Life, 1915-11-18 · page 32 of 52
Life — November 18, 1915 — page 32: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page contains three distinct pieces of social commentary: ## "The Public Duty of Making Lawyers" A debate about whether the State should subsidize professional education. Rev. Russell Conwell (Temple University president) claims the rich control education standards, disadvantaging poor students. The editorial counters that poor boys never had equal access to professions anyway, and questions whether taxpayer-funded lawyer and doctor training serves the public interest. It specifically references New York City College providing free education to "clever and diligent young Jews" seeking bar admission—revealing period antisemitic anxieties about Jewish professional advancement. ## "The Famous Conductor" Cartoon Shows a conductor trying to impose harmony on quarreling twins during a "midnight effort"—likely satirizing domestic discord or conflicting policy goals. ## "Fossil Dragons" and "Venice Bombing" Brief items: one defends a dinosaur fossil preservation effort in Utah (humorously suggesting future generations will need proof dinosaurs existed after Prohibition ends); another condemns bombing of Venice as cultural destruction, comparing it to historical library burnings.
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Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
964 The Public Duty of Mak- ing Lawyers NE Rev. Russell Conwell, de- scribed as President of Temple University in Philadelphia, is quoted as declaring in a speech in Pittsburgh that the rich, by endowments, now con- trol the standards of education so that “the poor boy no longer has an equal opportunity with the son of wealthy parents in obtaining a professional education.” Awful! One by one our boasted liberties are being cracked on.the head by the crafty capitalists and removed to the scrap-heap. Bro. Opper, of the Hearst troupe, should draw a picture of it—and doubtless will—for Bro. Conwell. But, after all, was there ever a time when the poor boy had an equal chance with the child of solvent parents to break into any profession but the min- istry? Perhaps it was easier for a clever poor boy to get into law or medicine before the days of law-schools and medical-schools than it is now, but we doubt it. It is not very hard now, espe- cially to get into law. Is it a part of the business of the State (meaning the taxpayer) to make entrance to these professions easier? If a boy wants to be a lawyer, must the State make a lawyer of him? Here in New York that process is being furthered by wholesale by all the local colleges, THE FAMOUS CONDUCTOR TRIES TO GET SOME. HARMONY INTO THE TWINS’ MID- NIGHT EFFORT ELSON HOOvERS. “HE'S OBJECTING AGAIN, DOCTOR. especially the City College, which min- isters gratis to the hunger of so many clever and diligent young Jews for the information that leads to admission to the bar. Whether so great a multiplica- tion of very needy young lawyers pro- motes the public interest is proper for inquiry and consideration, Lawyers should be picked men; men of probity as well as learning. That is even more true of doctors. A bad lawyer is mischievous: still more so a bad doctor. Questions of morals crowd in upon doctors. They carry heavy responsibilities. Is a great mul- tiplication of doctors, taught at the public cost, to be desired? Whether doctors and lawyers receive free education or not, the best will be apt to get to the top, and the ordinary sifting by competition will help the public. Nevertheless, enough doctors and enough lawyers are as good as too many. There are enough as it is. Why, then, berate the endowed colleges because there are not more? SAYS IT DOESN'T SEEM SENSIBLE” To Save Our Fossil Dragons WING to the spread of the tem- perance movement and impending disappearance of what reptiles are left, the President, on recommendation of Secretary Lane, has created the Dino- saur National Monument in Utah, to preserve the Juratrias rock-reefs in which have been found some of the biggest fossil reptiles in the world. It is a good plan to make this reser- vation. After rum has been completely abolished people will need all this fossil evidence to convince them that there ever were any dragons, PRQEEING bombs in Venice is just plain dirt. It is war, not on Italy, but on art, history, religion. It is an expression of the same brutish spirit that burned the library long ago at Alexandria, and lately at Louvain. =I) comicbooks.com