"WOOZY"?

"Evening up the decision" is a phrase used in baseball when the umpire makes a bad judgment on a certain play, and, shortly afterward, realizing his error, gives an equally bad decision on a close play for the opposing team. A week or so ago President Eliot saw fit to criticize the United States Military Academy at West Point, and this week feeling perhaps that he should have begun at home accuses the Harvard students of being "Woozy." The CRIMSON and the University have always had the utmost respect for President Eliot, who, by his actions and words has ever stood for the finer things, has ever proved himself one of the greatest of Harvard men. But we feel, nevertheless, that these recent utterances were ill advised and liable to harm the University.

As regards West Point, we believe that President Eliot erred, perhaps basing his opinions a little too much upon mere hearsay, of which there has been plenty. In this case it would seem that President Eliot is trying to umpire the game from the grandstand. He has not even had the privilege of serving under West Point officers, as many of us have had. In another column of today's CRIMSON a cadet, an ex-Harvard man, states the case for the Military Academy.

"Raps Drinkers at Harvard--Matrons and Young Women, He Asserts, Do Not Object to Meeting 'Woozy' Students." So ran the bold headline on the front page of the New York Times. Here President Eliot's attack is divided into two parts,--against the students for misbehaving and against so-called "good society" for countenancing, nay, even abetting the students' actions. But why pick on this one university, and why pick out the matrons and young women of this community of all places? Boston is Boston. If the undergraduates are "woozy" here, think what we would be were Harvard nearer New York or Philadelphia. Some few people in Boston are probably resisting the prohibition amendment; perhaps they laid in their supplies while the laying was good. But doesn't President Eliot realize that most people, from the poor man who can only afford a "hipper" of Rot Gut to the inventive genius who shoots his champagne across the border in a torpedo, are co-offenders with the "good society." Once more the umpire has rendered his decision, but with his back turned toward the play.