Council Begins Inquiry Into Class Organization

Council activities gathered momentum last night as President Edrie Weld, Jr. '16 announced final appointment of a sweeping five-man Committee on Class Affairs and nine other tentative appointments still subject to approval by the Council.

Straightening out the tangled class system will be the task of the new committee headed by Daniel P. S. Paul '46, 3L, chairman of the '46 Album.

Weld pointed out that since 1930 the organization of individual classes, as undergraduates and as alumni, has degenerated until at the present time classes lack constitutions and the mechanism for electing permanent officers.

There is no provision for filing the places of permanent committeemen who die, he said, adding that "no one in the University knows who is on the class committee." After the Class of 1947 elections, the top three men in the balloting were declared marshals whereas, Weld asserted, there is evidence that tradition demands separate elections for the three marshal posts.

In the confusion, Weld indicated, no elections were even held for the offices of secretary and treasurer.

Members of the new committee set up by the Council for a complete probe of Freshman affairs are: Robert J. Blinken '50, Paul V. Douglass '50, Frank E. Fite, Jr. '50, and S. David Kahn '50, Weld announced last night. Chairman of the group will be Richard W. Kimhall '50.

Paul and his committee will try to find out what has been done in the past and recommend to the Council some definite system of class organization improving on tradition where it sees fit.

"In a way this is the most important committee of the year," said Weld. "It will try to establish some force to hold the alumni back to the College. Its decisions may well mean the difference between an active and passive alumni."

Members of Paul's Special Committee on Class Affairs are: Robert S. Leventhal '48, John McNulty '48, Thomas Morse '48, and Thomas L. P. O'Donnell '47.

All other appointments announced by Weld are still subject to Council approval.

Robert J. Maier '48 will chair the new Housing Committee, and Michael B. Rothenberg '49 has been assigned a place on that committee. William D. Weeks '49 has been named to organize an Interhouse Dance Committee.