Study Says Harvard Cooler to Draft Than Other Colleges, Including Yale

One day last may, over 450 undergraduates trooped into New Lecture Hall to show how badly they wanted to stay out of the Army. The results of that survey, announced in a preliminary report this fall, show that Harvard men are more allergic to khaki than all but one of ten representative schools in the country. Only fifteen per cent tested here evinced any desire to go into service. The bulk were lukewarm at best, and fully a quarter wanted nothing to do with the armed forces-at all.

By way of comparison, a rugged 23 per cent of the Yalemen tested showed a "high willingness" to serve in the army.

The survey, part of a broader one on education and student values directed by Professor of Sociology Robin Williams of Cornell, interviewed 5,000 students in ten colleges: Harvard, Yale, Texas, North Carolina, U.C.L.A., Michigan, Wesleyan, Wayne, Fiske, and Cornell. Peter Rossi, assistant professor of Social Relations, tested the College's samples. He picked names at random from the Directory of Students to get his sample.

The most striking thing the College poll shows, according to Rossi, was that those students who were best informed on world events and who were boosting most ardently our present foreign policy were also the most reluctant to help it personally through military service. Harvard came out on top in "political knowledge"--tested by a series of questions on current affairs. A healthy majority supported the war in Korea as a necessary action. But a good deal fewer were willing to back up their sentiments by toting a rifle.

Conversely, those students most uninformed about world affairs were most willing to fight. Texas, for example, could muster only 17% "well informed" students, compared with the College's 34%. But Texas students were among the most willing to bear arms. Southern students in general rated higher in combativeness and lower in information about what they were fighting for. Nor was there much of a feeling of guilt among students in the ten colleges because their preferred educational status kept them civilians. When asked whether they "found themselves apologizing to people for not being in uniform," those who didn't want to be in uniform say they didn't. Most of the apologia came from those who were "highly willing" to go into service.

Neurotics, Too

Personal factors affected a good number of the answers, according to Rossi. Students were more willing to join up if their grades were low--probably on the assumption that if the inevitable is coming soon, one might as well enjoy it. Yet, those who admitted they were "not enjoying" college were no more willing to serve than those having a wonderful time. Those students judged neurotic also preferred civies more than most.

Rossi does not think the results of the survey mean Harvard men are weak-kneed creampuffs, or even more cowardly than Yalies. "It is easy to exaggerate opposition to going into the army," he says. "The impression given by the survey, at Harvard and nationally, is more of a lack of enthusiasm for military service than outright opposition to the idea. I doubt very much if any wholesale draft-dodging will come of it."