OCCIISIONAL PAPERS 
 ON THE HISTORY OF 
 ROSTON COLLEGE 
 
 RULES OF 
 
 GENTLEMANLY CONDUCT 
 
 Rev. Charles F. Donovan, S.J. 
 University Historian 
 March, 1983 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2016 
 
 https://archive.org/details/rulesofgentlemanOOdono 
 
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 COLLEGE 
 
 ARCHIVES 
 
 At the time Boston College was founded (1863) 
 American colleges were conservative institu- 
 tions in matters of student discipline. Many of 
 them had codes of conduct that would have done 
 credit to a seminary. There were few colleges 
 with officers whose specific responsibility was 
 student discipline, so the enforcement of rules 
 of conduct fell to the president or, in many 
 colleges, to the entire faculty. Reflecting a still 
 influential Calvinist tradition, faculties often 
 had stern and pessimistic views of their students, 
 as illustrated by the sentiments of a professor 
 at Davidson College in 1855: 
 
 Indulged, petted, and uncontrolled at home, 
 allowed to trample upon all laws, human 
 and divine, at preparatory school . . . [the 
 student] comes to college, but too often with 
 an undisciplined mind, and an uncultivated 
 heart, yet with exalted ideas of personal 
 dignity, and a scowling contempt for lawful 
 authority, and wholesome constraint. How 
 is he to be controlled?* 
 
 The historian of the University of Georgia 
 blames the influence of Puritan Yale for the 
 “flood of petty restrictions and commands” 
 that bound the Georgia students. ^ “These 
 rules were the law of the land as far as the 
 University was concerned and just as sacred. 
 The student’s passport to classes was a set of 
 laws [incidentally, sixteen pages long] signed 
 by the president; he was given ten days to 
 digest them and thereafter he fell hard under 
 their inexorable pains and penalties. His every 
 action was guided by them. A law got him out 
 
of bed and put him back again. He ate by them, 
 he studied by them, he recited by them — they 
 were with him always.”^ Among the things the 
 laws forbade were profanity, playing billiards 
 or cards, association with vile persons, blas- 
 phemy, theft, robbery, and forgery. Perhaps 
 the young Georgians were a fractious group 
 since they were warned; “If any scholar shall 
 assault, strike or wound the President, a Pro- 
 fessor, or a Tutor — or shall designedly break 
 their doors or windows, he shall be expelled.” 
 Similarly students were forbidden to keep any 
 gun, pistol, dagger, dirk, sword cane or other 
 offensive weapon in their rooms.'* 
 
 Boston College students seem never to have 
 been so mettlesome since there was never in 
 their rules any mention of carrying weapons. 
 Indeed that was an injunction of the Ratio 
 Studiorum, the sixteenth century Jesuit code 
 of education, that Boston College never adopted. 
 The Ratio's fifth rule for students was Regula- 
 tion on Side-Arms which stated: “None of our 
 students should bring into school any side-arms, 
 small-swords, poniards, or other weapons of 
 this type . . .” Apparently sixteenth century 
 European Jesuit college students had more in 
 common with the collegians of nineteenth cen- 
 tury Athens, Georgia, than those of Boston’s 
 South End. But students at Indiana Asbury 
 University, now DePauw, received similar 
 admonitions to those of Georgia. Among pro- 
 scribed activities were profane swearing, 
 drinking intoxicating liquors, gambling or play- 
 ing at games of chance, wearing fire-arms or 
 weapons, using obscene language and dis- 
 orderly deportment. 5 
 
 Faculty involvement in disciplinary matters 
 was commonplace. At Georgia the faculty met 
 “in secret” every Tuesday night after prayers 
 to consider violations of the student code.^ 
 Frederick Rudolph says that one year the Dart- 
 mouth faculty devoted 68 sessions to student 
 conduct, while at mid-century the University 
 of North Carolina faculty addressed 282 cases 
 of delinquency from a student body of 230.^ 
 
 An alumni committee of Haverford College 
 writing at the end of the nineteenth century 
 reported: 
 
