Category: Exam Questions

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Exam Questions Harvard Suggested Reading

Harvard. Mid-year exam for economic theory course. Haberler, 1931-32.

Portr‰t des Haberler, Gottfried [1900-1995]

 

 

In 1931-32 thirty-one year old Gottfried Haberler taught as a visiting lecturer at Harvard. Later he was to return to Harvard where he was appointed to a professorship in 1936. He was a member of the Harvard faculty until his move to the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C. in 1971.

This post provides three items from his 1931-32 course “Problems in Economic Theory”.

(1) Enrollment data. From the annual presidential report we see that only six students (half of whom were Radcliffe women) were registered for the course.
(2)  Assignments for both semesters’ reading periods. Note that Frank Knight accounts for a good half of that required reading.
(3) The final examination questions for the first semester. 

____________________

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 15. Dr. Haberler.—Problems in Economic Theory.

Total 6: 3 Seniors, 3 Radcliffe.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1931-32. Page 72.

____________________

Reading Period
Jan 4-20, 1932

Economics 15

Knight, F.H.: Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit, Chs. III, IV.

Wicksteed, P.H.: Common Sense of Political Economy, Pt. I, Chs. II, VI, XI; P. II, Ch. On Rent.

Knight, F.H.: A Suggestion for Simplifying the Statement of The General Theory of Price, Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 36, No. 3, June, 1928.

Suggestions for further reading:

Böhm-Bawerk, E.V.: Positive Theorie des Kapitals, 3rd or 4th edition (not translated), Exkurs VII, “Zurechnung”.

Mayer, Hans: Artikel “Bedürfnis”, “Produktion”, “Zurechnung” in Handwörterbuch der Staatswissenschaften, 4. Auflage.

Reading Period
May 9-June 1, 1932

Economics 15

Benham: “Economic Welfare”, in the Economica, June 1930.

Pigou: Economics of Welfare, Part I, Chs. 1,2,3,4,5; Part II, Ch. VIII, Secs. 1 and 2, Ch. X.

Knight: “Some Fallacies in the Interpretation of Social Cost”,Quarterly Journal of Economics for August 1924.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in economics, 1895-2003. Box 2. Folder: “Economics, 1931-32”

____________________

1931-32
HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Economics 15
[Mid-year Examination]

Students may use any books or notes they wish.
Answer SIX of these questions.

  1. The problem of imputation and its relation to the theory of marginal productivity.
  2. Is it true that, if every factor is remunerated according to its marginal productivity, the whole product is exhausted? Under what conditions?
  3. Discuss the major differences between the (a) Marshallian, (b) Austrian, and (c) Walrasian theory of value and price.
  4. Discuss the mutual relation of utility, value and price and especially the proposition that there is a conformity of subjective value and the market price. Is it not circular reasoning to say that marginal utility determines the market prices because marginal utility itself depends partly, at last, on the price?
  5. Discuss the proposition that orthodox economics is individualistic and overlooks the fact that every individual is the product of social forces.
  6. What is the meaning of the “law of variation” of the factors of production? How or under what assumptions is it possible to derive from it a universal law of diminishing returns?
  7. What is the function of the concept of “want” or “need” in pure economic theory? State your opinion as to whether it can or should be eliminated and how it could be done.
  8. What do you think of Institutionalism and its criticism of orthodox economic theory?

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943 (HUC 7000.55). Box 12. Examination Papers, Mid-Years. 1931-32.

Image Source: Link to Österreichische Nationalbibliothek record.

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Berkeley Exam Questions

Berkeley. Graduate Macro, final exam. Akerlof, 1992 and 1993

 

While the internet archive “The Wayback Machine” is truly a treasure chest filled with e-artifacts, without a pirate’s map to locate the buried treasure it is not for impatient, casual users. So from time to time, I dig around to share links to  economics from the recent past. For example course materials from…

Principles of Macroeconomics at M.I.T. from 1995-2006

Principles of Microeconomics at M.I.T. from 1994-2005

The following post takes us to late twentieth century Berkeley where and back when George Akerlof regularly taught a core macro course to graduate students. I have transcribed .pdf copies of his final exams from 1992 and 1993 (links to the original files provided below), trying to provide the look-and-feel of the original exams as much as possible.

For those who might not have come across George Akerlof’s autobiographical essay at the Nobel Prize website, I have just provided the Wayback Machine link to an archived copy.

_______________________

Department of Economics
University of California
Spring Semester 1992
Professor George A. Akerlof

ECONOMICS 202A
FINAL EXAMINATION

PLEASE READ THESE INSTRUCTIONS BEFORE BEGINNING.

  1. The exam is in three parts. Each part has equal weight in grading.
  2. You have three hours for the entire exam, so spend about 1 hour on each part.
  3. Answer all the questions using a separate Bluebook for each part.
  4. Be sure to write your name on the cover of all of your Bluebooks.

Grades will reflect the precision, clarity and completeness of your answers as well as their correctness.

 

PART A (Please use a Separate Blue Book)

State whether the following are True, False, or Uncertain. Explain why in each case.

  1. Suppose U.S. GNP is difference stationary. Suppose the 1992-1993 growth rate is expected to be .5 percent but in fact turns out to be 1.2 percent. Future expected growth rates should be adjusted upward by .7 percent.
  2. In long-run equilibrium in Summers’ model, with a constant rate of growth of the labor supply, q is either less than or equal to one.
  3. A country with staggered contracts commits itself to have zero growth of its money supply. It will have lower inflation and higher welfare than if it failed to make such a commitment.
  4. Real rigidities, such as efficiency wages, fail to explain deviations of unemployment from the natural rate.
  5. If Blanchard and Summers’ model is modified so that unions foresee shocks in demand, employment and wages will be constant over time.
  6. According to Bulow and Rogoff the marginal value of debt in amount D is (1-F(D)), where F(D) is the probability of default with D dollars’ worth of debt.

 

PART B (Please Use a Separate Blue Book)

State whether the following are True, False, or Uncertain. Explain why in each case.

  1. Consider a Shapiro-Stiglitz model where the production function is \varepsilon f(k), with the variation in \varepsilon due to productivity shocks. Unemployment will be invariant with changes in \varepsilon because workers never shirk in the Shapiro-Stiglitz model.
  2. Professor Charles E. Bucket found a significant correlation between the predicted component of the money supply and changes in GNP. His results are inconsistent with Taylor’s model because they imply that people do not have rational expectations.
  3. According to Murphy, Vishny and Shleifer, if the state sector has an elastic demand for lumber and the private sector has an inelastic demand for lumber, Perestroika will result in a welfare loss, even if the state sector initially is given priority for the output of the lumber industry.
  4. Summers’ model contradicts the observed correlation between investment and the rate of interest since in his model investment only depends on the value of q.
  5. Workers’ beliefs about what they should be paid will have no effect on unemployment since wages are set equal to marginal products. Unemployment develops because firms must pay wages so high that workers will not shirk.
  6. The observed variance of stock prices relative to the observed variance of the present discounted value of actual dividends is biased downwards in finite samples. Thus Shiller’s evidence is not inconsistent with efficient markets.

 

PART C (Please Use a Separate Blue Book)

Consider the following system motivated by Taylor

  1. yt= mt– pt (aggregate demand)
  2. yt= a(pt– wt) (aggregate supply)
  3. wt= pt-1 (wage determination)
  4. mt= mt-1+ \varepsilon t (money supply rule)

Find the impulse response function of a unit change in \varepsilon t on yt and pt.

Note: The impulse response function is the effect of a current unit shock on future values of the respective variables.

 

***END OF FINAL***

Source: The Wayback Machine internet archive.  PDF file of the Spring 1992 Final Exam of Economics 202A.

_______________________

Department of Economics
University of California
Spring Semester 1993
Professor George A. Akerlof

Economics 202A
FINAL EXAMINATION

PLEASE READ THESE INSTRUCTIONS BEFORE BEGINNING.

