Hollinger Corp. pH8.5 LB 2387 .S6 Copy 1 ■ [ Whole Number 164J U. S. BUREAU OF EDUCATION. BULLETIN No. 1, 1890 HOxNORARY DEGREES AS CONFERRED IN AMERICAN COLLEGES BY CHARLES FORSTER SMITH, A. M., Ph. D. PROFESSOR OF GREEK IN VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY [A PAPER READ BEFORK THE NATIONAL EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION AT Nashville, Tenn., July, 1889.] WASHINGTON GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 1890 9- Qc HONORARY DEGREES, AS CONFERRED IN AMERICAN COLLEGES. Twenty-two years ago President D. C. Gilman called attention in the Nation (August 1, 1867) to some of the evils connected with the whole- sale bestowal of honorary doctorates in law and theology, asserting that " the mode in which honorary degrees are conferred in this coun- try is a sham and a shame." " It is so easy to get a degree," he charges, '' so many men of slight acquisitions have obtained degrees, that it is now the way to apply for these honors ; and if the secret sessions of college corporations were made public there* would be an astounding revelation of intimations and open requests and indorsements. Mem- bers of the faculties of colleges are constantly applied to to lend their influence to secure a doctorate for this person or that. By designed coincidences letters are sometimes received from distant points and from very different writers, calling attention to the peculiar merits of this or that candidate, and recommending him to favorable considera- tion." Ex-President Woolsey, also, in an article on " Academic Degrees," published in the Century, July, 1884, says: "If there are excrescences in the system, such as seem to be hurtful to the advance of real study, every educated man ought to desire that they should disappear. Such we hold to be honorary degrees, especially doctorates in law and in theology ; and we believe them to be so little in accord with solid learn- ing that we could wish them to be suppressed, or, if that is impossible, checked and regulated." " The desire to obtain the honor is a desire which no man should indulge," says he further, " and yet the uncer- tainty and unreasonableness of the rules of selection provoke such a desire, especially in persons who have no good claims by which it can be justified." My own experience confirms for the South the truth of the charges made by these distinguished college men against the American mode of conferring honorary degrees. Before the first commencement after I became a member of the faculty of a college in South Carolina a re- 3 4 HONOKARY DEGREES. quest was received from certain gentlemen of a distant State asking that the degree of D. D. be conferred on Reverend , of that State. In addition ^to the high qualifications claimed for the reverend gentleman, it was stated that he had written a book, and it was thought that the degree would aid him in getting a publisher and help the sale of the book. Not a member of the faculty knew the candidate or any of his friends, and they promptly declined to recommend the bestowal of the degree. Another request that I remember was signed by two or three very well-known clergymen asking that a doctorate in theology be granted a preacher from a distant State, who was practically unknown to every member of the faculty, the only ground for the request, so far as known, being the fact that the nominee had been elected to some important church office. I was told that such requests had been not infrequent in the history of the institution. But suppose the college had been weak enough to yield, what would have been the effect? The uninitiated would of course have taken the fact that the degree came from a distant college as proof of the extensive reputation of the new doctor. A young preacher of promise, considerably under thirty years of age, told me sometime ago that, being one day at Dr. B.'s, that gentleman said to him, " I am writing to College, to ask that the degree of D. D. be conferred on Mr. A.;" and added, " If you would like the degree, I'll offer your name, too.'? The young man declined ; but Mr. A. got the de- gree. I happen to know that Mr. A.'s name was sent at the same time to another college, which declined to grant him the honor, and thus deprived him of the great glory of being doubly dubbed. I believe that the above is not an uncommon way of securing honorary degrees, especially that of D. D. The ablest preachers generally get the degree, but so many others receive the same honor that its value is greatly impaired. President Woolsey's remark that " They carry with them no evidence of learning, but only a certain indefinite superiority above others in the same sacred calling," is eminently true. One of the ablest -men whom Ten- nessee has produced used to say : " Some men are doctored for their learning, some for general ability; but I was doctored on the demand of the people." I venture to say that seldom does a college take the trouble to ascertain what qualifications in the way of erudition or lit- erary ability the candidate may have. Prominence, general reputation, preaching ability, success as an evangelist, determine the bestowal so far as the recipient is concerned ; various motives of policy often influ- ence the college. A striking example in proof is at hand. One of the strongest literary institutions in the South has lately conferred D. D. on a man who, if he had continued his college course, would at the time he received his doctorate have, just finished his Junior year in Yander- bilt University. The causa honoris in this case was a successful pas- torate in the college town. HONORAEY DEGREES. 