 . . . The minutes of the Faculty during 1870- 
 
 7 1 teem with chronicles of disciplinary 
 
 [ 2 ] 
 
small-beer, and display a spirit of pettiness 
 and triviality in the conception of college 
 government. Peccadilloes of small moment 
 are recorded with solumn iteration, reported 
 to the Committee on Instruction, considered 
 in both bodies, and decided with infinite 
 splitting of hairs. Every case of discipline 
 is a triangular duel, the poor culprit, how- 
 ever, getting his shots from both the other 
 parties .... Cases of disorder were met with- 
 out any sense of perspective.^ 
 
 In contrast to such records of disciplinary 
 minutiae and adjudication, from the beginning 
 discipline at Boston College received no great 
 emphasis. The first published catalogue, for 
 1868-69, devoted just three sentences to 
 discipline and the same sentences, without 
 addition, were repeated in the annual catalogues 
 for the following eight years: 
 
 When religious motives are continually 
 appealed to, less need is experienced of fre- 
 quent or severe punishments. 
 
 Flagrant offenses, such as are detrimental 
 to the reputation of the College, or are 
 obstructive of the good of the pupils, are 
 grounds for expulsion. 
 
 For faults of ordinary occurrence — such as 
 tardy arrival, failure in recitations, or minor 
 instances of misconduct, — a task, consisting 
 of lines from some classical author, is com- 
 mitted to memory during the hour after the 
 close of school. 
 
 The contrast between the brevity of the 
 Boston College rules and those of colleges cited 
 above can in part be accounted for by the fact 
 that Boston College catered to “day-scholars” 
 only, as the catalogue said, while the other 
 institutions were residential colleges respon- 
 sible for the welfare and conduct of the stu- 
 dents twenty-four hours a day for many months 
 of the year. Even so the contrast is impressive. 
 The directness and brevity of the Boston 
 College approach to discipline seem to reflect 
 a sensible and self-assured attitude on the part 
 of the administration. The first sentence is a 
 generalization, the statement of a principle, 
 religious motivation, that not only explains 
 the relative infrequency of “punishments” but 
 justifies the absence of a long litany of rules 
 and regulations. The following two sentences 
 
 [ 3 ] 
 
treat of flagrant offenses and minor faults. 
 Examples of major offenses are not given; 
 rather they are defined by their results: damage 
 to the College’s reputation or impairment of 
 the students’ welfare. For such misconduct 
 expulsion is a possible penalty. Faults of 
 ordinary occurrence include non-disciplinary 
 matters such as failure in recitations and tar- 
 diness. The impression is given that “minor 
 instances of misconduct” are indeed minor, 
 such as noise in a corridor or some instance of 
 mischief in a classroom. The brief and non- 
 threatening catalogue statement about disci- 
 pline in the earliest years of the College’s oper- 
 ation manifests a confident and mild attitude 
 on the College’s part in the matter of student 
 conduct. 
 
 After thirteen years of experience, it was 
 evidently felt that a few more particular guide- 
 lines regarding deportment should be pub- 
 lished. In the catalogue for the year 1877-78 
 and with little change for the rest of the cen- 
 tury, the following directives and warnings 
 were placed before the three sentences cited 
 above about religious motivation, flagrant of- 
 fenses, and faults of ordinary occurrence: 
 
 The candidate for admission should be 
 acquainted with and prepared to observe 
 the following rules: — 
 
 On arriving, the students will repair im- 
 mediately to the cloakroom, where they 
 will deposit their books, overcoats, etc.; 
 thence directly to the gymnasium, where 
 they will remain till time for Mass. 
 
 Those who are exempted from Mass, if 
 they arrive during Mass, will remain in the 
 gymnasium. 
 
 No class is to leave the gymnasium for 
 the school-room, unless accompanied by 
 the teacher. 
 
 When any one obtains permission to leave 
 the class-room, he is to return without 
 unnecessary delay. 
 
 The places for recreation are the gym- 
 nasium and the court. All the rest of the 
 premises are “out of bounds”; except when 
 the Prefect gives permission to walk by the 
 Church, or to members of the Debating 
 Society to recreate in their own room. 
 
