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Boston College Economics Programs Economist Market Economists

Boston College. Annual Economics Newsletters, 1978-2020

 

While preparing the previous post, I stumbled across an old departmental newsletter for Boston College archived at the website of Boston College’s economics department. A little more digging revealed that all departmental newsletters since 1978, when the first newsletter was prepared, can be downloaded from the Wayback Machine internet archive of web.archive.org. Forty-three years’ worth of newsletters provides us a treasure chest of detail. A link to an archived webpage with all the Boston College graduate economics placements from 2002-2019 has been appended to this post.

The inaugural doctoral programs in economics, education and history at Boston College were established in the academic year 1952—1953.

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Economic Newsletters of Boston College’s Department of Economics

1978 1979a
1979b
1980a
1980b
1981a
1981b
1982a
1982b
1983a
1983b
1984a
1984b

1985

1986

1987 1988 1989 1990
1991 1992 1993 1994

1995

1996

1997 1998 1999 2000
2001 2002 2003 2004

2005

2006

2007 2008 2009 2010
2011 2012 2013 2014

2015

2016

2017 2018 2019

2020

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Other stuff

Archived News from the Department of Economics.  From Dec 29, 2002 to September 13, 2007.

Boston College Economics Graduate Placements 2002-2019.

Categories
Columbia Economics Programs Economists Graduate Student Support

Columbia. List of 26 strong candidates applying for fellowships or scholarships, 1954

The following transcribed memo from 1954 was written to the President of Columbia University by Carter Goodrich. It appears to have been sent as evidence of what Goodrich had deemed “the fellowship problem”, i.e. “the inadequacy of our provisions for graduate aid”  resulting in no graduate applicants from the top U.S. and Canadian colleges and universities (excluding Columbia) except for one from Princeton and another from Bryn Mawr. The strongest applicants were “largely foreigners or refugees”. A list of the twenty-six top applicants was provided, with Peter Bain Kenen perhaps the one who was to cast the longest shadow going forward (and who incidentally went to Harvard and not Columbia for his graduate work). Leon Smolinski did obtain his Ph.D. in economics at Columbia and went on to teach at Boston College for thirty years. (A Boston College obituary for Smolinski).

________________________

Columbia University
in the City of New York

[New York 27, N.Y.]
Faculty of Political Science

March 8, 1954

President Grayson Kirk
Low Memorial Library

Dear Grayson:

I am taking the liberty of sending you this note to continue our chance conversation of the other day on the fellowship problem.

After looking over the nearly eighty applications for fellowships or scholarships in Economics, we realized that there was not a single applicant from Swarthmore, Haverford, Amherst, Williams, Wesleyan, Bowdoin, Yale, Stanford, McGill, Toronto, Smith, Wellesley, Mt. Holyoke, or from the undergraduate schools of Harvard or the Universities of California and Chicago. There is one from Princeton and one (French by nationality) from Bryn Mawr.

There are, nevertheless, a number of strong candidates, but largely foreigners or refugees. I am enclosing a copy of a list which I have submitted to the Executive Officer of the Department indicating the origins of the leading twenty-six candidates.

The failure to attract applicants from the institutions from which we might expect the best American and Canadian training appears to me a very serious matter. Part, at least, of the cause must lie in the inadequacy of our provisions for graduate aid.

Sincerely yours,
[signed: “Carter”]
Carter Goodrich

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

NAME

PLACE OF BIRTH

COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES

1. Joseph Raymond Barse Chicago, Illinois Northwestern University
Columbia University
2. Donald Van Twisk Bear New York City Princeton University
3. Robert Classon New York City Brooklyn College
4. Joan E. Belenken Brooklyn, N.Y. Barnard College
Cornell University
5. Narciso Asperin Ferrer Manila Ateneo de Manila (Law School and Graduate School)
6. William Smith Gemmell Schenectady, N.Y. Union College
7. Michele Guerard Le Havre, France Lycee de Seures,
Lycee de Fontaine,
Bryn Mawr College
8. Iran Banu Mohamed Ali Hassani Hyderabad Deccan, India Osmania University (Hyderabad Deccan, India)
Syracuse University
9. Peter Bain Kenen Cleveland, Ohio Columbia College
10. Jerzy Feliks Karcz Grudziadz, Poland Batory Liceum, Warsaw, Poland
Alliance College
Kent State University
Columbia University
11. Gregor Lazarcik Horna-Streda, Czechoslovakia State College of Kosice (Czechoslovakia)
Agricultural University
(Brno, Czech.)
School of Social Studies
(Paris, France)
Institute of International Studies (Paris, France)
Faculty of Law, University of Paris (France)
University Centre for European Studies (Strasbourg, France)
12. Michael Ernst Levy Mainz, Germany Hebrew University (Jerusalem)
13. Ira South Lowry Laredo, Texas University of Texas
14. Samir Anis Makdisi Beirut, Lebanon American University of Beirut
15. Yaroslav Nowak Kieve, Russia J. W. Goethe University (Frankfurt, Germany)
Columbia University
16. Algimantes Petrenas Kaunas, Lithuania Hamburg University
(Hamburg, Germany)
Baltic University
(Hamburg, Germany)
Columbia University
17. Guy A. Schick Aurora, Illinois Purdue University
18. Leon Smolinski Kalisz, Poland School of Economics, Warsaw, Poland
University of Freiburg (Germany)
University of Cincinnati
Columbia University
19. Werner Alfred Stange Berlin, Germany University of Kiel
(Kiel, Germany)
University of Bonn
(Bonn, Germany)
University of Maryland
20. Koji Taira Miyako, Ryukyus (near Okinawa) University of New Mexico
University of Wisconsin
21. Jaskaran Singh Teja Jhingran, Punjab, India Agricultural College (Punjab, India)
University of California
Harvard University
22. Marcel Tenenbaum Paris, France Queens College (Flushing, N.Y.)
23. Nestor Eugenius Terleckyj Boryslaw, Ukraine University of Erlangen (Erlangen, Germany)
Seton Hall University
Columbia University
24. John Jacob Vogel Irvington, N.J. Middlebury College
Columbia University
25. Ludwig Anton Wagner Vienna, Austria University of Vienna (Austria)
Columbia University
26. Theodore Raymond Wilson Baltimore, Md. Johns Hopkins University
University of Paris (France)

 

Source: Columbia University Archives, Central Files 1890-, Box 406, Folder “Goodrich, Carter 9/1953-5/1959”.

Image Source: Low Memorial Library, Columbia University from the Tichnor Brothers Collection, New York Postcards, at the Boston Public Library, Print Department.

Categories
Exam Questions Johns Hopkins

Johns Hopkins. Midyear and Final Exams for Five Economics Courses, 1932-1933

While on the whole I find these examination questions uninspired, I do wonder how one would have answered the last of the mid-year examination in economic history “Why is it that England had a socialist prime minister while the United States has an individualist president?”

_________________________

1C. Elements of Economics.

Three hours weekly through the year. Section 1: Dr. [George H.] Evans [Jr.], Thurs., Fri., Sat., 8.30, Maryland Hall 110; Section 2: Associate Professor [Broadus] Mitchell, Mon., Tues., Wed., 8.30, Gilman Hall 313; Section 3: Associate Professor [William O.] Weyforth, Mon., Tues., Wed., 11.30, Gilman Hall 314.

Particular attention is given to the theory of distribution and its application to leading economic problems.

Required of all students before graduation.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 1C
Mid-year Examination
Dr. Evans
February 1, 1933

  1. Under what conditions do lower prices mean higher profits?
  2. How do overhead costs affect the nature of competition?
  3. A country innkeeper hires a man to cripple the automobiles of passers-by. Is this man a producer? Explain.
  4. If each of our states were a separate nation, would we have less specialization than we have today? Explain.
  5. “The marginal utility of a ton of coal to a householder is $7.20.”
    1. Explain just what is meant by this statement.
    2. Why is the marginal utility of coal different now from what it was during the war? Explain carefully.
  6. Trace the history of bimetallism in the United States. What classes would be benefited if bimetallism were adopted in the United States in the near future?
  7. “The price of each good is determined by the willingness of buyers to purchase the last unit of the supply that is sold.” Discuss.
  8. A manufacturer buys out all his competitors. Assuming demand to be unchanged, can he now sell the former aggregate output at an advanced price? Explain.
  9. From the following figures for three firms which constitute the only producers or possible producers in the field, construct the combined long run supply curve and also the combined average cost curve which would prevail in the long run
  Average Costs of Production for Each Firm
No. of Units X Y Z
1 5 7 9
2 4.5 6 7.5
3 4.67 6 7.33
4 5 6.25 7.5
5 5.4 6.6 7.8
6 5.83 7 8.17

If the price in the market remains at $8 for a long period of time, how many articles will be supplied; what quantity will be produced by each firm? Suppose the price dropped to $7 and remained there.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 1C
Mid-year Examination
Dr. Mitchell
February 6, 1933

  1. Give a definition of Political Economy.
  2. What are the relative importances today of Production, Exchange, Distribution, and Consumption of wealth?
  3. Is the enterpriser gaining or losing in importance as an economic agent?
  4. Define capital and discuss the capitalistic method of production and exchange of wealth.
  5. Explain the marginal utility concept of value.
  6. Explain how market price is determined under conditions of competition.
  7. Discuss (a) monopoly price; (b) class price.
  8. What would be your definition of money?
  9. What is the argument of the inflationists at the present time?
  10. Give the organization and functions of the Federal Reserve System.
  11. Tell what you know of Technocracy, with your comment upon it.
  12. What are the main indictments which the present depression brings against the capitalist economic system?
  13. What are some reasons for believing that there is a decided drift toward collectivism in the United States now?

    *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 1C
Mid-year Examination
Dr. Weyforth
February 2, 1933

  1. Describe the more important changes that came about in the economic life of England as a result of the industrial revolution.
  2. How under a system of free enterprise is the overproduction of any article remedied? How is underproduction remedied?
    “Free enterprise is a self-regulating device for producing maximum satisfaction with a minimum of sacrifice.” Explain and criticize this statement.
  3. What is meant when it is said that modern industry is a capitalistic organization?
    A municipality which owned a street railway might find it desirable to give service at less than cost. Why? Could a capitalistically controlled company do this? Explain.
  4. “The use of machinery is limited by the extent of the market.” Why? In what sense is it equally true that the extending of markets has depended upon the development of the machine technique?
  5. Explain the nature of a corporation. How does it come into existence? Who owns it? How is it controlled and managed? What are some of its advantages and disadvantages?
  6. What functions do trade unions perform in our present economic system? Why did they not exist during the middle ages? What is meant by the “closed shop”? What justification is there for unions employing this device?
  7. In what way do commercial banks provide a medium of exchange? Why may it be said that banks create deposits? The national banking laws require that national banks maintain a certain reserve against deposits How does this limit the ability of banks to make loans?

    *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 1C
Final Examination
Dr. Mitchell
June 5, 1933

  1. Explain and discuss the underlying economic theory and the proposals of the Single tax. Tell something of the life of Henry George.
  2. State and discuss three theories of wages.
  3. Distinguish between “pure profits” and “wages of superintendence”. In what ways do pure profits arise?
  4. Explain the time discount theory of interest.
  5. “The business cycle is inherent in the capitalist economic system.” Discuss this statement.
  6. What are the main arguments for and against fiat money inflation?
  7. Explain the difficulties in combining economic planning with the price-and-profit system.
  8. What developments in American economic life appear to recommend socialism today?
  9. Enumerate and discuss the conditions under which trade and labor unions may raise the wages of their members without being injured by the boomerang of unemployment due to decreased demand for their products.
  10. Identify: Nassau Senior, John Stuart Mill, Charles Kingsley, Robert Owen, Friedrich Engels, Richard Arkwright, Charles Fourier, Samuel Gompers, David Ricardo, Mathew Carey.
  11. Discuss economic nationalism as applicable to the present day.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 1C
Final Examination
Dr. Evans
May 31, 1933

  1. What is meant by monetary inflation in the United States?
    How is it to be effected; what are its advantages and disadvantages?
  2. To raise revenue to pay the interest on a three billion dollar loan for the purpose of carrying out a public works program, it has been proposed that the federal government increase the income and gasoline taxes. A general manufacturer’s sales tax has apparently been rejected. Criticize the plan.
  3. The wages of federal employes were recently cut by approximately the same per cent that the Bureau of Labor Statistics index of the cost of living has fallen. What theory of wage determination was involved in this action? What theory of wages seems to you to explain wages most completely?
  4. What is meant by the incidents of ownership? Discuss them in connection with the various legal forms under which business units operate.
  5. If the prices of commodities rise in the near future, what will probably happen to rates of interest? Why? What is your prediction concerning the future of pure interest?
  6. Criticize some of the arguments for the tariff.
  7. Do the credit structure and the type of organization under which business units operate have anything to do with determining the recipient of profits?
  8. Is it necessary to give special assistance to the agriculturists in order to pull this country out of the depression? What characteristics of agriculture make it so difficult to do much for the farmers? What program should the government follow in its efforts?

_________________________

2C. Statistics. Dr. Evans.

Three hours weekly through the year. Th., Fri., Sat., 10.30, Gilman Hall 314.

In the first half-year attention is directed to the value and place of statistics as an instrument of investigation, and study is made of the chief methods used in statistical inquiry. In the second half-year the application of statistics to business and economic problems, such as price levels, cost of living, wage adjustments, business cycles, and business forecasting, are considered.

Prerequisite: Mathematics 1 C or 2 C.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 2C
Mid-year Examination
February 3, 1933

  1. The average deposit per individual depositor in savings banks in the United States was $437.89 in 1913. By 1926 this figure had risen to $633.10 per depositor, indicating that savings bank depositors were noticeably more thrifty than at the earlier date. Is the conclusion a sound one?
  2. Upon the following data construct price indices of the simple geometric type for 1901 and 1902, using 1900 as the base.
Commodity 1900
Price
1901
Price
1902
Price
A 1 2 3
B 3 3 3
C 1 1.5 2

In which year is the dispersion of the price relatives the larger? What is the significance of your observations upon the dispersions.

  1. A Japanese speaker argued recently that the apparently high birth rate of the Japanese in California was due to the fact that an unusually large proportion of the Japanese population was between the ages of 15 and 45, and that later this high birth rate would be reduced as the age distribution of the population became more normal. Discuss the validity of this argument.
  2. How would you verify the law of statistical regularity and the principle of inertia of large numbers?
  3. Without constructing what is technically called a ratio chart, plot the following figures so as to give the same effect as that produced by the ratio chart.
1900 2.4
1903 5.8
1904 7.3

How could your chart be converted into a ratio chart?

  1. Draw up in the rough a table with title, captions, stubs, etc., to provide for a complete cross-classification of the population of a city according to color, sex, marital status and age. (Note: emphasize the characteristics in the order named.)

    *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 2C
Final Examination
June 2, 1933

  1. Discuss the limitations upon the use of statistical method.
  2. Describe how and when the estimation of the value of one variable can be made from a known value of another variable by the use of the scatter diagram.
  3. How can the period of lag of one series in relation to another be determined.
  4. What is meant by “normal” business conditions and how may mathematical measurements of normal be made?
  5. In obtaining a seasonal index, can cyclical and erratic influences be largely eliminated? How? Describe two methods of eliminating the effects of seasonal variation from time-series data.
  6. Explain “mathematical methods of trend fitting are not fool-proof”. What are the various methods of determining a line of trend?
  7. What kinds of situations make necessary the use of index numbers? Give the methods of constructing index numbers.

_________________________

3B. Money and Banking.
Associate Professor Weyforth.

Three hours weekly through the year. Mon., Tues., Wed., 9.30, Gilman Hall 311.

In this course an analysis of the functions of money, credit and banking in our modern economic life will be made. There will be a description of various types of monetary systems, of the forms of credit and of banking and financial institutions. Particular attention will be given to the relationship between money, bank credit and prices; to the effects of price fluctuations upon individuals and upon general business conditions; to the problems of stabilizing prices and controlling business fluctuations by means of a deliberately directed monetary and credit policy. The Federal Reserve System will be studied with special emphasis upon its problem of credit control. Some time will also be devoted to the relationship between the money market and the stock market, to the problem of brokers’ loans, and to the financial operations involved in our international trade.

Prerequisite: Political Economy 1 C.

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THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 3B
Mid-year Examination
January 31, 1933

  1. Describe the functions performed by money and explain its importance in our present economic system.
  2. What is meant by “standard” money? Describe as many types of standard money as you can. Explain the difference between standard money and legal tender money. Illustrate the latter by examples from the United States currency.
  3. What factors were responsible for the rapid depreciation of German currency after the war? Why did prices rise more rapidly than the volume of currency? Can this be reconciled with the quantity theory of money? Explain.
  4. Explain the difference between fixed and circulating capital. What problems does this distinction create in regard to the financing of business enterprises? Explain fully.
  5. What is meant by the value of money? How do we measure changes in it? Explain the economic consequences of changes in the value of money.
  6. Distinguish between the functions of an investment banker and of a commercial bank. Explain how the commercial banks create deposits and show the limitations upon their powers in this respect.
  7. Describe the history of the monetary standard in the United States.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 3B
Final Examination
May 30, 1933

  1. Describe the more important types of loans and investments made by commercial banks. Describe the changes in the nature of their business since the war and the reasons for these changes.
  2. Explain the defects in our banking system prior to the establishment of the Federal reserve system and give a brief description of the steps toward reform.
  3. Explain the circumstances under which shipments of gold occur between two countries both of which are on a gold standard.
  4. Is there any limit to the extent to which the market rate of exchange may fluctuate between two countries when one or both of them does not provide for redemption of its currency in gold? Explain the operation of the factors involved.
  5. What is the importance of an elastic currency? What provision was made in the Federal Reserve Act for such a currency? What are the provisions of the laws passed during the present depression enlarging the note issues of national banks and Federal reserve banks?
  6. Explain the various methods which Federal reserve banks may employ to control credit and show how they operate.
  7. Explain and criticize the various principles that may be employed by Federal reserve banks as guides to their credit policy.
  8. What do you think of inflation as a means of promoting recovery from the depression?

_________________________

4B. Labor Problems. Professor [George E.] Barnett.

Three hours weekly through the year. Mon., Tues., Wed., 10.30, Gilman Hall 314.