5 It not uncommonly happens that the preachers, the newspapers, the people, doctor a man before the colleges are called in. A city could easily be mentioned where a preacher of any prominence is seldom in- troduced to an audience, or mentioned in the papers, except as "doctor,'^ and this without any regard for the facts in the case. It was observed at the General Conference of the Methodist Church, held in Nashville in 1882, that on some occasions the presiding bishop recognized every preacher \yho rose to speak as "Doctor , from ." And at the meeting of the same body in Richmond, 188G, it is said the com- mittee on public worship, announcing the appointments for the various pulpits the following Sunday, read every appointee as ''doctor," until the matter became so ridiculous that the Conference burst into laughter. It is not to be supposed that anybody was in donbt as to anybody's title. It simply is, or is getting to be, the custom. The evil we complain of, like so many others in educational matters, has come from the over-multiplication of small colleges ; and the ab- surdity to which honorary degree giving has been carried in some of the weaker back-woods or " one-horse" colleges is almost beyond belief. The story that went the rounds of the papers, a year or two back, about a Texas university whose faculty consisted of a father and two sons, the latter of whom conferred the degree of LL.D. on the old gen- tleman, receiving in return each a doctorate of philosophy from the grateful sire, created not a little amusement, and was doul^tless consid- ered only a huge joke. But if the Texas story was considered too funny to be true, what will be thought of this which comes from Arkansas and is vouched for by a preacher : " Springs " had got on a boom, like most other South- ern towns and springs, and the public-spirited citizens determined that they needed, not, as the General Court of Massachusetts in 1647, a school, but in conformity with the era of booms, a college. They were persuaded to this action by a sewing-machine agent, who pro- posed to be president of the institution. One load of lumber was brought and thrown down upon the lot selected for the college, and on this the board of trustees took their seats and held their first session. The only business transacted was the election of the sewing-machine agent to the degree of D. D., after which they adjourned — to meet no more, for the man with the needle left with his degree, and the college was abandoned. There are competent witnesses still living who could testify in the case of the, man who in consideration of a donation of $10,000 to a cer- tain college, now happily defunct, was to receive a doctorate in theol- ogy. The college iierformed its part, but the donation was not made. If that gentleman had only known of the institution which is said to have conferred D. D. on the generous donor of a Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, he might have gone tlowu to the grave with the coveted title, and a better name for honesty in keeping his contracts. 6 HONORARY DEGREES. In Tennessee, two at least, within my knowledge, of the so-called *' female colleges " have conferred honorary doctorates of law or divin- ity. One of these cases happened on this wise: The "female college" was about to die of inanition, and the president, calling the board of trustees together for the last time, got them to confer the degree of LL. D. upon himself and two others, one a popular preacher. A very good remark about honorary doctorates of this character is credited to the Rev. Sam Jones. Meeting one day two D. D.'s of recent brand, he said : " So, brethren, you are D. D.'s now *? Well, that thing is coming to me some of these days. I feel it in my bones. Not that I am going up to it; but when I see such men as you getting it, I know it is coming down, and will get to me after a while." Most colleges in the South and West, if not in the East, receive doubtless many curious and even amusing applications for the condi- tions of examination for doctor degrees. The most ambitious appli- cant that ever came under my personal observation was the author of the following letter, which the secretary of a leading south-western college allowed me to copy three years ago: *' Dear Sir : I wish to know what will be required of me to obtain the degree D. C. L. of University. I took of College, in 1880, A. B. ; 1881, A. M. ; in 1884, Doctor of Philology. I have been admitted to the Supreme Court of . and have practiced law in almost two years. I have read everything pre- scribed in the law course of Albany, Ann Arbor, Vanderbilt, Yale, Harvard, Missouri University, anSi Has*ings Law College, for LL. B., and outside. I am exceedingly anxious to obtain D. C. L. As I have three degrees from Alma Mater, I should like the other to come across the Rockies. Pardon my ambition. Related mater- nally to the well-known Patrick Henry and paternally to J. C. Calhoun, I am doubly fired. Could I take your requirements without actual attendance? I will stand an examination forwarded by you to any member of College, or to any gentleman in . If