 The use of tobacco is prohibited. 
 
 [ 4 ] 
 
Playing ball, snow-balling, pitching, and 
 all games that endanger the windows are 
 prohibited. 
 
 Whoever damages the College property 
 must make compensation. 
 
 No boisterous conduct is allowed in the 
 corridors or class-rooms at any time. Even 
 in the gymnasium and during recreation, 
 the behavior should be decorous. 
 
 In fine, any conduct unbecoming the 
 character of a gentleman will be regarded 
 as a violation of the College rules. 
 
 We learn from these added rules that atten- 
 dance at Mass was required each morning. 
 That reflects common practice at denomina- 
 tional colleges, where daily chapel remained a 
 feature of college life well into the twentieth 
 century. It is clear that exemptions from atten- 
 dance at Mass were possible. 
 
 We need to remind ourselves as we read 
 these rules that the majority of the students 
 attending the Jesuit institution in the South 
 End were of high school age, since Boston Col- 
 lege in its early decades offered a seven year 
 curriculum embracing preparatory and colle- 
 giate divisions. In the 1880s the collegians 
 were outnumbered four to one, and in the 
 1890s two to one. Thus the rules may have been 
 aimed mostly at the high-spirited youthful 
 scholars, but by that very fact they could have 
 been all the more restrictive and burdensome 
 for the sophisticated students of the Poetry, 
 Rhetoric, and Philosophy classes. 
 
 The ban concerning tobacco, which would be 
 applauded by many today, was repeated in 
 each year’s catalogue through 1894-95. No 
 mention was made of tobacco in College regula- 
 tions through all the succeeding years until 
 the thirteen year period from 1934 to 1947 when 
 smoking was forbidden except in designated 
 places, which represents a restriction rather 
 than a total ban on tobacco. 
 
 The admonition concerning conduct unbe- 
 coming the character of a gentleman empha- 
 sizes a worldly-religious ideal of civility and 
 manners that was not infrequently held before 
 college students in the nineteenth century. 
 For example, the 1867 college catalogue at 
 Duke warned: “Every student must observe 
 such propriety of language, form in manners, 
 
 [ 5 ] 
 
and gentlemanly deportment, as are proper for 
 cultured, Christian people; any departure 
 therefrom will be cause for reprimand, suspen- 
 sion, or dismission. 
 
 A similar tone was set in this excerpt from 
 Notre Dame’s 1864-65 catalogue; “Whether in 
 class or in recreation, when permitted to con- 
 verse at table, or during their walks, students 
 should endeavor to improve the purity of their 
 language and cultivate urbanity of manners. 
 A few years in college would be profitably em- 
 ployed if nothing else were learned but to con- 
 verse and behave with the dignity and propri- 
 ety of gentlemen.”'^ 
 
 The Jesuit college in Detroit translated the 
 gentlemanly ideal into the practice of awarding 
 monthly “elegant cards” for polite conduct. 
 In the catalogue for 1891-92 under the heading 
 “Politeness” the following exhortation ap- 
 peared: 
 
 The College expects from all its students 
 the manners and deportment of gentlemen. 
 Politeness is deemed a very important ele- 
 ment of education. Whatever, therefore, is 
 contrary to good breeding, and would be out 
 of place in respectable society, is generally 
 out of place in the College. Any and every 
 violation of good conduct, especially if it 
 occur on the way to and from the College, is 
 liable to punishment, and, if the violation is 
 gross, to dismissal. On the premises, smok- 
 ing, tobacco chewing, low or profane lan- 
 guage, uncouth games of any sort, are not 
 tolerated. With a view to encourage the prac- 
 tice of politeness and gentlemanly manners, 
 elegant cards, or testimonials of good con- 
 duct, are given to deserving students every 
 month. 
 
