Yale & Harvard Week

Last week Carl Sandburg, poet and biographer of Lincoln, went to the oldest and third oldest universities in the U. S. to get honorary degrees. Harvard and Yale greeted him affectionately. Sandburg, wearing a gown but no cap, his white mane and rugged face gleaming in the sun, gave their commencements a flash of homely Americanism, a flash just bright enough to illumine the shadow of European affairs that all but blacked out their gay, traditional ceremonies.

At Yale occurred the first of two extraordinary events in Sandburg's extraordinary week. There Lord Lothian, British Ambassador to the U. S., rising to speak to alumni, seized the occasion to speak to the whole nation. Lord Lothian's subject was the British fleet.

"Let me be blunt," said he, "If Hitler gets our fleet, or destroys it, the whole foundation on which the security of both our countries has rested for 120 years will have disappeared. . . . Moreover, if Hitler beats us, the totalitarian powers will possess airplane building facilities, naval and shipbuilding dockyards and industrial resources all over Europe ... which will enable them vastly to outbuild your own defensive preparations. . . . Many people in the U. S. believe that somehow or other, even if Great Britain is invaded and over run, the British Navy will cross the Atlantic and still be available, through Canada or otherwise, as part of your own defensive system. I hope you are not building on that expectation. . . . Only if we are beaten down and the greater part of the fleet has been sunk in action will the remains of it leave home to assist in the defense of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and other distant parts of the Commonwealth. ... It is my view that we are standing today not in the outer trenches of our old joint naval defense system but in the last trenches. ..."

To Yale's students, 1,486 of whom had petitioned President Roosevelt to keep out of the war, these were alarming words. No less alarming were those of Henry L. Stimson (three days later nominated Secretary of War), who arrived in New Haven to urge fellow Yalemen to support compulsory military training, and of Yale's President Charles Seymour, who on the radio urged repeal of the Neutrality Act and all possible aid to Britain.

At Harvard, meanwhile, undergraduates and alumni began their commencement and reunions under agreement (at President James B. Conant's request) to avoid war arguments. They knew well that many an alumnus bitterly resented Harvard undergraduate pacifism. They listened politely to Secretary of State Cordell Hull as he called isolation "dangerous folly" at an alumni gathering, to Class Orator Tudor Gardiner (a Porcellian) as he declared: "America must not again be dragged into the anarchy that is Europe."

On Class Day, Harvard's 5,000 alumni and undergraduates trooped merrily out to the Stadium for traditional fun-making. Placarded, costumed and loaded with ammunition for the traditional confetti battle, they laughed at a light-hearted speech by Ivy Orator Bayard S. Clark. Then up rose Davis R. Sigourney, '15, Ivy Orator 25 years ago and a captain in World War I, to make the traditional alumni welcoming speech to graduates. Mr. Sigourney looked grim. His words were grimmer.

"We of the class of '15," he began, ". . . should consider it a duty and a privilege to fight for the safety of our country. We would be proud to see our boys go out there and do the job again."

From undergraduates and younger alumni came boos, hisses, cries of "Throw him out!"

"Take it from me, you boys of 1940," went on Mr. Sigourney, "the boys of 1915 are far from senescent or from being armchair patriots."

More and louder boos. Cries of "Sit down!"

"We were not too proud to fight then and we are not too proud to fight now."

By this time the boos, mingled with a few cheers, were deafening. When Mr. Sigourney finished his speech, the crowd staged its confetti battle, fought with more vigor than enjoyment. That night Harvard was a house divided.

Next day, in a brief speech, Carl Sandburg said sadly: "We could well pray that in some quarters of the country there would be less vehemence, less vanity of affairs, less discussion regarding what should immediately be done, and something more of the element of prayer and humility that was Lincoln's in the 'house divided' speech. If we could first know where we are and whither we are tending, we could better judge what to do and how to do it."

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