Oust The Present

OUST THE PRESIDENT

It Is alleged that a Member was Approached.

CAN APPOINT SUCCESSOR

To Dr. Boone, of Normal, if His Vote Would Oust Him.

A Hard Fight to Remove the President of the Ypsilanti Normal-Twp Members of the Board Are Dr. Boone's Enemies.

The trouble concerning the State Normal College at Ypsilanti continues. It seems to be located principally in the newspapers, however, and to emanate largely from Lansing. So far as the Argus is able to learn everything about the institution is running as smoothly as could be expected. President Boone has the support of his faculty excepting a very few members, and of more than 95 per cent of the people of the city. Even a member of the faculty, who has often been critical of the administration and sometimes unfriendly, said recently, "it is evident now that they are lying about Pres. Boone." Everybody acknowledges him to be an able educator. Nor does any one attempt to deny that the institution has grown and prospered under his administration. It has a better standing and is more widely known today than ever before. In bringing about all this, President Boone has been a most active factor. If he be the unfit man he is alleged to be, how is this explained? Why has not this unfitness told against the institution?

The fact is, the seat of much of the trouble is in the state board of education. It is pretty generally understood that there are two members of the board who are positive and aggressive enemies to President Boone. That the board is divided on the deposition of the president at this time is undoubtedly true, the special telegrams from Lansing to Detroit papers quoting Supt. Hammond to the contrary notwithstanding. Jason B Hammond and Perry F. Powers are understood to be the members who are most active in desiring a change of administration.

There are able bodied rumors afloat throughout the state coming from most reliable sources to the effect that somebody is so deeply concerned in a change of administration at the college that a member of the board has been approached by persons of standing and assured that, if he would support the removal of President Boone, he might name Boone's successor. From whom these emissaries came or whether the statement was made on their own responsibility or with authority is not known. But if these rumors be true, there must be some purpose behind the proposed deposition of President Boone other than the highest good of the institution.

Again why was President Boone reelected a few weeks ago, if there now be cause for his deposition? Has anything transpired since that date to make him more unfit for the position he holds than when he was re-elected? If there has not, and these disqualifications existed at the time of his re-election, why did the board re-elect him? That there have not been any new causes for such action, those best acquainted with internal conditions at the college assert positively. Hence, if the deposition of the president is finally determined upon, the board may find that it would be much easier to dispose of him. had he not been re-elected Supt. Hammond is quoted in a dispatch from Lansing to a Detroit paper to the effect that the resolution of the board for re-employment included instructors only while it is known that the resolution explicitly included "all the persons now in the employ of the State Normal College." Hammond's statement seems like special pleading therefore.

Again, Hammond is quoted as saying that the matter of recinding the action of the board relative to President Boone passed at the meeting. April 28, will be taken up at the next meeting of the board at Marquette. Now, if it is intended to handle this question without bias and with the interest of the institution alone in view, why does Hammond propose to take this important question up at a meeting to be held at the farthest extremity of the state? This in itself looks suspicious. Especially since the assurance has been repeatedly given that all important interests of the college should be considered at the college with the president in attendance. All the people desire relative to this issue is that all interests concerned shall have just handling and that no snap judgment be taken. Because two politicians with a little temporary authority and less appreciation of educational matter happen to be enemies of the president of a great educational institution, it does not follow that this is sufficient and just cause for his removal. If the highest interests of such an institution demand the removal of its head, it ought not to be necessary to hold out any inducement to a member of the board of control in order to secure enough votes to do it. Now is the time for the friends of the institution to see that their influence is used when it will conserve the important interests of the state normal college.