The Fraternity and the College (collection)/The Fraternity and Its Alumni
There has been for some time, perhaps, a pretty general feeling that Greek-letter fraternities are more or less on trial to prove their worth and their efficiency. The general public has heard much in the last few years concerning high school fraternities and college fraternities, and much that it has heard is discreditable to them. There have been heated discussions in home circles and school boards, in school faculties and state legislatures, and the public, knowing little, has believed the worst, and has put all fraternities into the same disreputable class. The fraternities have been judged by the worst and the most foolish things that have been published about them. It has seemed to me that the alumni of college fraternities, scattered as they are throughout the whole country, may do more than any one else by sane influence, and sane advice, and sane conduct, to lift fraternities to a high plane, to correct the faults which even their warmest friends are willing to admit still exist, and to present to those who are outside of these organizations a fair exposition of what the college fraternity really stands for, and what it is doing.
The experience in college of these men who have gone out from the fraternity should give them an intimate knowledge of undergraduate life, and it should give them, too, a knowledge of the needs of undergraduates, their habits, their weaknesses, and the methods of influencing them. If the fraternity has faults no one is in a better position than the alumni to correct them, and no one is in a better position than are these men to set the fraternity right before outsiders, for having been out in the world a while they know what the world thinks and says of fraternities and ought to be able to meet the varied objections that are made to them.
"I don't like your fraternities," one of our old graduates said to me not long ago. "When I was in college we had only the literary societies, and they taught a man something, and developed a really democratic spirit." Now I know very well, because I had belonged to the same literary society that he had been a member of, at a time when fraternities were not allowed in the University of Illinois, that the literary societies here, as is the case in many other places now, were quite exclusive, were not democratic, and that they controlled college politics with an absolute completeness that would never be attempted by the modern fraternity. My friend did not know the college fraternity, which is in fact very similar in many respects to the literary society as he knew it, and he had forgotten the character of the organization to which he had belonged. It is this sort of error which old fraternity men may very easily correct.
My own college experience has been gathered very largley at the University of Illinois and my illustrations will, therefore, be chosen in most part from that experience. I think it is safe to assume, however, that the majority of the larger institutions of the country, especially the great state universities, are similar as to fraternity conditions and that my own experience is in the main not different from that which I should find were I located in some other institution. At the University of Illinois, then, I find that our alumni have exerted both a helpful and a harmful influence. Many of them use every opportunity to aid the fraternity to develop in the best way, and others have been the most objectionable influence with which we have had to contend both in their effect upon the conduct of local chapters and in the general influence which they exert among men who have little first hand knowledge of fraternities.
In the giving of financial aid our alumni have always been active. It is true that a few are willing to ride without paying their fare, or to enjoy the prestige and the privileges of a good house without helping to build it. Some still owe their board bills, though they find ample opportunity to criticize the present management of their organization when they visit it, and some have made promises of help which have resulted only in worthless slips of paper; but on the whole the alumni have shown the keenest financial interest in the local chapter and have been generous beyond what might have been expected in giving money. They have helped whenever the local chapters have got into financial corners, and this help came at a time when it was most needed.
We have, at the University of Illinois, between thirty-five and forty fraternal organizations, the most of them members of national fraternities. These chapters are all organized in about the same general way and carry an average membership of perhaps thirty. The two oldest of these organizations have been in existence for thirty-three years during ten years of which they were sub rosa, and they have a body of prominent and influential alumni. A number of our chapters have been organized for twenty years or more, and the majority have been running for ten or fifteen years. A few are of recent origin, and so have a small list of alumni, but for the most part the body of alumni of each chapter is considerable and its standing throughout the communities in which the members live is excellent. Eleven of our chapters own comfortable and well-furnished houses. The plans for the erection of these houses were in each case devised by interested alumni, the money for their erection has come in large part from the alumni, and the management and control of these investments is in each case, I believe, now in the hands of a corporation composed largely of alumni. The building of these houses has drawn heavily upon the time and resources of a large number of men and shows a thoroughly commendable interest on their part. A number of the other chapters through the generosity of the old members are also in a fair way soon to have houses of their own. In many other ways the alumni regularly contribute liberally to the financial support of the chapters, so that in this regard the fraternities have very little of which they may legitimately complain.
