The Undergraduate Chair

WAKE Up Dartmouth - Life Is What's Happening Now!" urged an oaktag placard carried by a mustached senior who periodically ascended the steps of Thayer Hall and challenged students to do something. Perhaps it was this added encouragement, or maybe it was spring, but for some reason, in the second week of April, undergraduates responded and tackled issues of both national and campus significance.

Most of the excitement centered around an April 14th visit to Hanover by Lewis B. Hershey, a kindly, wise, affable 72-year-old white-thatched gentleman who is in the unenviable position of being director of the Selective Service System at a time when many students are electing not to serve.

One week before General Hershey's arrival the Students for a Democratic Society initiated an ambitious campaign to indicate their opposition to the war in Vietnam and to the opinions Hershey had expressed in recent interviews. The SDS held a week-long fast for peace, in which about one dozen men dined only on liquids and vitamins, and nightly seminars discussing United States policy in Southeast Asia.

The Conservative Society responded by challenging the liberal group to a debate concerning Vietnam and the draft, an activity which a Conservative spokesman said "would be of much greater benefit than all of the agitation we've seen from the SDS recently."

Claiming that there seem to be "no honorable alternatives" to the war, the Conservatives tried to goad the SDS into action with the assertion that "when an enlightened, rational discussion is called for, it is only the immature and the ostentatious who reply with simplistic placard slogans." But the SDS was demonstrating, not debating.

The protest activities were climaxed in the three hours preceding the General's appearance. On the steps of Dartmouth Hall, site of fabled Dartmouth Night and football rallies, the SDS presented a speaking program featuring Professor Emeritus Ramon Guthrie's short "HisTory of Involvement in Vietnam," and a political harangue by Euguene S. Daniell Jr., candidate for the Democratic nomination for a Congressional seat from New Hampshire's second district.

With a crowd of 200 before him, Daniell characterized the Pentagon as a "collection of dry rot," sought student workers for his forthcoming campaign, and charged that if there was any invitation to the United States to enter Vietnam "it was sent by the CIA and has no validity."

While Daniell spoke the number of spectators doubled when students stopped by after watching fraternity softball games on the adjoining Green. The picketers were picketed by other picketers, carrying "Try 1-A" signs and encouraging men to support the war by giving blood. A "Keep Off the Grass" sign was ignored, while the most applauded aspect of the rally was a placard reading "Drink Budweiser."

The demonstrators soon picked up their stakes and moved to the plaza in front of Hopkins Center where a carnival atmosphere prevailed for one hour as those protesting U.S. aggression, some 100 including at least six faculty members, solemnly marched while twenty giddy pro-war undergraduates skipped around in the opposite direction.

Five hundred "neutrals" came to watch and enjoy the wit and wisdom displayed on the scores of posters carried by marchers ranging in age from eight to eighty. Amid serious and sincere appeals to "Stop Murder in Vietnam," "Halt United States Imperialism Now," and "Peace in Vietnam Is Not a Sellout," were rather frivolous signs saying "Abolish G.I. (Great Issues)," "Father Divine Is God," "Wendell Willkie," and the crowd's favorite, "Christ Lives in Argentina." The most effective pro-administration slogan read simply "Bong the Cong."

It was a quiet political rally, but in Hanover, political rallies of any sort are so rare that they become, by default, important events. A strongly concerned core of perhaps sixty students and professors generated the interest, and the hundreds of others who appeared were merely curious. Campus police reported only one rotten egg thrown, and that one missed.

Inside Spaulding Auditorium they closed the doors fifteen minutes early after a thousand undergraduates and towns people had jammed the hall, sitting in all aisles and standing along the walls. Dean Seymour squatted Indian style on the floor in a remote corner. General Hershey appeared in a civilian black suit and was, as predicted, warmly greeted.

The General somehow symbolized to us in remote, peaceful Hanover the war, a distant, undeclared but murderous war. Yet, at Dartmouth, formerly the most conservative and isolationist institution this side of the Mississippi, the spirit has changed, and the undergraduates have, if little else, become more belligerent.

A canvass by The Dartmouth of 300 randomly selected men revealed that 70.4 per cent "feel the U.S. should be militarily involved in Southeast Asia," and 71.5 per cent believed "that increased military action in Southeast Asia is necessary to contain the Communists."

Predictably, therefore, General Hershey was warmly greeted, and immediately won his audience by confessing "I am sure I'll be flattered to be charged with things over which I have no more influence than you do." Sketching the history of the draft, Hershey succinctly summarized the operations of his organization - "We count 'em, sort 'em, and send 'em."

If men are becoming better citizens by going to college, they get deferred," he explained, "and our problem is to devise a way of deciding just who is a successful student. If we exempted those in the top half of their classes, the good colleges would claim that potential Phi Betes are going off to fight. If we exempted on the basis of a test, bad colleges would complain that everybody enrolled failed and the whole student body is being drafted. So we compromise and consider both ranking and test scores."