In the first part of this course the problems growing out of modern industrial employment will be studied, e.g., child labor, industrial accidents, unemployment. It includes a critical discussion of the ameliorative measures which have been adopted in the leading industrial countries. Special attention will be given to an analysis of the principles underlying the schemes of social insurance against sickness, old age, and unemployment, so generally put into effect in recent years in European countries. In the second part of the course the history, structure and functions of American trade unionism are considered. Particular attention will be given to the working of representative systems of collective bargaining and an analysis of the conditions under which these systems have attained their greatest strength. An appraisal of rival forms of wage fixation, such as individual bargaining governmental intervention and shop committees will conclude the course.

Prerequisites: Political Economy 1 C and 12 B.

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THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 4B
Mid-year Examination
January 30, 1933

  1. On what principles, should an economic man divide his income between expenditure and saving?
  2. On what principles, should he divide his expenditure among different objects of expenditure?
  3. How and why should he divide his savings between investment and insurance?
  4. Describe briefly the various causes of unemployment.
  5. Discuss the effects of shortening the hours of labor.
  6. Why are the risks of unemployment, old age, etc. a part of the labor problem?

    *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 4B
Final Examination
May 29, 1933

  1. Define “trade union” and distinguish trade unions from such associations as medical societies, bar associations.
  2. Describe the relations among the various units (local union, national unions, etc.) making up the structure of American trade unionism.
  3. Classify and discuss the methods of enforcement used by trade unions against employers.
  4. Discuss “picketing”.
  5. What is the object of trade unions to the injunction?
  6. What is “scientific management” and how has it influenced the employer in his attitude toward labor?
  7. Outline the chief lines of approach to the governmental adjustment of industrial disputes.
  8. Is the labor market a good market?

_________________________

12B. Economic History. Associate Professor Mitchell.

Three hours weekly through the year. Mon., Tues., Wed., 1 p.m., Gilman Hall 314.

In the first part of this course a study is made of English economic history, the purpose being to show not only the industrial development of the English people as such but the way in which the economic motive has influenced the whole of social life. Particular attention is given to the characteristic forms of economic organization—the manorial system, the guild system, the entrance of capitalism and the causes and consequences of the Industrial Revolution. Special reference is made to those features of English economic history which have influence industrial life in the United States. The second part of the course is a survey of the economic history of our own country. Here the same effort is made, as in the case of England, to show the bearing of economic considerations on political evolution, especially in the direction of the growing importance of the Federal Government.

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THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 12B
Mid-year Examination
Dr. Mitchell
February 3, 1933

  1. What is meant by the economic interpretation of history?
  2. Describe the manor and the main steps in its disappearance.
  3. Contrast Wat Tyler and George Washington.
  4. How did the medieval city under the craft gilds differ from Baltimore today, economically, socially, and politically?
  5. What was Mercantilism? Are there tendencies toward a return to Mercantilism now? If so, is this movement wise or unwise, and why?
  6. What developments preceded the Industrial Revolution?
  7. Describe the Industrial Revolution.
  8. Make an argument that mankind would be better off had the inventors of the eighteenth century never lived.
  9. Why is it that England had a socialist prime minister while the United States has an individualist president?

    *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Political Economy 12B
Final Examination
June 2, 1933

  1. State and discuss what you consider to have been the main tendencies in American economic life.
  2. Give an outline history of the tariff until the time of the Civil War.
  3. Sketch the history of banking in the United States from 1791 to 1863.
  4. “The essential cause of the Civil War was the difference in economic pursuits of North and South.” Explain this statement.
  5. Describe the causes of the panics of 1837 and 1873.
  6. In what respects have Hamilton’s policies been borne out by American economic and political development?
  7. What considerations have turned the American people from approval of Theodore Roosevelt’s policy of “trust busting” to Franklin Roosevelt’s policy of relaxing the anti-trust acts?
  8. Give the main developments in “internal improvements” to the present time.
  9. State briefly what you think you will recall from this course twenty-five years from now.

Sources:

Course announcements from The College of Arts and Sciences, 1932-33 (February, 1932). The Johns Hopkins University Circular, New Series 1932, No. 2, Whole Number 434, pp. 38-39.
Course examinations from Johns Hopkins University, Eisenhower Library, Ferdinand Hamburger, Jr. Archives. Department of Political Economy. Series 6, Curricular materials. Box 2, Folder “Exams 1930-1935.”

Image Source:  Photo of Gilman Hall from the 1924 Johns Hopkins yearbook, Hullabaloo.

 

 

 

Categories
Economist Market Economists Gender Harvard

Harvard. Galbraith suggests Barbara Bergmann for Women’s Studies Professorship, 1983

 

The departments of anthropology, english and psychology at Harvard appear to have been relatively quick to respond to the 1983 opportunity of hiring a professor in women’s studies. The Harvard Dean then wrote a memo to encourage other departments to come up with candidates as well. John Kenneth Galbraith put forward the name of Barbara Bergmann for the serious consideration of the department. Perhaps someone knows whether his suggestion was able to obtain any search traction?

___________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

A. Michael Spence
Chairman

Littauer Center 200
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
(617) 495-2144

October 31, 1983

 

TO: Members of the Faculty, Economics Department

FROM: A. Michael Spence [Signed initials: AMS]

The attached is self-explanatory. Does anyone have ideas? Please let me know.

___________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Office of the Dean

5 University Hall
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
(617) 495-1566

October 4, 1983

TO: Chairmen of the Departments of Classics, Comparative Literature, Economics, Government, History, Philosophy, and Sociology

FROM: Henry Rosovsky

RE: Tenured Position in Women’s Studies

Last spring, the Committee on Women’s Studies informally notified several departments of the opportunity to nominate a distinguished scholar in the area of women’s studies. The appointment would be made entirely within a department with the understanding that the individual would devote at least half of his or her teaching time to Women’s Studies and play an active role in the future development of teaching and scholarly activities in that area.

Several departments (Anthropology, English, and Psychology) have already reported active searches; some have advanced to the short list stage. If your department is interested in pursuing this opportunity, please let my office know as soon as possible. If you wish to nominate a candidate, you should write to me describing the candidate (and the search procedure), and indicating what advantages will accrue to the department and to the Women’s Studies program if the position is assigned to your department. I expect that an assignment will be made by the end of the calendar year unless there is some compelling reason to delay.

dmg

___________________

John Kenneth Galbraith
Harvard University
Cambridge

207 Littauer Center
November 10, 1983

Professor A. Michael Spence
Littauer 200

Dear Michael:

Would you think of Barbara Bergmann, now at University of Maryland? She is one of our Ph.D.s, a brilliant economist, articulate in written and oral expression and both deeply and intelligently concerned with women’s issues. When President of the AEA I established as you know the Committee on the State of Women I the profession. Barbara took an alert and effective part in its work. I have no thought as to her availability; I do urge that she be considered. It would be very good, indeed, to have her back.

Yours faithfully,
[signed]
John Kenneth Galbraith

JG/all

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. John Kenneth Galbraith Personal Papers. Series 5. Harvard University File, 1949-1990. Box 526. Folder: “Harvard Department of Economics: General, 1975-1988”

Image Sources:  Barbara Bergmann in a Center for the History of Political Economy at Duke University spotlight web post. John Kenneth Galbraith (22 Feb. 1982) at “Top Management Forum” in Hilton Hotel in Amsterdam. Wikimedia Commons, from the Dutch National Archives.

 

 

 

Categories
Economics Programs M.I.T.

M.I.T. Minutes of the Visiting Committee of Department of Economics and Social Science, 1958

 

From a cover letter, dated March 25, 1959, written by R. T. Haslam, Chairman of the Visiting Committee for the Department of Economics and Social and Science at M.I.T., it appears that the mimeographed document  transcribed below was described as “the full transcript of the Meeting” sent by the Department of Economics for the report to be submitted by the visiting committee to the M.I.T. Corporation. At that time the department of economics and social studies included sections for economics, industrial relations, psychology, and political science together with a center for international studies. 

_______________________

DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS AND SOCIAL SCIENCE
Meeting of the Visiting Committee
October 7, 1958

Present: Visiting Committee

Robert T. Haslam, Chairman
Consultant and Director, W. R. Grace and Company

James A. Lyles
Senior Vice President, Frist Boston Corporation
Robert L. Moore
Chairman of the Board, Sheraton Corporation of America

Robert V. Roosa
Vice President, Federal Reserve Bank of New York

Willard L. Thorp
Professor, Merrill Center for Economics, Amherst College

Max L. Waterman
Vice President and Director, Singer Manufacturing Company

Clarence Wynd
Eastman Kodak Company

 

M.I.T.

John E. Burchard
Dean, School of Humanities and Social Studies

Robert L. Bishop
Professor of Economics; Head, Department of Economics and Social Science

Ralph E. Freeman
Professor of Economics; former Head, Department of Economics and Social Science

E. Cary Brown
Professor of Economics; in Charge of the Undergraduate Program

Roger W. Brown
Associate Professor of Psychology

Davis H. Howes
Assistant Professor of Psychology

Norman J. Padelford
Professor of Political Science; Director, Political Science Section

Ithiel deS. Pool
Professor of Political Science

Charles A. Myers
Professor of Industrial Relations; Director, Industrial Relations Section

Max F. Millikan
Professor of Economics; Director, Center for International Studies

Charles P. Kindleberger
Professor of Economics; in Charge of the Graduate Program

 

As the membership of the Committee is entirely new to the Department of Economics, Professor Bishop opened the meeting by giving a brief resume of its present organization and activities.

Teaching and research cover four main fields: Economics, Industrial Relations, Political Science, and Psychology. In one or more of these four fields, the Department teaches at least five distinguishable types of students: (1) undergraduates who elect one or more of the Department’s four fields as a part of their Humanities and Social Science program; (2) undergraduates who major in Course XIV, in (a) Economics or Political Science and (b) Science or Engineering; (3) graduate students in Course XIV, who are mostly Ph.D. candidates in either Industrial Economics or Political Science; (4) regular graduate students in the School of Industrial Management; and (5) members of the two Executive Development programs administered by the School of Industrial Management, including both Sloan Fellows (who are here for twelve months) and Senior Executives (who are here for ten weeks in either the Fall or Spring).

(1) Until the 1940’s, all juniors at the Institute took two terms of Economic Principles; and this was the substance of the Department’s contribution to the Humanities and Social Science program. Subsequently, we have added the fields of Industrial Relations, Political Science, and Psychology. As a result, the Department now offers four of the ten fields from which all students select their Humanities and Social Science subjects in their junior and senior years. (The attached Tables I and II [only a Table II was present in the departmental records. It is transcribed below] show total enrollments during 1956-57 and 1957-58 in the Department’s four fields and in the individual subjects within those fields. Most of the undergraduate enrollment represents students in the general Humanities and Social Science program). In 1957-58, as Table II shows, total undergraduate enrollments were: Economics 1206, Labor Relations 242, Political Science 378, and Psychology 519.)

(2) For eleven years the Department has had its own undergraduate major in Economics (Course XIV). At first this was just Economics and Engineering; later the option of Economics and Science was added. More recently there has been added an option in Political Science, which is an alternative to Economics but is also joined with Science or Engineering. In the future, Psychology might become a similar option; but Psychology is not now a major subject for undergraduates.

(3) The program for a Ph.D. degree in Economics, now one of the largest in this country, was in operation for some years before the Department had an undergraduate major in Economics. This year for the first time we are offering a program for a Ph.D. in Political Science. Our S.M. program is relatively small, and it is limited to Economics and Engineering (or Science). Unlike the Ph.D. program, it is open only to students who have studied Science or Engineering at the undergraduate level, as in our own undergraduate Course XIV.

(4) The Department offers several special subjects for the regular graduate students in the School of Industrial Management, who are all S.M. candidates. In addition, these students sometimes enroll in the same classes with our own graduate students in Economics; and, indeed, this has increased the size of some of our graduate subjects substantially during the past year or two. Furthermore, a small but increasing number of Industrial Management graduate students are becoming interested in going on to a Ph.D. in a combination of Economics and Industrial Management. Our colleagues in the School of Industrial Management have also been considering the addition of a Ph.D. program of their own. If this should materialize, it is likely that our Department will continue to participate substantially on the Economics side of such a program.

(5) The other teaching activity carried on in cooperation with the School of Industrial Management is in their two executive development programs. The older of these is the Sloan Fellowship program, for which executives in the 32- to 36- year age bracket spend a full calendar year at M.I.T. The other, shorter executive development program in which the Department teaches is aimed at a higher executive level. Our department handles about one-quarter of both of these programs.

Dean Burchard stated what he considers to be the present problems of the Department of Economics.

(1) To have the undergraduate program in Course XIV better known to secondary schools so that students will come to M.I.T. specifically for these combinations of humanities and sciences.

(2) To organize our offering in Psychology. A number of years ago a committee recommended that a Department of Psychology be established in the School of Science; but the latter was not prepared to take on such a department. Although there are courses in Psychology given in other Schools at M.I.T., the largest amount of teaching in Psychology comes under the School of Humanities. Therefore the development and improvement of the Psychology Section within the Department of Economics and Social Science is our responsibility.

(3) The new Political Science Section is fairly well organized; yet it still faces the problem of integration with the work of the Center for International Studies, particularly on research projects.

 

Undergraduate Program

Professor E. Cary Brown, chairman of the Committee on the Undergraduate Program, reported on his committee’s consideration of possible revisions in the curriculum in Course XIV. Normally the M.I.T. student can spend 80 per cent of his time in Science and Engineering, with the remaining 20 per cent in Humanities or Social Science. In Course XIV, the student spends the equivalent of a year in Economics or Political Science, instead of taking the more advanced or specialized subjects in his field of Science or Engineering.

After reviewing the experience of the past ten years on the Economics side—looking over thesis topics, the electives chosen by our majors, and finally the jobs that our graduates have held—it seems clear that we are dealing mostly with students who become engineers first of all, with social science skills on the side. For these students, we shall continue to offer our option in General Economics. We have also recommended, however, the addition of two other options in Economics. One will be in Industrial Economics, including Industrial Relations. The other will be in Quantitative Economics and Methods.

The program in Industrial Economics will be aimed at the range of problems confronting business firms on an industry-wide basis. We shall aim to turn out students in this option who will be industry analysts in the broadest sense.

The Quantitative Economics option will be even more professional in orientation. Emphasis will be on technical training in analytical methods, with primary attention to statistics, econometrics, and programming and decision theory, including “operations research,” for which there is a rapidly growing demand.

At present, too many of our basic Economics subjects are not taken until the senior year; so we have recommended changes that will allow our majors to take these subjects earlier. We have also recommended several new subjects, including a research seminar as thesis preparation in the first term of the senior year.

There followed a discussion of a variety of departmental problems. One concerns the fact that, in the Economics wing, we have relatively many young full professors, in their early forties, with relatively few associate and assistant professors. The demands of our graduate program and our undergraduate major are such that relatively few senior members of the staff participate at any one time in the elementary subjects, 14.01 and 14.02. There also was discussion of the assistance that can be given by the older members of the Department to graduate students who are carrying out their first teaching assignment in the sections of elementary Economics. As Mr. Haslam pointed out, these are the first instructors that the student meets in the Department of Economics, and a favorable impact is very important.

 

The Psychology Section (reported by Professors Roger W. Brown and Davis Howes)

At present Psychology teaching is limited to the Humanities program; but within the next year or two we hope to set up a Psychology option in Course XIV. The decision that we have to make with the administrative authorities is whether to be content with a purely routine service in teaching elementary Psychology or whether to have a Psychology Section composed of persons with significant research activities who will develop a broader teaching program.

There are other psychologists at the Institute in both the School of Industrial Management and in the new Communications Center. These people are concerned with a limited set of rather specialized applications of Psychology. Collaboration with these other psychologists would be very fruitful if a graduate program of training Ph.D.’s in Psychology could be set up, and some of them occasionally teach Psychology subjects in the Humanities program; but, for the time being, the responsibility for manning and administering that program rests wholly on the Psychology Section in our Department.

There is a remarkable opportunity at M.I.T. for collaboration between psychologists and other scientists—in computers, to name one example, and also in such fields as electronics and the chemical effects of drugs on human behavior. These potential opportunities will always draw able young research-oriented psychologists to M.I.T.; but they will not stay beyond about three years unless there is more chance for growth and development of the psychology program than at present. Now there is no senior member of the Psychology group; the four psychologists of faculty rank consist of one associate professor and three assistant professors. It was agreed that a constructive step would be the appointment of a full professor of psychology.

 

The Political Science Section (reported by Professors Norman J. Padelford and Ithiel de S. Pool)

Political Science has gone through some of the problems that Psychology is now facing. Immediately after the war we started out as a purely service group, offering as part of the Humanities program undergraduate courses which have averaged from 350 to 400 students. Three years ago we came to feel, as the psychologists do now, that a mere service function would not satisfy us professionally. As the first step to broaden our base we set up an undergraduate course combining Political Science with Science and Engineering. After this course was launched and operating satisfactorily, there were discussions about a Ph.D. program in Political Science. The same arguments that were used for Economics and for Psychology came up—namely, that the ablest men cannot be recruited and retained unless they have good graduate students around them. We have had to go to Harvard and to Fletcher School for young teachers in our undergraduate courses.

A program for a Ph.D. in Political Science was launched this Fall. We have 13 mature and talented graduate students whose interests are focused on policy problems. We put these students to work on research projects. This is possible with a small group only slightly outnumbered by staff; for each student can work as assistant to a staff member.

As far as our group is concerned, we see no point in simply duplicating what is done at other institution. Our range of interests covers the following major topics:

(1) We are concerned with the growth and evolution of political communities from an elementary stage to maturity, whether in such places as Burma or at the international level, where we have been studying the process by which a group of nations in the so-called Atlantic community can become knitted together.

(2) We have a strong interest in the role of communications in the political process between men and between groups in the political process. This is an important topic, which has been inadequately stressed elsewhere.

(3) The touchstone of our approach is a study of the place of government and the role of public policy against the background of changes in science and technology.

One final word about our needs as we look ahead. We have set up six fields of study: (1) International Relations and Foreign Policy, (2) Political Communications, (3) Defense Policy, (4) Government and Science, (5) Political and Economic Development, and (6) Political Theory and Comparative Politics. In the areas of Defense Policy and Government and Science, we are not provided with faculty as we should be. We need to find individuals for each of these fields and also the wherewithal to support them at the faculty level. Our second need—and the most urgent at the moment—is for fellowships and scholarships. We are encouraging our graduate students to take loans for their education, paying them back afterwards rather than depending on scholarship money.