  1. The exam is in 3 parts. Each of the first 12 questions has equal weight in grading.
  2. Some questions are much more difficult than others.
  3. Answer all the questions using a separate Bluebook for each part.
  4. Be sure to write your name on the cover of all of your Bluebooks.
  5. There are 70 total points for the exam.

Grades will reflect the precision, clarity and completeness of your answers as well as their correctness.

 

PART A (Please use a Separate Blue Book)

State whether the following are True, False, or Uncertain. Explain why in each case. Each question is worth 5 points.

1) According to Sargent unemployment is a random walk since the change in unemployment between t and t+1 depends only on an error term which is uncorrelated with prior information.

2) In Summers’ model if the investment equation is of the form:

\frac{I}{K}=a+bQ,

adjustment costs will be of the form:

A=\frac{1}{2a}{{\left( \frac{I}{K}-b \right)}^{2}}K.

3) In the Shapiro-Stiglitz model an increase in the labor supply will leave the unemployment rate constant because the nonshirking boundary depends only on the unemployment rate (which is the ratio of the number of unemployed to the total labor supply). In equilibrium this ratio will be unchanged if there is a shift in the labor supply.

4) In the Barro-Gordon model if the government’s desired level of unemployment is exactly the natural rate, there is no benefit from precommitment to zero increase in the money supply.

5) Every day Mr. and Mrs. Romer have higher income than expenses. They have the following strategy of money holding. When their bank account reaches $2,500 they purchase a $2,000 bond. On May 7, they received an unexpected bill for $1,063 for earthquake insurance. The expected level of their bank account will increase by exactly $1,063.

6) Consider an economy with perfect competitors and constant costs. Suppose the money supply changes by \varepsilon . Some firms keep their prices constant. These firms will suffer losses due to their individual decisions to keep their prices constant which are proportional to \varepsilon (first-order). The change in their profits due to the change in the aggregate equilibrium because many such firms kept their prices sticky, however, is proportional to \varepsilon 2 (second-order).

7) If workers retain their union membership even if unemployed, unemployment will not follow a random walk.

 

PART B (Please Use a Separate Blue Book)

Answer the following questions. Each question is worth 5 points.

8) Graph the effect of a permanent and a temporary (one-period) unexpected change in the money supply in the Taylor model. Explain your graph.

9) Two identical firms A and B have a constant certain payout x. Firm A has all equity. Firm B has debt D. The interest rate is r and the corporate profit tax rate is \tau . Derive the value of firms A and B on the assumptions of efficient markets. What is the difference, if any, between the value of firms A and B?

10) The demand for real balances, when fully adjusted in the long-run, is

{{m}^{*}}=a{{y}_{t}}-b{{r}_{t}}

The adjustment process is given by

{{m}_{t}}-{{m}_{t-1}}=\delta \left( m_{t}^{*}-{{m}_{t-1}} \right)

What are the long-run and short-run income and interest elasticities of the demand for real balances?

(Note: y, r, and m are the logarithms of income, the interest rate and real balances).

11) Given the demand for money is of the form

\frac{M}{p}=a-b\pi

What is the maximum steady-state level of seigniorage?

(Note: \pi is the rate of inflation, M is nominal money balances and p is the price level).

12) Debt-laden poor Country A has debt with New York banks of D dollars. It will pay off x dollars of this debt, where x is a random variable with uniform distribution between 0 and  \bar{X}. Industrial rich Country B kindly offers to buy (and retire) Z dollars worth of A’s debt from New York banks if Country A will leave the probability distribution of its payoffs unchanged. According to the Bulow-Rogoff model, how much must Country B pay to leave Country A with only D-Z dollars of debt? What is the “value” in terms of decreased debt payments to Country A of Country B’s kind offer?

 

PART C (Please Use a Separate Blue Book)

Answer one of the following two questions. Worth 10 points.

 

1) Derive from first principles the non-shirking boundary (in the Shapiro-Stiglitz) model.

— OR —

2) Derive from first principles the AR(1) equation for xt in the Taylor model.

 

*** END OF FINAL ***

Source: The Wayback Machine internet archive.  PDF file of the Spring 1993 Final Exam of Economics 202A.

Image Source: The Wayback Machine internet archive. “George A. Akerlof. Biographical” webpage at the Nobel Prize website.

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Economists Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Topics for the Ricardo Prize Examination, 1916

 

In an earlier post, JACOB VINER BEATS PAUL DOUGLAS FOR RICARDO PRIZE SCHOLARSHIP, 1916, we learned of a head-to-head competition between two young men who were to go on to become colleagues at the University of Chicago. Rummaging through Harvard Economics Department’s Correspondence & Papers, I happened to find a copy of the Ricardo Prize Examination topics for that 1916 examination in a folder where one would not have expected it to be filed. Now the record is more complete.

____________________

Ricardo Prize Exam. Will be Held in Upper Dane Tomorrow

The Ricardo Prize Scholarship examination will be held in Upper Dane Hall tomorrow at 2 o’clock. The scholarship is valued at $350, and is open to anyone who is this year a member of the University, and who will next year be either 8 member of the Senior class or of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Each candidate will write in the examination room an essay on a topic chosen by himself from a list not previously announced, in economics and political science. In addition, statements of previous studies, and any written work, must be submitted by every candidate to the Chairman of the Department of Economics not later than the time of the examination. The man who wins the scholarship must devote the majority of his time next year to economics and political studies.

Source:  Harvard Crimson, April 4, 1916.

____________________

1915-16
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
RICARDO PRIZE EXAMINATION

  1. The Single Tax.
  2. Minimum Wage for Men, in the Light of Economic Theory.
  3. Some Phase of the Theory of Value and Price.
  4. Regulation of Railroads by the States.
  5. The War and the Rate of Interest.
  6. Agricultural Credit.
  7. The Regulation of Monopolies.
  8. Free Trade in England.
  9. The Banks and the Stock Exchange.
  10. Price Maintenance.

April 5, 1916.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Department of Economics. Correspondence & Papers 1902-1950 (UAV.349.10). Box 23. Folder: “Course outlines, 1935-37-38-42”.

Image Source: Collage of details taken from photos apf1-08488 (Viner) and  apf1-05851 (Douglas) from University of Chicago Photographic Archive, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.

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Chicago Exam Questions

Chicago. Money, Prelim Exam for Banking and Monetary Policy, 1959

 

Preliminary examinations at the University of Chicago for Money, Banking and Monetary Policy from the Summer Quarter, 1956 and Winter Quarter, 1969 have been posted earlier.

On August 4, 1959 a three-hour “Core Examination” was taken by seventeen students and a four-hour “Money Prelim” was taken by nine students. Two additional questions were added to the “Money Prelim”.

_______________

Summer Quarter 1959 Examination Committee for Money, Banking and Monetary Policy:

Milton Friedman (chairman)
Earl J. Hamilton
Reuben A. Kessel

_______________

Reuben A. Kessel, obituary
New York Times, 21 June 1975.

Dr. Reuben A. Kessel, professor of economics at the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business since 1962, died yesterday at a hospital in Chicago, after having suffered a stroke a week ago. He was 52 years old and lived in Floss moor, Ill.

Dr. Kessel earlier taught at the University of Missouri and the University of California at Los Angeles. From 1952 to 1956 he was an economist with the Rand Corporation. He later served as research associate with the National Bureau of Economic Research here. He joined the Chicago faculty in 1957.

He was the author of “Cyclical Behavior of the Term Structure of Interest Rates.”

He received an M.B.A. degree in 1948 and a doctorate in 1954, both from Chicago.

Surviving are his widow, a daughter and two brothers.

