Council Reduces NSA Staff, Votes Separate Fund Drive

Four men, appointed by the Student Council, will go to the National Students Association nationwide convention next year, the Council decided last night at an open meeting in Dunster Common Room. The Council also severed its connections with the Combined Charities Drive.

On the Combined Charities issue the vote was 8 to 3 (two abstaining) in favor of the Council's separation from the drive and conducting a separate campaign for its own funds. Money for college organizations such as Phillips Brooks House and the Salzburg Seminar will probably be raised in the special Council drive.

Fund Drive

A fund drive committee, headed by Robert P. Hyde '51, will study assignment of specific beneficiaries of the separate fund campaigns. The Hyde report will present its recommendations in the second week of April.

Two mental attitudes prevailed in the three and a half hour public debate on NSA's future status. One, a "has it been worth the money" approach, was summed up in a remark by Council Secretary Patrick B. McCormick '50, who said, "If NSA didn't cost us anything, the Council would approve it quicker than Ireland would elect Saint Patrick prime minister."

A second view, that NSA's future shouldn't be considered from the stand-point of cost and material results, but on a basis of NSA's less tangible contributions, was expressed by Erskine Childers, international vice-President of NSA, who said, "When I think of a Harvard student directing a self-government program with German students under the auspices of NSA, I see a practical contribution."

Intense Debate

Childers was one of many who crowded the Dunster Common Room for the meeting. The atmosphere of the meeting during the NSA debate was intense but at all times well ordered.

Chief objections to NSA performance in its initial two years were based on its high expenses and few visible results. NSA cost the Council $1300 in 1948-49 and will cost about $800 this year. Most of the money went toward paying the expenses of the NSA delegation's trips. In reply to a demand from Council Treasurer Roy M. Goodman '51 for a cut on this item, Robert F. Fuller '50, chairman of the Harvard NSA, insisted four men was rock bottom for adequate representation at national conventions.

Fuller emphasized that Harvard has achieved considerable prestige in the NSA and has a duty to continue support of the student organization. Fuller said after the meeting that he was well satisfied with the Council's decision