actual attendance is required, could I be favored with a tutorship in languages, rhetoric, literature, elocution, or history, whilst taking the course ? I should hate to give up my law practice and go east, unless I could recompense with a tutorship, partially. Young men in the West need to stick to their territory. We will discuss that after hearing from you on the course. Let me hear from you im- mediately." In order to ascertain as nearly as possible what are the exact facts with regard to the bestowal of honorary degrees in the United States, I have made a laborious and careful study of the reports of the Com- missioner of Education for the fourteen years (1872-1885) for which we have information on the subject of honorary degrees. The following is the result :* * For convenience, I class all doctorates of law and letters under LL.D., and all doctorates of theology under D.D. Prof. John Williams White suggested, in his speech before the Scientific Association, August, 1881, that the favor into which S.T.D. had recently been growing in this country indicates, perhaps, " an attempt on the part of the clergymen to escape the odium attaching to the D. D. " HONORARY DEGREES. Tear. D. D. LL.D. Ph.D. Totals. 1872 138 169 191 125 137 148 157 148 132 164 188 196 195 185 90 107 71 67 69 .58 78 106 65 92 102 91 100 101 7 17 15 19 26 19 31 33 29 49 30 36 25 22 235 1873 : 293 1874 277 187 J '. 211 1870 232 1877 225 1878 266 1879 287 1880 226 1881 305 1882 ... . . . ... ..» . 320 323 1884 320 308 2,273 1,191 358 3, 822* * There may be, here and there, a slight error in the count, but it has been made with great care,, and may be depended on as substantially correct. It will be observed that, though there is some fluctuation^ the num- ber of honorary degrees conferred, especially doctorates of divinity and philosophy, is on the whole growing. An important question in the- matter of increase is this : Does the number of colleges conferring hon- orary doctorates increase in proportion to the number of degrees be- stowed ? This is answered by the table here given. Colleges re- porting to Com- missioner of Education. Number confer- ring honorary doctorates. Number con- ferring D. D. Number con- ferring LL. D. Number con- ferring Ph. D. 1872 298 327 374 258 289 260 273 281 • 287 306 336 308 347 283 83 105 103 80 101 100 96 104 88 112 124 117 139 117 67 82 93 65 72 83 79 83 71 92 103 97 108 94 51 57 45 39 51 43 47 56 44 56 54 61 64 67 7 1873 13 1874 1875 10 12 1876 20 1R77 14 1878 21 1879 17 1880 18 1881 29 1882 17 1883 26 1884 19 1885 19 • It will thus be seen that the number of colleges conferring honorary degrees a little more than keeps pace with the number of colleges re. ported each year. The whole number of separate colleges that con- ferred honorary doctorates between 1872 and 1885 was 250, distributed over thirty-six States, two Territories, and the District of Columbia. Ohio heads the list, by right, as having more colleges and universities than any other State, with twenty -four; followed by Pennsylvania witb twenty-three, Illinois with eighteen, Tennessee and New York with seventeen each, Iowa with twelve, Indiana eleven, the remainder from eight to one. In the six New England States there were conferred from 1872 to 1885,. D. D., 264, LL. D., 272j in the four Middle States, D. D., 570, LL. D., 262 j 8 . HONORARY DEGREES. in thirteen Southern States (including Missouri and West Virginia), D. D., 656, LL. D., 343; in twelve Western States and two Territories, B. D,, 757, LL. D., 278; in the District of Coluinbia, D. D., 12, LL. D., 3!. It will be observed that in New England the two degrees are conferred in nearly equal numbers, while in the Middle and Southern States about twice as many D. D.'s are bestowed as LL. D.'s, and in the West- ern States the proportion is nearly three to one. With regard to Ph. D. as an honorary degree. President Woolsey has this to say in his excellent article: "The degree of Pb. D., which in -Germany is what M. A. has been in England and the United States, has been for a few years used among us as a degree conferred, on ex- amination, upon students in science. There certainly can be no objec- tion to this novelty, if the examination is severe and thorough. But some colleges, chiefly, if not entirely, seated in the Western States, went beyond this and gave the degree to some who, without an examination for it, had gained some distinction in physical science. It was according to logic and analogy so to do ; but a convention of scientific men, more than a year since, protested against the extension of the field of honors, and their protest has been received, we judge, with no dissatisfaction by the country." If I understand President Woolsey aright, his statement is a little misleading. The resolution adopted by the American Philological Association, at the meeting held in Cleveland, Ohio, July, 1881, and con- curred in by the American Association for the Advancement of Science at its next meeting, held in Cincinnati, August, 1881, was as follows : Whereas many college^ in the United States tave, in recent years, conferred the degree of doctor of philosophy, not by examination, but honoris causa : be it Resolved, That this association deprecates the removal of this degree from the class to which it belongs (namely, B. D., LL. B., M. D., and Ph. D., degrees conferred after examination), and its