I can not commend too highly the unselfish efforts which many of these men have put forth in their desire to erect chapter houses for their fraternities. Few of our alumni are wealthy and those few are quite as often as not unwilling to give liberally. It is the rank and file, the men of moderate means or men with small salaries who have given the money. Professional men just starting—lawyers, doctors, business men—have been willing to devote their time generously to these enterprises with no possibility of personal gain. In fact the contrary has often been the result, for the man who stands at the head of these house-building schemes is in no sense likely to increase his popularity with those who have been persuaded to help champion the project. Our success in building houses for our fraternities, however, shows that many of our alumni have been generous and unselfish in the matter of giving money.
But notwithstanding the importance of money in the management and the progress of the affairs of an individual or an organization, I have never felt that the whole duty of a parent was done when he furnished his young son with generous sums of money, or that a fraternity alumnus had discharged all of his fraternity obligations when he responded graciously to a call for contributions to the house fund or sent in a check to be used in defraying the expenses of the annual dance. The fraternity often and usually needs financial support, but it needs something more than this, if it is to get on. The active chapter of any fraternity should be able to look to its alumni for direction and advice and example in those things in which the older men have had the wider experience. The alumni should give character and stability to the chapter; they determine its family history and its standing in the wider sense of the word. In college, for example, that fraternity is often considered the most fortunate which can show in the college annual the longest list of prominent fratres in facultate or the most impressive list of brothers who live in the college community, or whose names can be found in Who's Who. At rushing time at least the alumni are often made one of the strongest parts of the argument. They are brought in if possible as show pieces, and the photographs of those who may have attained any degree of prominence are proudly exhibited. The fraternity who can show that one of its alumni is or has been in the presidential chair usually feels that its cause is won. The actual importance and worth of such members is sometimes small indeed.
It may be argued with convincingness by freshmen and by others who know little or nothing at first hand about it, that the alumni on the faculty, because of their sympathy with young men, their knowledge of the conditions surrounding college life, their wide experience in fraternity matters, and their specific interest in the local chapter, will be helpful and an uplifting influence. It ought to be true, but in too many instances it is not. A sensible faculty member who is willing to take a little time and to use a little tact could easily reorganize a chapter if he would do so, and yet make the members think that they had done it themselves. It is not difficult to find conspicuous examples of faculty men some of them prominent and all of them busy who by persistent and diplomatically directed efforts have succeeded in changing for the better the whole character and standing of their fraternities. I have in mind now two well-known men in this University—one the head of an important department and the other one of our most prominent executive officers—each of whom has revolutionized his fraternity. From one of these I received only yesterday a letter saying, "Tell me about the boys. Do any of them need prodding up or encouragement?" He knows the ins and outs of his fraternity like a book; he is acquainted with the weak brother, and he can lay his finger on the man who will take responsibility and who will accomplish what needs to be done. He gets all this with skill, and gentle diplomacy, and without the expenditure of a great amount of time. He is a busy man who drops in upon the boys for a moment and out again, and who says the right word when, to and whom, it needs to be said. He is helping this fraternity and he is helping all other fraternities, and is the sort of alumnus whom I am glad to encourage. The other man has accomplished a similar result, and from the bottom of the list scholastically he has helped to bring his fraternity into the list of the ten highest in college. He knows all the men personally, he has won their confidence, and his advice is asked and followed on all occasions. Much more could have been accomplished and that more easily, if these men could have had the coöperation of the other alumni on the faculty who, in many cases, had more leisure and who were under quite as much obligation to help as were the men who actually did the job.