_______________

CORE EXAMINATION
MONEY, BANKING AND MONETARY POLICY

Preliminary Examination for the Ph.D. and A.M. Degrees
Summer Quarter 1959
[August 4]

WRITE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION ON YOUR EXAMINATION PAPER

Your Code Number and NOT your name
Name of Examination
Date of Examination

Results of the examination will be sent to you by letter.

Answer all questions. Time 3 hours.

  1. Answer both a and b.
    1. During the calendar year 1958 the United States “lost” over $2 billion of gold.
      1. Explain precisely what this statement means.
      2. What factors might account for the loss?
      3. What monetary or other effects does the loss have?
    2. It has been urged that to stem further losses, the U.S. should raise the price of gold from its present official level of $35 an ounce to a higher level.
      Discuss the consequences of such a move if

      1. other major countries raise the price of gold in proportion or
      2. they do not.
  2. Comment on both a and b.
    1. “Banks like to lend money. It’s their bread and butter. But sometimes loans have to be turned down. Remember, bankers are not lending their own money. Bank loans are made from money entrusted to banks by depositors.” (Business in Brief, Chase Manhattan Bank, No. 13, Oct. 1956, p. 8).
    2. “Treasury financing in 1954 was carried out with short- and intermediate-term securities, many of which were bought by commercial banks and served to increase the money supply.” Economic Report of the President, 1956.
  3. Consider a closed economy which has a fiduciary currency fixed in nominal amount. In this economy, a tax on earnings is replaced by a tax of equal yield on real property. Trace the consequences to be expected for income, interest rates, and the level of prices.
  4. Suppose all wages are escalated, in the sense of being linked continuously to a price index. It would be argued by many that government could not under such circumstances acquire real resources by issuing fiat currency. Do you agree? Justify your answer.

_______________

MONEY, BANKING AND MONETARY POLICY

Preliminary Examination for the Ph.D. and A.M. Degrees
Summer Quarter 1959
[August 4]

WRITE THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION ON YOUR EXAMINATION PAPER

Your Code Number and NOT your name
Name of Examination
Date of Examination

Results of the examination will be sent to you by letter.

Answer all questions. Time: four hours.

  1. Answer both a and b.
    1. During the calendar year 1958 the United States “lost” over $2 billion of gold.
      1. Explain precisely what this statement means.
      2. What factors might account for the loss?
      3. What monetary or other effects does the loss have?
    2. It has been urged that to stem further losses, the U.S. should raise the price of gold from its present official level of $35 an ounce to a higher level.
      Discuss the consequences of such a move if

      1. other major countries raise the price of gold in proportion or
      2. they do not.
  2. Answer either a or b.
      1. Sir John Clapham has asserted (The Bank of England, Vol. II, p. 421) that it was in the Bank of England that “the practice of central banking had originally been worked out.” To what extent do you agree?
      2. Explain and criticize what you consider the most important contribution to monetary thought before 1900.
  3. Analyze, in terms of the income-expenditure approach, the effect of a reduction in the stock of money via (a) an open market sale by the Federal Reserve, (b) a surplus in the budget used to reduce the stock of money. Indicate the empirical magnitudes that must be known to predict the quantitative effect in each case.
  4. Comment on both a and b.
    1. “Banks like to lend money. It’s their bread and butter. But sometimes loans have to be turned down. Remember, bankers are not lending their own money. Bank loans are made from money entrusted to banks by depositors.” (Business in Brief, Chase Manhattan Bank, No. 13, Oct. 1956, p. 8).
    2. “Treasury financing in 1954 was carried out with short- and intermediate-term securities, many of which were bought by commercial banks and served to increase the money supply.” Economic Report of the President, 1956.
  5. Consider a closed economy which has a fiduciary currency fixed in nominal amount. In this economy, a tax on earnings is replaced by a tax of equal yield on real property. Trace the consequences to be expected for income, interest rates, and the level of prices.
  6. Suppose all wages are escalated, in the sense of being linked continuously to a price index. It would be argued by many that government could not under such circumstances acquire real resources by issuing fiat currency. Do you agree? Justify your answer.

Source: Hoover Institution Archives. Papers of Milton Friedman, Box 77, Folder 8 “University of Chicago, Econ 331”.

Image Source: Irwin Collier taking a break from archival work at the Hoover Institution.

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Exam Questions Toronto

Toronto. Examination papers in political economy, 1876

Knox College Building

 

The previous post provided transcriptions of the 1875 examinations at the University of Toronto in political economy. The 1876 examinations transcribed below include two additional examinations dedicated to Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations.

______________________

Other Toronto examinations in political economy

University of Toronto, Annual Examinations for 1858.

University of Toronto, Annual Examinations for 1875.

University of Toronto, Annual Examinations for 1891.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Second Year.

ROGERS’S POLITICAL ECONOMY.

Examiners: Thomas Hodgins, M.A., LL.B. [and] W. P. R. Street, LL.B.

  1. What is the true definition of rent? Does this definition apply equally to land in country and city? State generally the causes which will increase and diminish rent.
  2. What is the measure of the price in England of any kind of foreign produce? Give an illustration of this.
  3. When the imports of a country exceeds its exports, what advantage or disadvantage to the country is thereby indicated? Illustrate your answer by one or two imaginary commercial transactions between merchants in two countries.
  4. Mention some of the causes giving rise to an efflux of specie. Can you suggest a case in which such an efflux would not be checked by a rise in the rate of discount?
  5. Explain the constituent parts of wages, and state the causes which determine their amount.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Second Year.

ROGERS’S POLITICAL ECONOMY
Honors

Examiner: Thomas Hodgins, M.A., LL.B. [and] W. P. R. Street, LL.B.

  1. What are the economical grounds upon which a government is justified in insisting upon the education of the young, and in levying a tax for educational purposes?
  2. Illustrate, by reference to the past history of England, the alteration that has taken place during the last five centuries in the theory of the functions of government.
  3. When a tax is imposed on an export, in what cases may it be paid by the consuming country? What is the effect upon the trade in the article taxed in the exporting country where the tax is not paid by the consuming country?
  4. A certain article of commerce, of which there are several grades having different values, becomes suddenly scarce: are all the grades affected equally as to price? Explain your answer fully.
  5. Shew the fallacy of the statement that inferior lands have been occupied and cultivated as population has increased.
  6. Explain the meaning of the assertion that values are relative to each other. What circumstances are necessary to give value to any object of commerce?

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Third Year.

POLITICAL ECONOMY
Pass

Examiner: W. J. Robertson, B.A.

ROGERS.

  1. (a) Investigate the relation between labor and wages, so as to discover the causes of high and low wages.
    (b) Explain and criticize the Malthusian theory of population.
  2. (a) Give an account of the principal restrictions on occupations as exhibited in the commercial history of England.
    (b) Examine various methods adopted to regulate the rate of wages, and shew their economic effects.
  3. “There is not a shadow of evidence in support of the statement that inferior lands have been occupied and cultivated as population increases.” What theory is here referred to? What is Rogers’ theory of rent?
  4. In the long run the price of commodities depends, as we have several times seen, on the cost of production.” Fully explain this statement. What modification does it admit of?
  5. (a) “The fact is, as demand, to be effectual, must be accompanied by the power of exchange; so supply, to be effectual must be accompanied by the power to produce.” Develop a line of argument in support of this statement.
    (b) Shew the effect of increasing the price of manufactured or imported articles, the price of the productions of the earth given in exchange remaining fixed.
  6. Assign limits to governmental interference with the free course of trade.
  7. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of indirect taxation.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Third Year.

SMITH’S WEALTH OF NATIONS

Examiners: Thomas Hodgins, M.A., LL.B. [and] W. P. R. Street, LL.B.

