Arnold Group Seeks Action On Transfers

The Association for the Arnold Arboretum has demanded that the Corporation seek a judicial hearing on the legality of the transfer of books and specimens from the Arboretum to the University's new herbarium in Cambridge.

In a review of the Arboretum controversy, John T. Hemenway '46, president of the Association, yesterday condemned the Corporation for "refusing to ask for court instructions and obdurately opposing all efforts to obtain a judicial hearing on the matter."

In the past the University has refused in petition the courts for instruction on the grounds that it considers its action completely legal.

Corporation Acts on Bailey Plan

The Association, a group "organized to protect and support the Arnold Arboretum in the public interest," has charged that the removal of books and specimens was a violation of the agreement by which the Arboretum was created in 1872 as a public trust administered by the University.

Under the Bailey Plan to consolidate nine separate University centers concerned with botany, the Corporation in June, 1954, completed the removal of six-sevenths of the library and specimens from the Arboretum to the new herbarium on Divinity Avenue.

When a trustee refuses to petition the courts for instructions, the only other method for enforcing an educational trust in Massachusetts is by positioning the State Attorney General, George Fingold. Fingold has refused to interfere, and the State Supreme Court upheld his action on technical grounds last February.

The Association the statements, asserts, will continue to "seek to reintegrate the Arnold Arboretum and to vindicate Harvard's reputation as a scrupulous guardian of trust funds."