The attitude of "The hell with them" usually breeds the resolve no longer to care what "they" think, and to discard the notion, or what is by now the pretense, of being a representative. The student-leader's guiding motive shifts from the electorate to his own mind, or his own desires; the rationale is no longer representation, but power; not altruism, but egoism. And with this comes the abnegation of responsibility, a ram pant evil among Harvard undergraduates.

Exceptions Are Rare

Again, it is necessary to note that this is not universally true. There are many student leaders who are big-minded, realistic but still cognizant of the apathetic political realities of Harvard undergraduates, who nonetheless try to do a good job.

But it does not take much investigation to see that such a student is rare; and that irresponsibility is widespread. It takes the form of the play director who walks out on the play in the middle, the fund drive chairman who forgets to send out checks to charities. What does it matter what I do? he bitterly asks; no one cares, anyway.

From abnegation of responsibility it is but a small step to abnegation of moral standards. A Council treasurer absconds with the funds; athletes gang up on town youths and beat them up; a candidate for office buys votes from a neighboring school. With the former "representative" now interested only in himself (and athletes are a curiously unique kind of representative) and with no one to answer to but himself, many sorts of actions are possible.

At this point it is again necessary to pause. We have traced a line from a man seeking representative office to a man committing a minor crime; fortunately most student-leaders do not go to the end of the line, nor is it inevitable that they should do so. But the path has been laid, and he who wishes may follow it. That few do so is a credit not to the obscurity of the path, but to the strength of the individual.

Nor is the severance of the leader from the student the sole reason for such actions; the student-leader has the example of countless numbers of his elders. One reads so frequently of political pecadillos on the national level that one may easily come to suppose that the only way to get into politics is through minor illegal machination.

A second cause is the unsettling laxity of the majority of undergraduates when such evils are brought to light. They have been reading the same newspapers for as long as the undergraduate politicians, and while most would not choose to emulate national political sins, they have become so used to them, that seeing them on a college level more amuses than disturbs them. They are just another aspect of unimportant, recreational activities; they are above the concern of the scholar. One is more inclined to laugh at the way these men try to imitate their elders than to shudder over the realization that this sort of loose morality may carry over into more important fields after college.

This attitude is similar, and perhaps a result of, a third possible cause of the problem: the generally laissez-faire attitude of the Faculty and the administration. Harvard is uniquely fortunate in having an enlightened administration which believes that a part of education as important as formal instruction is the teaching of the student to plan and regulate his own life. The freedom of publications and other organizations to print and say whatever they wish and, within certain minimal boundaries, do whatever they wish is found at few other colleges. It forces upon the Harvard undergraduate a degree of maturity demanded of few of his fellows at schools across the country, and most undergraduates respond admirably.

Students vs. Student-Leaders

But it is much easier to be a mature student than a mature student-leader; and so the student-leaders are faced with the great burden of living up to the Administration's expectations of them and withstanding the many temptations which the near-absence of administrative control invites. It is thus legitimate for the bitter student-leader to feel that he is his own conscience; with fellow students apathetic and administrators fearful lest they become paternalistic, he is given quite a free hand.

The fear of paternalism sometimes extends in the perverse direction of keeping hands off one group by exerting control over another. The Young Republican vote-buying of two years ago was seized upon by the Student Council as a way of making its power felt in the land, but before it could take any action, the Administration stepped in, refused to authorize the Council to take the action it wished, and took no action itself against the HYRC.

The Administration is also under pressure not to let the transgressions of its students reach the public. Some Boston papers are eager to receive any report that will lower the public estimate of Harvard, and Harvard authorities are just as eager to frustrate them in their desire. Thus the beating of town youths may go almost unpunished if the athletes involved are valuable to the university; for it is better to let them off with a stern warning than to put them on probation or expel them and risk the nastiness of sensationalist press coverage.

Faculty Attitudes Important

Yet another Faculty attitude comes to mind, which appears unrelated to the present problem, but is still relevant to administration laissez-faire and general Yard apathy. One cannot help but note certain professors who appear rather bored with their large lecture courses, and House tutors who dislike to sit with students at dinner, a growing phenomenon noted by the Council Committee on the Houses. The sight of a tutor entering a dining hall, looking about in vain for his graduate friends, and proceeding to sit alone at an empty table, is a distressing one for the student who would like to sit with a member of his House staff now and then, and find out his opinions. The student who does not associate with Faculty members in tutorial or in small courses may frequently feel that Faculty members are really not interested in him, and do not care what he thinks or does. If he feels academically deficient besides, he may attempt the compensatory way out, and enter the ego-building road of the student-leader.