  1. Shew how the accumulation of stock leads to the improvement in the productive powers of labour.
  2. Expain the two different ways in which a capital may be employed so as to yield a revenue or profit to its employer.
  3. Does the money of any Society form a portion of its gross, or its neat revenue, or of either, or both? Explain fully.
  4. Explain shortly the advantages gained by the substitution of paper for gold or silver money.
  5. What is meant by the “balance of trade”? Explain the fallacy upon which was founded the supposition, that a favourable balance of trade was necessary to the prosperity of a country.
  6. What are drawbacks? What was their object under the mercantile system, and in what cases, if any, does the author think them reasonable, and in what cases unreasonable?

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Third Year.

SMITH’S WEALTH OF NATIONS
Honors.

Examiners: Thomas Hodgins, M.A., LL.B. [and] W. P. R. Street, LL.B.

  1. Distinguish the gross, from the neat, revenue of all the inhabitants of a country; and describe what each is composed of.
  2. “What is annually saved, is as regularly consumed as what is annually spent, and nearly in the same time too, but it is consumed by a different set of people”.
    How does the author proceed to shew this?
  3. Explain the different ways in which a nation may purchase the pay and provisions of an army in a distant country.
  4. How does the author expose the fallacy of the theory entertained by Mr. Locke, Mr. Law, and others, that the increase of the quantity of gold and silver, after the discovery of the Spanish West Indies, was the real cause of the lowering of the rate of interest in Europe?
  5. Shew how it is, that the study of his own advantage necessarily leads each individual member of a Society, to prefer that employment of his capital which is most advantageous to the Society.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Third Year.

POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Honors

Examiner: W. J. Robertson, B.A.

MILL I.

  1. Explain what is meant by the mercantile system. Assign causes for the errors involved therein.
  2. (a) Mention and illustrate by examples, the different kinds of indirect labor employed in production.
    (b) Distinguish between materials and implements.
  3. (a) “Yet in disregard of a fact so evident, it long continued to be believed that laws and governments without creating capital, could create industry.” Fully explain. What exception does Mill admit to the general rule he lays down?
    (b) Examine whether the unproductive expenditure of the rich is necessary to the employment of the poor.
  4. Distinguish between circulating and fixed capital. Show the effect of increasing the latter at the expense of the former.
  5. Give the substance of Mill’s remarks on the degree of productiveness of productive agents.
  6. Compare the advantages of production on a large and on a small scale, including in your discussion the relative advantages of large and small farming.
  7. Give and illustrate the law of increase of production from land.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Candidates for B.A.

CIVIL POLITY.

Examiner: Rev. George Paxton Young, M.A.

COX’S BRITISH COMMONWEALTH.
SMITH’S WEALTH OF NATIONS.

  1. Define the duties of Government.
  2. Where does the right of taxation lie? Give historical illustrations.
  3. Discuss the question, whether a representative in Parliament ought to be the chosen advocate of particular classes or interests.
  4. “The law does not allow any man, however great his property, to give more than one vote to one candidate.” —Is this law based on correct principles?
  5. What distinctions are there between the pleadings in equity and at common law?
  6. What are the principles on which International Executive Government is established?
  7. Point out the reciprocal obligations of a Supreme State and its Colonies.
  8. What principle give occasion to the division of labour? To what limitation is the division of labour subject? Illustrate.
  9. Discuss the subject of the wages of labour.
  10. Inquire into the policy of restraints upon the importation from foreign countries of such goods as can be produced at home.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1876
Candidates for B.A.

POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Honors

Examiner: W. J. Robertson, B.A.

MILL

  1. (a) Discuss the nature of wealth, giving different views. What conclusion does Mill come to? Give his reasoning.
    (b) Discuss after Mill the nature of productive labour.
  2. How does Mill answer the question, “What is Capital?” State the fundamental propositions respecting capital; and examine the effect of government loans for unproductive expenditure.
  3. Inquire into the effect of increasing the cost of the raw material of manufactures; and show whether the increased cost of food affects prices or not.
  4. Give, with illustrations, the equation of International Demand.
  5. Give the substance of the chapter “Of Excess of Supply.”
  6. Trade the influence of credit on prices, and inquire into its effects on the general prosperity of a community.
  7. Give different theories of the cause of rent. Criticise Mill’s statement of it, showing how he differs from American economists.
  8. What are the principles of the Theory of Value?
    (a) Give Mill’s summary.
    (b) Some political economists assign as the cause of value, desire for an object—values being regulated by the strength of the desire. Carefully examine this view.
  9. What different remedies have been offered and tried for low wages? State your own views on the principal cause of low wages; also, state the most effectual remedies.
  10. (a) Examine how far paternal government would be economically beneficial.
    (b) Give illustrations of how governments may undertake commercial enterprises for the benefit of the nation, which otherwise could be carried out by private companies.
  11. Discuss, from an independent stand point, the advantages and disadvantages of incidental protection.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1876.

Image Source: Knox College. University of Toronto Libraries / Heritage U of T / U of T Chronology. (archived copy at the Wayback Machine)

 

 

Categories
Exam Questions Toronto

Toronto. Examination papers in political economy, 1875

From the six exams covering economics at the University of Toronto from 1875 we see that Rogers’ Manual of Political Economy was used as an introductory text with J. S. Mill’s Principles being principal text for the more advanced courses. Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations also explicitly examined.

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About the 1875 Examiners

Thomas Hodgins, M.A. Q.C., Toronto

The Canadian Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery of Eminent and Self-Made Men: Ontario Volume. Chicago and Toronto: American Biographical Pub. Co., 1880. pp. 386-388.

George Paxton Young

Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Vol. XI (1881-1890).

William John Robertson (Toronto, B.A.1873)

A Brief Historical Sketch of Canadian Banking and Currency  by W. J. Robertson (Examiner in Political Economy, Toronto University). Paper read before the historical and political science association of the University of Toronto, Feb. 4th, 1888.

William P. R. Street (b. 10 May 1868; d. 27 August 1946)

According to Toronto City Directory:  Judge (1890)

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University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1875
Second Year.

ROGERS’S POLITICAL ECONOMY

Examiners: Thomas Hodgins, M.A., LL.B. [and] W. P. R. Street, LL.B.

  1. What was Mr. Price’s scheme for extinguishing the National Debt?
  2. What are the objects of Trades Unions, and what are the means taken to carry them out?
  3. Explain the peculiar disadvantages of taxes on raw materials.
  4. What is the measure of value? Explain the statement that there can be no universal rise in values.
  5. How does the author discuss the question as to the propriety of government interference to check the too rapid exhaustion of coal in Great Britain?
  6. State briefly the causes which increase and diminish rent, and explain their operation in doings so.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1875.

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University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1875
Second Year.

ROGERS’S POLITICAL ECONOMY
Honors

Examiners: Thomas Hodgins, M.A., LL.B. [and] W. P. R. Street, LL.B.

  1. Mention some of the causes of an efflux of specie.
  2. “If a government interferes with the liberty of its subjects it is bound to shew cause for the interference.” What are the two causes which the author mentions as justifying such interference?
  3. How is Rent defined? Upon whom does the loss arising from an increase in the wages of agricultural laborers fall? Explain?
  4. Mention some of the difficulties in the way of an equitable tax upon incomes.
  5. Explain the operation of a rise in the rate of discount in checking a drain of specie. Under what circumstances is it likely to be ineffectual for that purpose?
  6. What is the real pledge given by a government as the security for the National debt? How is this shewn by the author?

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1875.

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University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1875

Third Year.
POLITICAL ECONOMY
Pass

Examiner: W. J. Robertson, B.A.

ROGERS.

