ARMS AND THE ARTS

The present hubbub, instigated at the College of the City of New York at the editor of "Campus", the college paper, in an attempt to sound undergraduate opinion on the presence in the curriculum of the course in military science, culminates today and tomorrow in a ballot of the college by the Student Council. In this way the advocates of the abolition of this course hope to present sufficient undergraduate sentiment opposing its continuance to convince the faculty that it should be removed.

The question of limitation of college armaments has long been a mooted one. Here at Harvard the Debating Union has occasionally attempted to give the matter the light of forensic discussion, but other affairs have obscured the question, and it has been, at least publicly, forgotten. Yet now, when all things relative to the military must submit to a candid appraisal, there is no reason why this particular phase should be overlooked.

Of course the violent journalism of the city college editor need not serve as a precedent for action here. But that is no reason why there should be no judicial weighing of the matter at Harvard. Military science must appear to many as an incongruity in any college of the liberal arts. And the continuance of courses in the art of war at a time when education is believed to be a capable agent for peace discourages the faithful adherent of that cause.