 

The Industrial Relations Section (reported by Professor Charles A. Myers)

The Industrial Relations Section is the oldest of the sections in the Department of Economics. Last November we had a 20th Anniversary Conference in which we reviewed what we have been trying to do. Originally we set up our teaching program solely at the undergraduate level; but we have expanded to include participation in the doctoral program of the Department. Today M.I.T. has more students working for doctor’s degrees in Economics with emphasis on Industrial Relations than has any other university in this country. Our activities include courses for management, both in the programs of the School of Industrial management and in the new Greater Boston program for executive development. As we have no staff of our own but share our teachers with the Department of Economics, we confine our activities to certain areas such as the Scanlon Plan—a union-management cooperation plan, which has annual conferences attracting about 200 participants from all over the country. In addition, we have held conferences on research administration; some trade unions have come here for conferences under our auspices; and we hold each year a one-day workshop in connection with the Boston Chamber of Commerce.

Professor Pigors has pioneered in a method of management training and development called the incident process, which is now used by 800 companies. We think it offers more challenge to students than the case method. The case method presents a problem with all the material supplied; the incident process gives the student only an incident, leaving him to seek out the pertinent facts by questioning the discussion leader. As a teaching device it has had wide impact outside of M.I.T.

Some of our recent research has been on comparative international studies. As we learned more about economic development, we saw its close connection with problems of industrial relations. We obtained a Ford Foundation grant; and my two trips to India and a book have come out of that. We plan to cover India, Mexico, Japan, Western Germany, Indonesia, Sweden, England, France, and Italy in our studies of management in industrial societies.

 

The Center for International Studies (reported by Professor Max F. Millikan)

Although the CIS has a Visiting Committee of its own, its work is so closely connected with that of the Department of Economics and Social Science that they share each other’s problems. There are two ways in which the Center’s activities are important to the Department of Economics. First, there is a considerable overlap of staff members who conduct research in the Center and teach in the Department; so the Center and the Department have a joint interest in recruiting an outstanding and stable staff. Second, The Center’s research program provides opportunities for graduate students in the Department to undertake thesis work in the international field.

Briefly, the Center was founded in 1951, growing out of a contract which M.I.T. undertook on behalf of the State Department to explore a defense against jamming the Voice of America. Growing out of this study appeared the need for a research organization on problems related to American foreign relationships, as there are many ways in which technology and science have become involved in foreign policy and international relations. The Center then removed itself from government affiliation and became a permanent member of the M.I.T. family.

Since 1952, with the support of the Ford, Rockefeller, and Carnegie Funds, it has carried on projects in four different fields: (1) relations between the United States and the Soviet bloc, especially in the area of Soviet scientific publications and the administrative handling of research and development in the Soviet Union; (2) economic and political development of the underdeveloped countries—especially the process of economic growth in Indonesia, India and Southern Italy; (3) international communications—especially the pattern of information-flow in foreign countries and its effect upon attitudes and decisions of significant political groups; (4) Professor Rostow, who was responsible for the studies on the Soviet Union and on China which we have published, has now turned his attention to the features in American society which influence our attitude toward foreign policy.

Our principal problem for the future is to provide some stability for our research staff. We have drawn key people to M.I.T. who have made a substantial contribution through their research; but many members of our staff are listed as visiting professors because M.I.T. cannot provide tenure positions for them. What we need is a continuing corps to devote half time to research in the Center and the other half to teaching.

The Center is in a position to offer to graduate students research opportunities second to none in this country. In the future we look toward using the Center’s resources at the undergraduate level. In these new areas it is normal for development to begin at the graduate level and work down.

 

The Graduate Economics Program (reported by Professor Charles P. Kindleberger)

In the first place, our graduate program aims primarily at a Ph.D. degree; we do not offer a Master’s degree except in a combination of Economics with Science or Engineering (mostly as a fifth year for our own Course XIV graduates). In the Ph.D. program we limit ourselves to a small group of high-quality candidates—about 20 to 25 new students each year.

Admission of Graduate Students. These 20 to 25 new students are chosen from a group of about 120 applicants, who have various reasons for wanting to study at M.I.T. Some are attracted by the men on our teaching staff and some by the prestige of M.I.T. in general. We should also face the fact, however, that competitive fellowship offers also play a prominent role in applicants’ decisions to come here or go elsewhere. On the other side of the picture, some would-be applicants are scared away if they are not highly skilled in mathematics, even though only a minority of our graduate students specialize in areas of economics where high-powered mathematical techniques are used.

Financing Graduate Students. There are various ways in which a graduate student can pay his way here: he may get a fellowship from an outside source to be used at any university of his choice—National Science Foundation, Ford Foundation, and Woodrow Wilson Fellowship support comes this way; also, we have some privately endowed “name” fellowships in our department—Goodyear, Westinghouse, and Hicks; and we have some departmental and Institute funds to offer; lastly, a student may pay his own way. Sometimes students who do not qualify for financial assistance at first, but who come on their own, turn out to be very good. We hire no teachers from the group of first-year graduate students, so this source of earning is not open until at least the second year of graduate study, and usually not until the third.

Ph.D. Curriculum. At the end of the second year, the graduate student takes his general examinations—four written and four oral. After this comes his thesis. We are very much interested in the process of writing a thesis, as we believe that it is here that the student acquires professional maturity. We do not go along with the movement to cut down on the time of the Ph.D. degree by reducing the thesis to the proportions of an article.

Post-Doctoral Students. More and more M.I.T. is attracting post-doctoral scholars from abroad—last year a Swede, a Norwegian, a Dutchman, and a Turk; this year two Germans, a Swede, an Italian, a Belgian and a Frenchman. These people add to the scholarly atmosphere; and we need mature students for training at a post-doctoral level. This, however, requires more money; and we have already applied to the Ford Foundation for funds for this purpose.

*  *  *  *  *  *

            In the general discussion of pressing problems Professor Bishop mentioned the following:

The Economics Library Budget. The state of our Dewey Library budget can be held over for discussion at the next meeting of this committee. If we have not been successful in our drive for funds, we shall need to ask the assistance of the committee.

Ours is very much of a library department, as we have no laboratory. Although our library budget is high compared with that of some engineering departments, it is low compared with that of other leading departments in Economics. For example, our library budget stands at $4,000 annually, compared with $6,000 for that of Johns Hopkins. Ours is possibly the best industrial relations library in the country; but it is a second-class economics library. I should like to see the budget figure raised by $2,000.

(Mr. Maslam offered to approach Mr. Bradley Dewy for a donation for this purpose.)

Age Distribution of Department Members. It happens that our department has an unusual age distribution in the field of Economics. There is a great gap between the full professors and the instructors. The former are all in their early forties; and there are few runners-up at the associate professor and assistant professor level. This is a problem of major importance.

*  *  *  *  *  *

            Professor Thorp suggested this kind of Committee report to the Corporation: that the Committee has met; that all its members are new; that they therefore need time to get acquainted with what is going on in the Department; that they find no problems requiring immediate action; and that they are looking forward to a meeting next year. There was also agreement in recommending that there be somewhat more continuity of membership on the Visiting Committee than in the past.

*  *  *  *  *  *

TABLE II
Comparative Numbers of Students Completing Individual Subjects in the Department of Economics and Social Science, 1956-57 and 1957-58
[Note: Course titles provided after Table II]

1956-57

1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total

Net Change

Economics—Undergraduate

14.01

466 292 758 460 316 776 +18
14.02 58 117 175 94 143 237

+62

14.03

26 26 26 18 44 +18
14.04 14 14 8 8

-6

14.09

27 28 55 25 19 44 -11
14.20 23 23

-23

14.30

25 25 -25
14.32 20 20 17 17

-3

14.33

18 18 16 21 37 +19
14.40 20 20 20 20

14.43

11 11 13 13 +2
14.54 11 11 10 10

-1

Totals

1156 1206

+50

 

 

1956-57

1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total

Net Change

Economics—Graduate

14.101

11 11 14 14 +3
14.102 5 5 8 8

+3

14.115

34 34 36 36 +2
14.116 34 34 36 36

+2

14.117

18 24 42 15 20 35 -7
14.121 32 32 31 31

-1

14.122

30 30 31 31 +1
14.132 6 6

-6

14.151

6 6 11 11 +5
14.161 15 15 15 15

14.162

12 12 16 16 +4
14.171 11 11 8 8

-3

14.172

6 6 9 9 +3
14.174 5 5 14 14

+9

14.192

5 5 1 1 -4
14.195 10 10 1 1

-9

14.196

11 11 5 5 -6
14.271 11 11 7 7

-4

14.272

7 7 7 7
14.281 13 13 15 15

+2

14.282

18 18 +18
14.292 7 7 10 10

+3

14.371

34 34 35 35 +1
14.372 15 15 16 16

+1

14.381

56 56 27 27 -29
14.382 1 1

+1

14.451

23 23 24 24 +1
14.461 8 8 8 8

14.471

15 15 12 12 -3
14.481 9 9 6 6

-3

14.581

20 20 23 23 +3
14.582 16 16 17 17

+3

Totals

509

497

-12

Totals—Economics

1665

1703

+38

 

*  *  *  *  *  *

1956-57 1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total Net Change
Industrial Relations—Undergraduate
14.61 12 12 -12
14.63 86 75 161 80 75 155 -6
14.64 47 75 122 36 51 87 -35
Totals 295 242 -53

 

1956-57 1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total Net Change
Industrial Relations—Graduate
14.671 6 6 7      7 +1
14.672 10 10 -10
14.673 18 18 +18
14.674 10 10 +10
14.681 17 17 18 18 +1
14.682 19 19 10 10 -9
14.694 16      16 +16
Totals 52 79 +27
Totals—Industrial Relations 347 321 -26

 

*  *  *  *  *  *

1956-57 1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total Net Change
Political Science—Undergraduate
14.51 50 93 143 73 72 145 +2
14.52 29 25 54 31 25 56 +2
14.53 7 7 25 25 +18
14.90 17 13 30 14 11 25 -5
14.91 25 36 61 26 23 49 -12
14.92 18 18 42 42 +24
14.93 7 11 18 26 26 +8
14.95 22 22 -22
14.96 14 14 14
14.97 6 6 3 3 -3
14.98 3 3 +3
14.99 4 4 +4
Totals 373 378 +5

 

1956-57 1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total Net Change
Political Science—Graduate
14.521 6 6 -6
14.523 4 4 +4
14.524 2 2 +2
14.531 15 15 3 3 -12
14.533 18 18 12 12 -6
14.571 34 34 36 36 +2
14.941 8 8 +8
14.953 10 10 7 7 -3
14.954 1 1 5 5 +4
14.956 5 5 8 8 +3
14.957 6 6 7 7 +1
14.958 6 6 +6
Totals 95 98 +3
Totals—Political Science 468 476 +8

 

*  *  *  *  *  *

1956-57 1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total Net Change
Psychology—Undergraduate
14.70 112 175 287 83 126 209 -78
14.73 83 73 156 32 35 67 -89
14.77 47 47 27 16 43 -4
14.79 42 42 8 29 37 -5
14.81 14 14 9 9 -5
14.82 11 43 54 +54
14.84 35 35 +35
14.85 32 32 +32
14.86 18 32 50 +30
14.88 3 3 +3
Totals 546 519 -27

 

1956-57 1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total Net Change
Psychology—Graduate
14.771 32 32 -32
14.772 6 6 +6
14.774 12 12 5 5 -7
14.791 5 5 8 8 +3
14.792 11 11 2 2 -9
Totals 60 21 -39
Totals—Psychology 606 540 -66

 

1956-57 1957-58
Subject Fall Spring Total Fall Spring Total Net Change
Grand Totals for the Department 3086 3040 -46

Source: M.I.T. Archives. MIT Department of Economics Records, Box 4, Folder “V.C. [19]47-64”.

________________________

Course numbers, names and instructors
1957-58*

ECONOMICS (UNDERGRADUATE)
14.01 Economic Principles I (Bishop)
14.02 Economic Principles II (E. C. Brown)
14.03 Prices and Production (A. Williams)
14.04 Industrial Organization and Public Policy
14.09 Economic Problems Seminar (Bishop)
14.20 Building Economics (Maclaurin)
14.30 Elementary Statistics (Ando)
14.32 Statistical Quality Control (H. A. Freeman)
14.33 Elementary Statistics (Ando)
14.40 Money and Income (R.E. Freeman)
14.43 Public Finance (E.C. Brown)
14.54 International Trade (Kindleberger)
ECONOMICS (GRADUATE)
14.101 Mathematics for Economists (H. A. Freeman)
14.102 Mathematics for Economists (H. A. Freeman)
14.115 Economics and Finance: Principles and Policies II (Kindleberger, R.E. Freeman)
14.116 Economics and Finance: Principles and Policies III (Kindleberger)
14.117 Economics and Industrial Management (Solow, E.C. Brown)
14.121 Economic Analysis (Bishop)
14.122 Economic Analysis (Samuelson)
14.132 Schools of Economic Thought (Bishop)
14.151 Mathematical Approach to Economics (Samuelson)
14.161 Economic History (W. W. Rostow)
14.162 Economic History (W. W. Rostow)
14.171 Theory of Economic Growth (Rosenstein-Rodan)
14.172 Research Seminar in Economic Development (Millikan)
14.174 Non-Economic Factors in Economic Growth (Hagen)
14.192 Economics Seminar
14.195 Reading Seminar in Economics
14.196 Reading Seminar in Economics
14.271 Problems n Industrial Economics (Bishop)
14.272 Government Regulation of Industry (N.N.)
14.281 Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Economic Development (Maclaurin)
14.282 Economics of Innovation Seminar (Maclaurin)
14.292 Industrial Economic Seminar
14.371 Statistical Theory (H. A. Freeman)
14.372 Statistical Theory (H. A. Freeman)
14.381 Statistical Method (Houthakker, Durand)
14.382 Economic Statistics (Houthakker)
14.451 National Income (Millikan)
14.461 Monetary and Banking Problems (Higgins)
14.471 Fiscal Policy? (E. C. Brown)
14.481 Business Cycles (Houthakker)
14.581 International Economics (Kindleberger)
14.582 International Economics (Kindleberger)
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS (UNDERGRADUATE)
14.61 Industrial Relations (D. V. Brown)
14.63 Labor Relations (Siegel)
14.64 Labor Economics and Public Policy (A. R. Weber)
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS (GRADUATE)
14.671 Problems in Labor Economics (Miernyk)
14.672 Public Policy on Labor Relations (Myers)
14.673 Labor-Management Relations and Public Policy (D. V. Brown, Myers)
14.674 The Labor Movement: Theories and Histories (Siegel)
14.681 Seminar in Personnel Administration (Pigors)
14.682 Seminar in Personnel Administration (Pigors)
14.694 Seminar in Union-Management Cooperation (N.N.)
POLITICAL SCIENCE (UNDERGRADUATE)
14.51 International Relations (Padelford)
14.52 Principles and Problems of American Diplomacy (Pye)
14.53 Seminar in International Politics (Schilling)
14.90 Government, Politics and Technology (R. C. Wood)
14.91 The American Political System (Tillman)
14.92 Comparative Political and Economic Systems (L. W. Martin)
14.93 Seminar: Issues in Contemporary American Politics
14.95 Politics, Society, and Policy Making (Pool)
14.96 Influences on Policy Decisions (N.N.)
14.97 Political Science Seminar (Padelford)
14.98 Political Science Seminar (Padelford)
14.99 International Political Communication (Davison)
POLITICAL SCIENCE (GRADUATE)
14.521 Strategic and Political Geography (N.N.)
14.523 National Security and Military Technology (McCormack, Schilling)
14.524 Politics and National Defense Policy (Schilling)
14.531 Asian Politics and United States Foreign Policy (Pye)
14.533 Social Science and U. S. Foreign Policy (Millikan)
14.571 Major Problems in Untied States Foreign Policy (Padelford)
14.941 Government and Public Administration (R. C. Wood)
14.953 Mass Media and Communication Systems (Lerner)
14.954 Methods of Communication Research (Lerner)
14.956 Public Opinion and Propaganda (Davison)
14.957 Research Seminar in International Communications (Davison)
14.958 Research Seminar in International Communications (Davison)
PSYCHOLOGY (UNDERGRADUATE)
14.70 Introductory Psychology (Swets)
14.73 Organization and Communication in Groups (Swets, Gleicher)
14.77 Psychology of Language and Communication (N.N.)
14.79 Learning (Howes)
14.81 Psychology of Perception (Swets in 1958-59)
14.82 Psychology of Motivation (N.N. in 1958-59)
14.84 Theories of Personality (R. W. Brown in 1958-59)
14.85 Social Psychology (R. W. Brown in 1958-59)
14.86 Behavior in Groups (M. E. Shaw in 1958-59)
14.88 Advanced Psychology Seminar (Staff in 1958-59)
PSYCHOLOGY (GRADUATE)
14.771 Interpersonal Relations Seminar (N.N.)
14.772 Industrial Sociology Seminar (N.N.)
14.774 Social Psychology Seminar (R. W. Brown)
14.791 Reading Seminar in Social Science
14.792 Reading Seminar in Social Science

 

SourceThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology Bulletin, General Catalogue Issue 1957-58. Chapter 10, Descriptions of Subjects, 14. Economics and Social Science, pp. 233-238.

*For 14.81/14.82/14.84/14.85/14.86/14.88 information from the General Catalogue Issue 1958-59 pp. 237-8.

Image Source:  From Technique (1949), M.I.T. Yearbook cover.

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Harvard. Examinations for Political Economy courses, Dunbar, Laughlin, and Taussig, 1886-87.

 

On January 5th, 2021 my 94 year old father passed away following a Covid-19 infection. On January 6th, 2021 a pro-Trump mob breached the United States Capitol, leading to the impeachment of President Donald Trump exactly one week later. With the exception of a single post that had been nearly completed before those two days, Economics in the Rear-view Mirror has had no new content added.  With today’s post (January 24, 2021) your curator resumes his work of collecting, transcribing and presenting artifacts to provide a documentary record of the evolution of the economics curriculum.

This post adds to our collection brief course descriptions, enrollment figures and examinations from Harvard for the academic year 1886-87 when Charles Dunbar, J. Laurence Laughlin, and Frank W. Taussig constituted the entire department of political economy. 

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Political Economy 1 (1886-87).

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 1. First half year: Laughlin’s Mill’s Principles of Political Economy. —Dunbar’s Chapters on Banking. Profs. Laughlin and Taussig.

Total 207: 1 Graduates, 33 Seniors, 100 Juniors, 47 Sophomores, 7 Freshmen, 19 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 58.

