The Changing Face of the Harvard Corporation

It was the kind of vote that's usually just a formality. But this time, the University made history.

Over a week ago, the Board of Overseers approved the Harvard Corporation's decision to add a black member to its ranks for the first time. Since 1650, when the Corporation began, certain types of people have tended to control its very definite and extensive power. They've been white. They've been wealthy. And until recently, they've been men.

Later this month, when black lawyer Conrad K. Harper walks into a Corporation meeting for the first time, at least one aspect of that power structure will change.

But with such a small group, increasing one form of diversity may mean diminishing another. It may also mean keeping the balance of the Corporation heavily weighted toward the corporate, rather than academic, side.

Gender balances are also in question. Despite the impending loss of one of only two female members, the selection committee did not choose a woman to replace her.

While the Corporation has taken some steps toward changing its historically white, male persona, Harper's selection does not necessarily signal a continued commitment to reform. There is still much progress to be made.

The Corporation

The Fellows of Harvard University, as the seven members of the Corporation are known, are a veritable collection of superlatives. They are the oldest corporation in the Western Hemisphere at the oldest college in the country. They are the most powerful people at the most powerful University--with the most money of any educational institution in the world.

They are unpaid. On the first and third Monday of every month, they fly from around the country to meet in Loeb House's Cabot Room, where they talk amongst themselves from morning until well after lunch, discussing matters both vital and secret.

The smaller of Harvard's two governing boards--the other is the Overseers--the Corporation has ultimate control over the University's $14.4 billion endowment. Split that among seven people, and it's roughly $2.1 billion apiece. The Corporation is also the final arbiter of major decisions relating to the University's finances, land and management.

Former Corporation member Hugh D. Calkins '45-'49 calls the body "invisible" to most people at Harvard. And they stay that way on purpose, he says.

"We're meant to be a group of very confidential advisors to the President," says Calkins, also a former Crimson president. "We perform that function well by being out of the limelight." Calkins says what happens in Corporation meetings should stay behind closed doors so the president can bring up whatever University topics he thinks are most pressing without fear that they will be published in The Crimson the next morning.

In this way, the Corporation remains behind the scenes--going public about only the most important and controversial University decisions and events.

President Rudenstine acts as a spokesperson for this seven-person elite--of which he himself is a member.

Legal Eagle

According to Harper, becoming the first black member of the Harvard Corporation was merely a matter of being in the right place at the right time.

"There are many persons of color who might have had that distinction," Harper told The Crimson when he was appointed.

A 1962 graduate of historically black Howard University, Harper graduated from Harvard Law School in 1965. Ten years later he made partner at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, one of New York's most prominent law firms.

Harper has held a number of leadership positions in state and national legal organizations. He has also gained international prominence in the legal profession and has been associated with a number of international law organizations, including serving as a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague.

Throughout his career, Harper has been an outspoken advocate for diversity. As the President of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York from 1990-1992, he threw his weight behind efforts to change the composition of the city's federal bench.

In a Nov. 1990 speech to the association, Harper called for the bench to diversify but also spoke against hard and fast ratios for accomplishing that goal.

"It is admissible even to suggest that minority lawyers of the front rank are not available for judicial service," Harper told his audience. "The absence of adequate numbers of minorities on the bench illustrates a want of will by our appointing powers and political leaders, not a lack of adequate candidates."

If Harper's views on New York City's federal bench translate to Harvard, the University could be looking at some changes, although Harper says he will have to familiarize himself with the University before deciding how he stands on specific issues.

It's Academic

Over the past decade, the Corporation has come under fire for becoming increasingly corporate. Only two of the current members, Rudenstine and Hanna H. Gray, are career academics, while the rest have focused on business or law.

In the fall of 1994, some faculty members expressed concern at the increasing divide between the University's high-level management and the heart of the school--its teachers.

Tensions between the faculty and the central administration came to a head over a report by Rudenstine that suggested a 1 percent reduction in faculty benefits. Some faculty members criticized the administration for running Harvard like a business.

Shortly after, James R. Houghton '58, who was then chairman of the board of Corning, Inc., was appointed to the Corporation. He replaced scientist Charles P. Slichter '45, known by many as the Corporation's academic voice. Houghton's appointment meant that the Corporation's membership had twice as many business executives as academics.

And while the corporation does have to operate as a unified group on decisions, Slichter says that representation from diverse academic and career backgrounds is helpful in keeping in touch with issues sensitive to certain groups of people.

While Harper has spent his career largely in the practice of law, he does have some experience on the faculty side of higher education as a former lecturer at the law schools of Yale, Rutgers, Fordham and the City University of New York.

Harper says one of the things he enjoyed as a lecturer at other universities was meeting with students. He plans to use his new status as a Corporation member to interact more with students.

"It's a part of the joy and a part of the obligation," he says.