  1. If the contract be voluntary, and the service be mutual, is one man’s gain another’s loss? Discuss.
  2. (a) What is the cause of value? Distinguish between value in exchange, and value in use.
    (b) What expedients are adopted to lessen labor, and increase production?
    (c) Give examples of the beneficial effect of division of labor.
  3. (a) What, according to Rogers, is the measure of value? Illustrate.
    (b) Can there be a general rise in value? If not, why not?
    (c) Can there be a general rise in price? Illustrate.
  4. (a) What functions does money perform? Account for the error that money alone is wealth.
    (b) Enumerate various substitutes for money.
  5. Investigate the true relation between Capital and Labor, referring to popular theories and remedies, which you deem erroneous.
  6. Give an account of the causes which depress the rate of wages.
  7. Give Rogers’s views regarding the subject of Protection, stating the limits he prescribes, and shewing wherein he disagrees with Mill.
  8. (a) Give the general rules of taxation?
    (b) What are the relative advantages of direct and indirect taxation?

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1875.

 

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University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1875

Third Year.
CIVIL POLITY.
Honors

Examiner: W. J. Robertson, B.A.

MILL I.

  1. (a) What are the requisites of production?
    (b) Does nature contribute more to the efficacy of labor in some occupations than in others? Explain.
  2. State the different ways in which labor is employed. Criticise the division of labor into agricultural, manufacturing, and commercial.
  3. Discuss, after Mill, the questions of productive and unproductive labor, also of productive and unproductive consumption.
  4. Enumerate and illustrate (where necessary) the fundamental propositions respecting capital.
  5. Institute a comparison between the benefits of large and small farming respectively.
  6. Give the substance of Mill’s chapter “Of the Law of the Increase of Labor.”

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1875.

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1875

Candidates for B.A.
CIVIL POLITY.

Examiner: Rev. George Paxton Young, M.A.

COX’S BRITISH COMMONWEALTH—SMITH’S WEALTH OF NATIONS.

  1. From what source is the right of government derived? Examine the question fully.
  2. Give an account of the origin and rise of the British Cabinet. On what conditions does the permanence of any particular Cabinet usually depend?
  3. Describe the practice of Parliament with respect to private bills; and state what different courses may be adopted when a public bill is returned from either House to the other with amendments.
  4. What is an impeachment, and how is it conducted?
  5. Examine the doctrine of the balance of power.
  6. Under what restrictions are criteria of truth afforded by public opinion? And to what extent do justice and policy require that governments should be directed by its dictates?
  7. Give an account of the origin and use of money.
  8. Show, that, in the price of commodities, the profits of stock constitute a component part altogether different from the wages of labour, and regulated by different principles.
  9. Explain the order in which manufactures, agriculture, and foreign commerce naturally arise; and state the relation of these branches to the increase of opulence, whether in town or country.
  10. “The attention of governments never was so unnecessarily employed as when directed to watch over the preservation of the increase of the quantity of money in any country.” How does Smith establish this position?

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1875.

 

______________________

University of Toronto
Annual Examinations: 1875

Candidates for B.A.
CIVIL POLITY.
Honors

Examiner: W. J. Robertson, B.A.

MILL

  1. Show what would be the effect of increasing fixed Capital, at the expense of circulating.
  2. Explain and illustrate the diversity in the effective strength of the desire of accumulation.
  3. Give the substance of the chapter “Of the Law of the Increase of Production from Land.”
  4. Distinguish between Communism, St. Simonism, and Fourierism. Criticise these systems.
  5. Examine Mill’s views on the right of bequest and inheritance.
  6. Give examples of the influence of custom on rents, tenure of land, and prices.
  7. Discuss the question of peasant proprietorship.
  8. Enumerate various popular remedies for low wages. Criticise.
  9. State Mill’s theory of rent, with your own views thereon.
  10. Can there be an over-supply of commodities generally? Explain.
  11. (a) What regulates international values? Illustrate.
    (b) Briefly show the indirect benefits of Commerce.
  12. Give examples of exceptions to the rule of Laisser-faire.
  13. Discuss briefly the influence of credit on prices.

Source: University of Toronto. Examination Papers for 1875.

Image Source:  BlogTO / Toronto of the 1880s (January 11, 2011)

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Final Examinations for Junior and Senior Political Economy. Dunbar, 1876-77

 

Economics in the Rear-view Mirror’s scribe-curator is now back in action to provide four examinations (two mid-year and two final exams) from the two political economy courses taught at Harvard by Charles F. Dunbar during the 1876-77 academic year.

It is really great to be back transcribing and curating!

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Political Economy Courses
Elective Studies, 1876-77.

Prof. Dunbar. Philosophy 5. Political Economy.

— J. S. Mill’s Political Economy. — Bagehot’s Lombard Street. — Lectures on the Financial Legislation of the United States.

Number of students: 1 Graduate, 30 Seniors, 64 Juniors, 7 Sophomores, 2 Unmatriculated.
Number of sections: 2
Exercises per week for students: 3
Exercises per week for instructors: 6

Prof. Dunbar. Philosophy 6. Advanced Political Economy.

— Cairnes’s Leading Principles of Political Economy. — McKean’s Condensation of Carey’s Social Science. — Lectures.

Number of students: 2 Graduates, 22 Seniors
Number of sections: 1
Exercises per week for students: 3
Exercises per week for instructors: 3

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College 1876-77, p. 49.

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PHILOSOPHY 5.
Mid-Year Examination
February, 1877

[In answering the questions do not change their order.]

  1. Why is the distinction between labor for the supply of productive and for the supply of unproductive consumption, more important than that between productive and unproductive labor?
  2. What is the ground for saying that “every increase of capital is capable of giving additional employment to industry, and this without assignable limit”?
  3. How does the existence of the banking system facilitate the equalization of profits in different employments?
  4. How far is the doctrine of rent, or of the value of land, affected, if it be shown that in the actual occupation of the earth the best lands are the last to be cultivated?
  5. What is the ground for saying that rent is not a part of the cost of production, the fact being that the farmer is obliged to take account of it as one of his expenses?
  6. On what does the cost of labor depend?
  7. Is there any commodity of which the change of supply must be actual as well as possible, in order that its value may be made to conform to its cost of production?
  8. Why does the durability of the precious metals give steadiness to their value?
  9. Criticise Mr. Mill’s statement that when there are successive emissions of inconvertible paper it will drive out the metallic money previously in circulation, “that is, if paper be issued of as low a denomination as the lowest coin; if not, as much will remain as convenience requires for the smallest payments.”
  10. How would a currency of convertible paper compare in steadiness of value with one of inconvertible paper which was of fixed amount?
  11. Explain the statement that it is “not general taxation but differential taxation,” that affects values and prices.
  12. Explain the disproportionate pressure on the Bank of England as compared with other banks, during a financial panic.
  13. What are the advantages and disadvantages of the “many-reserve” system, and how does American experience affect Mr. Bagehot’s reasoning on the matter?
  14. The following is the account of the Bank of England (given in millions and tenths of millions) for May 9, 1866: –

Issue Department.

Notes issued,

£27.3

 Gov’t debt and securities,

£15.0

____

 Coin and bullion,

£12.3

£27.3

£27.3

Banking Department.

Capital,

£14.5

 Government securities,

£10.9

Rest,

£  3.2

 Other securities,

£20.8
Public deposits,

£  5.8

 Reserve,

£  5.8
Private deposits,

£13.5
Seven-day bills,

£  0.5

____

£37.5

£37.5

The panic reached its height and the Act of 1844 was suspended on the 12th; in the next three weeks the Bank increased its loans by thirteen millions, and five millions were drawn out by depositors. What changes must therefore be made in the above account? What changes would have been necessary if depositors had drawn seven millions instead of five?

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943. Box 1, Folder “Mid-year examinations, 1876-1877”.

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PHILOSOPHY 5.
Final Examination
May, 1877

[Do not change the order of the questions.
A number marked with an asterisk may be substituted for the same number not so marked.]