1886-87.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 1.
[One-hour Examination. Nov. 17, 1886]

  1. Point out, as to the following articles, whether they are or are not capital; and, as to those which you consider capital, whether they are fixed or circulating capital: a dwelling-house; a bale of cotton goods; a government bond; hewn granite; a plow; a stock of tobacco.
  2. A keeps twenty saddle horses in Boston for hire. B keeps twenty horses which he uses in cultivating a farm in the country. Trace the respective economic effects of their expenditure in maintaining the horses.
  3. State concisely the laws of production and distribution as to land, and explain the connexion between them.
  4. Comment on the following proposition: “There should be annually appropriated by every city or town of 5000 or more inhabitants a sum of money sufficient to pay wages at the rate of one dollar a day for 300 days in the year to as many as 10 percent of the actual population. … Any person finding himself out of employment should have the privilege of making application to the Department of Labor, and should be given some useful work to do at the wages of one dollar per day of eight hours, so long as he might choose to work for that pay.”

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Scrapbook of Professor Frank W. Taussig, p. 10.

1886-87.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 1.
[Mid-Year Examination. 1887]

  1. Compare the economic effects of defraying war expenditure by loans and by taxation.
  2. Does the rent of a factory building affect the value of the goods made in it? Does the rent of a farm affect the value of the grain grown on it? Does the rent paid for a lot near a great city, from which gravel is taken, affect the value of the gravel?
  3. It has been said that “the laws and conditions of the production of wealth partake of the character of physical truths. There is nothing optional or arbitrary in them.” State briefly the laws of the production of wealth here referred to, and whether the statement in regard to them is true.
  4. It has been said that the law of population and the law of diminishing returns from land point inevitably to misery and want as the destiny of the mass of mankind. What influences affecting the operation of these laws are to be taken into account; and if they are taken into account, are the laws of population and diminishing returns from land thereby shown to be invalid?
  5. Explain briefly the nature of the remuneration received by the following persons: a farmer tilling his own land; a merchant carrying on business with his own capital; a manufacturer carrying on business with borrowed capital; a holder of railway stocks; a holder of government bonds; a patentee.
  6. Wherein is the value of metallic money governed by different principles from those that regulate the value of commodities in general? And wherein is the value of inconvertible paper money governed by different principles from those that regulate the value of coin?
  7. Credit is said to be purchasing power. Explain what is meant by this proposition, and in what manner it bears on the theory of the value of money. Point out in what form credit, as purchasing power, is most likely to affect prices in the United States and in France.
  8. (a) Suppose that:
    In the U.S. one day’s labor produces 2 bushels of corn;
    “      “       “     “      “         “            “          10 yards of cotton cloth;
    “ England     “      “         “            “          1 bushel of corn;
    “       “            “       “         “            “          5 yards of cotton cloth.
    Would trade arise between England and the United States? If so how?
    (b) Suppose that in England one day’s labor produced 8 yards of cotton cloth, other conditions remaining the same as in (a). Would trade arise? If so, how?
    (c) Suppose that in England one day’s labor produced 2 yards of cotton cloth, other conditions remaining the same as in (a) Would trade arise? If so, how?
  9. Suppose a new article to appear among the exports of a given country. Trace the effects in that country on the course of the foreign exchanges; on the flow of specie; on the value of money; on the terms of international exchange. Would the results be the same if, instead of a new article of export, some article previously exported were to be sold abroad in larger quantity because of a lowering of its cost and price?
  10. (a) Arrange in proper order the following items of a bank account: Loans, $538,000; Bonds and Stocks, $40,000; Capital, $200,000; Real Estate, $26,000; other assets, $26,000; Surplus, $65,100; Deposits, $440,000; Notes, $101,550; Cash, $124,000; Cash Items, $52,650.
    (b) Suppose the bank to discount four months paper (at 6 per cent) to the amount of $10,000, of which it purchases one-half by promises to pay (the bearer) on demand, and one-half by cash. How would the account then stand?
    (c) Suppose a borrower to have repaid a loan of $2000 by giving $1000 in cash, and $1000 in a cheque on the bank. How would the account then stand?
    (d) Suppose the bank to be confronted, in a time of general embarrassment, with demands from depositors for cash, and from borrowers for discounts. What policy would be adopted if it were the Bank of England? If it were a United States national bank?

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Scrapbook of Professor Frank W. Taussig, pp. 10-11.

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 1. Second half year: Division A (Theoretical, introductory to Courses 2 and 3). Mill’s Principles (Books IV, and V.). — Cairnes’s Leading Principles (Part I., chaps. Iii. and v.; part III., chaps. i.-v.). — Thompson’s Lectures on Protection. — Sumner’s Protectionism. — Bimetallism. Prof. Laughlin.

Total 101: 6 Seniors, 44 Juniors, 38 Sophomores, 5 Freshmen, 8 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 58.

 

1886-87.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 1.
Division A.
[Year-end Examination.  1887]

  1. If taxes levied on the rich cause a diminution in their unproductive expenditure, would that in any way affect the employment offered for labor? Discuss fully.
  2. What principle does Mr. Mill furnish by which the respective shares of labor and capital are determined? Has his Wages-Fund Theory any connection with his exposition of the dependence of “profits” on Cost of Labor?
  3. In discussing the distribution of the product, why is it that the relative shares of labor and capital can be discussed independently of rent? Would an increase of rent affect the share of labor or of capital?
  4. Why is it that city banks make a greater use of the deposit liability than of the note liability? Why is the fact just the reverse with country banks?
  5. State fully the difference between Cost of Labor and Cost of Production. Would a decrease in Cost of Production affect Cost of Labor in any way?
  6. If the returns, and consequently wages, in our extractive industries were to decline, how would the course of our foreign trade probably be affected?
  7. Explain carefully how, and under what conditions, Reciprocal Demand regulates Normal Value.
  8. How do you reconcile the doctrine of comparative cost in international trade with the fact that a merchant regulates his conduct by a comparison of prices at home with prices abroad?
  9. Explain how a tax on “profits” may fall either (1) on the laborer, or (2) on the landlord.
  10. Discuss the argument that protection raises wages.
  11. Is the customs-duty on sugar economically justifiable?

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 3, Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College (June, 1887), pp. 5-6, in bound volume Examination Papers, 1887-89.

 

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 1. Second half year: Division B (Descriptive). Mill’s Principles (selections). — Upton’s Money in Politics. —Jevons’s The State in Relation to Labor. —  Lectures on Money, Bimetallism, Cooperation, and Trade-Unions. Prof. Taussig.

Total 106: 1 Graduate, 27 Seniors, 56 Juniors, 9 Sophomores, 2 Freshmen, 11 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 58.

 

1886-87.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 1.
Division B.
[One-hour Examination. April. 4, 1887]

  1. As society advances, what changes would you expect in the relative values of wheat of coal, of cotton cloth, and of watch-springs?
  2. Suppose the coinage of silver under the act of 1878 had been 20 millions of dollars a month, what would now be the money in use in the country? Explain briefly what has been the actual coinage, and what effect it has had on our monetary system.
  3. Make a comparison between the issues of paper money by the Continental Congress during the war of the Revolution, and by Congress during the civil war.
  4. Explain briefly what is meant by the following phrases: five-twenties; ten-forties; seven-thirties; continued 3 ½ per cents. 

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Scrapbook of Professor Frank W. Taussig, p. 12.

 

1886-87.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 1.
Division B.
[Year-end Examination. 1887]

  1. Suppose the price of silver to rise to such a point that the ratio of silver to gold would be 15 to 1, what change would take place in the money at present in use in the United States?
    Is such a change probable? If so, why? If not, why not?
  2. State the essential differences between the coinage acts of 1792, 1834, and 1878.
  3. “All experience has shown that there are periods when, under any system of paper money, however carefully guarded, it is impracticable to maintain actual coin redemption. Usually contracts will be based on current paper money, and it is just that, during a sudden panic or an unreasonable demand for coin, the creditor should not be allowed to demand payment in other than the currency in which the debt was contracted. To meet this contingency, it would seem to be right to maintain the legal tender quality of United States notes. If they are not at par with coin, it is the fault of the Government and not of the debtor, or rather it is the result of an unforeseen stringency not contemplated by the contracting parties.” From the Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, dated December, 1877.
    Under what circumstances was this passage written? Is the recommendation made by it a wise one? Has it been acted on?
  4. Ten men club together to buy flour at wholesale, each taking a part and paying his share of the price. Ten others club together, borrow money jointly, and lend it out to themselves for aid in carrying on their trades. A third ten club together, set up a workshop on joint account and work in it, and periodically divide the net proceeds.
    What kinds of cooperation are typified, respectively, by these proceedings? In what countries has each kind been most widely applied? Which seems to you to be of greatest intrinsic interest for the social question?
  5. What is meant by the eight-hour law? Wherein does it resemble, and wherein differ from, factory legislation in England?
  6. Compare the regulations of the Knights of Labor in regard to strikes with those of an English Trades-Union.
  7. “The present doctrine is that the workmen’s interests are linked to those of other workmen, and the employer’s interests to those of other employers. Eventually it will be seen that industrial divisions should be perpendicular, not horizontal.” Explain what is meant by this passage; state by what devices it is endeavored to promote the “horizontal” and the “perpendicular” divisions, respectively; and given an opinion as to which line of division is likely to endure.
  8. The declaration of principles of the Knights of Labor demand “the enactment of laws providing for arbitration between employer and employed, and to enforce the decision of the arbitrators.” Is it desirable to comply with that demand in whole, in part, or not at all?
  9. Suppose a tax were levied of ten percent on the house-rent paid by every person, those who occupied their own houses being assessed for the letting value of their dwellings. Would such a tax be direct or indirect? Would it conform to the principle of equality of taxation? Give your reasons.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Scrapbook of Professor Frank W. Taussig, p. 12. Also, Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 3, Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College (June, 1887), pp. 5-6, in bound volume Examination Papers, 1887-89.

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Political Economy 2 (1886-87).

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 2. Economic Theory; its history and present stage. — Lectures, preparation of papers, and discussion of selections from leading writers. Prof. Taussig.

Total 49: 2 Graduates, 33 Seniors, 14 Juniors.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 58.

1886-87.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 2.
[Mid-year Examination, 1887]

  1. It has been said that the Mercantile writers built up the first system of political economy; again, that a system is first found in the writings of the Physiocrats; and again, that Ricardo created political economy as a science. What should you say as to these statements?
  2. Say something as to the connection that may be traced between the personal history of Adam Smith and of Ricardo, and the characteristics of their writings.
  3. Sketch the history of the doctrines as to the productiveness of different kinds of labor from the time of the Mercantile writers to that of J. S. Mill.
  4. Comment on the following:—
    “It remains a matter of some difficulty to discover what solid contribution Malthus has made to our knowledge, nor is it easy to ascertain precisely what practical precepts, not already familiar, he founded on his theoretic principles…. ‘Much,’ he thought, ‘remained to be done. The comparison between the increase of population and of food had not, perhaps, been stated with sufficient force and precision’ and ‘few inquiries had been made into the various modes by which the level’ between population and the means of subsistence ‘is effected.’ The first desideratum here mentioned—the want, namely, of an accurate statement of the relation between the population and the supply of food—Malthus doubtless supposed to have been supplied by the celebrated proposition that ‘population increases in a geometrical, food in an arithmetical, ratio.’ This proposition has been conclusively shown to be erroneous, there being no such difference of law between the increase of man and of the organic beings who form his food. When this formula is not used, other somewhat nebulous expressions are sometimes employed, as, for example, that ‘population has a tendency to increase faster than food’ a sentence in which both are treated as if they were spontaneous growths…It must always have been perfectly well known that population will probably (though not necessarily) increase with every augmentation of the supply of subsistence, and may, in some instances, inconveniently press upon or even for a certain time exceed the number properly corresponding to that supply. Nor could it have ever been doubted that war, disease, poverty — the last two often the consequences of vice — are causes which keep population down. Again, it is surely plain enough that the apprehension by individuals of the evils of poverty, or a sense of duty to their possible offspring, may retard the increase of population, and has in all civilized communities operated to a certain extent in that way. It is only when such obvious truths are clothed in the technical terminology of ‘positive’ and ‘preventive’ checks that they appear novel and profound; and yet they appear to contain the whole message of Malthus to mankind.”
  5. State carefully Cairnes’s theory of value, and show wherein it differs from Ricardo’s exposition of that subject.
  6. Explain the conclusions which George draws as to wages from an analysis of the simplest stage of society, and those which Ricardo draws as to values from a similar analysis. State whether the reasoning in the two cases differs and if so, wherein; and give an opinion as to the soundness of the conclusions reached.
  7. State carefully the wage-fund doctrine as expounded by Cairnes, and show wherein his exposition is an advance on the previous treatment of the subject.
  8. In a collection of examination questions, the following was asked:—
    “Cairnes argues that we cannot apply the law of supply and demand to labor, because the supply of labor is produced by biological forces and not as commodities are produced.— What is the fallacy of this argument?
    Comment on the question, and answer it; and refer briefly to the history of the line of argument that draws and analogy between the value of labor and of commodities.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943. Box 1, Folder “Mid-year Examinations, 1886-1887”.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 2.
[Year-end examination]

  1. Comment, separately or in a connected essay, on the following extracts:—
    (a) “The first of these theories is known as the wage-fund theory of the books on Political Economy. It represents the rate of wages as depending on the amount of capital which employers think proper to disburse as wages. The wage rate was regarded as the dividend, found by dividing the wages-fund by the number of labourers. But though this division doubtless takes place, there is nothing in the theory to determine either the whole amount which is to be divided, or the proportional share which any particular labourer may obtain. Nobody can possibly suppose that workmen in different branches of production, or in different ranks in the same branch, receive the same wages. Nor can anybody imagine that the capitalist distributes his capital simply because it is capital, irrespective of the produce which he expects from the labour bought.” — W. S. Jevons.
    (b) “Ricardo held that profits and wages are the leavings of each other. Later economists have generally rejected this doctrine; but even those of them who maintain that wages are paid out of capital, fall back on arguments which imply its truth. For instance, Cairnes, who earnestly maintained that capital is divided into wages, rent, material, and wage-fund, argued that trades-unions could not increase the rate of wages because, if they did so, they would reduce profits below the rate which would make investment worth while. On his own doctrine, increased wages could not trench on profits. … We shall see further on that wages and profits are not the leavings of each other, because they are not parts of the same whole.”
    (c) “If we assume that upon a cultivated island are tools and carts and animals for draught, and other forms of capital, adequate for a thousand laborers, the production will vary within a very wide range according to the industrial quality of the laborers using that capital. If we suppose them to be East Indians, we shall have a certain annual product; if we suppose Russian peasants to be substituted for East Indians, we shall have twice or three times that product; if we suppose Englishmen to be substituted for Russians, we shall have the product again multiplied two or three fold. By the wage-fund theory, the rate of wages would remain the same through these changes, inasmuch as the aggregate capital of the island would remain the same through these changes and the number of laborers in the market would be unchanged, the only difference being found in the substitution of more efficient for less efficient laborers. According to the view here advanced, on the contrary, the amount to be paid in wages should and would rise with the increased production due to the higher industrial quality of the laboring population.”
    (d) “The capital of the employer is by no means the real source of the wages even of the workmen employed by him. It is only the immediate reservoir through which wages are paid out, until the purchasers of the commodities produced by that labor make good the advance and thereby encourage the undertaker to purchase additional labor.” — W. Roscher.
    Whom do you judge to be the writers of the extracts (b) and (c)?
  2. State carefully Walker’s theory of business profits. Give an opinion as to its value (1) in explaining differences between the returns of different managers, and (2) in eliminating such returns, like rent, from the problem of distribution.
  3. Compare Carey and Bastiat, and say something as to the manner and extent of their influence on the course of economic speculation.
  4. Explain wherein the attitude of Wagner to economic study differs from that of Mill and Cairnes.
  5. “Mr. Cairnes asks, ‘how far should religious and moral considerations be admitted as coming within the province of political economy?’ His answer is that ‘they are to be taken account of precisely in so far as they are found to affect the conduct of men in the pursuit of wealth;’ and one needs only to allude to the influence of mediaeval religion both on the forms and the distribution of the wealth of the community, the changes in both with the change in religion after the Reformation, in proof of the impotence of the a priori method in relation to this class of agencies. Yet a few pages after recognizing their title to investigation, Mr. Cairnes argues that induction, though indispensable in physical, is needless in economic science, on the ground that the economist starts with a knowledge of ultimate causes’ and ‘is already at the outset of his enterprise in the position which the physicist only attains after ages of laborious research.’ The followers of the deduction method are in fact on the horns of a dilemma. They must either follow Mr. Lowe’s narrow path, and reason strictly from the assumption that men are actuated by no motive save the desire of pecuniary gain, or they must contend that they have an intuitive knowledge of all the moral, religious, political, and other motives influencing human conduct, and of the changes they undergo in different countries and periods.”
    Was Cairnes inconsistent in the manner here stated? Does his reasoning lead to the alleged dilemma?
  6. Should you agree with the following:—
    “If economic phenomena were the results of a single force or combination of forces, standing alone, then only would the assumption hold good that there is an identity of effects on the appearance of the same causes. But economic facts are so closely connected with the whole of life, the element of personal freedom comes in so constantly, that a causal connection like that of a law of nature cannot be shown. This is at bottom the sound point in the criticisms of Ricardo’s keen logic. Ricardo often begins with facts, carefully and nicely observed in real life, and makes them the first premises of his reasoning. Then he uses a method of reasoning which is common in philosophy, but inadmissible in political economy. By logical sequence of thought he leads the reader, who can see no flaw in the chain of conclusions, to a result which, notwithstanding the solidity of the premises and the steadfast reasoning, is yet by no means unquestionable. For in the end we are not concerned with the elaboration of a truthful train of thought, but with a truth of real life; hence the test of truth lies in the connection of cause and effect that exists in real life; and as to that, with its manifold and varied possibilities, no human insight can make the true combinations in advance by abstract reasoning. There may be an artistic truth, which yet, when compared with reality, is not a truth. Even if one sees no inconsistency with the facts of experience up to the very last step in the reasoning, yet that reasoning gets its final stamp of truth only from experience. Our thoughts on the facts of the world are often true only so long as we shape them according to those facts that we know; a new experience comes in to better this approximate truth.” — Knies, Die Politische Oekonomie vom Historischen Standpunkte.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 3, Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College (June, 1887), pp. 7-9, in bound volume Examination Papers, 1887-89.

Note: Political Economy 2. Has been posted earlier.

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Political Economy 3 (1886-87).

