THE UNIVERSITY CHEST

During the war considerable attention was focussed on the Community War Chest idea, which made possible the lumping together of contributions, great and small, towards war activities to be applied where most needed. This idea, or at least a similar one, has been introduced by the University of Vermont in establishing a "Loyalty Fund" for graduate gifts in annual contributions or single donations.

Heretofore, the founding of scholarships, and fellowships, the establishment of memorial professorships, and the erection of dormitories or other college buildings have been the usual way for alumni to bequeath in their wills or contribute while alive to the welfare of their university.

The unsatisfactoriness of such a system has long been felt. In the first place, bequests left for some specific purpose often would be far more effective if applied in some other way. The object for which they were given disappears or is merged in something else, and unless some legal re-interpreting of the will can be done, the bequest unaltered proves to be a mill-stone around the university's neck. The object for which it was given must be revived or forcibly kept alive just to use the money of the gift. The McKay Fund left to Harvard, while not by any means an extreme of this sort, is an illustration of the legal complications that often follow in the wake of any specific bequest.

Contributions from living alumni, of course, involve no such entanglements, but in their case there is another objection. Graduates of comparatively limited means find it difficult to use in any appropriate way the little they can afford to give. A gift of several thousand dollars can stand on its own feet anywhere; but when it is a question of several hundreds or less, the gift by itself feels a little abashed. Yet such contributions together form a very valuable addition to any university's resources.

Here at Harvard, the Endowment Fund is at present serving the purpose of the University of Vermont's Loyalty Fund. But when the endowment quota a completed the only permanent contribution box for alumni will be the customary twenty-fifth year gift of each college class. The establishment of a "University Chest" similar in plan to Vermont's Loyalty Fund would serve as a permanent storehouse for all graduate offerings, rich and poor alike, and would lighten the task of "continually passing the hat."