  1. To what extent is it true that “wages (meaning of course money wages) vary with the price of food, rising when it rises, and falling when it falls”?
  2. “Even a general rise of wages, when it involves a real increase in the cost of labor, does in some degree influence values.” How?
  3. What is the meaning of the statement that “it is not a difference in the absolute cost of production, which determines the interchanges [of commodities between countries], but a difference in the comparative cost.”
  4. How was the exchange of commodities with other countries be affected by an improvement which lowers the cost of production of some article which the country already exports?

4. *Explain both branches of the statement that “they are in the right to maintain that taxes on imports are partly paid by foreigners; but they are mistaken when they say, that it is by the foreign producer.”

  1. If a country has a large regular product of gold, what will be the natural effect on the rate charged for bills of exchange upon foreign countries, and why?
  2. If both the capital and population of the country are increasing, what will be the effect on wages, profits, and rent, respectively? Give the reasons.

6. *Why do improvements which cheapen the production of luxuries have less effect than those which cheaper the necessaries of life, in retarding the decline of profits towards the minimum?

  1. What is the ground for saying that a tax on what is properly called rent falls wholly on the landlord in the long run?
  2. Is a tax on the value of unimproved property (as e.g. vacant land) consistent with Adam Smith’s first canon of taxation? Give your reasons.
  3. The following is the account of the Bank of England for November 11, 1857:—

Issue Department.

Notes issued, £21.1 Gov’t debt and securities, £14.5
____ Coin and bullion, £  6.6
£21.1 £21.1

Banking Department.

Capital, £14.5 Government securities, £   9.4
Rest, £  3.4 Other securities, £26.1
Public deposits, £  5.3 Reserve, £  1.5
Private deposits, £12.9
Seven-day bills, £  0.9 ____
£37.0 £37.0

In the next two weeks five millions were lent to individuals and three millions of deposits were drawn out. Show the changes in the account and the effect on the limit fixed by the act of 1844.

    1. What was the date of the last suspension of specie payments in the United States? Explain the circumstances which led to it.
    2. Show what influences besides improving credit made the sale of 5-20’s easy in 1863, although it had been nearly impossible in 1862.
    3. Explain the plan on which the national banks are established; show its points of resemblance, if any, to the plan of the Bank of England; and state the purposes for which the deposits of bonds and the reserves are required.
    4. Describe the action which Congress has taken on the subject of currency since the financial crisis of 1873.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Final examinations, 1853-2001. Box 2, Folder “Final examinations, 1876-1877”.

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PHILOSOPHY 6.
Mid-year Examination
February, 1877

[In answering the questions do not change their order.]

    1. How far are prices determined by Reciprocal International Demand, Reciprocal Domestic Demand, and Cost of Production, respectively? Is any change to be made in Cairnes’s statement that “an alteration in the reciprocal demand of two trading nations will act upon the price, not of any commodity in particular, but of every commodity which enters into the trade?”
    2. What is Cairnes’s reply to Mill’s statement that the portion of supply which is reserved for future sale forms no part of the supply which determines market price? How does Cairnes define supply and demand as affecting market price?
    3. In the general cheapening of manufacturers, resulting from modern improvements, which is cheapened most, the consumption of the masses or the consumption of the rich?
    4. How does the following statement of the wages-fund doctrine compare with Cairnes’s statement of it?
      “The wages-fund, therefore, may be greater or less at another time, but at the time taken it is definite. The amount of it cannot be increased by force of law or of public opinion, or through sympathy and compassion on the part of employers, or as the result of appeals or efforts on the part of the working classes.” (Walker, “The Wages Question,” p. 138.)
    5. It is said in answer to Cairnes’s argument for coöperation, that laborers can now bring profits to reinforce wages, by means of the savings banks. What answer is to be made to this?
    6. What is the connection between general wages and foreign trade, as illustrated by the case of the Australian colony, Victoria?
    7. What were Cairnes’s reasons for expecting in 1873 that before many years the balance of trade would become permanently “favorable” to the United States?
    8. “If the high rates of industrial remuneration in America be only evidence of a low cost of production, how is the fact to be explained, that the people of the United States are unable to compete in neutral markets, in the sale of certain important wares, with England and other European countries?”
    9. What is the inconsistency between the common definition of the cost of production and the doctrine of international values? How is the inconsistency to be remedied?
    10. Compare Carey’s doctrine of Value with Mill’s.
    11. “Diminution in the value of capital,” says Carey, “is attended by diminution in the proportion of labor given for its use by those who, unable to purchase, desire to hire it. Had the first axe been exclusive property of one of our colonists, he would have demanded more than half the wood that could be cut, in return for its use… His neighbor would find it to his advantage to give three-fourths of the product for use of the axe… The arrival of the ship having given them better axes at a smaller cost, would not give, nor could the other demand so large a proportion as before … In the fourteenth century, when a week’s labor would command only 7½d. in silver, the owner of a pound of that metal could demand as compensation for its use a much larger proportion than now, when the laborer can obtain that quantity in a little more than a fortnight.”
      What is the fallacy in this reasoning?
    12. Criticize the following statements : –
      “Ricardo’s system is based upon the assumed fact, that in the beginning of cultivation, when population is small and land abundant, the richest soils alone are cultivated… If it can be shown that, in every country and at every age, the order of events has been direct opposition to what it is supposed by Mr. Ricardo to have been, then must his theory be abandoned as wholly destitute of foundation.”
    13. It is also assumed that if our paper currency is brought to equality of value with gold, no further withdrawal of paper will be necessary. Can this be taken for granted? Can the gold now in the Treasury or in the Pacific States, or any of it, be regarded as a provision for specie resumption?

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943. Box 1, Folder “Mid-year examinations, 1876-1877”.

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PHILOSOPHY 6.
Final Examination
May, 1877

    1. What is the reason “that’s so little impression has been made on the rate of wages and profits” by the immense industrial progress of recent times?
    2. Criticise the following extract from Walker’s “Wages Question,” p. 198: –

“Instead of asserting, as Prof. Cairnes has done, the practical isolation of certain great groups, with the entire freedom of movement within these groups, I believe that a fuller study of industrial society will establish the conviction that nowhere is mobility perfect, theoretically or even practically, and nowhere is there entire immobility of labor; that all classes and conditions of men are appreciably affected by the force of competition; but that, on the other hand, the force of competition, which nowhere becomes nil, even for practical purposes, ranges from a very high to very low degree of efficiency, according to national temperament, according to peculiarities of personal character and circumstance, according to the laws and institutions of the community, and according to natural or geographical influences.”

    1. It is laid down that high general wages do not hinder a country from exchanging with others. Trace the course of a trade, opened between two countries one of which has higher general wages and higher prices for all commodities adapted to foreign commerce than the other, and show the application of the principle first stated.
    2. What is meant by saying that a nation is interested, not in having its prices high or low, but in having its gold cheap?
    3. Examine the question whether a nation which has an unfavorable balance of trade can maintain specie payments?
    4. What is Mr. Carey’s doctrine as to the prices of raw materials and finished goods respectively, and the reason for it? How does he answer the question, “must not improved cultivation tend to cheapen corn, as improvements in the mode of conversion tend to cheapen cloth?”
    5. Compare Mr. Carey’s doctrine as to the distribution between capital and labor with the proposition laid down by Ricardo and Mill, that profits tend to decline in consequence of an increasing cost of labor.
    6. Discuss the following:—
      “The use of bank-notes tends, we are told, to promote the expulsion of gold. Were this so, it would be in opposition to the great general law in virtue of which all commodities tend to, and not from, the places where their utility is greatest…The check and the bank-note stimulate the import [of the precious metals], as is proved by the fact, that for a century past, they have flowed towards Britain, where such notes were most in use.”
    7. What is likely to be the effect of the attempt of Ohio and Illinois to make the subsidiary silver a legal tender without limit, supposing their constitutional power to do so to be granted?
    8. What are the distinguishing characteristics of the land-reforms undertaken in the last century in France, Prussia, and Russia, respectively?
    9. Of these six, — Adam Smith, Sir James Stewart, Quesnay, J.-B. Say, Ricardo, Sismondi, — take three, giving dates, relations to each other, and doctrines or discussions for which they are best known.
    10. Show the contributions of Ricardo, Mill, and Cairnes, respectively, to the full development of the doctrine of international values.