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 3. Investigation and Discussion of Practical Economic Questions (Bimetallism, Gold and Prices, American Shipping, Canadian Reciprocity, and Railway Transportation. — Each student presented ten theses, which were read and discussed in the class. Prof. Laughlin.

Total 35: 3 Graduates, 12 Seniors, 19 Juniors, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 58.

1886-87.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 3.
[Mid-year Examination, 1887]

  1. Discuss the following statement: “I would venture to assert that the influence of gold in raising or reducing prices depends not so much on the quantity of it available for use, as on the circumstances attending its production, and the facilities offered for its employment. … The sudden acquisition of money by those who rushed into gold mining … could not do otherwise than raise the demand for the necessaries and luxuries of life beyond the supply, and thus enhance their cost.”
  2. In considering the serious fall of prices since 1873 and its effects on existing contracts, compare the relative advantages to be derived from (1) a system of international Bimetallism, and (2) the Multiple Standard. What difficulties stand in the way of using the multiple standard?
  3. Give the facts in regard to the Free Coinage of gold, or silver, to-day in England, France, Germany, and the United States.
  4. Discuss the provisions of the U.S. Coinage Act of 1853, and its bearing on the success of the double standard in this country.
  5. Could an agreement of the chief commercial countries of the world to coin gold and silver at a fixed ratio keep the value of silver from falling under all circumstances?
  6. Name any Navigation Laws of the United States now in force, which had their origin in the retaliatory legislation of our early history.
  7. What effect has the policy of reciprocity, taken together with the high cost of building iron ships in the United States, had upon the foreign carrying trade of the country?
  8. Does the existing tariff work to diminish the United States foreign tonnage? How does the provision as to a drawback on articles manufactured wholly or in part of imported materials affect our foreign tonnage?
  9. What remedies should you propose for the decline of American shipping?
  10. Was the first experiment of issuing notes by a Bank, chartered by the United States, a successful one? Why?

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943. Box 1, Folder “Mid-year Examinations, 1886-1887”.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 3.
[Year-end examination]

  1. How do you account for the additional fall in the value of silver since the close of 1885?
  2. Are there sufficient grounds for believing that gold is scarce? What is the measure of scarcity? Is it the “needs of trade”?
  3. Discuss the causes of the growth of American shipping to 1856. Why have these causes not produced the same results since 1856 as before?
  4. Why were the issues of the Second United States Bank superior to those of the State banks of the same period?
  5. Ought the United States notes to be retired?
  6. In what way was the Reciprocity Treaty of 1854 between Canada and the United States connected with the fishery question? Why was the Treaty given up?
  7. What were the economic results of the Treaty? Do they furnish evidence as to the wisdom of reciprocity in the future?
  8. Are there any reasons to suppose that competition operates to modify rates on the railways of the United States?
  9. What are the objections against “pools”? Are these objections well founded?
  10. Compare the railway systems of England and France. How are discriminations regarded in these countries?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 3. Papers set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College (June, 1887), pp. 9-10, in the bound volume Examination Papers, 1887-89.

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Political Economy 4 (1886-87).

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 4. Financial history of England and America since the Seven Years’ War. — Lectures. Prof. Dunbar.

Total 157: 1 Graduate, 44 Seniors, 44 Juniors, 53 Sophomores, 2 Freshmen, 13 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 58.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 4.
[Mid-year examination, 1887]

[Copy not (yet) located]

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 4.
[Year-end examination, 1887]

Omit two questions

  1. Why did the repeal of the corn laws settle the question as to the adoption of free trade by England?
  2. Describe the leading measures by which Napoleon III. sought to stimulate the material prosperity of France.
  3. What were the reasons for granting public lands in aid of railway companies, as exhibited in the cases of the Illinois Central and the Pacific Railroads?
  4. The effects of the civil war on the system of landholding in the South and its probable influence on the general industry of that section.
  5. In what respects do quick transportation and telegraphs tend to produce analogous effects, and how are prices, as a measure of the value of gold, thereby affected?
  6. Among the causes for the decline of American shipping, how important was the civil war?
  7. What are the causes which make England the convenient centre for the “triangular” trade between nations?
  8. Describe the effects of the civil war on the tariff system of the United States.
  9. What form of wealth did France pay out in settlement of the indemnity of 1871, and what form did Germany actually receive?
  10. The causes which prevented the disastrous fall of gold predicted by some writers after 1850.
  11. The absorption of silver by India and reasons for its recent irregularity.
  12. The heavy demands for gold, 1871-83, and the reasons why they failed to produce any financial disturbance.
  13. The circumstances which enabled the United States to accumulate gold with special ease after the passage of the Resumption Act.
  14. If the working of the English coal mines should tend to become more expensive, could England protect her industrial supremacy by the importation of cheap coal? Give the reasons carefully.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 3. Papers set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College (June, 1887), pp. 10-11, in the bound volume Examination Papers, 1887-89.

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Political Economy 6 (1886-87).

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 6. History of Tariff Legislation in the United States, and consideration of its economic effects. — Lectures, written exercises, and oral discussion. Prof. Taussig.
Second half-year.

Total 38: 2 Graduates, 28 Seniors, 4 Juniors, 4 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 59.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 6.
[Year-end examination, 1887]

  1. Comment on the historical statements, and on the reasoning from them, in the following extracts:—
    “Such was the state of things [bankruptcy and ruin the most complete] at the date of the passage of the tariff act of 1842. Scarcely had it become a law, when confidence began to reappear and commerce to revive—the first steps toward the restoration of the whole country, in the briefest period, to a state of prosperity the like of which had never before been known. Seeing that these remarkable facts were totally opposed to the free-trade theory, the author was led to study the phenomena presented in the free-trade period from 1817 to 1824, and in the protective one which commenced in 1825 and ended in 1834, — the one terminating in bankruptcy and ruin similar to that which exhibited itself in 1842, and the other giving to the country a state of prosperity such as had again been realized in 1846. … The more he studied these facts, the more did he become satisfied that the free-trade theory embodied some great error.” H. C. Carey, Preface to the Principles of Social Science.
  2. It has been said that protective duties cause the price of the protected articles to fall; and such an effect is said to have been produced on the prices of cotton cloth after 1816, of copper after 1869, and of steel rails after 1870. Comment on the principle, and on its application in these three cases.
  3. “This ill-understood and much reviled principle [the minimum principle] appears to me to be a just, proper, effective, and strictly philosophical mode of laying protective duties. It is exactly conformable, as I think, to the soundest and most accurate principles of political economy. It is, in the most rigid sense, what all such enactments so far as practicable ought to be: that is to say, a mode of laying a specific duty. It lays the import exactly where it will do good and leaves the rest free. It is an intelligent, discerning, discriminating principle, not a blind, headlong, generalizing, uncalculating operation. … The minimum principle, however, was overthrown by the law of 1832, and that law, as it came from the House, and as it finally passed, substituted a general and universal ad valorem duty of fifty per cent.” Webster, Speech in the Senate, 1836.
    What were the duties to which Webster refers in this passage? And what should you say to his comments on them?
  4. Explain carefully what is the fundamental proposition in Walker’s Treasury Report of 1845, and discuss its soundness as a principle of tariff reform.
  5. Explain the present system of duties on woollen cloths, stating briefly its history; and say something as to its effects.
  6. It has been said that high duties should be levied on manufactured articles and low duties on raw materials, because raw materials, being more bulky, require much shipping to transport them, and their free admission would give increased employment to American vessels. Assuming that the materials would in fact be carried in American vessels, should you say the argument was a sound one?
  7. How can you explain the fact that, while the manufacture of cotton cloths has been little, if at all, dependent on protection, the heavy duties on silk piece-goods have not prevented a continuous large importation?
  8. It has been proposed to admit sugar from Cuba duty free, by a reciprocity treaty. Should you be in favor of such a measure?
  9. Discuss one of the following subjects. (Those who have prepared special reports on any one of these subjects are not to select that one for discussion.)
    1. The financial working of the tariff act of 1846.
    2. Proposed tariff legislation since 1883.
    3. The circumstances under which the tariff act of 1833 was passed.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 3. Papers set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College (June, 1887), pp. 11-12, in the bound volume Examination Papers, 1887-89.

_______________________

Political Economy 7 (1886-87).

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 7. Public Finance and Banking. — Leroy-Beaulieu’s Science des Finances. Prof. Dunbar.

Total 12: 3 Graduates, 6 Seniors, 3 Juniors.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 59.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 7.
[Mid-year examination, 1887]

[Copy not (yet) located]

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 7.
[Year-end examination]

Divide your time equally between A and B.

A.

[Two questions may be omitted.]

  1. Discuss the suggestion, which has been made, that among the French taxes upon real estate we ought to reckon,—
    1. The impôt des portes et fenêtres;
    2. Of the contribution des patentes, the droit proportionnel [à la valeur locative des locaux occupés].
  2. Weight the following reasons given by Leroy-Beaulieu for approving lottery loans:—
    “Les emprunts à loterie peuvent être regardés comme une combinaison ingénieuse et inoffensive dans les cas suivants: quand le prêteur est toujours certain de retrouver un jour, même en ayant la chance la plus mauvaise, au moins le capital qu’il a versé; quand, en outre, un intérêt rémunérateur, quoique inférieur à celui qu’autoriserait le marché des capitaux, est accordé à toutes les obligations, sans exception, même à celles qui ne sortent pas au tirages (3 ou 4 p. 100 par exemple, au lieu de 5 ou 6 p. 100 qui seraient peut-être le taux habituel du marché); quand, en dernier lieu, les lots n’ont qu’une importance modique, 20,000, 30,000, 50,000, 100,000 ou 150,000 francs au plus, et qu’ils ne peuvent pas donner lieu à des fortunes énormes. Dans tous ces cas les emprunts à loterie sont inoffensifs: le prêteur est sûr de ne pas perdre son capital, ni la totalité de l’intérêt dû pour ce capital: il sacrifie seulement une faible portion de cet intérêt pour courir la chance d’un gain considérable, mais pas assez toutefois pour procurer d’énormes fortunes. Dans ces conditions on peut soutenir que l’emprunt à loterie provoque l’épargne, surtout dans les basses classes.”
  3. Explain and discuss the system of reducing debt by means of terminable annuities, introduced by Mr. Gladstone.
  4. Discuss the following summary of conclusions, arrived at by Leroy-Beaulieu:—
    “Pour résumer cette épineuse matière, nous dirons que la partie de la dette d’un pays qui est entre les mains des nationaux peut légitimement être assujettie à tous les impôts généraux grevant dans le pays les valeurs analogues. Au contraire la partie de cette dette qui est entre les mains d’étrangers doit en être exempte. Mais jamais l’État ne peut s’arroger le droit de mettre un impôt spécial sur sa rente. Voilà ce que disent le bons sens et l’équité.”
  5. Compare the experience of England and France in the conversion of their national debts, and give the reasons for the marked difference.
  6. Discuss the propositions, laid down by Mr. Buckner, in his speech of April, 1882, in opposition to the Bank Charters Extension Bill,—
    1. That the currency ought to be issued by the government;
    2. That an elastic currency is mischievous, as introducing an element of uncertainty, and that the government should therefore issue a fixed amount of convertible notes.

B.

Mr. Goschen’s Budget for 1887 rests upon the estimate that income and outlay, if existing arrangements should not be changed, would be as follows (000’s omitted):—

Revenue. Expenditure.
Customs £20,200 Consolidated Fund £30,592
Excise 25,292 Army 18,394
Stamps 11,658 Navy 12,477
Land Tax 1,065 Civil Service 17,932
House Duty 1,920 Customs, Post, Teleg., &c. 10,786
Property and Income Tax 15,900
Post, Telegraph, &c. 15,120 ______
£91,155 £90,786
Surplus 974

Mr. Goschen then proposes, inter alia,—

  1. To diminish sinking-fund payments by £2,000,000;
  2. To take a penny off the income-tax, reducing it by £1,560,000;
  3. To lower the duty on tobacco, and thus give up £600,000 more.

Discuss these propositions, giving all explanation needed for a clear understanding of the subject by an uninformed reader.

Mr. Goschen says of the sinking-fund payments, “I lay great stress upon the fact that unless we put the matter into an endurable form, you will risk far larger inroads upon the sinking-fund than I here propose;” and further that “practically the whole burden of paying off debt has to be borne by the payers of income-tax.” In confirmation of these views it is pointed out that when the fixed charge for public debt was settled the income-tax was only 2d., that it is now 8d., and that other branches of revenue have not been “elastic.”

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination papers, 1873-1915. Box 3. Papers set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College (June, 1887), pp. 13-14, in the bound volume Examination Papers, 1887-89.

_______________________

Political Economy 8 (1886-87).

Class Enrollment.

Political Economy 8. Financial history of the United States. — Lectures. Prof. Dunbar.
First half-year

Total 32: 1 Graduate, 25 Seniors, 3 Juniors, 3 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1886-87, p. 59.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 8.
[Mid-year examination]

[Copy not (yet) located]

Image Source: Harvard Library, Hollis Images. Charles F. Dunbar (left) and James Laurence Laughlin (middle) and Frank W. Taussig (right).

 

Categories
Popular Economics Suggested Reading Syllabus

Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle. Economics Readings, Topics for 1889-1890

The Chautauqua Institution established a four-year cycle of reading assignments that provided a popular college liberal arts education. Beginning in 1885 an introduction to economics was introduced into the program with an economics textbook listed every fourth year among the half-dozen or so books to be read by participants in the circle.

This post begins with a brief history of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle (a.k.a. the C.L.S.C.) followed by a list of the economics texts assigned during the first sixty-six years of the C.L.S.C. The economics content from the outline for 1889-90 published in the C.L.S.C. journal, The Chautauqua, is the core artifact of this post. As an added bonus, 140 questions and answers provided for study of Richard T. Ely’s textbook, An Introduction to Political Economy, have been included as well.

On October 24, 1889 the C.L.S.C. held an Adam Smith Memorial Day. Q&A’s for discussion were included in The Chautauqua.

___________________________

Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle.

Excerpt from “A Brief History of the CLSC”

…Bishop [John Heyl] Vincent [cofounder with Lewis Miller of the Chautauqua Institution] conceived the idea of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle (CLSC), and founded it in 1878, four years after the founding of the Chautauqua Institution.

At its inception, the CLSC was basically a four year course of required reading. The original aims of the CLSC were twofold:

To promote habits of reading and study in nature, art, science, and in secular and sacred literature

and

To encourage individual study, to open the college world to persons unable to attend higher institution of learning.

On August 10, 1878, Dr. Vincent announced the organization of the CLSC to an enthusiastic Chautauqua audience.

Over 8,400 people enrolled the first year. Of those original enrollees, 1,718 successfully completed the reading course, the required examinations and received their diplomas on the first CLSC Recognition Day in 1882.

The idea spreads and reading circles form.

As the summer session closed in 1878, Chautauquans returned to their homes and involved themselves there in the CLSC reading program. Many introduced the CLSC idea to their friends and neighbors and, in turn, additional groups were established for the purpose of studying and discussing the CLSC course of instruction. The concept of local “CLSC Reading Circles” spread and, by the turn of the century, over 10,000 “circles” had been formed.

Clearly, the rapid and widespread growth of the CLSC filled a deeply felt need for a structured program of reading and learning. As such, its importance both to the Chautauqua movement and to the spread of education was significant to the history of our country. Arthur E. Bestor, Jr., president of the Institution 1915-1944, wrote in his Chautauqua Publications: “Through the home reading courses of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, it (Chautauqua) reached into innumerable towns, especially in the Midwest, and made education a powerful force in American life.”

The CLSC becomes a role model.

With the success of its program of planned reading, book selections
and local circles, the CLSC became the prototype for book clubs, study groups and university extension courses. According to the World Book Encyclopedia, the CLSC was “an example to American universities when they developed their extension programs, and influenced adult education leaders in such countries as England, Japan and South Africa.”

Dr. Vincent’s ideal yields nationwide results.

From 1878 through the 1920s the CLSC maintained a preeminent position in the field of adult education and augmented the general support for learning. This, in turn, prompted the spread of libraries in small communities, the extension of adult education, the growth of book clubs, the availability of book review services, the increasing opportunities for enrollment in institutions of higher learning, and the involvement of people in community life and social organizations generally.

More nationwide reading opportunities result in a period of decline.

The accumulated effects of the Depression, the spread of libraries
in small communities, the extension of adult education, the growth
of book clubs, the availability of book review services, the increasing opportunities for enrollment in institutions of higher learning and
the involvement of people in community life and social organizations steadily detracted from the influence of the CLSC….

Economics from the CLSC Book List:
1878-1944

1885-1886

George McKendree Steele. Outline Study of Political Economy. New York: Chautauqua Press, 1885.

1889-1890

Richard T. Ely. An Introduction to Political Economy. New York: Chautauqua Press, 1889.

1893-1894

Richard T. Ely. Outlines of Economics. Meadville, Penn.: Flood and Vincent, 1893.

1895-1896

Carroll D. Wright. The Industrial Evolution of the United States. Meadville, Penn.: Flood and Vincent, 1895.

1899-1900

Richard T. Ely. The Strength and Weakness of Socialism. New York: Chautauqua Press, 1899.

1903-1904

Richard T. Ely. Studies in the Evolution of Industrial Society. New York: Macmillan, 1903.

1907-1908

John R. Commons. Races and Immigrants in America. New York: Macmillan, 1907.

1910-1911

Edward P. Cheyney. An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England. New York: Macmillan, 1907.

1915-1916

Albert Bushell Hart, ed. Social and Economic Forces in American HistoryChautauqua, New York: Chautauqua Press, 1913.

1943-1944

John W. McConnell. The Basic Teachings of Great Economists. New York: Blakiston, 1943.

Source:  Chautauqua Literary & Scientific Circle. Book List 1878-2017.

___________________________

The Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle.
Books for 1889-90.

An Introduction to Political Economy. Ely $1.00

Bible in the Nineteenth Century. Townsend $0.40

How to Judge of a Picture. Van Dyke $0.60

Outline History of Rome. Vincent and Joy $0.70

Physics. Steele $1.00

Preparatory and College Latin Course in English. 1 vol . Wilkinson $1.30

___________________________

C. L. S. C. OUTLINE AND PROGRAMS.
FOR OCTOBER [1889]

First week (ending October 8).

“Political Economy.” Chapters I.-VII. inclusive.

Suggestive Programs for Local Circle Work:

The Lesson. (The uneven division of the work in Political Economy as laid out in the Outline is made that the work might be taken up by topics; first, the growth of industrial society; second, the characteristics of industrial society; third, the definition of political economy; fourth, the division, methods, and utilityof political economy.)

