Читать книгу The Goose-step: A Study of American Education онлайн

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Nicholas Miraculous bided his time, and several months later came the chance to get rid of Cattell and at the same time to exhibit his new patriotism. Cattell wrote a letter to a congressman, in support of pending legislation exempting from combatant service in Europe conscripts who objected to war. The interlocking trustees, who had already conscripted themselves to make money out of the war, took the position that in writing this letter Cattell had committed a crime, and they suddenly dismissed him from the university. In spite of his twenty-six years’ service, they did not even take the trouble to notify him what they proposed to do, but left him to learn of their action from a newspaper reporter who waked him in the middle of the night. The trustees declared that a professor could not take a stand on any public question as his own personal opinion; to which Cattell replied: “When trustees announce that no statement can be made by a teacher that is not affirmed by Columbia University, they challenge the intellectual integrity of every teacher.”