Source:  Harvard University Archives. Harvard University. Final examinations, 1853-2001. Box 2, Folder “Final examinations, 1876-1877”.

Image Source: Charles F. Dunbar in E. H. Jackson and R. W. Hunter (eds.), Portraits of the Harvard Faculty (Boston, 1892).

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard Socialism

Harvard. Exams and enrollment for economics of socialism and communism. Edward Cummings, 1893-1900

The father of the American poet E.E. Cummings, Edward Cummings, taught courses in sociology, labor economics, and socialism at Harvard during the last decade of the 19th century before he resigned to become the minister at Boston’s South Congregational Church. In this post I have included all the exams for his course on ancient and modern  utopias (a.k.a. communism and socialism) that I have been able to find. A course description and enrollment data are readily available from internet archives and included below as well. 

Note: for only the 1893-94 academic year and the single-term version of the course offered in 1895-96 are the exams complete. For the other academic years when the course was offered I have only found the first term exams.

Analogous courses on schemes of social reconstruction were taught in one form or another later by Thomas Nixon Carver, Edward S. Mason, Paul Sweezy, Wassily Leontief,  Joseph Schumpeter, and Overton Hume Taylor.

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Course Description
(1897-98)

*14. Socialism and Communism, — History and Literature. Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 9. Asst. Professor Edward Cummings.

[An asterisk (*) indicates that the course can be taken only with the previous consent of the instructor.]

Course 14 is primarily an historical and critical study of socialism and communism. It traces the history and significance of schemes for social reconstruction from the earliest times to the present day. It discusses the historical evidences of primitive communism, the forms assumed by private ownership at different stages of civilization, the bearing of these considerations upon the claims of modern socialism, and the outcome of experimental communities in which socialism and communism have actually been tried. Special attention, however is devoted to the recent history of socialism, – the precursors and the followers of Marx and Lassalle, the economic and political programs of socialistic parties in Germany, France, and other countries.

The primary object is in every case to trace the relation of historical evolution to these programmes; to discover how far they have modified history or found expression in the policy of parties or statesmen; how far they must be regarded simply as protests against existing phases of social evolution; and how far they may be said to embody a sane philosophy of social and political organization.

The criticism and analysis of these schemes gives opportunity for discussing from different points of view the ethical and historical value of social and political institutions, the relation of the State to the individual, the political and economic bearing of current socialistic series.

The work is especially adapted to students who have had some introductory training in Ethics as well as in Economics. A systematic course of reading covers the authors discussed; and special topics for investigation maybe assigned in connection with this reading.

 

Source: Harvard University. Division of History and Political Science Comprising the Departments of History and Government and Economics, 1897-98, pp. 35-36.

____________________

1893-94

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 14. Asst. Professor Cummings. – Ideal Social Reconstructions, from Plato’s Republic to the present time. 1 hour.

Total 22: 7 Graduates, 8 Seniors, 5 Juniors, 2 Sophomores.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1893-94, p. 61.

 

 

ECONOMICS 14.
Mid-year examination, 1893-94.

(Arrange your answers in the order of the questions. Omit one.)

  1. What is a Utopia? and what significance do you attached to the recurrence of such literature at certain historical ethics?
  2. “For judging of the importance of any thinker in the history of Economics, no matter is more important to us than the view he takes of the laboring population.” Judge Plato, More and Bacon by this standard.
  3. “Moreover, it is hardly too much to say that Plato never got to the point of having a theory of the State at all.” In the Republic “man is treated as a micropolis, and the city is the citizen writ large.” Explain and criticize.
  4. “In More’s Utopia we have a revival of the Platonic Republic with additions which make the scheme entirely modern.… The economical element in the social body receives for the first time its proper rank as of the highest moment for public welfare.” Explain. To what extent have the ideals of Utopia been realized?
  5. “Then we may say that democracy, like oligarchy, is destroyed by its insatiable craving for the object which defines to be supremely good?” What, according to the Republic are the peculiar merits and defects of the several forms of political organization? and how are these forms related in point of origin and sequence?
  6. “Sir Thomas More has been called the father of Modern Communism.” How does he compare in this respect with Plato? How far do you trace the influence of historical conditions in each case?
  7. “But in your case, it is we that have begotten you for the State as well as for yourselves, to be like leaders and kings of the hive,– better and more perfectly trained than the rest, and more capable of playing a part in both modes of life.” Criticise the method and purpose of the educational system of the Republic. How far does Plato’s argument as to the duty of public service apply to the educated man to-day?
  8. “The religious ferment produced by the Reformation movement had begun to show signs of abatement, when another movement closely connected with it made its appearance almost at the same time in England and Italy, namely, the rise of a new philosophy.” How was this new philosophy embodied in the social ideals of Bacon and of Campanella? and what is the distinguishing characteristic of it?
  9. What essential contrast between pagan and Christian ideals have you found in schemes for social regeneration?
  10. Is there any recognition of “Social Evolution” in the Utopian philosophies thus far considered?
  11. What in a word, do you regard as the chief defect of the social reconstruction suggested in turn by Plato, Lycurgus, More, Bacon and Campanella? To what main problems suggested by them have we still to seek an answer?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers. Mid-Year, 1893-94.(HUC 7000.55).

 

ECONOMICS 14.
Final examination, 1893-94.

(Arrange your answers in the order of the questions.)

  1. [“]The essential unity and continuity of the vital process which has been in progress in our civilization from the beginning is almost lost sight of. Many of the writers on social subjects at the present day are like the old school of geologists: they seem to think that progress has consisted of a series of cataclysms.” How far is this criticism true? Is the characteristic in question more or less conspicuous in earlier writers?
  2. “At the outset underneath all socialist ideals yawns the problem of population…. Under the Utopias of Socialism, one of two things must happen. Either this increase must be restricted or not. If it be not restricted, and selection is allowed to continue, then the whole foundations of such a fabric as Mr. Bellamy has constructed are bodily removed.” State carefully your reasons for agreeing or disagreeing. In which of the schemes for social reconstruction, ancient or modern, do you find any adequate recognition of the part which selection plays in progress?
  3. “If it is possible for the community to provide the capital for production without thereby doing injury to either the principle of perfect individual freedom or to that of justice, if interest can be dispensed with without introducing communistic control in its stead, then there no longer stands any positive obstacle in the way of the free social order.” Discuss the provisions by which Hertzka hopes to guaranteed this “perfect individual freedom.” Contrast him with Bellamy in this respect.
  4. “I perceive that capitalism stops the growth of wealth, not – as Marx has it – by stimulating ‘production for the market,’ but by preventing the consumption of the surplus produce; and that interest, though not unjust, will nevertheless in a condition of economic justice becomes superfluous and objectless.” Explain Hertzka’s reasoning and criticise the economic theory involved.”
  5. What is the gist of “News from Nowhere”?
  6. The condition which the social mind has reached may be tentatively described as one of realization, more or less unconscious, that religion has a definite function to perform in society, and that it is a factor of some kind in the social evolution which is in progress.” How far have you found a recognition of this factor in theories of social reconstruction?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Final Examinations, 1853-2001. (HUC 7000.28). Box 2, Papers Set for Final Examinations in Philosophy, History, Government and Law, Economics, Fine Arts, and Music in Harvard College, June 1894.

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1894-95

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 14. Asst. Professor Cummings.—Philosophy and Political Economy.—Utopian Literature from Plato’s Republic to the present time.  2 hours.

Total 8: 5 Seniors, 2 Juniors, 1 Sophomores.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1894-95, p. 62.