 Any nineteenth century reader of Newman’s 
 Idea of a University was familiar with his 
 warning that a gentleman, be he ever so urbane 
 and civil, is not necessarily a Christian. The 
 ideals of politeness and gentlemanliness may 
 in some quarters have been promoted as purely 
 secular goals. But, as in the Duke statement, we 
 may assume that the Jesuit colleges expected 
 that religious motives would underlie and 
 elevate polite conduct. Indeed in all the years 
 from 1877 through 1908 the Boston College 
 catalogue statement on the character of a gentle- 
 
 [ 6 ] 
 
man was followed in the very next sentence 
 by the allusion to the religious motives that are 
 habitually appealed to. 
 
 The Boston College statement concerning 
 conduct unbecoming the character of a gentle- 
 man disappeared after 1912-13 but was re- 
 vived in an altered form from 1934 through 
 1947, when the following paragraph was 
 printed under the heading “Gentlemanly 
 Conduct”: “Students are held responsible to 
 the College authorities for the requirements of 
 gentlemanly conduct not only within the pre- 
 cincts of the College but at all times and in all 
 places. Any violation of these requirements 
 within the College precincts is subject to the 
 disciplinary sanction specified below.” The 
 disciplinary sanction referred to was a system 
 of demerits that was introduced in the 1930s. 
 Ungentlemanly conduct earned anywhere from 
 one to five demerits and five demerits entailed 
 probation. 
 
 The author recalls being told mildly but 
 firmly by his Freshman dean in 1929 (when 
 the “character of a gentleman” paragraph was 
 not in the College catalogue) that certain high 
 jinks in the corridor between classes was con- 
 duct not becoming “a Boston College gentle- 
 man”. So the ideal of gentlemanliness was very 
 much alive as a standard of conduct for gener- 
 ations of Boston College students. 
 
 Going back to the expanded disciplinary 
 rules first published in 1877, the restrictions 
 on playing ball and snow-balling were neces- 
 sary because of the extremely limited outdoor 
 property. When planning the College, Father 
 McElroy originally wanted to purchase a 
 larger piece of property on Harrison Avenue 
 but he ran into public protest, on religious 
 grounds, against what was termed an “auda- 
 cious attempt on the part of ecclesiastical 
 authorities to acquire undue and colossal 
 power.”" So McElroy compromised and won 
 the city’s approval to purchase only a section 
 of the city block he had hoped to have. On the 
 property bounded by Harrison Avenue, James 
 Street, and Concord and Newton Streets, 
 were erected the imposing Church of the 
 Immaculate Conception, a residence for the 
 Jesuits, and the college building, which was 
 expanded in 1889. The buildings pretty well 
 
 [ 7 ] 
 
occupied the space and a very limited “court” 
 was left for student outdoor recreation. In no 
 modern sense could the property be called a 
 campus. Hence the ban on ball-playing, and 
 the gradual conviction on the part of the Col- 
 lege authorities by 1900 that a new and 
 larger location for the College was a necessity. 
 
 We learn from the restrictive rules about 
 places for recreation that from very early days 
 students engaged in debate enjoyed special 
 status. The Debating Society was privileged, 
 in tight quarters, to have a room of its own. 
 
 There is a certain inertia or stability in the 
 texts of college catalogues. The formal expres- 
 sion of a college’s ideals and code of conduct 
 tends not to change from year to year. Thus the 
 above-quoted rules from the 1877 catalogue 
 were modified piecemeal and over a long time. 
 The admonitions about ball-playing and places 
 of recreation were dropped after 1893. The 
 reference to after-hours memorizing of literary 
 lines as a punishment for misbehavior appeared 
 for the last time in 1898 (though the practice 
 of “jug”, as this disciplinary expedient was 
 called in many American colleges, continued 
 into the twentieth century). The paragraph on 
 faults of ordinary occurrence disappeared the 
 same year. The reference to an appeal to relig- 
 ious motives was dropped after 1908, not, one 
 can assume, because religious motives were no 
 longer in the picture but because the section on 
 discipline was sharply reduced and entirely 
 omitted from the catalogue between the years 
 1914 and 1924. Incidentally it may be of sig- 
 nificance that 1914 was the year the College 
 left the high school and opened on its new 
 Chestnut Hill campus. 
 