Following his twenty-minute statement Hershey fielded one hour's worth of questions with the skill and finesse of a veteran politician. He successfully managed to avoid addressing himself to the moral problems of war, his own personal feelings, or the predicament of conscientious objectors.

Typical of the General's style was this response to "Would you send men to fight in a war you considered morally wrong?" "On a football team," replied Hershey, "you can decide the quarterback can't call signals, but you still don't quit the team. You stay and play to win."

"He wasn't very politically sophisticated," remarked one student filing out, "but he sure had the knack of evading questions." The general consensus - "He's a nice old man."

THE Undergraduate Council took a long look at itself during the past few months, realized it needed reforming, and then was unable to reform for the same basic reason that it needed reforming in the first place — nobody cares.

Three proposals were put before the body by its own members, proposals which required a two-thirds vote of the entire membership to pass. Since 56 is two-thirds, and since only 58 bothered to come to what was called the most important meeting of the year, nothing passed.

A UGC Evaluation Committee had discussed the "structure of student government" for eight weeks, and from its debate evolved a plan establishing three permanent parallel student governmental agencies - the Interdormitory Council, the Interfraternity Council, and a new Interclass Council. The ICC was to be made up entirely of class officers and members-at-large elected by each class.

Two other proposals agreed in principle with the three-unit system, but differed in the composition of the ICC. One plan called for ICC members to be elected representatives from each dormitory and fraternity, and the other strictly limited the number of members.

In spite of the fact that UGC President Angus S. King endorsed the Evaluation Committee's proposal as "a significant improvement over the present structure," supporters of alternate plans were present in sufficient strength to obstruct all action. Although 43 voted for plan one, the total was 13 short of the required 56.

King and other student leaders were bitterly disappointed, perhaps more with the apathy of the UGC members who did not attend than with the failure of the restructuring proposals to pass.

A student-faculty committee will most likely be established to again look into the problem and come up with some "viable" recommendations.

The Dartmouth, after commenting that "the most obvious fact which was pointed out (at the meeting) is that student government is stagnant, or constipated, if you will," concluded that "the next UGC and other student government groups are going to find themselves just as helpless. The only hope seems to be in major change. And maybe some day..."

WE'VE established a successful image by association," says Ken Ellis '67, drummer and leader of the Dartmouth Five Plus One. "We played at all the football rallies and the squad was undefeated. What more could you ask for?"

In their striped blazers and broad brimmed straw hats, the dixieland group is in its third year of acting as the unofficial College combo. Appearing at all rallies, most football and hockey games, swimming meets and crew races, the talented ragtime unit has ingratiated itself with the Hanover audience by entertaining the home fans and effectively hazing the opposition.

Most successful in the confines of Davis Rink, Ellis and his easy-going, ad-lib partners greet the Indian hockey squad with a rousing rendition of "Dartmouth's in Town Again," and then welcome the enemy with an equally spirited version of "The Mickey Mouse Club Theme Song," with 2000 voices wailing the principal refrain - "M-I-C, K-E-Y M-O-U-S-Eeee."

This past year the Cornell hockey squad, sensitive about the fact that nearly all its players hail from north of the border, took great exception to the ''Five's" up-tempo arrangement of the Canadian National Anthem. A ten-foothigh wire fence held them off.

According to Ellis, because of the demanding athletic schedule fifteen different men play with the group during the course of a year, with anywhere from three to seven performers at one time. However, when the "Five" plays for dancing, as it did recently at Mt. Ascutney, or for easy listening, as it did at the Moritshire Restaurant in West Leb, it is staffed by Dave Zeiger '64 on piano, Jim Tonkovitch '68, trumpet, Bruce Thorsen '66, bass, John Higby '69, trombone, and John Cumming '67, clarinet, beside Ellis on the drums.

Without time to rehearse, the musicians — each of whom has at least ten years of experience on his instrument and a varied background that extends from rock and roll through classical symphony - practice on the job. "With good talent and dixieland music, we keep experimenting while we are playing, and our music is always varied, never stiff," Ellis explains.

With their services demanded by many College groups, and with a Reunion Week engagement with the Class of 1941 on tap, the Dartmouth Five Plus One is hoping to cut a long-playing record next fall. "A musical group has to have technique, taste, and the ability to smile - that's most important," Ellis says. "One thing is certain, everyone in our group can smile. Some even think it's the best thing we do."

Following his lecture at Dartmouth on April 14, General Lewis B. Hershey, Directorof Selective Service, is surrounded by students asking him more questions.

Undergraduate Editor Larry Geiger '66,who has occupied "The Chair" in note worthy fashion this year, comes fromHarrison, N. Y. He was goalie on thesoccer team, won commendations in history and economics, and was an ABC tutor last summer. His experience as sportseditor of The Dartmouth led to his current appointment as DC AC publicity editor until the new director arrives June 1.Larry is a member of Delta Upsilon andCasque and Gauntlet.

Dartmouth's Five Plus One minus one.