transfer to the class of honorary degrees. • My impression Is that in most cases where Ph. D. has been conferred it has been given as a sort of lower LL. D., and just as LL. D. would be given, with or without regard to attainments in physical science. In «very instance that has come within my own knowledge this has been the case. In one other point, too, President Woolsey is wrong. Many persons, doubtless, have supposed, as he did, that the colleges thus conferring Ph. D. as an honorary degree were " chiefly if not entirely seated in the Western States." But the report of the Commissioner of Educa- tion tells a different tale. From 1872 to 1885, inclusive, 358 honorary doctorates of philosophy were conferred in the United States, and 156 of these were given in New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey, while only 107 were given in ten Western States. New Eng- land has a better record in this respect than the three Middle States. But 44 honorary doctorates of philosophy were conferred in New Eng- land colleges, Dartmouth leading, with 20; Williams, University of HONORARY DEGREES. 9 Vermont, and Amherst, 5 each ; Bowdoin and Lewis College, 3 each ; Colby, Bates, and Maine Agricultural aud Mechanical College, 1 each. In twelve Southern States 44 such doctorates were conferred, and 6 in the District of Columbia. All will readily agree with President Woolsey in his objection to the custom which has come into vogue of making the degree honorary ; it is simj)ly that he is wrong as to geographical distri- bution. It is a pity that the custom has not been confined to small colleges, for then it might easily be rendered ridiculous, aud so checked; but when such a protest as that of the philological and scientific associations is unheeded by institutions like Princeton, Amherst, Michigan Uni- versity, Lafayette, Dartmouth, Hamilton, Madison, Union, Dickinson, Western Reserve, University of Wisconsin, University of North Car- olina, De Pauw, University of the City of New York, all of which conferred Ph. D. as an honorary degree the year after the protest or later, it can not be hoped that the weaker institutions. West, South, or East, will seriously heed the protests of scholars. Perhaps nothing shows more clearly how serious is the evil connected with the bestowal of honorary degrees, complained of by Presidents Woolsey and Gilman, than the growth of the custom of conferring Ph. D. as an honorary doctorate. The value of the degree, which in Germany is the reward purely of scholarship as proved by examination and other tests, was speedily imi)aired when colleges big and little all over the land began to confer it as a sort of inferior LL. D. A table will easily show the spread of this as an honorary degree. Number col- leges confer- ring Ph. D. Number hon- orary Ph. D. 's conferred. 1872 7 13 10 12 20 14 21 17 18 29 17 26 19 19 7 1873.: 17 1874 15 1875 19 1876 . .. 26 1877. . 19 1878 31 1879 33 1880 29 1881 49 1882 30 1883 36 1884 25 1885 22 It will be seen that the protest of the philological and scientific asso- ciations had seemingly some temporary effect, inasmuch as there was a drop down from 29 colleges conferring 49 honorary doctorates of phil- osophy in 188], to 17 colleges with 30 such degrees in 1882; but the very next year the number of colleges so bestowing the degree had again risen to 25 and the degrees to 36. The worst feature of the matter, however, is not the increase in the number of honorary doctorates of philosophy, but in the advance in the 10 HONORARY DEGREES. number of colleges, especially small colleges — Western, Middle, and Southern — so conferring the degree. For we find that whereas only seven colleges from 5 States so conferred the degree in 1872, up to 1885 one hundred and eleven colleges from 32 States had so bestowed it. These included all the Middle States, 4 New England, 10 Western, 13 Southern, and the District of Columbia. In other words, the custom has spread over the whole country. A hasty glance at the list of 111 colleges that have conferred honorary Ph. D.'s will show that while a number of leading colleges — some of which were mentioned above — have set thebad example, it has been followed chiefly by the smaller and weaker colleges of the Middle, Western, and Southern States.* With regard to A. M., the custom was formerly well-nigh universal in American colleges of conferring this second degree three years after graduation on those of their graduates who were engaged in a literary calling, or had prosecuted further studies in any branch. The Univer- sity of Virginia introduced the English custom of conferring A. M. on examination, just as A. B. Of late years most of the best colleges have adopted this plan; but very many, perhaps most, colleges that confer honorary degrees, though they may have ceased to give A. M. three years after graduation to any of their graduates who apply, still confer it as an honorary degree on their own graduates or others. In 1880 — I looked no farther back — 119 honorary A. M.'s were conferred ; in 1881, 180 ; in 1882, 138 ; in 1883, 149 ; in 1884, 178 ; in 1885, 140. In these six years, too, I find at least 25 colleges not reported as confer- ring honorary doctorates which conferred A. M., thus swelling the num- ber to 275. Moreover, as the term " in course" leaves it undetermined whether the degree is conferred on examination or three