THE DEGREE.

Now that the question of Gov. Butler's degree has been decided, a few comments of the press may be of interest. Those that follow were written before the overseers' meeting:

If the title of Doctor of Laws is really to be regarded as an appendage to the governorship, it would be better to have it established by law than to compel Harvard University to perform the humiliating duty of bestowing it without regard to the qualifications of the recipient. - [Boston Journal.

It was a graceful custom, and much can be said in favor of it. But when it can no longer be observed without stultification and absolute falsehood, it is high time to abandon it. - [Boston Herald.

Such a breach of the custom, so long established as to be almost law, would be a disgrace to its officers and would very seriously affect the feelings of the Commonwealth towards the college, for the people would not stop to discriminate or to remember that the insult was not really the act of the old and time-honored college, but merely a venting of spleen on the part of the narrow-minded and prejudiced men who, unfortunately, chance for the moment to represent her. [Wendell Phillips.

It is hardly the function of the college to use its degree bestowing power in such manner as either to help or overthrow any politician. Its officers have nothing to do with Butler's chances at the polls, or with his popularity as a demagogue. Their duty is simply to see that the university suffers no damage as an institution of learning and a teacher of morals. It is dedicated to "Christo et Ecclesiae," and has "Veritas" for the motto on its coat-of-arms; and what has Butler to do with Christ and His Church or with "Truth?" If it discovers that in giving a degree to a particular person the college will impair its moral standing and lower the value of its diplomas with all respectable and thoughtful men, it is its duty not to give it. Moreover, it cannot afford, any more than any apostle, or prophet, or moralist, or minister, to do a wrong thing just once more. The time for every man or society to stop doing wrong is now. - [New York Evening Post.

A refusal of the degree will be regarded as an aristocratic protest against electing a man of humble origin, no matter what his talents, to the executive chair. It will also be regarded as a piece of partisan spite by all fair-minded citizens. - [New Haven Union.

The following editorials were written after the action of the overseers:

The college has done right, we believe, to discriminate in the men it chooses to honor and to withhold honors where the character of the incumbent of the chief magistracy is not such as should be commended to popular exaltation. This course may give rise to much bitterness, and will, perhaps, be taken by a large portion of the governor's supporters as an affront to the people by "Boston aristocracy. . . This probably ends the attendance of the governor in state with the Lancers at the Harvard commencement, a parade which might as well be cut off for good. -[Springfield Republican.

The controversy over this matter has been somewhat excited, but there has at no time been any other reason given for conferring the degree than that it is usual to do so, whoever might be the governor. Now that the question has been decided, it may be expected that an attempt will be made to create sympathy for the governor as having been slighted, and it will be asserted that the college has set itself up above the wisdom of the people. It will be used as an argument to favor the governor's reelection and to injure the college. But we fancy that the governor's vote will not be increased nor the college hurt to any appreciable extent by the act of yesterday. Nobody ever supposed that the authorities of Harvard College regarded his excellency as a fit man for governor, and they certainly deserve credit rather than denunciation for expressing their minds. - [Advertiser.

Of Harvard's loss of "popularity" the Boston Herald says: There is a great deal of idle talk about some supposed loss of popularity which is to accrue to Harvard College because its overseers, acting in the performance of the duties of their office, have not thought it proper to confer the degree of doctor of laws upon Governor Butler. We do not suppose that the overseers gave any special thought to the popularity or the unpopularity of their act. They had a simple duty to perform, and they performed it; and to suppose that the college is to lose its hold upon the public regard because the gentlemen in charge of its affairs do not hold its honors so lightly as to vote to bestow them where they are undeserved, is an absurdity. "Popularity" which is to be lost in this way is better lost than gained. Matters have not yet come to such a pass in Massachusetts that an individual or an institution will lose anything by adherence to correct and consistent principles.

Of Governor Butler's explanation the Advertiser says: He knows, and every intelligent person in the United States knows, that the college has departed from its usual custom not on account of his political creed, not on account of the condition or the principles of his supporters, not on account of his qualifications or want of qualifications in the item of learning, but because he is himself a person whose public character and example are inimical to the standards a university is under the highest obligation to approve and inculcate.

The Post remarks with considerable heat: A majority of the overseers of Harvard University, having done just what they should not have done with respect to the question of conferring a degree upon the governor, and having thus committed the great institution to a policy of narrow-minded exclusiveness utterly unworthy of it, and, so far as we have been able to judge, condemned by the sons of the college generally, perhaps it is unprofitable to further discuss the matter. As Dundreary used to say to his valet, "You go to the devil and there you are." Harvard has simply made a fool of herself, and that is all there is to it. All the camels that she has put down without a grimace have made her struggles and final revulsion from even as considerable a gnat as Governor Butler absolutely ridiculous.