The eyes of the academic world are focused on Wisconsin where there is being waged a battle which, while perhaps not vital in and of itself, is momentous in its implications. The effect of the replacement of Dr. Glenn Frank by another man of liberal tendencies might cause no great effect on the educational life of the state university but the establishment of precedent by the displacement of a liberal president of a supposedly-liberal university through the whim of the supposedly-progressive governor of that state would be a telling blow to educational freedom in America.

If the reasons for removing Dr. Frank are no more valid than those set forth by the regents of the university Wednesday morning it may well be assumed that the desire of the state administration to secure a more firm control over the university by the insertion of a more pliable man is the motive prompting the move to oust Frank rather than any action, inaction or failing on his part.

There can be no doubt of the right of the state regents to remove Dr. Frank. But his removal without substantial grounds could have no effect but to sterilize the academic profession. As Mr. Lippman points out without security there can be no freedom. The effect would be to make boards of regents and trustees, usually composed of men of material rather than academic minds, the guiding and controlling force in intellectual education. Soon the universities would be as the legislatures, at the mercy of pressure groups. Scientific education would be outlawed. Advancement in knowledge would be stifled.

Were the cast study one of a reactionary chief executive ousting a college president for refusing to force teacher's oath on his faculty it would be more clear cut. But even a Progressive La Follette can, perhaps unconsciously, trammel the freedom he professes to hold dear. Fortunately there will be a public hearing on the case. If the evidence warrants removal there can be no complaint. But distressing and disastrous will it be if the power motive seems to stimulate such action.

It is not overly dramatising this case to point to the corrollaries of academic bondage. In other lands control of schools has suggested control of the press--then of speech. At such a stage the term civil rights is mere verbage. Princetonian