THE ATHLETIC QUESTION.

EDITORS HERALD-CRIMSON.-It seems absolutely necessary to me that the faculty should fully understand the position taken by the students in regard to the matter of the new athletic regulations, and as the college papers have as yet failed to present that position as I conceive it to be, I shall endeavor to express what appears to me to be the student feeling. If I am mistaken in my interpretation of that sentiment, I do not doubt that I will soon be corrected through your columns. In the first place, I should like to have it understood that we do not question the good intentions of the faculty. Every student appreciates their motives, and although the students may not agree on the action of the faculty, they certainly believe that the majority of the faculty are actuated only by a desire to benefit the college.

The main and radical objection I have to the resolutions is not to the provisions of the resolutions, but to the existence of any resolutions. In trying to force these resolutions on the students, the faculty of Harvard College have adopted a policy directly contrary to the one that has been in force so long and with such good effects,-the policy of non-interference. Their action can be looked at as nothing less than a long step back ward in the progress of Harvard toward the ideal university, and what makes this step more unendurable is its absolute uselessness. We have been yielding gradually to the views of the faculty on this point, and have tacitly been granting the necessity of some regulation of athletics. But, to state the question in plain terms, what evidences have we seen of this necessity? What has been done by the athletes of our college in the past few years that necessitates some regulation by a kind faculty? We have been playing a rather rougher game of football than in the past. True; but it is a well-known fact that the students as a body were opposed to the roughness of the game, and there can be no doubt that student sentiment would have stepped in to prevent the repetition of such playing in another year. But the ill-advised action of the athletic committee last fall made it a matter of honor for the students to continue the game through the season. For my part, I can see no excesses to which the athletes of late years have gone that would not have regulated themselves without the interference of the faculty. Another objection we have to these resolutions, a very important objection, even if we concede the expediency of any interference, is that they were passed without any consultation whatever with the students. In so important a matter, it seems that we should have been consulted. Conceding the expediency of any resolutions and throwing aside their arbitrary passage, we still find numerous objections to some of the resolutions themselves. Therefore I will hastily take up each resolution.

The first one, in reference to the appointment of a director of physical training, has no especial fault, other than its uselessness. We have no objection to the printing of a dozen names, more or less, in the college catalogue. In regard to the second resolution, excluding professional trainers, student opinion is divided. No one objects to the general theory that professionalism should be excluded from our athletics. But a great many do object to the methods which have been adopted to exclude that professionalism. The faculty certainly would not wish us to have amateur teachers in mathematics or physics, for instance. Still it may be answered, that in the opinion of the faculty, the character of professional teachers of mathematics and physics is, as a whole, higher than that of professional baseball players. Suppose that we grant this to be true; does it follow that the students of Harvard College are so weak that their methods and morals would suffer from the little contact they have with men who make ball-playing a business? It might be well for the faculty to turn its attention a little more closely to some other aspects of the moral training of Harvard College and let such slight matters as professionalism take care of themselves. The third resolution is one of the most objectionable. It reads:

"Resolved, That no college organization shall row, or play base-ball, foot-ball, lacrosse or cricket, except with similar organizations from their own or similar institutions of learning."

This shuts out such organizations as the Union Boat Club, the Beacon Ball Nine, the Union Lacrosse team, and the Longwood Cricket team. Now the members of many of these organizations are largely graduates of Harvard, and are all to be classed under the head of gentlemen amateurs. As for the question of the expense incurred in competing with these organizations, it is only necessary to say that they are all within the immediate neighborhood of Boston. What reason in the world can have actuated our faculty in passing such a ridiculous resolution, it is hard to discover. But stay! a faint rumor reaches our ears that this resolution was passed to satisfy Princeton, who had no similar organizations to practice with. This then, is one of those delightful compromises that are so pleasant to read about. The fourth resolution in regard to a faculty committee, is harmless padding. The committee would probably carefully mind its own business and let the students alone. The fifth resolution, in regard to no man engaging in sports more than four years, is some more padding. The conference committee wanted to make a show of having done something and resorted to that familiar trick of newspaper men of filling in with unimportant matter. The fourth and fifth resolutions are, therefore, in themselves comparatively harmless.

The sixth resolution is another very objectionable one. We don't know which college is to be entrapped by this, but it must be a compromise for some one. The ridiculous ideas of the Harvard faculty about gate-money and fences are well known. Their idea is to cause all expense to be borne by the wealthier students, who can afford to subscribe to the maintenance of athletics. This for sooth brings about a spirit of democracy! Harvard democracy we had better call it. The seventh resolution caps the climax. Our patience has already been sorely tried, but the faculty have carefully kept the heaviest blow for the last. Our dear friend Columbia, with whom our experiences have been so pleasant, had to be propitiated, and this is the result embodied in few and choice words of the purest English style.

"Resolved, That no inter-collegiate boat-race should be for a longer distance than three miles."

Oh Columbia! that you should have come to this. Not content with your experience of last year, your glorious (?) victory of two years ago, you must extort this resolution from our willing faculty, ready to yield anything to any college, however unimportant, that had the hardihood to ask. The authority of dozens of races, won in the last mile, of hosts of crew men, who have rowed in four-mile races and are still "alive," is as nothing beside the desire to propitiate everybody. Princeton and Columbia, according to common report, have succeeded in gaining concessions from Harvard. We should like to ask, but without any desire to offend the tender sensibilities of our representative at that mournful conference, "what concessions were made to Harvard?" Of course, the last resolution was necessary to make the others of any effect. We think better of Yale, however, than to believe that she will be forced to adopt these measures by any such threat.

These, then, are the resolutions, objectionable in themselves and objectionable on the ground that we were not consulted, but mainly objectionable on the principle they violate, that of non-interference. '84.