Who Calls the Tune?
IF THE GOVERNMENT at Washington were not so eager to plan every one's private life for him, there would probably be less apprehension felt by college educators because of the prospect that, following the war, there will come a period in which government funds will be needed to finance some of the educational work among discharged service men, whose opportunities for higher education were rudely interrupted by the war. There seems to be little disagreement over the proposition that such government aid will be necessary, financially speaking; but there has been a great deal of doubt concerning the administration of that aid—whether it should be federally directed, or conducted by purely local or state authority.
It is notorious that he who pays the piper feels that it is his privilege to call the tune. Moreover, Washington's armies of bureaucrats have revealed a passion for planning things for others which leads to a fear that such government assistance might presage a centralization of educational authority. More than a broad hint of such apprehension is to be found in the recently issued annual report of President Conant to the Harvard Board of Overseers, and it is safe to say that the President of Harvard is by no means alone therein.
It is difficult to find in the record made by Washington's eager planners much to inspire faith in the idea that federal oversight of college education would be a salu- tary thing. It is easier to see that such a system would be another step aside from the traditional American Way, possibly justified during the existence of a war, but wholly unwelcome and regrettable in times of peaces Centralized control of university education seems to many a thing to avoid, and one knows only too well what sometimes follows when the camel's head once gets inside the tent. There is usually a plausible plea for Fascism based on the idea that it is "so efficient"; but one needs always to remember that it is not always efficiency for the sort of things a free and democratic people cherish as forming the essence of existence. Hence the strong tendency to insist that, while the federal government may well assist to enable the teaching, it should not dictate arbitrarily as to the things taught.