 1 here was added to the catalogue in 1895 
 a section on Parental Cooperation that had more 
 to do with students’ academic interests than 
 discipline, but it was printed directly after the 
 paragraph on discipline. This is the section: 
 
 The efforts of teachers and prefects will 
 be much facilitated if the co-operation of 
 parents can be secured. 
 
 Parents are, therefore, earnestly requested: 
 1st. - To insist upon daily study at home, 
 for two or three hours at least. 
 
 2d. - To notify the Prefect speedily in case 
 of the withdrawal of their sons, or of neces- 
 
 [ 8 ] 
 
sary detention from, or tardy arrival at, 
 school; of failure to receive the monthly 
 report. 
 
 3d. - To attend to notifications, always 
 sent by the Prefect on the second day of an 
 unexplained absence, or for lessons signally 
 bad during a considerable length of time. 
 
 4th. - Not to pass over, without inquiry, 
 averages for lessons falling below seventy- 
 five. 
 
 An exhortation on parental cooperation ap- 
 peared in the catalogue from 1895 through 
 1899, then after an omission for ten years, from 
 1909 through 1933 and again from 1937 through 
 1951. By the latter year the statement on 
 parental cooperation had undergone slight 
 modification: 
 
 The efforts of teachers and prefects will 
 be much facilitated if parents or guardians 
 will cooperate with them in maintaining 
 discipline and insisting on obedience to 
 regulations made for the purpose. Parents 
 are therefore asked: 
 
 1. To insist that the required amount of 
 time be devoted to home study. 
 
 2. To notify the Dean of Men immediately 
 in case of withdrawal of the son or of neces- 
 sary detention from, or late arrival at, class. 
 
 3. To give immediate attention to notifi- 
 cation always sent by the Dean of Men in 
 case of unexplained absence and also to any 
 complaint registered by the Dean of Studies 
 in regard to any considerable deficiency in 
 class standing. 
 
 Both the 1895 and the 1951 versions of the 
 plea for parental cooperation refer to home 
 study. During the thirty-eight years from 1913 
 to 1951, with the exception of the three years 
 1934-36, the catalogue had a paragraph on 
 home study, placed just before the section on 
 parental cooperation. This is the 1895 version: 
 Home Study. - All the endeavors of the 
 faculty will fail to insure success for the stu- 
 dents unless they apply themselves to their 
 studies with diligence and constancy out- 
 side of the class hours. Approximately 
 twenty-five hours a week are spent in class 
 work; and to prepare recitations and exer- 
 cises for this work, as well as to review the 
 matter previously seen, at least three hours 
 
 [ 9 ] 
 
of home study daily are required. Parents 
 and guardians are, therefore, urged to insist 
 on this application. 
 
 By 1951 the hours of class had decreased 
 but in turn the expectation of hours of home 
 study increased. After the same first sentence, 
 the 1951 statement read: “Approximately 
 
 nineteen hours a week are spent in class work, 
 and approximately two hours a day should be 
 spent in the preparation of each class assign- 
 ment.” 
 
 For a brief period, 1934-1939, the catalogue 
 contained a paragraph on Dishonesty in 
 Examinations: 
 
 Any student acting dishonestly or attempting 
 to act dishonestly in the course of a major 
 examination is subject to suspension, and if 
 readmitted must repeat the semester’s work 
 in the course in which he was taking the 
 examination. Any manifestation of dis- 
 honesty or any attempt at dishonesty in the 
 conduct of class repetitions, written or oral, 
 is subject to the sanction to be determined 
 upon at the discretion of the Professor of the 
 class and the Dean of Studies. 
 
 The year 1934 saw major additions and 
 innovations in the catalogue concerning student 
 conduct. In addition to the new admonition 
 regarding dishonesty in examinations, there 
 appeared for the first time a section about 
 parking on campus and a demerit system for 
 breaches of discipline. The rules on parking, 
 which were headed “Automobiles” and ap- 
 peared in the catalogue in the years 1934-1947, 
 indicated that student cars, with clearance 
 from the Dean of Discipline, were restricted 
 to what was called the College parking area. 
 That was the parking lot that used to lie to the 
 east of Gasson Hall before construction began 
 on the new library. It accommodated fewer 
 than 130 automobiles, but that was at a time 
 when the student population was under 1500. 
 Students were forbidden to park anywhere 
 else on campus or on any streets near the Col- 
 lege. Parking privileges were liable to forfei- 
 ture if the campus speed limit of twelve miles 
 an hour was exceeded. 
 