Second week (ending October 15).

“Political Economy.” Chapters VIII. and IX.

In the Chautauquan: Helen Campbell, Child Labor and Some of its Results (pp. 21-24)

The Lesson. (As marked out in the Outline)

Debate—Resolved: That the Government should abolish all restrictions on the rate of interest. (See Ely’s “Political Economy,” p. 79.)

Third week (ending October 23)

“Political Economy.” Chapters X. and XI.

**  **  **  **  **  **  **  **

Adam Smith Day.—October 24.

“The wise form right judgment of the present from what is past.”—Sophocles.

  1. Paper—Life and Character of Adam Smith.
  2. Questions on Adam Smith in The Question Table.
  3. A Symposium of Letters—The best method of national taxation. Each member is to write and read a letter addressed to the president of the circle, giving his views on this subject. He is to commend or censure the American system—that of protection—and show that it is either in harmony with, or in opposition to, the four maxims regarding taxation laid down by Adam Smith:

    1. The Subjects of every state ought to contribute toward the support of the government, as nearly as possible, in proportion to their respective abilities: that is, in proportion to the revue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state.
    2. The tax which each individual is bound to pay ought to be certain and not arbitrary. The time of payment, the manner of payment, the quantity to be paid, ought all to be clear and plain to the contributor and to every other person.
    3. Every tax ought to be levied at the time and in the manner in which it is most likely to be convenient for the contributor to pay it.
    4. Every tax ought to be so contrived as both to take out and keep out of the pockets of the people as little as possible over and above what it brings into the public treasury of the state.

SPECIAL MEMORIAL, DAY.—ADAM SMITH.

  1. Of what nationality was Adam Smith?
    A. Scotch
  2. What happened him when he was three years old?
    A. He was carried off by Gypsies.
  3. His introduction as an author was made by an article in the Edinburgh Review on what famous book?
    A. Dr. Johnson’s Dictionary.
  4. Under what sobriquet is Smith spoken of in the “Noctes Ambrosiae”?
    A. Father Adam.
  5. Upon what work does his fame mainly rest?
    A. His book “The Wealth of Nations.”
  6. What probably induced this “Kirkcaldy recluse” to accept the office of traveling tutor to the young Duke of Buccleuch?
    A. The opportunity it would afford him for collecting facts for this book.
  7. What great event was transpiring in America at the time the “Wealth of Nations” was published?
    A. The opening of the Revolutionary War.
  8. If according to the historian Green, “books are measured by their effect on the fortunes of mankind,” what rank must be assigned to the “Wealth of Nations”?
    A. It must be classed among the greatest of books.
  9. Who said that it was “perhaps the only book which produced an immediate, general, and irrevocable change in some of the most important parts of the legislation of all civilized nations”?
    A. Sir James Mackintosh.
  10. What does Smith consider the only source of wealth?
    A. Labor
  11. What method of compulsory education did he propose?
    A. That every one wishing to enter upon a trade be required to pass a test examination.
  12. From what three classes or orders of civilized society did he contend came all the revenues which supply every other class?
    A. Landlords, laborers, and capitalists.
  13. From what great historian did the “Wealth of Nations” receive its first emphatic welcome?
    A. David Hume.
  14. What prime minister of England took the principles it taught as the ground-work of his Policy?
    A. William Pitt.
  15. What great event not long after its publication set England against the doctrines of political innovation taught in the book?
    A. The French Revolution.
  16. What change of opinion did Pitt undergo regarding Smith’s free trade notions?
    A. At first warmly participating in them, he became one of their leading opponents.
  17. What habit of Smith’s, indulged even in society, caused much amusement?
    A. The absent mindedness which led him to talk to himself.
  18. What acts showed his beneficent nature?
    A. Much of his ample fortune was spent in secret charities.
  19. What did he call himself in reference to his weakness, the collection of a fine library?
    A. A “beau in his books.”
  20. Throughout his life who was his closest friend?
    A. His mother.

Questions: pp. 97-98. Answers: p. 229.

**  **  **  **  **  **  **  **

Fourth week (ending October 31).

“Political Economy.” Chapters IX.—XV. inclusive.

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 1 (October, 1889), pp. 87-88.

**  **  **  **  **  **  **  **

Questions and Answers.
On Ely’s “Political Economy.”

  1. Q. Of what science does political economy form a branch?
    A. Sociology, or social science.
  2. Q. What is sociology?
    A. The science which deals with society.
  3. Q. Into how many departments has social science been divided?
    A. Eight: language, art, science and education, family life, social life (in the narrower sense), religious life, political life, and economic life.
  4. Q. What is meant by economic life?
    A. That part of man’s life which is concerned with “getting a living.”
  5. Q. What forms a fundamental fact of economic life?
    A. The dependence of man upon his fellows.
  6. Q. In what respect does the economic life of a nation differ from that of an individual?
    A. The basis of national economy is political independence.
  7. Q. What is a state?
    A. The union of a stationary people, occupying a defined territory, under a supreme power and a definite constitution.
  8. Q. What are the two great factors in a national economy?
    A. Territory and man.
  9. Q. Cite one example showing the tendency of a national economy to change?
    A. Landed property was once largely common property; in civilized nations it came into the possession of individuals; now a reverse process is seen in the fact that forests are becoming public property.
  10. Q. Viewed from the standpoint of production, into what five stages is the economic progress of humanity divided?
    A. The hunting and fishing stage; the pastoral; the agricultural; the commercial; and the industrial.
  11. Q. Viewed from the standpoint of transfer of goods, how many economic stages are there?
    A. Three: truck economy; money economy; and credit economy.
  12. Q. What people are a type of the hunting and fishing stage?
    A. The American Indians.
  13. Q. Where are vivid pictures of people living in the pastoral stage found?
    A. In the earliest chapters of the Bible.
  14. Q. To what manner of life did the pastoral stage give rise?
    A. To the nomadic.
  15. Q. What was probably the earliest form of settled agricultural life?
    A. Village communities.
  16. Q. What remain to-day as witnesses of the former common ownership of land?
    A. The Boston “Common”’ and the “commons” of other New England towns.
  17. Q. What radical changes mark the commercial stage?
    A. Important cities arose along the sea-coast and on rivers; mines were worked; and the use of money became more general.
  18. Q. What made possible the far-reaching changes marking the industrial stage?
    A. The application of steam to industry and the improvement in the means of communication and transport.
  19. Q. With what periods was the truck, or barter, economy coincident?
    A. The hunting and fishing, the pastoral, and part of the agricultural periods.
  20. Q. What one fact is sufficient to show the change from money economy to that of credit?
    A. The fact that banks now form an essential part of the entire national economy.
  21. Q. What are some of the main causes for the existence of the present economic problems?
    A. The industrial revolution; the new importance of capital; the possibility of improvement; and the higher ethical standards.
  22. Q. What are some of the remarkable features of the recent development of the industrial revolution?
    A. Increased domestic and international commerce; corporations and trusts; problem of the working day; resistance to improvements; and sudden riches.
  23. Q. What great change in production occurred during the industrial revolution?
    A. Two of its chief factors, capital and labor, were separated.
  24. Q. What has been the result of this division?
    A. Capital has acquired a new power which has created modern socialism.
  25. Q. What is the wide-spread belief of reformers regarding the solution of this problem?
    A. That labor and capital must be again united, but they differ as to the methods.
  26. Q. In what are three characteristic features of modern economic life to be found?
    A. In the relations which it bears to freedom, to ethics, and to the state.
  27. Q. Under what condition has economic freedom ever been absolute?
    A. Under primitive anarchy.
  28. Q. In what way may real freedom be increased by restriction laws?
    A. Such laws may remove restrictions to liberty arising outside of law.
  29. Q. In what five ways does economic freedom manifest itself?
    A. Freedom of labor, of landed property, of capital with respect to loans, in the establishment of enterprises, and of the market.
  30. Q. What restrictions have been placed up on freedom of movement?
    A. Tramp laws, the anti-Chinese legislation, and a law forbidding contracts with foreign laborers to come to the United States to work.
  31. Q. In what respect is freedom of the market restricted in the United States?
    A. Heavy taxes are laid on foreign trade.
  32. Q. What is mentioned as the leading advantage resulting from a general freedom of the market?
    A. Competition would develop new forces, and reveal new resources of economy, excellence, and variety of products.
  33. Q. What disadvantages is it claimed would follow such a freedom?
    A. The moral standard of economic life would be lowered; and there would result longer hours of labor and cheaper prices.
  34. Q. What does ethics demand for the truly civilized life of each individual?
    A. That so far as possible each should be supplied with economic goods to satisfy his reasonable wants and afford the completest development of his faculties.
  35. Q. What is the basis of the economic life of modern nations?
    A. Individual responsibility.
  36. Q. What part, then, does the state enact in this life?
    A. It enters where the individual’s powers are insufficient.
  37. Q. Give the derivation and meaning of the term political economy.
    A. It comes from three Greek words and means the housekeeping of the state.
  38. Q. Give a definition of political economy in its most general terms?
    A. It is the science which treats of man as a member of economic society.
  39. Q. What is the true business of the political economist?
    A. To describe the best means for the promotion of the welfare of the people as a whole.
  40. Q. What aims does political economy distinctly include within its province?
    A. Ethical aims; it does not merely tell us how things are, but also how they ought to be, and shows that in many cases the general honesty which exists now as a mere matter of course was once a future ideal.
  41. Q. Into what three parts is political economy commonly divided?
    A. Into general eco nomics, special economics, and finance.
  42. Q. By what three methods is all knowledge acquired?
    A. The inductive, the deductive, and the statistical.
  43. Q. What term has been selected by the author as the most fitting to describe the laws governing political economy?
    A. Social laws.
  44. Q. What assertion is often made against political economy by business men?
    A. That it is not practical.
  45. Q. In return what assertion may be made against the opinions of business men?
    A. Their range of facts is too narrow, and each man is apt to be absorbed in his own affairs
  46. Q. What is brought forward as an illustration of this point?
    A. That the attempt to improve politics by putting practical business men in office has often resulted disastrously.
  47. Q. What elements have united in forming the science of political economy?
    A. Business, philosophy, jurisprudence, politics, and philanthropy.
  48. Q. Give examples showing how different systems of religion have affected the character of nations?
    A. The fatalism of the Turks led to indolence; the Jewish religion stimulated its followers to activity and accumulation; Christianity dignifies honest labor.
  49. Q. What service does political economy perform for law?
    A. It explains the reasons for a great part of the laws, their nature, and the principles which should govern them.
  50. Q. For what is a body of international law now needed as never before?
    A. To regulate international economic relations.

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 1 (October, 1889), pp. 94-95.

___________________________

C. L. S. C. OUTLINE AND PROGRAMS.
FOR NOVEMBER. [1889]

First week (ending November 8).

“Political Economy.” Part II. Chapters I. and II.

Second week (ending November 15).

“Political Economy.” Part II. Chapters III. and IV.

“Questions and Answers on Political Economy,” in The Chautauquan.

Third week (ending November 22)

“Political Economy.” Part III. Chapters I. and II.

Debate—Resolved: That by granting private ownership in land the state permits a monopoly of one of the bounties of nature. (See text-book on “Political Economy,” pp. 77-78, 161, and 296-297.)

Fourth week (ending November 30).

“Political Economy.” Part III. Chapters III. and IV.

Debate—Question: Is the coinage of silver as authorized by the “Bland Bill” a source of financial danger to the United States?

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 2 (November, 1889), pp. 217-218.

**  **  **  **  **  **  **  **

Questions & Answers
ELY’S “POLITICAL ECONOMY.”

  1. Q. What is the only operation man can perform upon matter?
    A. He can simply move it.
  2. Q. What can he produce by this action?
    A. Quantities of utility.
  3. Q What is the economic term applied to the creation of utilities?
    A. Production.
  4. Q. What is the term applied to the results of labor?
    A. Wealth.
  5. Q. If the quantity of cotton cloth should double between two censuses, and the price fall one half, would the wealth of the country be increased?
    A. It would be doubled.
  6. Q. What sets the limit to all production?
    A. The power of consumption.
  7. Q. What supply motives of economic activity to man?
    A. His wants.
  8. Q. Into how many classes may those things which man wants be divided?
    A. Into necessaries, comforts, conveniences, and luxuries.
  9. Q. What are luxuries?
    A. Whatever contribute chiefly to enjoyment, rather than to a better training of man’s powers.
  10. Q. What are the three factors of production?
    A. Nature, labor, and capital.
  11. Q. Considered in an economic sense, what is meant by nature?
    A. Simply land.
  12. Q. What is capital?
    A. Every laid-by product which may be used for further production.
  13. Q. What tendency marks the development of industrial civilization?
    A. It becomes constantly more complex.
  14. Q. What forms at present a characteristic feature in the organization of the productive factors?
    A. The division of labor.
  15. Q. To what part of political economy is the name exchange applied?
    A. To that dealing with transfers of goods.
  16. Q. What is value?
    A. The measure of utility.
  17. Q. What is price?
    A. Value expressed in money.
  18. Q. Upon what does price depend?
    A. Immediately, upon supply and demand; secondarily, upon cost of production.
  19. Q. What is money?
    A. A universal standard of value and a medium of exchange.
  20. Q. Under the different conceptions concerning it, what single form of money will pass as money in every sense of the word?
    A. Gold money.
  21. Q. When is paper money said to be redeemable?
    A. When government pays coin for it on demand.
  22. Q. How much paper money can be issued by a nation with safety?
    A. An amount equal to one-third of the government revenues payable in this kind of money.
  23. Q. What effects follow the arbitrary de crease or increase of the amount of money?
    A. In the former case burdens are added to every debtor; in the latter, creditors are robbed.
  24. Q. What is the established ratio between gold and silver in the United States?
    A. One to sixteen.
  25. Q. What is meant by the term demonetization of silver?
    A. The withdrawing it from current use as full legal tender.
  26. Q. What is meant by bi-metalism?
    A. The use of both silver and gold at a fixed ratio of value as legalized currency.
  27. Q. On what condition only could the introduction of bi-metalism be regarded with favor by economists?
    A. That it become an international measure.
  28. Q. What restriction does the Bland Bill lay upon the coinage of silver in the United States?
    A. Not less than $2,000,000 or more than $4,000,000 worth of silver must be coined every month by the mints.
  29. Q. What is John Stuart Mill’s definition of credit?
    A. Permission to use the capital of another person.
  30. Q. What instrument of credit is known as a check?
    A. An order on a banker by a person having money on deposit to pay to the bearer a certain specified sum of money.
  31. Q. What is a draft?
    A. A check given by one banker against another.
  32. Q. What are bankers?
    A. Middle men between borrowers and lenders.
  33. Q. What banks are allowed to issue notes which circulate as money?
    A. National banks.
  34. Q. What is a clearing-house?
    A. An institution designed to save for the banks of a city, time, labor, and circulating notes.
  35. Q. What is protection as used in political economy?
    A. A regulation which lays a tax on all imported commodities when similar commodities can be produced at home.
  36. Q. What are the two leading arguments of protectionists?
    A. The diversified-natural industry argument and the protection-to-infant industry argument.
  37. Q. What are the leading arguments of free traders?
    A. That protection is not needed to accomplish either of the above mentioned ends; that it is not a benefit to the laboring man; and that it fosters monopolies.
  38. Q. What reform is needed at the present time more than a tariff reform?
    A. That of municipal government.
  39. Q. What have been far greater forces in adding to the wealth of modern nations than the tariff policy?
    A. Inventions and discoveries, especially the application of steam to industry.
  40. Q. If it be true that American labor would be better off without it, why should the protective system not be removed suddenly?
    A. It is an historical growth which has taken deep root, and sudden removal would be dangerous.

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 2 (November, 1889), pp. 225-226.

___________________________

C. L. S. C. OUTLINE AND PROGRAMS.
FOR DECEMBER. [1889]

First week (ending December 8).

“Political Economy.” Part IV. Chapters I-V. inclusive.

Book Review—“Looking backward.” By Edward Bellamy.

Debate—Resolved: That the formation of trusts and combinations are a development in the right direction. (See Ely’s “Political Economy,” p. 241.)

Second week (ending December 16).

“Political Economy.” Finish Part IV. Part V.

Third week (ending December 23)

“Political Economy.” Part VI.

Questions and Answers  on “Political Economy,” in The Chautauquan.
Debate—Resolved: That I have a right to know how much I shall do for the state, which is impossible under the present tariff system.

Fourth week (ending December 31).

“Political Economy.” Part VII.

Roll-Call—A written question on any point in political economy.
Table Talk—Discussion of the above named questions. (If preferred, the questions may be taken from the list in the back part of the text-book, or the whole time may be devoted to any one of these questions.)

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 3 (December, 1889), p. 344.

**  **  **  **  **  **  **  **

Questions & Answers
ON ELY’S “POLITICAL ECONOMY.”