years after graduation on application, it is reasonable to infer that the number of actual honorary A. M.'s is very much greater still. One fact of promise for the future is that most of the recently founded, well-endowed and equipped colleges and universities do not confer hon- orary degrees. The University of Virginia in this, as in so many other respects, set a good example to other institutions, and has never since the opening in 1825 deijarted from the rule to confer no honorary de- grees. She has had a goodly and eminently respectable, if not large, following in Johns Hopkins, Boston University, University of Cali- fornia, Vanderbilt,t Purdue, Tulane, University of Texas, and in three of the four best female colleges, namely. Smith, Wellesley, and Bryn Mawr. * As to individual colleges, the highest number of honorary doctoi'ates of philosophy during the fourteen years belongs to Lafayette, namely, 24 ; next comes Princeton, 21 ; then Dartmouth, 20 ; the University of Wooster, 20 ; University of the City of New York, 15 ; Hamilton, 16 ; Washington and Jefferson, 13 ; Union, 11 ; Madison University and Pennsylvania College, 7 each ; University of Michigan, 7 ; Western Reserve College, 6 ; the others, from 5 to 1. t Reserves the right to confer honorary degrees, but has exercised it only once, and then gave ample reasons for making an exception to its announced rule of con- duct in favor of an eminent scholar. . HONORARY DEGREES. 11 Honorary degrees properly bestowed and ia reasonable number could not be detrimental. In the best educational systems of Europe they still obtain. But it is clear that the reductio ad absurdum is about accomplished in the United States. At least 365 universities and col- leges have the right to confer honorary degrees, and within fourteen years 275 separate institutions are found to have exercised the right. And this makes no allowance for the colleges that confer degrees but do not report. These would swell the number considerably. In 1872 the Commissioner of Education received reports from 298 colleges, and of these 83 conferred 235 honorary doctorates. Thirteen years later (1884) he received reports from 347 colleges, but this time 139 colleges conferred 320 honorary doctorates. Can even so great a country as the United States produce learned 'men, great men, or even strong men, sufficient to keep the mills going? But are all these institutions really entitled — except by their charters — to confer honorary degrees ? Pres- ident Woolsey thinks, " Where, in a place of learning a certain branch of study is not taught, there ought to be no degrees given in it." Ap- plying this test, we find that only 48 colleges and universities were re- ported in 1884 as having theological departments, but a single glance at many of the names in the list shows that if the doctorates might, by being limited to these, be lessened in number, they would not be im- proved in quality. Several honorary degrees have recently been conferred by the great colleges on women — and surely no one can find fault with this if the degrees are confined to such women — and this will help for a time to briug up the general average of quality among the doctors. But even this new supply can give only temporary relief. With 250 colleges giving honorary doctorates, the market is sure to be overstocked, and values to depreciate. Then, too, if the boards of trustees of two or three so-called "female colleges " have conferred honorary doctorates, what is to hinder the j)ractice from becoming general ? What if the legion of these so-called "female colleges" all over the South and South -West had taken to conferring honorary degrees, and had bestowed these honors after the manner in which most of them now grant their diplomas *? Add the fact that at least two military academies and six agricultural colleges and industrial universities (which, President Woolsey supposes, "would not think of conferring the degree with which we have to do") have conferred honorary doctorates. What is to hinder others from doing likewise ? Is it not, after all, a mercy that matters are not worse ? As to the remedy : I know no better cure for the evils herein detailed than the suggestion of President Gil man. He proposes: "First, the older and firmer colleges might refuse to give honorary degrees under any circumstances. The smaller and younger colleges would be likely to follow the example. This would be the simplest and easiest mode of remedying the abuse. Or, secondly, doctorates in law or theology 12 HONORARY DEGREES. might be given on examination, the candidate o 021 345 094 3 ( candidates for the baccalanreate, openly and honorably, with a thesis or treatise which should exhibit his attainments. This is the usage c some of the foreign universities. Or, thirdly, a college might declar its purpose to advance its own graduates to honorary distinctions o certain recognized principles of promotion — the publication of som scholarly work, the accomplishment of some literary task, or the attair ment of some high position. In every case the reasons for bestowiuj the degree should be openly avowed. If a man is made doctor of laws the public have a right to know whether it means he has fought a battle or is on the right side in politics, or is a donor to the extent of fiv< thousand dollars and upwards. " h A ,^S.£»aiil9 021 345 094 3 ''m. .^■■< ^^,=v.v\v