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THE HESPERIAN
corrupt practices acts, for municipal reform
and for good government in general, a great
part of the political wisdom of the younger
men engaged has come to them from ex
periences in college politics.
It is almost wholly in the domain of col
lege politics that there is and must bo an
irrepressible conflict between the frat and
the anti-frat. For all purposes of political
intrigue tho organization of the fraternity
men is indefinitely superior to that of tho
barbarians. The game of politics as played
by them is not the same as the game of pol
itics when played by those who are all un
pledged. It consequently follows that the
two factions cannot work amicably together
in the close relations of an open literary
society. There may be a fair game
with loaded dice if all the dice are loaded
alike, but not if one man has loaded dice,
tho other dice that are unloaded. So I
should think there might be an amicable
literary society made up entirely of fraternity
people, as we know there can be of non
fraternity people, but the two classes cannot
play tho game of politics together, because
they play it with different instruments. It
is not a fair game, and only mutual distrust
and dislike can result from trying to play it.
My point is that politics is an integral part
of tho life of an open literary society, one of
tho most valuable parts in fact, and that to
introduce a permanent line of cleavage makes
it an unfair and unplayable'ganio and wrecks
the society.
You will pardon mo for having dropped
back onto the old line of argumentation
which occupied meso fully in tho fall of '84.
Subsequent facts have so confirmed tho argu
ments wo then used that tho tendency to
exult is too much for a naturally weak nature.
Wo said that the two old societies could live
and thrive with the anti-fraternity amend
ments in their constitutions, and they have.
We said that fraternity members did not
make good members of a literary society,
and tho Philodicean diod. No society
with fraternity mombers in it could hope to
)iavo a more loyal or capable membership
than did tho Philodicean. If that could not
live, tho experiment might as well bo given
up. And if it should be urged that lack of
a hall and the facilities for making a society
homo was the cause of death, the barbarian
Delians started under tho same adverse con
ditions, and .prospered. Wo are as nearly
justified in writing q. e. d. after the propo
sitions for which wo formerly battled as
one can over be in political affairs.
It may bo suggested that 1 have got a
long ways from tho text with which I started,
that of college politics as a school of right
eousness. And yet it is the development of
loyalty to a beneficent organization, and of
willingness to work and fight for what one
believes to bo right which constitutes what I
consider a growth in righteousness through
political experience. When a man moves
that the secretary of the society cast its
unanimous ballot to elect some other person
to an oflice which ho wants himself, simply
because he believes it for tho good of tho
organization that matters should take this
course, he gets a training in right conduct
which few other experiences afford. And
whon he has learned in the interests of that
organization tho necessity of doing tho
humblo thing, as woll as the conspicuous
thing, and of sacrificing himself through
wearying work to a cause or a party, ho has
advanced far in his preparation for American
citizenship.
Yours always,
Amos G, Waenku, '85.
E. McGeo, '98, has a position in4tho Mcf .
Cook high school.
Miss Gather had a splendid story in the
Overland Monthly for January.
Elizabeth Shornson and Martha Oappoll
spent tho holidays with their parents in
Lincoln.
Moso Barlow, the student who severely
injured his eyes last year whilo at work in
tho chemical laboratory has boon visiting, in
Lincoln for a week or two. His oyos havo
about recovered.
