Rules Were Made to Be. . .

The Harvard Band's TV performance last Sunday was a perplexing one. It was not the music that confused us, but the fact that one student organization could appear on a commercially backed show when last November another, the Rugby Club, was refused the same right. The Band's sponsor may have been a charity, as Dean Watson explained, but after all, the Connecticut Cerebral Palsy Association, which had planned the Rugby contest, is not exactly Palmolive-Peet. Apparently the Dean's Office and the Corporation, which ruled on the Rugby case, differ on whether to classify charities as commercial sponsors or not.

This is not the sole perplexity either. The Band's concert took place despite an emphatic rule which asserts that "NO organization shall be allowed to appear on a commercially sponsored Radio or TV program." This is doubly strange, since Watson in the past has been an administrator who

". . . being in doubt,

He ruled them out

Which he always does when pressed."

Moreover, the rule invoked by the Corporation last year--that "no athletic team" shall "take part in any game where the purpose is purely the earning of money . . ."--was irrelevant. Unlike football or tennis, the Rugby Club depends on the University for nothing save playing fields, locker space, and old shors. Consequently, it is no more an athletic team than the Harvard Liberal Union.

We have, then, a tableau which includes one rule misapplied, one rule broken with official sanction, and a quarrel between Governing Board and Dean's Office on definitions. Added to this are the Saturday afternoon sportscasts of the football games, sponsored by the Atlantic Oil Company. At best, this is a tableau riddled with inconsistencies. At worst, it is a perversion of the University's dubious Good Name Policy, a perversion which exalts the popular Band and football team over lesser known groups solely on the basis of which will glorify Harvard's name the most.

Whatever this tableau's specific origins, the basic trouble is the Corporation's rule forbidding groups that grace their name with Harvard to perform on commercially sponsored shows. Why the administration maintains this rule is still none too clear, except that it obviously involves fear for Harvard's reputation. Perhaps the Corporation is afraid that people will suspect it of selling the use of Harvard to purveyors of soap and toothpaste. Why anyone, however, should confuse a student group's appearance on radio with official endorsement of its sponsor any more than he confuses football sportscasts with official endorsement of Atlantic White Flash is beyond us. All the University need do is require that in all programs where the Harvard name crops up a statement be read to the effect that no official endorsement of any sort is involved. Granted, a few listeners or viewers will pay no attention. But avoiding misunderstandings by divesting student groups of their freedom is a craven and costly solution.

Perhaps, however, the University imposes this rule thinking that mere association with common commercial pursuits would automatically besmirch the Good Name. Though better founded, this is an even worse excuse for limiting organizations. The Good Name has suffered mightily from the administration's policy toward freedom of the Faculty, yet policy remains what it always has been. The benefits of freedom--the experience and maturity gained from its use--are no less worthwhile for students. It is a mystery why the Corporation should be so bold in one case and so rimid in the other.

We certainly have no objection to the Band performing on television--in fact, we would like to see and hear more of its from local loudspeakers. We would also like to see and hear all undergraduate groups good enough to rate such an invitation to see and hear them unhampered by application, discriminatory or otherwise, of a needless rule. These groups have more to offer than their names, and we hope that the Corporation, which has disavowed responsibility for their actions, will balance its policy by disavowing its restrictions on their freedom.