Unfortunately, however, my experience has been that more than half of the fraternity alumni in a university take little or no interest in the personnel or progress of their fraternity, and would not even recognize their fraternity brothers if they should meet them on the street. They have their names printed at the head of the list published in the college year book, or it is engraved upon the program of the formal annual dance, but if they were suddenly ushered into the chapter house, they would not know Smith from Knappenberger, or the president of the chapter from the freshman who is being rushed, and they feel as lonesome and out of place as a blind man at a ballet. Every once in a while I fall in with these "brothers" who are invited out once a year or once in two years, perhaps, to meet the members of the chapter, and I watch with interest their struggles to get on, their embarrassment at knowing no one, their relief when the meal is over and they can get by themselves and discuss the present economic situation of the European war. I know a number of fraternities who count among their faculty members several men of prominence not one of whom could name three undergraduate members of the fraternity, and who do not in any way make an effort to help their organizations. I know dozens of members of our faculty who could easily find the time if they wished to get acquainted with the members of their fraternity, and to help brace up the chapter if only by their occasional presence, who know little more about the organization than the location of the chapter house. As to the real life and character of the boys they know nothing, and so the positive influence which they might exert for the betterment of the organization is lost.
The excuses given by faculty men for their lack of interest in their fraternities or lack of attention to them is most often that they do not have the time, but those who do find the time are often the ones who have most to do and who do most. Others allege that there is a certain embarrassment likely to follow any familiar acquaintance with individual students, and they wish to keep themselves free from these entanglements. If such an embarrassing situation does arise when a member of the faculty shows a little personal interest in the members of his fraternity it is more likely to be the fault of the faculty man than of the student. In all the years that I have been associated with students I have never known a member of the faculty to be criticized for showing too much interest in any individual student whether he were a fraternity brother or otherwise. The faculty brother is most favorably situated to give help to the local chapter and ought to do so far more frequently than he does.
The same things might be said with reference to the alumni who are not connected with the faculty but who live in the college town. The undergraduate looks perhaps with more favor upon the opinions and advice of the successful business man than he is likely to do upon that given by a member of the faculty who is, of course, in his eyes a mere theorist. A steady, sensible business man is a tower of strength to any fraternity if he will show interest. No old members of the fraternity are so favorably situated as are these two classes of alumni for directly influencing the chapters, and yet a distressingly large percentage of them assume no responsibility and show no interest.
The alumnus returning after a separation of time or distance is also to be considered. At every institution, I have no doubt, there are specific times of the year when a definite effort is made by fraternities to get the alumni back in force. It may be at commencement time, or at college anniversaries, or reunions, or at the celebrations of various college events. With us it is at the annual Home-coming, though any other event would serve the same purpose and might bring the same complications. The officers of the chapters send out letters of invitation to all the old members, a few of the local alumni—good fellows and unmarried usually—essay to help in the round-up, the attraction of a football game proves too much for the old timers, and they come back en masse. Such a return is full of possibilities. The freshman has heard of all these old heroes, and he wants to meet them. To many of them have come a measure of success and reputation, and the effect of their presence and the force of their words count for much in the life of the chapter. The effect of mingling with these men if they are healthy and sane and have the real good of the chapter in mind cannot be overestimated. But experience has shown that this is not always the case, and such a return is often a matter of concern to college authorities and to serious minded fraternity officers, for the returning alumnus, even though he has reached middle age, frequently forgets that he should have outgrown the follies of the freshman and too often feels that he must cast himself in the rôle of a sporty undergrad. The things he would not dream of doing in his own town and in his own house he falls into with eagerness in the chapter house. Instead of being looked on as influence for good and welcomed as a help in the building up of proper fraternity ideals, an effort is often made to conceal his escapades and the freshmen must sometimes be sent out of the house in order that they may not be a witness to his indiscretions. He does not see that whether he has been out one year or twenty in the eyes of the underclassmen, he is an "old man" who is to be looked up to as a hero, and to be followed as an example.
