Voting and discussion often lasts through the night, and after members deliver the notice of election to sophomores, they either go back to their rooms to sleep or return to the club and await results. During the four-hour period between notification and acceptance or refusal, the clubs are permitted no contact with candidates. The decision, of course, does not rest solely with the undergraduate. Many of the candidates have had fathers, brothers, perhaps generations in one club. Even in 1953 when club life has lost most of its emphasis, a traditionally A.D. family's offspring going to Spee can be startling event. And for the man who has had relatives in a club for seventy years, a rejection by the clubs can be a major crisis.
The precise qualifications for club membership are vague. Dean Watson is proud that none of the clubs have discriminatory clauses in their constitutions. But critics of the clubs point out that while there may not be a formal rule, the Yearbook annually lists almost no men who count both a final club and Hillel House among their activities.
It is in their defense of election policy that club members point up the basic difference between final clubs and the secret societies at Yale. "It's not," one member says, "as if we take all the outstanding people in the College and then prohibit the Jewish men who have done well. Our candidates are usually selected with little regard to their activities here. We chose from a certain type and background and there just aren't very many Jewish students in that group to begin with." Echoes another club member, "To some extent we let the headmasters at certain prep schools do the screening for us."
Mt. Auburn Citadels
These defenses do not usually satisfy the critics, however. This admitted-exclusiveness angers many, who feel that it frustrates the Horatic Alger tradition. In 1939, a student writing in the The Harvard Progressive termed the clubs "Citadels of Snobbery," and charged that they had not place at democratic Harvard. In '39, however, defense was more vocal: "Nonsense," said one club alumni, "it's these progressives who have no place at Harvard."
While there has been occasional friction between members and non-members in recent years, the incidents have not been serious ones. At worst, some clubs have been targets for snowballs, and a few broken windows have resulted. More often, any resentment takes a quiet, sardonic tone, as when Porcellian was plastered with signs by non-members during a convention: "American Legion Welcome--Free Beer Upstairs."
Today, most member and alumni are realistic about the clubs. Watson speaks for the group: "Social clubs are as old as mankind. There is only a terribly small percentage--one or two percent--who want to get into a club and don't. The club system doesn't hurt the College at all. We rather encourage them," Watson concludes.
And so, while some of the unclubbed continue to point out with justification that the system doesn't help the College either, the clubs go on with their punchings and elections. It is likely that more than two percent of the students are antagonistic to the system; it may be that the clubs have sometimes imposed a barrier where there should be none. But, as a non-member says, "I don't think much about the clubs. I don't bother them and they don't bother me."
In 1914, when the clubs were at their zenlth, John H. Gardiner, in his book-called "Harvard," indulged in a bit of wishful thinking. "The significant thing about clubs at Harvard," Gardiner wrote, "is that they are unimportant to men outside of them." Now, half a century later, Gardiner's observation is at last accurate.