Conant took two routes to evade such pressure. One was by the installation in his office of a crystal ball which is inevitably brought out when someone makes a request of him. Conant draws the supplicant over to the crystal ball, they both peer into it, and they are confronted by an enormous "No." It's an easy way out, but it shows applicants that they are not alone in their desires for more funds.

Another means of lightening the load carried by Massachusetts Hall has been a deliberate policy of decentralization. "Every dean balances his own budget," says Conant. The deans are responsible for their own alumni, and, by implication, for their own fund-raising. "The president's job," says Conant, "is to run interference for the various deans, and to make sure that the interference doesn't get in anybody's way."

It's Not the Size, but the . . .

The need for such decentralization has come about because of the University's increasing complexity. "It's not that the University has grown so much larger over the years," the president remarks, "but that it has become so much more complex. Since the time President Eliot disbanded the School of Veterinary Medicine, the University has abandoned none of its projects and departments, while adding dozens of new ones. I'm not saying that these additions are not excellent projects, but they do make the University unbelievably unwieldly."

Visitors, students, and even faculty members often plaintively wonder "Who in the world runs this University?" Conant likes to have this question asked. It can't be answered, he feels, and this is because no one is really "running" the University. Each man is doing his own job efficiently, and the University just keeps on going. Conant, through his dominating position on the Corporation, his position on the ad hoe committees, and his chairmanship of faculty meetings, is able to guide the University on its long-range policies. To the undergraduates who question Conant's lack of knowledge on such projects as parietal rules and student porters, a remark he once made to a dean of another college furnisher an apt answer. "I couldn't get into the housekeeping details even if I wanted to. I just have time to look after the dollars and the professors."

The inclusive job Conant does in looking after those two items is amazing in view of the time he spends fulfilling his social engagements. In addition to Harvard groups, all varieties of educational and scientific groups hunt Conant as a possible after-dinner speaker official meetings also consume long, argumentative hours. Conant's family life with his wife and sons became more and more sporadic. Luckily, the boys were away at school when their father's outside activities became so time-consuming. The order one, James, graduated from Michigan and is now head of Time magazine's Montreal bureau. Ted, twenty-four years old and like his brother a Navy veteran, graduated from Swarthmore last year. He achieved fame of a sort on the campus by buying a pin-ball machine and sending it off to his father after the town of Swarthmore had held a confiscatory sale. At present the machine rests quietly in the attic of 17 Quincy Street.

In order to preserve some small bit of privacy in his home life. Conant had made a rule requiring himself to eat at home with his wife at least twice a week. The Conants also take two vacations a year. These are usually connected with some aspect of University business, but the president manages to slip in some fishing or other exercise between lectures.

Another huge chunk of the president time is taken up with his activities in behalf of non-Harvard causes, educational and otherwise. While not considering himself the spokesman for American education. Conant feels the president of Harvard should speak up frankly on questions on which he either has very strong opinions or feels he is particularly well-informed. A man of strong opinions and particularly well-informed on a multitude of subjects. Conant has thrown himself into many national controversies with an enthusiasm matched only by the information and foresight behind it.

Thus in 1935, when Massachusetts passed a "Teachers Oath" requiring all instructors to support the constitution. Conant opposed the bill before the Legislature as an unnecessary reflection on the teaching profession, but did not like Professor Kirtley Mather, at first refuse to sign the oath once it had become law. When testifying before the Legislature Conant dodged the question to what he would do about Communists of his own faculty.

His war-time experiences strengthened Conant's views about Communism. At Chairman of the National Defense Research Committee, his job was to decide what scientific projects the United States should embark upon. A dramatic incident in this job was his part in deciding that the atomic bomb was enough of a possibility to make an investment of $2 Million worthwhile. A more mundane part was the assigning of scientist to the projects and committees on which he thought they would he most valuable one man a Canadian--whom Conant at pointed to a minor committee later turner out to be a member of the Canadian spring which gave some secrets to Russia. The treason of Klaus Fuchs was a shocking and bitter experience for Conant.

Communists, Conant believes, are of necessary part of an international secret conspiracy. As such they are unfit teachers and he would not now knowing engage on for his faculty. Nor, on the other hand would he institute any drive to uncover possible Communists at Harvard "the cure is worse than the disease in an academic community." Conant admits that he frankly had no idea of while he would do if a trusted faculty member walked up to him one day and said "I am now and have always been a Communist. Do something about it." Say Conant. "You could not make a hard-and fast rule on something like that. Let just wait until it happens and hope that it won't."

In pre-war years Conant was noted as much for his anti-Communism as his anti-Nazlism. The latter was then more fashionable issue, however, and thus Co- nant's rejection of a scholarship offer from Nazi publicity man "Putzi" Hanfstaengl '09 caused a national uproar. Conant ignored it and proceeded to send a representative to ceremonies held at Heidelburg University. Accused of inconsistency, Conant pointed out the difference: Hafstaengl represented a party "which had struck at the principles we believe to be fundamental to universities throughout the world," while Heidelburg represented what had been attacked by this party.

In the post-war year Conant has crusaded for a more logical method of making scientific decisions in a democracy--"one of my lost causes"--and a stronger public school system. The principle focus for his scrutiny has been, however what he calls "the mess we are making of our draft." The present system of deferments he feels, is both inefficient and undemocratic. It should be replaced by a plan of Universal Military Service under which all men would serve a regular term in the army automatically on leaving high school. In advocating this he has been attached by the far right as unrealistic and the far left--the old term again--a warmonger. Yet Conant stands firm. Careful study has convinced him that this plan is the best so far, and he will support it until a better one is found. This too is the way he guides Harvard and it is a good one