LABOR AND HIGHER EDUCATION

The objection of the New York Federation of Labor to the acceptance by colleges of educational donations appears to be an instance of undue prejudice on the part of labor and an ignorance of the benefits which such gifts as the Rockefeller and Carnegie endowments have given Labor claims that these gifts "cannot but undermine to a degree democratic independence in higher educational institutions." In this assertion, it is mistaken in that the source of the donation has no influence on the ideas which higher institutions propagate. A teacher or professor has always had the right to his private opinion maintained. In fact all attempts to suppress this principle of academic freedom have failed.

Is it possible to conceive that the minds of our own professors could be controlled by the opinions of those men who have made our college possible through endowments?

The giving of money to colleges has always been considered one of the best ways of serving social betterment. It offers freedom and enlightenment to the nation through improving facilities for education and presents an excellent method for a man of wealth to become a real benefactor. Labor, with its plan of state and Federal endowment of colleges would limit and deaden education. There would be less variations, less diversity, less freedom in educational opportunities. All minds would be sent through the same machinery and cast in the same mould.