Fund Without Friends

Twenty-five thousand dollars spread out among some six thousand undergraduates is hardly a gigantic sum of cash. Independent, uncoordinated, hap-hazard drives for assorted charitable organizations quite probably could extract that much from the College without untoward effort. Yet the Student Council, acting as agent for a long list of such worthy agencies, has been able to garner just a bit more than half that amount, despite a two-month campaign that will end on Sunday. Usually, seven-dollar-per-man pledges were signed by the great majority of men at registration in the fall, the money collected, the budget balanced. But this year for some reason, that has not been the case.

The old warhorses--apathy, procrastination, plain indifference--can be trotted out to explain the pitifully low returns. And the new rationalizations--late veterans checks, post-Yale poverty, plain forgetfulness--can very easily be used to explain away neglect of pledges. Five thousand dollars worth of these pledges are still unfulfilled, and, in a last-minute drive to catch up with wayward pledge-makers, the Council has offered an easy out--contributions from University coupon books. Lack of ready cash is no longer an adequate plea. The Council's Service Fund relieves everyone from the irk-some chore of wallet-reaching or door-slamming before an endless chain of charity canvassers; it seems only just that everyone should have a share in making this relief a reality.