  1. Q. What is private property?
    A. The exclusive right of a person over economic goods.
  2. Q. In the case of what land in the United States was it felt that the individual elements in property encroached upon the social elements?
    A. That surrounding Niagara Falls.
  3. Q. Into what four parts are the products of industry usually divided?
    A. Rent, interest, profits, and wages.
  4. Q. What is rent?
    A. The annual return of land in itself.
  5. Q. What determines the amount of rent?
    A. The surplus yielded above returns on labor and capital.
  6. Q. What is interest?
    A. The sum paid for capital lent to others.
  7. Q. What determines the rate of interest?
    A. The opportunities for, and the fruitfulness of, investments.
  8. Q. What are profits?
    A. Whatever is left after paying rent, interest, and wages.
  9. Q. Under what circumstances do profits tend to equality?
    A. When the flow of capital is free—that is out of the power of monopolists.
  10. Q. What is the difference between capital and capitalization?
    A. Capital is the amount actually invested in property; capitalization is the amount at which property is valued.
  11. Q. What familiar form is often assumed by capitalization?
    A. “Stock-watering.”
  12. Q. What determines the wages of labor?
    A. The “standard of life” fixed for the laborer; called also the iron law of wages.
  13. Q. What methods have been found better adapted to keep the industrial peace than the ordinary wages system?
    A. The sliding scale of wages, and arbitration and conciliation.
  14. Q. What one factor of production is embraced in modern labor organizations?
    A. The laborers.
  15. Q. What are mentioned as some of the advantages secured by labor organizations for their members?
    A. Diminished intemperance; educational opportunities; and social culture.
  16. Q. What is meant by profit sharing?
    A. Securing to laborers a share of the profits in addition to their wages.
  17. Q. Where voluntary co-operation is carried out successfully, what good effects on character has it produced?
    A. It has made men diligent, frugal, intelligent, and considerate of the rights of others.
  18. Q. By what name is a coercive co-operation for productive enterprises known?
    A. Socialism.
  19. Q. What good service has socialism rendered?
    A. It has called general attention to social problems and to the need of social reform.
  20. Q. Of what American laws is it claimed that they create artificial monopolies?
    A. The tariff laws.
  21. Q. What other privileges are classed under artificial monopolies?
    A. Copyrights and patents.
  22. Q. What are natural monopolies?
    A. Those businesses which become monopolies on account of their own inherent properties.
  23. Q. What plan is advocated for the prevention of private monopolies?
    A. The limitation of charters for natural monopolies.
  24. Q. What is one of the most serious social evils of the present?
    A. Child labor.
  25. Q. What should be the constant aim of public authority and private effort, regarding social troubles?
    A. To anticipate and prevent their existence.
  26. Q. What is the meaning of consumption as used in political economy?
    A. The destruction of a utility.
  27. Q. When does consumption become wasteful?
    A. When nothing is left to show for it.
  28. Q. When is there most danger of a glut in the market?
    A. When least is produced, or in crises of industrial life.
  29. Q. What is public finance?
    A. That part of political economy which deals with public revenues.
  30. Q. At what are the annual revenues of the various governments of the United States—federal, state, and local—estimated?
    A. At about $800,000,000.
  31. Q. What would be the result if these governments received a surplus of money each year and kept it from circulation?
    A. A panic.
  32. Q. In the United States how alone can the money flowing into the treasury from the revenues get out again?
    A. In payment of claims on the United States.
  33. Q. What makes the importance of finance plainly apparent?
    A. A knowledge of the magnitude of the revenues and expenditures of governments in modern times.
  34. Q. Of what in general are these increased expenditures of government a sign?
    A. Of national health.
  35. Q. What are the three permanent sources of revenue?
    A. Productive domains, industries, and taxes.
  36. Q. How is it shown that by means of taxation popular rights have been secured?
    A. Monarchs were obliged to ask money of the people; the people granted them on condition of receiving their demands.
  37. Q. Do large expenditures of public money for the public ever prove ruinous to a nation?
    A. Not if the money to be collected is justly distributed among the people.
  38. Q. What are customs duties?
    A. Taxes on imported articles.
  39. Q. What are excise taxes?
    A. Taxes on articles produced in the United States.
  40. Q. What is one of the greatest evils against the present system of taxation?
    A. It is not properly proportioned, and falls more heavily on the poor than on the rich.
  41. Q. What seems the most promising remedy against the evils of taxation?
    A. An income tax.
  42. Q. When did political economy as a distinct science come into being?
    A. A little more than a hundred years ago.
  43. Q. Why did it not arise earlier as a separate science?
    A. Chiefly because finance and labor—its two most fruitful sources of inquiry—have only in modern times become questions of importance to governments.
  44. Q. What side of economics was taught and practiced in the Orient?
    A. The ethical side.
  45. Q. How did Aristotle regard industrial life?
    A. He strictly subordinated it to the higher callings of society.
  46. Q. What does the economic life of the Romans plainly show?
    A. The disastrous consequences of slave labor and of landed property.
  47. Q. In what particular does Christianity teach the opposite of all former instruction in economy?
    A. It asserts the honorableness of toil.
  48. Q. To what standpoint have modern economists arrived?
    A. That law, morality, and utility must harmonize.
  49. Q. What is the laissez faire theory of political economy?
    A. The non-interference of government in matters of trade.
  50. Q. In what two countries is the greatest activity in economics to be found at the present time?
    A. Germany and the United States.

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 3 (December, 1889), p. 352-353.

___________________________

C. L. S. C. OUTLINE AND PROGRAMS.
FOR JANUARY. [1890]

First week (ending January 8).

Second week (ending January 15).

Third week (ending January 23).

In the Chautauquan: The Railroads and the State [by Franklin H. Giddings, pp. 413-417]

Debate—Resolved: The state ownership of railroads is the best remedy for the evils connected with the present system.

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 4 (January, 1890), p. 472-473.

___________________________

C. L. S. C. OUTLINE AND PROGRAMS.
FOR FEBRUARY.

Second week (ending February 15).

In the Chautauquan: “Economic Internationalism.” [Richard T. Ely, pp. 538-542.]

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 5 (February, 1890), p. 602.

___________________________

C. L. S. C. OUTLINE AND PROGRAMS.
FOR MARCH.

Third week (ending March 22)

In the Chautauquan: “The Nationalization of Industry in Europe” [by Franklyn H. Giddings, pp. 668-672]

Source: The Chautauquan. Vol X. No. 6 (March, 1890), pp. 729-730.

[Other economic writings in this issue]

Charles J. Little. Karl Marx. 1818-1883, pp. 693-698

George Gunton. Trusts and How to Deal with Them, Part I,  [Feb. 1890] pp. 573-575

___________.  Trusts, and How to Deal with Them. Part II. pp. 699-703.

 

Categories
Funny Business

Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle. Hektographing for Dummies, 1889

 

 

From the official organ of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, The Chautauquan, we have the following recipe for creating duplicates of material prepared for distribution at one of the local circles. One of the reasons that walk-talk-and-chalk remained the pedagogical choice of many professors for so long.

Here is a more recent guide to the process put together by the University of Iowa Libraries.

_______________________

[Do-it-yourself Hektograph, 1889]

THE hektograph is a useful contrivance for taking several copies of any written document. In circles it is so convenient for printing programs and circulars that we print here directions for preparing one, with ink.

Take 2 oz. of gelatine (Cooper’s preferred) and 12% fluid oz. of glycerine. Soak the gelatine over night and drain well. Put the glycerine into a small pail or any suitable vessel and set it into another and larger dish which has been partly filled with salt water. By heating the salt water to the boiling point, the glycerine may be raised to a temperature of 200°; when this temperature is obtained, add the gelatine to the glycerine, and heat the mixture for several hours to drive off the water. Now pour the fluid into a shallow pan and allow it to cool for at least twelve hours. (A shallow oblong tin pan 8 by 10 inches in size and one inch in depth may be made by the tinner; an ordinary oblong pie pan will answer the purpose, or even a thin board with laths nailed around the edge.)

The ink for use on the hektograph is made by putting 1/6 oz. 3 B. purple aniline in 1 fluid oz. of hot water. On cooling add 1/6 oz. each of alcohol and glycerine.

To use the pad, write with an ordinary pen, on a sheet of paper whatever you wish to print, using the above ink. Allow the ink to dry on the paper of its own accord, without the use of the blotting paper. When dry lay the paper, the written side down, on the pad, pressing it down lightly and smoothly. Now by taking the corner of the paper between the thumb and finger, it may be carefully removed leaving the impression from which the printing is to be done on the pad. To print, simply lay the paper evenly on the impression on the pad and press the surface very lightly. Thirty or forty impressions can be made before it will be necessary to write the copy over. As soon as the printing is done, wash the pad with a sponge or cloth, using lukewarm water, until all the ink is removed. The ink should not be allowed to stand on the pad. If the surface of the pad becomes uneven, the composition may be melted and poured back. New material may be added at any time.

Source: The Chautauquan, Vol. 10, No. 2 (November, 1889), pp. 234-235.

Image Source:  “Jell-O Cup” will get jiggly” from the website www.amny.com posted April 10, 2014.

 

Categories
Johns Hopkins Popular Economics Syllabus

Chautauqua University Extension. Three Lectures on Labor Movement. Ely, 1889

While preparing a later post on the economics component of the 1889-90 C. L. S. C. (Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle), I came across a reference to a syllabus for a series of lectures given by Richard T. Ely in Chautauqua, New York. I tracked down the three reports of the syllabus (transcribed for this post below) in the Chautauqua Assembly Herald which can be consulted on-line from what appear to be scans of microfilm images.

For a brief history of the Chautauqua Education Movement in the United States.

________________________

Chautauqua University Extension.
Lectures on the Labor Movement in the Hall of Philosophy
by Dr. Richard T. Ely.

I.
The Nature of the Labor Problem, August 7, 1889.
SYLLABUS OF TOPICS

  1. Introductory Remarks
    1. University Extension lectures are primarily for instruction and not for entertainment. They are to give popular presentations of serious subjects. Those who do not care for this sort of lectures are advised to remain away rather than annoy the lecturer and disturb the rest of the audience by coming and going.
    2. The character of the present course, which is an adaptation of class-room work.
    3. The examination at the close of the course.
  2. Comments on the Annotated Bibliography.
  3. The Existence of Social Classes.
    1. What is meant by classes? Stormonth gives this definition: “A number of persons in society supposed to have the same position with regard to means, rank, etc.” Webster’s definition is as follows: A group of individuals ranked together as possessing common characteristics.” Modern classes are industrial, especially in republics, but industrial pursuits are everywhere acquiring increasing importance in class-formation.
    2. Ancient and modern classes compared. The influence of occupation in early times seen in the castes of India. “Sir Henry Maine.”
    3. Law and industry as a basis of classes compared. Economic forces often more powerful than legal forces. Illustrated by the contrast between nominal and actual freedom. “The Tribe of Ishmael.”
    4. It is a mistake to shut our eyes to the fact of the existence of classes in the United States, and to the further fact that with us class lines are becoming more inflexible and difficult to cross. America is becoming more like European countries.
    5. The good and evil effects of the existence of classes. The ideal is the harmonious and helpful co-existence of classes. “For…the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that body being many are one body…But God hat tempered the body together, having given more abundant honor so that part which lacked, that there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another. And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; if one member be honored, all the members rejoice with it.”—St. Paul, First Epistle to the Corinthians. This bring us naturally to
  4. The solidarity of social classes.
    Modern society cannot prosper unless all parts participate in this prosperity, but wealth may increase while society decays. The oneness of society and the oneness of social life, illustrated by Professor Burrough’s Chautauqua sermon of Sunday, July 7, of this year.
    “While there is a single guilty person in the universe, each innocent one must feel his innocence tortured by that guilt”—Hawthorne in the Marble Faun.
  5. The labor problem, a problem of such real living importance that it may be called the problem of problems, but it must never be regarded as a class-problem.
    The error of the more radical forms of socialism in treating the labor problem as merely a class-problem, thereby promoting class-hatred and delaying social reform.
    The emancipation of the laboring classes can never be accomplished by the laboring classes alone.
  6. The true meaning of this phrase of Gladstone. The individual and social standpoint contrasted. The social standpoint illuminated by the labor problem.
    “A sense of wrong is a mighty strong eyewash. It will clear out a lot of sophisms which blind men’s eyes.”—Dr. Heber Newton—Also true of love. Illustrations taken from American and English experience, of social benefits from the agitation of the labor problem.

Source: Chautauqua Assembly Herald. Vol. XIV, No. 13 (August 7, 1889), p. 3.

________________________

II.
The Causes of Existence of the Modern Labor Problem
August 8, 1889.
SYLLABUS OF TOPICS

  1. Introductory Remarks
    The multiplicity of causes render their comprehension difficult.
  2. The organic character of all forms of social life, and the youthful features of the present politico-economic organism in civilized nations.
    The hopefulness of this view.
  3. Movement the law of life.
    The newness of our present economic life. Illustrations.
    1. Transportation one hundred years ago.
      Adam Smith, in 1776, assumes that beef and grain are too bulky to be transported with profit from Ireland to England. These are his words:
      “Even the breeding countries of Great Britain never are likely to be much affected by the free importation of Irish cattle. *** Even the free importation of Irish corn could very little affect the interests of the farmers of Great Britain. Corn is a much more bulky commodity than butchers’ meat. *** The small quantity of foreign corn imported, even in times of greatest scarcity, may satisfy our farmers that they have nothing to fear from the freest importation.” With this, contrast American competition in the supply of wheat and beef in 1889, in its effects on European agriculture.
    2. Banks One Hundred Years Ago.
      Banks have increased in number, and their functions have changed within fifty years.
      “in [illegible] the fourth bank was established, the Bank of Maryland, in the city of Baltimore, if I am not mistaken; and that bank was open one year before a single depositor came to its counters. Bagehot, the English authority, says that as late as 1880 all the discussions of bankers were upon the circulation and not at all upon the deposits of their banks. *** I looked at the bank statements of the banks of New York the other day, and the figures were these: The circulation of all banks was $5,000,000; the deposits of the banks in the same week were over $400,000,000.
      Seth Low in a speech before Boston Merchants’ Association, January 8, 1889.
    3. Corporations one hundred years ago compared with corporations and trusts to-day.
      One hundred years ago Adam Smith expressed the belief that corporations could not succeed on account of their inability to hold their own in competition with individuals and private firms. Now, the conviction is expressed that the individual as such is disappearing in industrial life, and Mr. Seth Low holds that this must be offset by increasing the importance of the individual in political life.
    4. Free Trade in Land a modern fact.
      Former system of land tenure in Europe and America.
    5. The Relative freedom of Trade and Commerce likewise Recent.
    6. The Free Choice of Occupations a new right.
    7. The freedom of migration a nineteenth century right.
      Illustrations of the former condition of the law taken from Adam Smith’s “Wealth of Nations.”
    8. The right of free combinations of labor and capital likewise a modern fact.
    9. The universal, personal freedom of the manual laboring classes, in all civilized lands, is a fact not a generation old.
      The opinion of Aristotle on slavery quoted.
    10. Capital, as we understand it, a force peculiar to modern times.
      “Such war cries as we find, Lassalle raising against capital would not have been understood among the ancients and the oppressed classes of the middle ages.”—Kaufman.
      Confirmation of this view found in Aristotle. The word “capital” not found in the index of Jowett’s Aristotle’s “Politics.”
    11. Railroads, telegraphs, telephones and other applications of steam and electricity very recent facts.
    12. The division of labor as now understood a recent fact.
    13. Our present manufacturing class a recent creation.
      The use of the word “manufacturer” in 1776.
    14. Some common materials are new discoveries.
      Cotton, anthracite coal, and protection.
  1. A new industrial world requires a new industrial organization and a new industrial science, but both the organization and the science are incomplete.
    As a consequence of the foregoing, progress produces long-continued social distress.
  2. Some of the results of the above described changes on the laboring classes.
    The changes a condition without which the labor problem would be an impossibility.

    1. Deterioration in the condition of the masses may be relative or absolute.
      The condition of the masses must be examined in both respects.
    2. Diminished security of [illegible word, “asistence”?]
      Illustrations taken from North and South.
    3. Irregularity of employment and income, and attended evils.
    4. Increased reparation of classes.
    5. Changed and deteriorated environment of the majority of wage-earners.
      “Beyond a doubt, sickness is the greatest foe of the poor. It absorbs their savings, creates poverty and pain, and fills our public and private institutions. It is the tenement house system that creates or fosters most of the prevalent disease, degradation, misery and pain. It invites pestilence and destroys morals.”— F. Wingate. [Charles F. Wingate]
      Father Huntington’s testimony quoted.
    6. Industrial and moral evils attendant on frequent migrations of wage-earners.
    7. Machinery both a blessing and a curse.
    8. Increased wants and their effect on the industrial situation.
      Character of these increased wants, some good, some bad.
      Table showing comparative percentage expenditure of working men’s families in Illinois and Massachusetts.
Items. ILLINOIS. MASS.
Subsistence 41.38 49.28
Clothing 21.00 15.95
Rent 17.42 19.74
Fuel 5.63 4.30
Sundries 14.57 10.73
[Totals] [100.00] [100.00]

Source: Chautauqua Assembly Herald. Vol. XIV, No. 14 (August 8, 1889), p. 3.

Cf. Table on p. 282 of Ely’s An Introduction to Political Economy (1889) .

________________________

III.
Industrial Evils and Their Remedies,
August 9, 1889.
SYLLABUS OF TOPICS

  1. Child Labor.
    “The number of males over sixteen engaged in manufacturing in 1880 was 2,019,035, an increase in ten years of 24.97 per cent. The number of females over fifteen was 531,639, an increase in the same time of 64.2 per cent. and of children 181,921, an increase of 58.79 per cent. ** The employment of women in all gainful occupations is increasing fifty per cent. faster than the population, or than the employment of men, and the same is true to still greater degree of the employment of children, save in the very few states which have stringent factory laws and make any genuine effort to enforce them.”— W. Bemis in the article “Workingmen in the United States,” in the American edition of the Encylopaedia Britannica. A workingman’s paper quoted on child labor in the coal mining regions. The testimony of President Crowell.
  2. The increasing number of women wage-
  3. The dwellings of the laboring classes in cities.
  4. Sunday work an evil of increasing magnitude.
    The opinion of workingmen on the “abolition of Sunday.” Is there any law of New Jersey in defense of Sunday? If so, why is it not enforced against the railroad corporations? When laboring men violate any law of the money power it is anarchy, and the law breakers are imprisoned or hanged. But when the money power violates all laws, both human and divine there is neither penalty nor remedy.
    “Look at the Central Railroad of new Jersey running coal trains every Sunday, compelling its employes to work upon that day. ** God knows it is hard enough to work for a mere pittance six days in the week, but it is intolerable to be compelled to work on Sunday for nothing as we do—to desecrate the Sabbath and to be deprived even of the boon of preaching. If this is not anarchy, what is it? And how much longer shall the Golden Calf rule in New Jersey?—Correspondence of John Swinton’s Paper.” Comment on the statement, “work on Sunday for nothing.”
    The agitation for a free Sunday on the part of the bakers in New York and Philadelphia. Remarks of the former secretary of the Journeyman Bakers’ National Union in a letter to the lecturer.
    The agitation of the Sunday question by other workingmen in New York; also in Chicago. Editorial in the “Knights of Labor” on Sunday slavery.
    The American Sabbath Union and the testimony of its secretaro, Rev. Wilbur F. Crafts.
    The true spirit of Sunday observance and the Sunday reform socially considered.
  5. Over-work and night-work:
  6. Excessive mortality of the wage-earning classes, especially of their children.
    This evil economically and socially considered. The principal causes of death are social. “Some 16,000 children under five die every year in New York—just twice the normal mortality for a large city. ** If viewed rightly, this would be called simply massacre.”— F. Wingate.
    Mortality among the white and colored people of the South:
WHITE. COLORED.
Memphis, 1888 19 37
Average for nine years 19 37
Chattanooga, 1888 16 33
Knoxville, 1888 13 29
Average for 8 years 14 31
Clarksville, av. for 2 years 13 28
Columbia, av. for 2 years 13 16

These cities are in Tennessee. Statistics for Columbus, Savannah and Atlanta, Georgia, for Richmond, Mobile and Charleston, are similar in significance.
Dr. G. W. Hubbard, of Meharry Medical School, gives four causes of the large mortality of colored people, viz., poverty, ignorance of the laws of health, superstition and lack of proper medical attendance.
“At present the average age at death among the nobility, gentry and professional classes in England and Wales was 55 years; but among the artisan classes of Lambeth it only amounted to 29; and while the infantile death rate among the well-to-do classes was such that only eight children died in the first year of life out of 100 born, as many as 30 per cent. succumbed among the children of the poor in some districts of our large cities. The only real cause of this enormous difference in the position of the rich and the poor with respect to their chances of existence lay in the fact that at the bottom of society wages were so low that food and other requisites of health were obtained with too great difficulty.”
Dr. C. H. Drysdale, in report of Industrial Remuneration Conference, 1885. Investigations of Joseph Korosi, director of municipal statistics of Buda Pesth. Comments on other data.