With us drinking and gambling are not allowed in the chapter houses, and all fraternities have definite rules against these practices which are pretty faithfully kept. "One of our alumni made so much betting on the Minnesota game that he is going to buy us a new rug," a freshman said to me not long ago. It did not seem to occur either to the freshman or to the alumnus that there was inconsistency in furnishing a house, in which gambling is prohibited, from the proceeds of money won by gambling. "The greatest shock and disillusionment I ever received," an upperclassman from a neighboring university recently confessed to me, "was to be called on in my freshman year to help put to bed one of the heroes and former athletes of our chapter who had returned to visit the college and the chapter, and who was brought into the house too drunk to help himself. All the influence for good which his reputation had had upon my life was wiped out by seeing him in that condition." "What are we to do?" the president of one of our most prominent fraternities asked me only a few weeks ago. "We have a house rule against drinking, but if our alumni are not furnished with something to drink they will be out of humor, will make us all unhappy, and will probably bring liquor into the house no matter what we say against it." One such experience will ruin all the good work which may have been done by the officers of the active chapter during the year.
Only this week I had a conversation with a group of old college men whose escapades had not been quite creditable and who excused themselves on the ground that what they had done would not influence the upperclassmen, and that they had not allowed the freshmen to take any part in the performance. It would be an imbecile lot of freshmen who did not know what was going on and who was either not ashamed of it or made worse by it. Not even the ritual sets before the undergraduate members of the fraternity the ideals of the organization as do the words and actions and general bearing of the returning alumnus. Without giving a word of direct precept he may yet leave behind him an influence and an inspiration which are immeasurable. If his return, however, is in order that he may live over again the follies of youth and if he leaves behind him the memory of a beery breath and a vulgar tongue he is not helping to raise the standards of fraternities as their best friends wish might be done. The sensible undergraduate officer of the fraternity always deplores such escapades, but he does not wish to seem discourteous to the returning alumnus or to make him angry, and he usually sees no way out of the embarrassment but to endure in the hope that the underclassmen will not notice the disgraceful proceeding or that he will be so disgusted with it as not to be injured by it.
The experienced alumnus may exert a powerful influence in the suggestion or advice which out of his wider experience he may offer to the chapter. Although the undergraduate fraternity man usually keeps in mind the fact that the responsibility for running the fraternity is on him and he wishes the alumnus also to keep this in mind, yet he is not averse to taking advice if it is offered at the proper time and in the right spirit. Sometimes, however, the alumnus, returning after an absence of many years, exaggerates the apparent faults of the chapter and attempts by a hammer and tongs method to correct them at once. Ordinarily he fails, and injures the chapter more than he helps it. Only a few days ago I listened to a young fraternity man out of college but a few years, criticising his fraternity most severely. He was somewhat incensed at me because I had found occasion to praise them for the stand they were taking in certain matters. "I jump on them," he said. "I believe in giving them hell; if they are praised it gives them the swell head." He could not see that being an alumnus he was an adviser rather than a director of the affairs of the chapter, and that the character of his criticisms destroyed his influence for good. Nor could he appreciate the fact that the chapter was in a better condition, had a better standing, and had higher ideals than when he was an active member of it. His presence was endured, but his advice, even such of it as was worth while, was entirely discredited.
I believe that those men who have been a part of the fraternity, who have worked for it and in it, and who have assimilated its ideals even though it be only in part, but who are now out of its active membership still love the organization though sometimes it may be with a somewhat dormant passion, and still want to help it. If the fraternity is to overcome present prejudice, if it is to reach a higher plane, it will be by the general coöperation of the members, active and alumni. In the world at large and in the communities from which our educational institutions draw students the alumni of fraternities are the only men who can truthfully present the facts about these organizations and who can correct the erroneous impressions which actually exist. They can spread the knowledge of what Greek-letter fraternities actually are, and they can better than any other men help to make them what they ought to be. The active chapters must draw their alumni and faculty members closer to them than they have heretofore done, and the returning alumnus must give his best endeavor to help the active chapter live up to its regulations and its ideals rather than to break them down in order that he may prove what a dead game sport he once was. The undergraduate members of a fraternity should be able to look to their alumni for financial help when it is needed, for some suggestion and advice, for examples of sterling self-controlled character which have been wrought out by striving for the ideals which the fraternity set up. In this way the alumni may do for the fraternity what no one else can do.