In addition to his faculty experience, he has authored scholarly articles on Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall. He has been a director of both the Academy of Political Science and the Academy of American Poets.

His future colleagues, on the other hand, come from heavily corporate backgrounds. Besides Houghton, University Treasurer D. Ronald Daniel is a director at McKinsey & Co. and Robert G. Stone Jr. '45 is chairman emeritus and director of Kirby Corporation.

Other than Rudenstine, only Gray--a former president of the University of Chicago--has made academia her career. However, both of them have been largely involved in the administrative side of the profession.

The two remaining fellows are departing, to be replaced by Harper and Herbert S. Winokur Jr. '64-65, who was appointed at the same time. Both Richard A. Smith '44-46 and Judith Richards Hope spent over a decade on the board.

Smith, known for his expertise in financial matters as well as medical issues, chairs Harcourt General Inc., a Fortune 500 company with interests in publishing and educational materials. Hope, a lawyer, has been active in Republican politics--working for both the Ford and Reagan administrations--as well as being a senior partner for the international law firm Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker.

Winokur will join the board around the same time as Harper--before the beginning of the next academic year. He serves as the chair and CEO of the investment firm Capricorn Holdings, Inc., based in Greenwich, Conn.

Winokur is a member of the board of directors of the Harvard Management Company.

'A Woman's Touch'

For 338 years, the Corporation was entirely male. When Hope entered the Cabot Room in Loeb House for her first bimonthly corporation meeting, it was no small feat.

Eleven years later, she is leaving Harvard's most elite in order to concentrate her time on her law career and her work in Republican politics.

During the search process, Rudenstine and Provost Harvey V. Fineberg both said finding a woman to replace Hope would be desirable, but that finding the most qualified person--man or woman--was their first priority.

Calkins, who served on the Corporation for 17 years without a female colleague, says having a woman on board helps the University in a variety of ways, especially now, in the wake of last October's merger between Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges. "I have always thought that would make the Radcliffe people...more comfortable," Calkins says.

He says women can offer the governing body something unique: perspective on the obstacles women face in the workplace.

According to Calkins, Harvard is a model for other national institutions in its policies regarding tenure and other opportunities for women in a university setting.

"As a society and as a university, we have really failed to come to grips with the fact that women do take a larger share of family responsibility than men do," he says.

When Harvard "gets cracking" on helping women juggle things like Ph.D. aspirations and raising families, the whole country will benefit, he adds.

But female Corporation members are important to more than just "women's issues," according to Calkins.

"I think women are more sensitive to human relationship-type questions," he says. "I think Harvard could benefit from a woman's touch."

However, Calkins says the University is not wholly to blame for the Corporation's lack of women.

"In the searches I participated in, women were included as much as men," Calkins says. "In the last 30 years, I'm sure there has not been any conscious attempt to exclude women."

Instead, Calkins says, it is the nature of the job--combined with its stringent requirements--that makes it hard for women to join.

Slichter, a Corporation member from 1970 until 1995, says that because the job requires extensive experience--both business and academic--qualified female candidates have come up only in recent years. And it was not easy for University officials to draw these women in once they found them.

"Women who were qualified were highly sought by corporations [all over the country]," Slichter says.

Because the Overseers meet less frequently and are a larger body, Slichter says, there are more women on the Overseers than the Corporation.

Eventually, Slichter predicts, the Corporation's demographics will grow to be more like those of the Overseers, who are much more diverse.

The composition of the Corporation should gradually begin to look like Harvard's student body, Slichter says, since the governing board represents the University at its highest levels.

But although change seems to be coming, it is arriving slowly.

"The Corporation should be leading, not following," Slichter says.

Variations on a Theme

According to both Slichter and Calkins, race, gender and field of expertise are only some of the elements the University should consider in trying to diversify the Corporation.

And up until the 1960s, when Cleveland-based Calkins joined the Corporation, most of the Fellows were from New England.

According to Calkins, transportation barriers kept the board laden with East Coast-based members. During Harvard's first three centuries, it would have been impossible for someone outside the Northeast to make it to a meeting every two weeks. The introduction of airplanes changed all that.

But even today, most of the Corporation members hug the Atlantic coast, working in Washington, D.C. or New York City.

Religious diversity is another consideration. Calkins recalls that about 30 years ago, the Corporation was excited about appointing its first Jewish member.

They were more than a little surprised when they discovered that John Blum, their new member, was Episcopalian. It was not until the second half of the 20th century that the Corporation actually included a Jewish Fellow--former Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences Henry Rosovsky '53.

Houghton emphasizes that whatever members' backgrounds are, the decisions of the body are made "as one."

Former President of the Board of Overseers Charlotte P. Armstrong calls the group "a very close-knit body."

"They have to look for congeniality among themselves," she says. "You're seeking a range of experience, and wanting people who will speak up and ask questions. In many ways, it's very like a corporate board. You don't just take everything for granted. That's really the essence of it."