 The system of demerits was announced in 
 the catalogue for sixteen years, 1934-1950. 
 This explanation (with minor variations) ap- 
 
peared in the catalogue each of those years: 
 
 Problems of Discipline are regulated by a 
 system of Demerits. All Demerits are imposed 
 by the Dean of Discipline. 
 
 Disorder during College exercises: 1 to 
 
 5 demerits. 
 
 Smoking in forbidden places: 1 for first 
 offense; 3 for each subsequent offense. 
 
 Ungentlemanly conduct: I to 5 demerits. 
 
 Defacement of property: 1 to 3 demerits. 
 
 Deliberate violation of rules: 1 to 3 
 
 demerits. 
 
 Deliberate neglect to attend College exer- 
 cises: 1 to 3 demerits. 
 
 A student who incurs five (5) demerits is 
 put on probation. One who is on probation 
 will be debarred from all participation in 
 extra-curricular activities, and may be 
 obliged to report for special work at 9:30 
 A.M. on the four Saturdays following the 
 imposition of probation. 
 
 A student who incurs ten (10) demerits in 
 any year will be dropped from the College. 
 At the end of the year all demerits will be 
 cancelled except in the case of students who 
 incur probation after May 1st. The probation 
 of these students will be continued during 
 the First Semester of the following year. 
 
 The postwar period brought to campus the 
 hordes of mature students who were veterans 
 as well as a new breed of student for whom the 
 exhortation to “home study” was inappropriate, 
 namely, the resident student. More compli- 
 cated times required more detailed rules cover- 
 ing varied situations and these came to be re- 
 corded in documents other than the College 
 catalogue. Early in the 1950s there appeared 
 a small booklet titled “Boston College Student 
 Hand Book” which gave information about 
 student government, extracurricular activities, 
 annual academic awards, academic regulations, 
 religious customs, with a final four page (out of 
 forty pages) section on discipline. In the one 
 year 1956-57 the College catalogue, as if to 
 explain its own silence on a number of topics 
 of interest to undergraduates, called attention 
 to the existence of the Student Hand Book. 
 
 From that time on there were no references 
 in the catalogue specifically under the heading 
 of discipline. But it is interesting that two 
 
 [ 11 ] 
 
matters came to be included under “College 
 Regulations” for the first time that are de- 
 portment-related. From 1957 through 1965 
 there was an item on the annual retreat, a 
 practice that had been in effect for over ninety 
 years. The statement was the following: “All 
 Catholic students are required to make a 
 Retreat sometime during the academic year. 
 Failure to comply with this requirement will 
 result in the student’s withdrawal from the 
 College.” These were late pre-Vatican II days 
 when there was little embarrassment about 
 compulsion in matters religious and less sen- 
 sitivity to freedom and conscience than be- 
 came the vogue a decade later. Perhaps there 
 were rumblings of discontent and it was felt 
 that a severe sanction had to be attached to 
 failure to comply with the retreat rule. 
 
 The second new item to be introduced under 
 “College Regulations” appeared in the cata- 
 logue from 1957 through 1966 under the head- 
 ing “Dress.” It read: “Students will not be 
 admitted to class unless they conform to 
 minimum standards of good taste in the matter 
 of dress. They are expected to wear suit coats 
 and ties, together with other articles of clothing 
 that show respect for themselves and others.” 
 By 1967, with the advent of flower people 
 and hippie haberdashery, the College ran 
 down the flag on dress standards, at least in 
 the catalogue. 
 