  1. Intemperance as an Industrial Evil
    Intemperance must be regarded both as with cause and effect.
    Music as a remedy for intemperance. Experiments in London where oratorios like “St. Paul,” the “Messiah,” “Elijah,” and Spohr’s “Last Judgment” have been appreciated by “crowds of the lowest classes, some shoeless and bonnetless, and all having the savor of the great unwashed; who sat in church for two hours ‘quietly and reverently.’” See Barnett’s “Practicable Socialism” p. 56. Testimony: “If I could hear music like that every night I should not need the drink.” A New York experiment.
    Positive measures required for the cure of intemperance and not merely negative. Working-men’s halls. The efforts of working-men in Baltimore. Modified Prohibition considered.
  2. Other Evils.
    “Pluck-me Stores.” Excessive immigration, monopolies, accidents, a wide-spread spirit of lawlessness, pauperism.

Source: Chautauqua Assembly Herald. Vol. XIV, No. 15 (August 9, 1889), pp. 6-7.

Image Source: The University of Wisconsin yearbook, The Badger 1894.

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Year-end Examinations in Political Economy, 1885-1886

 

Seven of nine courses listed in Political Economy were taught during the 1885-86 year at Harvard. This post provides the enrollment information as well as the June final examinations for six of those political economy courses. Mid-year examinations are not included with one exception.

In addition the final course examination for Philosophy 11 (The Practical Ethics of Modern Society) has been included since that course deals with social and economic reform.

Note to self: only the mid-year examination for Taussig’s Political Economy 6 is included below, the others still need to be located.

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Enrollment 1885-86

[Philosophy] 11. The Practical Ethics of Modern Society.—Studies of the principles of Social Reform.—The subjects dealt with were: problems of charity, divorce, the Indians, the labor question, and temperance. Practical study of institutions and methods of philanthropy and benevolence. Prof. Peabody

Total 35: 1 Graduate, 1 Law, 12 Divinity, 12 Seniors, 3 Juniors, 3 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 2 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1885-1886, p. 50.

 

PHILOSOPHY 11.
THE ETHICS OF SOCIAL REFORM.
[Year-end Examination]

[Omit one question]

  1. The inductive method as applied to ethical questions.
  2. The relation of Political Economy to the ethics of social reform.
  3. “Estimating life by multiplying its length into its breadth, we must say that the augmentation of it results from increase of both factors.” (Spencer.)
    Explain and criticize.
  4. “Suppose that a man going through a wood should be struck by a falling tree and pinned down beneath it, &c.” (Sumner, Social Classes, p. 153.) Why should we help him?
  5. Contrast the Roman “Liberalitas” and the Christian “Caritas.”
  6. “Marriage appears to me more than a mere contract. It has an extent of obligation different from what belongs to ordinary contracts.” (Story.) Why?
  7. New methods in Indian legislation.
  8. The programme of the Socialists and its difficulties.
  9. “Eventually it will be seen that industrial divisions should be vertical, not horizontal.” (Jevons.) Explain and illustrate.
  10. Illustrate the interdependence of various social reforms.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 2.  Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College(Cambridge, Mass., 1886) in Examination Papers 1883-86 (Bound Volume), pp. 6-7.

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Enrollment 1885-86

[Political Economy] 1. J. S. Mill’s Principles of Political Economy (Laughlin’s edition).—Dunbar’s Chapters on Banking.—Lectures on the financial legislation of the United States. Profs. Dunbar and Laughlin.

Total 176: 2 Graduates, 27 Seniors, 75 Juniors, 53 Sophomores, 19 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1885-1886, p. 50.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 1.
[Year-end examination]

  1. Explain what is meant by the “standard of living” of the laboring class. In a densely populated country would the standard of living have any influence on the general rate of wages?
  2. Show clearly why there must be land in cultivation which pays no rent.
  3. Explain carefully the relation between Cost of Labor and Real Wages. How can an increase of population affect Cost of Labor?
  4. Under what conditions can it be said that normal value depends on the “expenses of production”? State the law of market and normal value for commodities affected by the law of diminishing returns.
  5. Explain the reason for the existence of foreign trade. Is there any different reason for the exchange of goods in domestic trade?
  6. What is inconvertible paper money? From the history of the United States notes state the main events showing the attitude of Congress towards their issue, while the notes were inconvertible.
  7. Why is a bank obliged to limit its loans when its cash reserve is seriously impaired?
  8. Why is it that the products of extractive industries are liable to great variations of market value?
  9. Upon whom would a tax on Rent fall? Would such a tax be a discriminating tax on the agricultural interests?
  10. What are the advantages of direct taxation? State by what kinds of taxation, direct or indirect, the United States gets its revenue.
  11. Is it correct to say that high wages alone prevent us from selling manufactured goods in foreign markets?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 2.  Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College(Cambridge, Mass., 1886) in Examination Papers 1883-86 (Bound Volume), p. 8.

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Enrollment 1885-86

[Political Economy] 2. History of Economic Theory.—Examination of selections from leading writers. Prof. Dunbar.

Total 18: 1 Graduate, 8 Seniors, 9 Juniors.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1885-1886, p. 50.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 2.
[Year-end Examination]

A.

Discuss, either separately or in connection with each other, and as fully as your time will allow, the four extracts which follow, viz.:—

I.

“[The historical method] would have been scarcely intelligible to some of the old economists; economic research was to men like Ricardo a superfluous work. What use had they for facts? The one central fact of human selfishness was enough; out of that they could deduce all the principles of their science…. The method of the old school required the invention of an ‘economic man.’ who is supposed to have none other than economic desires or purposes; and its speculations are concerned with his possible and probable behavior. The new school insists that this is a clear case of ‘lunar politics’; that such men do not exist, and that it is of small consequence, therefore, to determine what they would do if they did exist.”—[Rev. W. Gladden in The Independent, Oct. 8, 1885.]

II.

“The theory of natural laws has had two bad consequences; it has taken away all notion of an ideal to be sought, and it has singularly narrowed the conclusions of political economy. In the writings of the orthodox economists, they never speak of the final object which we should seek to reach, nor of the reforms which justice might direct. Is distribution effected in the manner most favorable to human progress and happiness? Does consumption conform to the moral laws?
…Have we no economic duties to perform?…The rigorous science does not occupy itself with what ought to be, but only with what is; it cannot then propose or seek for an ideal. It merely describes how wealth is produced, distributed, and consumed; and hence the poverty of its practical conclusions. In fact, if liberty alone is enough to cause everything to arrange itself in the best way and to establish harmony, the programme of political economy must be nearly exhausted in countries which, like England, the Netherlands, and Switzerland, have admitted free trade and free competition.”—[M. Laveleye in the Revue des Deux Mondes, July, 1875, p. 464.]

III.

“Political economy…insists that all trade, whether in tangible commodities, in personal services, or in commercial credits, is of one and the same nature; that trade is buying and selling, which is naturally profitable and ought to be free;…that every seller has the right to get the most he can for his service under all circumstances—that is to say, to render the least of his own service needful at the time to get the service of the other man; that God ordained to be proper and profitable this mutual exchange of services among men; that no persons in the world except the parties themselves, man to man, have the wisdom to dictate its terms.”—[Professor Perry in the Nation, June 10, 1886.]

IV.

“But economic science is wholly practical; it has no raison d’être except as directing conduct towards a given end; it studies the means leading towards that end, not merely for the sake of knowledge, but in the hope of guiding men so that they may pursue that end in the most appropriate way; it is not content to describe the principles that have actuated human conduct, but desires to look at  these principles in the light of after events, and thus to put forward the means that are best adapted for attaining the end in view.”—[Cunningham’s Politics and Economics, p. 12.]

B.
One question may be omitted.

  1. State and discuss Walker’s theory by which labor is represented as having the residual share of all product, after the payment of rent and profits.
  2. “But the fundamental truth, that in all economic reasoning must be firmly grasped and never let go, is that society in its most highly developed form is but an elaboration of society in its modest beginnings, and that principles obvious in the simpler relations of men are merely disguised and not abrogated or reversed by the more intricate relations that result from the division of labor and the use of complex tools and methods.”
    What limits, if any, should you set to the validity of arguments thus drawn from the case of primitive society?
  3. Examine the following proposition stated by Mr. George:—
    “Capital has never to be set aside for the payment of wages when the produce of the labor for which the wages are paid is exchanged as soon as produced; it is only required when this produce is stored up, or what is to the individual the same thing, placed in the general current of exchange, without being at once drawn against—that is, sold on credit. [When an employer needs capital] it is because he is not only an employer of labor, but a merchant or operator in, or an accumulator of, the products of labor.”
  4. State and discuss the reasoning by which Mr. George supports the following proposition:—
    “Without any increase in population, the progress of invention constantly tends to give a larger and larger proportion of the produce to the owners of land, and a smaller and smaller proportion to labor and capital. And as we can assign no limits to the progress of invention, [if labor-saving invention were ever to reach perfection] wages would be nothing, and interest would be nothing, while rent would take everything.”
  5. State (a) Mr. George’s theory of the causes of commercial depressions;
    (b) Mr. Crocker’s theory of the same, as explained by excessive saving and investment in productive forms.
    Discuss either (a) or (b).

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 2.  Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College(Cambridge, Mass., 1886) in Examination Papers 1883-86 (Bound Volume), pp. 9-11.

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Enrollment 1885-86

[Political Economy] 3. Investigation and discussion of practical economic questions of the day: bimetallism; appreciation of gold; American shipping; government issues and national bank notes; Canadian reciprocity.—Short theses criticized by the Instructor and discussed by the class. Prof. Dunbar Laughlin.

Total 17: 1 Graduate, 5 Seniors, 11 Juniors.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1885-1886, p. 50.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 3.
[Year-end Examination]

  1. Compare the difficulties with our coinage in 1834 with those of to-day. Would the remedy which was applied in 1834 be a correct one to-day?
  2. What is the present condition of the Latin Union?
  3. Have you any reasons to offer for the recent additional decline in the value of silver since September, 1885?
  4. Discuss the influence on American tonnage of existing laws in regard to the importation of materials for the construction in the United States of (1) ships to be sailed under our own flag in the foreign trade, and of (2) ships to be sailed under a foreign flag.
  5. How do you account for the increasing tonnage of foreign wooden sailing-vessels in our ports?
  6. If we have little steam tonnage in the foreign trade, why is it that builders of iron and steam ships can exist in the United States? How does your conclusion on this question affect the argument for free ships?
  7. On reasons connected with the quantity of notes issued, would you advocate the use of United States notes, or National Bank notes?
  8. Discuss the plans which propose the continuance of the national bank system by substituting other bonds for United States securities.
  9. Is the national bank note immediately convertible under the present system?
  10. What advantages were expected by American manufacturers from the Reciprocity Treaty with Canada? Were these expectations realized?
  11. How were our agricultural interests actually affected during the continuance of the Treaty (1854-1866)?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 2.  Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College(Cambridge, Mass., 1886) in Examination Papers 1883-86 (Bound Volume), p. 11.

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Enrollment 1885-86

[Political Economy] 4. Economic history of America and Europe since the Seven Years’ War.—Lectures. Prof. Dunbar.

Total 184: 1 Graduate, 74 Seniors, 57 Juniors, 41 Sophomores, 11 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1885-1886, p. 51.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 4.
[Year-end Examination]

Three questions to be omitted.

  1. What was the plan of the Zollverein, and what was its influence on the political unity of Germany?
  2. What were the leading measures by which Napoleon III. stimulated the material development of France?
  3. History of the Suez canal.
  4. Why can India no longer be depended upon to absorb surplus silver from Europe as formerly?
  5. How far is the decline of American shipping traceable to the civil war?
  6. Reasons for the increased financial importance of the United States Treasury since 1861.
  7. The industrial effects of steam transportation and the telegraph.
  8. Why did the French indemnity of 1871 seriously affect England, the United States, and Austria?
  9. The suspension and resumption of specie payments by France in the decade, 1870-80.
  10. The financial effect of the concentration of bank reserves in New York.
  11. The difference in the development of city and of country banks (in the United States and in England), and the inference to be drawn as to the future development of banking.
  12. Jevons’s sunspot theory of crises, and the reasons for and against it.
  13. The English coal supply and the national debt.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 2.  Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College(Cambridge, Mass., 1886) in Examination Papers 1883-86 (Bound Volume), p. 12.

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Enrollment 1885-86

[Political Economy] 6. History of Tariff Legislation in the United States.— Discussion of principles.  Consent of instructor required. Dr. Taussig.

Total 35:  2 Graduates, 4 Law, 17 Seniors, 11 Juniors, 1 Other.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1885-1886, p. 51.

 

1885-86.
POLITICAL ECONOMY 6
[Mid-Year Examination]

  1. Comment on the following:—
    “Beside the protection thrown over the manufacturing interest by Congress during this period (1789-1812), the war which raged in Europe produced a favorable effect. As the United States was a neutral nation, she fattened on the miseries of the European nations, and her commerce increased with astonishing rapidity. Our manufactures flourished from the same cause, though not to a corresponding degree with our commerce.”
  2. Take two of the following:—
    (a) Give some account of the sources from which we learn the character of the act of 1828, and the circumstances under which it was passed.
    (b) What was Webster’s position on the tariff question, in 1824, in 1828, and in 1833?
    (c) What was Clay’s position on the tariff question in 1820, in 1828, and in 1832?
    Under (b) and (c) discuss briefly the reasons why Clay and Webster acted as they did at the dates mentioned.
  3. Comment on the following:—
    “Whenever we diminish importation by a protective tariff, we must at the same time diminish the production of those goods which, were trade free, we should given in exchange for the goods imported…..It would, however, be a mistake in the other direction to assume that all the industry set in operation by the tariff is withdrawn from other employments, and that there is no increase whatever. The very fact that, under free trade, goods are imported instead of being made at home shows that we find it easier to make the goods which we send abroad than to make those which we receive in exchange for them. Hence when we are forced to make them for ourselves, there must be an increase in the sum total of our industry.”
  4. Comment on the following, and state when and by whom you think it was written:—
    “The principal argument for the superior productiveness of agricultural labor turns on the allegation that the labor employed on manufactures yields nothing equivalent to the rent of the land, or to that net surplus, as it is called, which accrues to the proprietor of the soil….It seems to have been overlooked that the land itself is a stock or capital, advanced or lent by its owner to the occupier or tenant, and that the rent he receives is only the ordinary profit of a certain stock in land, not managed by the proprietor himself, but by another, to whom he lends or lets it, and who, on his part, advances a second capital, to stock and improve the land, upon which he also receives the usual profit. The rent of the landlord and the profit of the farmer are, therefore, nothing more than the ordinary profit of two capitals belonging to two different persons, and united in the cultivation of the farm.”
  5. State as nearly as you can what were the duties on cotton goods, woolen goods, bar iron, hemp, and articles not specifically provided for, in the years 1800, 1814, 1820, 1830, and 1837. Mention what tariff act was in force at each date, and whether the duty was specific or ad valorem. Use tabular form if you wish.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Examination papers in economics, 1882-1935. Prof. F. W. Taussig, p. 7.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 6.
[Year-End Examination]

[Omit one question.]

  1. Does a tax on imports operate as a tax on exports? Apply your reasoning to the exports of Southern cotton in 1830, and to those of Western grain in 1880.
  2. Assuming that you were called on to reduce duties, state the order of preference in which you would effect reductions in the present duties on iron, sugar, silks. Give your reasons.
  3. Make a comparison between the general course of tariff legislation in the United States and on the continent of Europe, from 1860 to the present time.
  4. Make a comparison between the tariff legislation of the United States in 1833 and in 1846.
  5. Comment on the reasoning and the statements of fact in the following:—
    “The duty of 1867 on wool, which gave to wool-growing its greatest encouragement, has added nothing to the cost of wool to the manufacturer or the consumer. On the contrary, the price has been greatly cheapened. In 1867 the price was 51 cents, in 1870 it was 46 cents, in 1875 it was 43 cents. There has been a steady reduction, with occasional fluctuations, since 1867. Free wool will be of no permanent benefit to manufacturer or consumer, but a positive loss to both. On the other hand, the wool-growing interest will be ruined by the competition of Australia, New Zealand, and the South American States.”
  6. Would you impose specific or ad-valorem duties on steel rails, wool, woolen cloths? Give your reasons. What has been the practice in imposing duties on these articles since 1860?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 2.  Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College(Cambridge, Mass., 1886) in Examination Papers 1883-86 (Bound Volume), pp. 12-13.

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Enrollment 1885-86

[Political Economy] 8. Financial history of the United States.—Bolles’s Financial History— Lectures. Prof. Dunbar.

Total 31:  1 Graduate, 4 Law, 15 Seniors, 11 Juniors.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1885-1886, p. 51.

 

POLITICAL ECONOMY 8.
[Year-end Examination]

  1. What grounds are there for doubting the necessity of the first legal tender act?
  2. Explain the steps by which the legal tender paper, at first regarded as a temporary issue, became a permanent currency.
  3. What were the arguments for and against the asserted right of the government to pay the five-twenties in paper?
  4. In what respects did the resumption act when passed appear to be insufficient for its purposes?
  5. What was the argument for the proposition that contraction in some form was necessary for a return to specie payments; and how was contraction practically avoided?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University Examination Papers, 1873-1915. Box 2.  Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, Political Economy, History, Roman Law, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College(Cambridge, Mass., 1886) in Examination Papers 1883-86 (Bound Volume), p. 13.

Images Source:  Harvard Library, Hollis Images. Charles F. Dunbar (left) and James Laurence Laughlin (middle) and Frank W. Taussig (right).