overland Monthly
evidently written by Regent and
probably read before q full Board be-
fore publication-ingeniously sounds
the ground for q rebellion - for
n throwing off all State alle-
glance and the assumption of an
independent position. 1t is assumed
that refusal to accept further State
aid is to establish an independence of
all State control. This is the worst
pettifogging ever attempted by the ad-
vocate of hopeless cause-a cause the
success of which depended solely on
the admitted insanity of whole peo-
pie. The banker Regents might found
an independent University, with GILL
MAN and the LIE CoNTE as Professors,
but they cannot use the peoples money
to erect their buildings or pay salaries.
The University of California is the
property of the people of California.
1t has cost them an immense sum of
money. 1t was the maelstrom which
swallowed all the tide-land money!
sum which should have been.added to
the State School Fund. And now these
gentlemenly Regents these repre-
sentatives of the little money aristoc-
racy which aspires to rule six hundred
thousand people-would like to con-
vert the proceeds of all this money to
their own use. 1t cannot be done.
The real value of the State University
has never been apparent to the masses,
and the usefulness of the establish
ment is now SO impaired that for all
practical purposes it might as well be
closed until such time as it can be
placed under the control of Board of
Regents selected from among the peo-
pie and in whom the people have con-
tidence. The feeling of democracy is
yet too strong on the Pacific coast
to be controlled by coterie so small
in mental power and so limited in
golden strength. The alleged inca
pacity of Professor CARR for the posi-
ton he has so long held as an excuse
for his removal, is, to use common
term, too thin-so transparent that it
will deceive no one. The real, and
perhaps the sole cause of his removal,
is found in the conflict of social caste
which has been so long carried on in
the University. 1t is to be regretted
that the wives of Professors will let
the length of trail or the texture of
dress to influence their social inter-
course with each other, but when
Professors broad-toed shoes, and old
fashioned coat are urged as evidence
of his incapacity to fill the chair in
the Agricultural or any other depart
ment of the University, we are reluc-
family impelled to the conclusion that
the internal connections of the insti-
tuition are so violent that nothing
short of a thorough reorganization will
tit it for the usefulness we have right
to expect from an establishment that
has cost so much money. The aristo-
cratic GILMAN and the aristocratic LIE
CONTE regard Professor CARR as a ple-
beian. They detest his democratic hab-
its of shaking hands with O. tiller of
the soil, and their gorge rises at the
sight of his hob-nailed shoes. The
very name Department of AgricuI-
ture " has an offensive sound to the re-
fined ears Of those delicate-nerved
Professors, and they want it expunged
from the list of studies over which
they preside. They want everything
common-everything that smells of
the laboring class-stricken from the
University programme. They want
the concern lavender-scented, gilt
edged, high-toned, shoddy-fied, so that
there will be no more plain-dressed
professors wives and no more square
toed professors. That they have found
a majority of the Board of Regents
willing to aid them in freeing the
University of everything plebeian, the
dismissal of Professor CARR, affords
satisfactory evidence. The University
is worth nothing new, and will con-
tinue useless until the next meeting
of the Legislature. When the present
Board of Regents were appointed a
good many people wondered why its