Where the Elite Meet

Next fall the Student Council will "represent" the largest undergraduate body in the history of the College. University Hall will rely on this group for an accurate appraisal of undergraduate opinion on housing, tutorial, and other pressing College problems. In addition, the individual student looks to the Council for wise administration of the vast sums publicly subscribed to its Student Council Fund. But as the average undergraduate quietly subscribes his seven dollars to the Council, he should become aware of the amazingly small share of democratic control he is allowed to exercise over this Council, of the pitifully small voice he actually has in this supposedly representative body. He should realize that each Council, through a complicated procedural device, may control the selection of a slate from which 60 per cent of the succeeding Council is chosen. And he should know that this 60 per cent will arbitrarily select the remaining members of the new Council, in the manner of many exclusive organizations that make no pretense of representation and do not label themselves a "Student Council."

He should be aware of the fact that 71 per cent of the members of the Student Council in the past ten years have been Club men, while during those years only 22 per cent of an average class belonged to a Club. He should realize that cliques of men from the various athletic squads and other single groups have managed to form a near-majority in many of the Councils (in '42, 7 of the 14 members were taken from the football, baseball and basketball squads, while in '43 the ratio was 6 out of 13). He should learn that over a four year period close to 50 per cent of the membership of the Council was taken from two Houses, Eliot and Winthrop.

He should be alarmed over the arbitrary method by which his money is allocated to non-charitable organizations through the College. His contributions to this Fund, made under the general impression that this money was to be devoted to various charities, enabled the Council to invest $3400 in various Freshman affairs over a period of five years. It is true that $2700 of this money was returned to the Council, but what of the balance of $700, what of the scholarships that could be granted for that money, and what system of auditing was employed to insure that this money was not spent to cover the inefficiencies of a Dance Committee here, or for free entertainment at a Smoker there? The audit of the Student Council Treasurer, as provided by the Constitution, is entirely too perfunctory to afford much assurance. Certain choice details such as the $800 loan granted the Freshman Class in May of 1945 without even the formality of a Council vote, might prompt the undergraduate to look further. But other expenditures would only emphasize the complete divorce that he, and students like him, have accepted from the control of the money he pledges. The expenditure of $275 in five years for private Council dinners and Council pictures is not an expense that many students would begrudge if they were asked. But the fact remains that they never have been asked.

And the student body as a whole should know that Harvard alone, out of 14 colleges surveyed throughout the country, consents to allow its student legislature to be chosen by appointment. If the elective procedure is capable of providing capable leadership at Cornell, Oberlin, Chicago, Williams and other leading colleges, there is no reason why Harvard need fear smoke-filled rooms and Tammany-style politics. Fraternity blocs, the plague of many student governments elsewhere, could not achieve control on the local scene, where but one-fifth of the electorate belong to social clubs, and where the very nature of the organizations would preclude any concerted political activity.

If the next Council is not to be neutralized by a wave of non-confidence growing out of its continued denial of the democratic process, it must scrap the present plan of nomination-appointment and substitute a system of free election of representatives. It is generally conceded that the Houses provide a more cohesive group of elective units than do the classes, thus each of the Houses and Dudley should be allotted two representatives, to be chosen by open election in March of each year. The incoming Sophomore class would be represented by four men, to be chosen from the Yard on the same plan. In all cases, nomination for the House elections should be conducted by petition, with modifications of the present plan to insure a fair method af obtaining signatures.

Two other features of the present Constitution should be altered con-currently in order to clear the last traces of the present "closed-corporatino" system. First, a required University audit of all Freshmen Affairs books, and, secondly, the revision of the present amending procedure of the Constitution. Under the existing proviso it is impossible for any group but the Council itself to amend the Constitution. The corporation is not only closed, but was meant to stay closed.