Cornell Alumni News - eCommons@Cornell - Cornell University

diately that I have no personal acquaintance
with any of the nominees in either case, and
with respect to the Cornellians, I intend not
the slightest suggestion of doubt as to either
their integrity or ability.
Nevertheless all of the Cornell nominees
are from the business world with little suggestion
of interests outside that community.
Why do we not have an opportunity to elect
an outstanding government official, a newspaperman,
an artist, a liberal, a scientist,
or an educator? It seems unthinkable that
the trustees of a great university should not
include representatives of these disciplines.
It is no answer to say that this levening
may be supplied to the Board from some
other source. The purpose of the ballot is
for the exercise of a democratic influence.
Cornell alumni have little enough share
in the selection of the university's trustees.
We should certainly have a broad enough
basis so that some rationale of selections is
available. It would follow that an alumni
trustee would then have some sense of mandate
to represent the point of view that his
background expresses. Through this most
devious route the alumni might indeed have
some slight influence on the course of the
university.
One more horrid thought keeps gnawing
at my vitals: Suppose there were some correlation
between the size of an alumnus's
contribution and his nomination. But, I suppose,
the blackness of this thought should
have been spared even this exposure.
- GERRIT C. CONGER '37
FALLS CHURCH, VA.
[The following letters were addressed to the
Alumni Association with copies to the
NEWS.-ED.]
ALUMNI ASSOCIATION: Since I suspect that
my problem, upon receiving the annual
alumni ballot for election of trustees, is not
unique, I will take up your time, and mine,
with the complaint. In many years, I find
that my knowledge of the nominees for the
posts of alumni trustees, are known to me
only through the brochure which accompanies
the ballot. This, I realize, can not be
helped. But the information in the brochure,
while giving a good view of the candidate's
"status" tends to reveal little else. It certainly
gives no inkling of how the nominees
may feel on some of the major issues which
face Cornell, and all major universities, in
these rather tumultuous days for American
higher education.
What do the candidates see as the role of
the university in this era? Do they think this
role should be changing? What about the
degree of student freedom, as compared to
the degree of regulation? More? Less? What
about the problems of research vs classroom
skills? Do they have opinions on the
question of bigness and the issue of "dehumanizing?"
This list serves merely to
suggest a few of the more obvious questions
in the field today.
I feel that it is important to me to know
something of a candidate's general attitude
and approach to these types of questions.
In broad terms, I would like to know
whether he thinks Cornell has struck a good
balance between "liberalism" and "conservatism."
(Admittedly unsatisfactory words,
but they should serve to make my point.)
I would like to have the opportunity to
vote for a trustee on the basis of my opinion
for the warm days ahead
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June 1966