Guys and Dolls

There doesn't seem to be any official policy on Radcliffe women in Harvard clubs. Plenty of ideas on the subject have appeared but all of them have somehow fallen by the wayside. Last year, for example, Dean Bender suggested a plan to permit departmental and religious clubs to combine, and to permit organizations in other categories to petition for the privilege. Each petition would be considered "on its merits by the Harvard and Radcliffe Student Councils and Faculty Committees." Radcliffe's Dean Sherman rejected this idea as she has rejected many others like it.

At present only departmental clubs are allowed to combine. The College and Radcliffe U. N. Councils both petitioned to join forces, but both were refused. The Harvard Administrative Board is afraid that combining clubs will deprive college organizations of their all-Harvard flavor; Radcliffe fears that its undergraduate activities would be dominated by Harvard.

Despite these misgivings, parallel groups in the two colleges have combined in almost everything but name, and none of those dire predictions have been realized. Political groups, drama groups, and language groups, to name a few, have all cooperated closely for many years. The only effect the current rules have is merely to inconvenience student organizations, confuse their authority, force them to figure out separate charters and to elect separate officers. Whatever purpose the authorities had in mind for these restrictions have long since been lost in the muddle; only the inconveniences remain.

But more serious than this, the present set-up, as well as all the plans suggested by various administrative officials, presuppose that students are so immature that they can't avoid being "used." This idea always leads to serious finagling with undergraduates' freedom.

Neither college need worry that undergraduate groups will be dominated by members of the other sex because no organization has to admit anyone it does not want. All undergraduate groups should automatically be allowed to decide for themselves whether they will have a bi-sexual membership or not.