 This essay has been a brief review of Boston 
 College’s public statements, specifically, 
 catalogue statements about student deportment. 
 It is worth concluding with a comment about 
 the first student handbook in the 1950s which, 
 though its section on discipline was brief 
 (containing the paragraph on gentlemanly 
 conduct that had appeared in the catalogue in 
 the 1940s and the same rules on automobiles 
 as had entered the catalogue in 1934), was 
 preceded by a general statement that may be 
 called a philosophy of collegiate discipline 
 that seems to have undergirded administrative 
 thinking and ruling on student conduct since 
 1868. The handbook stated: 
 
 The college reserves the right to dismiss at 
 any time a student who fails to give satis- 
 factory evidence of earnestness of purpose 
 and active cooperation in all the require- 
 
ments, of conduct and academic work. In this 
 matter the college believes itself to be the bet- 
 ter judge of what affects the best interests of 
 the college and the student body. Once a 
 student registers and attends college, he 
 is held responsible for the regulations and 
 traditions of the college. 
 
 The statement reflects the paternalistic and 
 institutionally self-assured approach to mat- 
 ters disciplinary that was common through- 
 out academe until the advent in the 1960s of 
 student activism and litigation with ensuing 
 “due process” procedures and elaborate judicial 
 boards for disciplinary problems. Besides its 
 statement of a philosophy of disciplinary action, 
 the Student Hand Book contained another 
 feature that reflected the fatherly and simple 
 spirit of an earlier time, namely, a series of 
 moral exhortations or generalizations sprinkled 
 throughout the text of the booklet. At the bottom 
 of every other page or so, printed in bold face 
 type, were maxims or warnings such as these: 
 
 Boston College men are always conscious 
 of the importance of their position, whether 
 at the College or away from it. 
 
 The use of slang, even in sports, is not 
 the mark of an educated gentleman. 
 
 Boston College students always raise their 
 hats as a mark of respect to their professors 
 both clerical and lay. 
 
 Upper classmen at Boston College take a 
 brotherly interest in the members of the 
 Freshman class. 
 
 Jackets, not sweaters, may be worn in the 
 classrooms. 
 
 Noise in the college corridors creates a 
 general disorder and confusion. Order is 
 the rule of your College. 
 
 Boston College men are always good 
 sports even when losing. 
 
 Does your example inspire others to aspire 
 to the “Heights”? 
 
 Such an open approach to the inculcation of 
 order, urbanity, and civility seems closer today 
 to the 1860s than the 1980s even though the 
 Hand Book was in circulation only three 
 decades ago. Styles and expressions of moral 
 leadership change with changing times and 
 colleges are not so direct today in their atten- 
 tion to decorum and order. 
 
For the better part of a century Boston Col- 
 lege’s only or principal expression of rules for 
 student conduct was contained in the annual 
 catalogue. The nature and brevity of the rules 
 suggest an unworried and unpetty administra- 
 tion, and a civilized and unboisterous student 
 body. 
 
NOTES 
 
 'Frederick Rudolph, The American College 
 and University (New York: Alfred Knopf, 
 
 1968), p. 105. 
 
 2E. Merton Coulter, College Life in the Old 
 South (New York: Macmillan, 1928), p. 77. 
 
 Ubid. 
 
 ‘^Coulter, pp. 78-79. 
 
 ^George B. Manhart, DePauw Through the 
 Years (Greencastle, Indiana: DePauw Univer- 
 sity, 1962), Vol. I, p. 145. 
 
 ^Coulter, p. 81. 
 
 ^Rudolph, p. 106. 
 
 ''Committee of the Alumni Association, 
 A History of Haverford College (Philadelphia: 
 Porter and Coates, 1892), p. 356. 
 
 ■^Nora Chaffin, Trinity College, 1839-1899: 
 The Beginnings of Duke University (Durham, 
 N.C.: Duke University Press, 1950), p. 281. 
 
 "'Arthur Hope, C.S.C., Notre Dame: One 
 Hundred Years (Notre Dame, Indiana: Univer- 
 sity Press, 1943), p. 142. 
 
 "David R. Dunigan, S.J., A History of Bos- 
 ton College (Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing 
 
 Co., 1947), p. 31. 
 
 [ 15 ] 
 
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