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1895-96

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 141. Asst. Professor Edward Cummings.—Communism and Socialism.—Utopias, ancient and modern. Hf. 2 hours. 1st half-year.

Total 15: 1 Graduate, 10 Seniors, 2 Juniors, 2 Sophomores.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1895-96, p. 63.

 

ECONOMICS 14.
Mid-Year Examination, 1895-96.

(Arrange your answers in the order of the questions. Omit one.)

  1. The different senses in which the word Socialism is used. Where do you intend to draw the line between Socialism proper, and familiar forms of government interference and control – such as factory legislation, municipal water works, and government postal, telegraph or railroad services? Why?
  2. “National communism has been confused with the common ownership of the family; tenure in common has been confused with ownership in common; agrarian communism with village commons.” Discuss the evidence.
  3. “Just as Plato had his Republic, Campanella his City of the Sun, and Sir Thomas More his Utopia, St. Simon his Industrial System, and Fourier his ideal Phalanstery…. But the common criticism of Socialism has not yet noted the change, and continues to deal with the obsolete Utopias of the pre-evolutionary age.” What do you conceive to be the character of the change referred to? How far did earlier Utopias anticipate the ideals of the modern social democracy?
  4. What indication of Socialistic tendencies are to be found in the discipline of the Christian church? Explain the triple contract and its bearing on the doctrine of the usury.
  5. “The Communistic scheme, instead of being peculiarly open to the objection drawn from danger of over-population, has the recommendation of tending in an especial degree to the prevention of that evil.” Explained Mill’s argument. Do you agree?
  6. To what extent are the theories of Karl Marx indebted to earlier writers in the 19th-century?
  7. How far are the economic series of (a) Lasalle, (b) Marx related to the theories of the so-called orthodox Economists? Explain critically.
  8. How far do you trace the influence of historical conditions in the social philosophies of Plato, More, Bacon, Rousseau, St. Simon, Karl Marx?
  9. What connection do you see between the teachings of Rousseau and (a) modern Socialism, (b) modern Anarchism?
  10. What, according to Hertzka, is the economic defect of the existing social and industrial system, and what is the remedy? Contrast “Freeland” with “Looking Backward.”

Source: Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers. Mid-Year, 1895-96.(HUC 7000.55).

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1896-97

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 14. Asst. Professor Edward Cummings.—Communism and Socialism.—History and Literature.2 hours.

Total 13: 10 Seniors, 2 Juniors, 1 Sophomore.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1896-97, p. 65.

 

ECONOMICS 14.
Mid-Year Examination, 1896-97.

(Arrange your answers in the order of the questions. Omit one.)

  1. The different senses in which the word Socialism is used. Where do you intend to draw the line between Socialism proper, and familiar forms of government interference and control – such as factory legislation, municipal water works, and government postal, telegraph or railroad services? Why?
  2. “National communism has been confused with the common ownership of the family; tenure in common has been confused with ownership in common; agrarian communism with village commons.” Discuss the evidence.
  3. “Just as Plato had his Republic, Campanella his City of the Sun, and Sir Thomas More his Utopia, St. Simon his Industrial System, and Fourier his ideal Phalanstery…. But the common criticism of Socialism has not yet noted the change, and continues to deal with the obsolete Utopias of the pre—evolutionary age.” What do you conceive to be the character of the change referred to? How far did earlier Utopias anticipate the ideals of the modern social democracy?
  4. What indication of Socialistic tendencies are to be found in the discipline of the Christian church? Explain the triple contract and its bearing on the doctrine of the usury.
  5. The contributions of Greek writers to the development of economic thought.
  6. To what extent are the theories of Karl Marx indebted to earlier writers in the 19th-century?
  7. How far are the economic series of (a) Lasalle, (b) Marx related to the theories of the so-called orthodox Economists? Explain critically.
  8. How far do you trace the influence of historical conditions in the social philosophies of Plato, More, Bacon, Rousseau, St. Simon, Karl Marx?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers. Mid-Year, 1896-97.(HUC 7000.55).

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1897-98

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 14. Asst. Professor E. Cummings.—Communism and Socialism.—History and Literature.2 or 3 hours.

Total 12: 3 Graduates, 5 Seniors, 2 Juniors, 2 Sophomores.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1897-98, p. 78.

 

ECONOMICS 14
Mid-Year Examination, 1897-98

Outline briefly the characteristics of socialistic theory and practice in ancient, medieval and modern times, — devoting about an hour to each epoch, and showing—

(a) so far as possible the continuity of such speculations; the characteristic resemblances and differences;

(b) the influence of peculiar historical conditions;

(c) the corresponding changes in economic theory and practice.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers. Mid-Year, 1897-98.(HUC 7000.55).

 

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Not offered 1898-99

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1898-99, pp. 72-73.

____________________

1899-1900

Course Enrollment

[Economics] 14. Asst. Professor Edward Cummings.—Communism and Socialism.—History and Literature.Lectures (3 hours); 6 reports or theses.

Total 22: 2 Graduates, 11 Seniors, 4 Juniors, 1 Sophomore, 4 Others.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1899-1900, p. 69.

 

ECONOMICS 14
Mid-Year Examination, 1899-1900

  1. How, according to Plato, are economic organization, and the problems of production and distribution related (a) to social development; (b) to social and political degeneration?
  2. What do you conceive to be his most permanent contribution to social philosophy? What his chief defect?
  3. How far do the teachings of the Christian church and the Canon Law throw light on the gradual development of our fundamental economic ideas in regard to wealth, capital, trade, commerce?
  4. How far is there ground for the contention that the writings of Rousseau have been the chief arsenal of social and political revolutionists?
  5. “The right to the whole produce of labor—to subsistence—to labor:”
    What, according to Menger, have been the most important contributions to the successive phases of this discussion?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Examination Papers. Mid-Year, 1899-1900.(HUC 7000.55).

Image Source: University and their Sons. History, Influence and Characteristics of American Universities with Biographical Sketches and Portraits of Alumni and Recipients of Honorary Degrees. Editor-in-chief, General Joshua L. Chamberlain, LL.D. Vol II (1899), pp. 155-156.

 

Categories
Economic History Exam Questions Harvard Undergraduate

Harvard. First Undergraduate General and Specific Exams in History, Government and Economics Division, 1916.

 

In this post we can read some of the history behind the establishment of Harvard’s undergraduate tutorial and divisional examination system for which the Division of History, Government, and Economics served as an early testing ground. The first general examination of that division along with the “specific” economics field examinations from 1916 are transcribed below.

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Backstories regarding the Division Examinations in History, Government, and Economics

History of Origin and Growth of the Tutorial System
Shows Gradual Incorporation in All Departments But Chemistry
Introduction of General Exams In Medical School Made Entrance Wedge
January 10, 1933

Excerpts from a brief history of the General Examinations and the Tutorial System recently published by the University follows below.

In the spring of 1910 a committee was appointed which examined the system prevailing in American medical schools of granting the degree upon an accumulation of credits in courses, and the European system of two general examinations, the earlier upon the general scientific or laboratory subjects and the final one upon the clinical branches. The committee recommended the adoption of the latter system, and after its provisional approval by the Faculty of Medicine in March of the following year, another committee, mainly of different members, worked out a plan which was adopted by that Faculty in October, 1911.

Adopted by Divinity School

Shortly after its adoption in the Medical School the idea of a general examination invaded departments at Cambridge. In the academic year 1911-12 it was adopted in the Divinity School for the degrees of Bachelor and Master of Theology; and in this case it seems to have worked well from the start. Meanwhile the division of History, Government and Economics had been considering the matter, and after a year of careful study formulated a plan which as sanctioned by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences in the winter of 1912-13. The examination was to be conducted by the division and in fact by a committee of three of its members appointed by the President, who were to be relieved of one half of their work of instruction. It was to consist of both written and oral tests, was to be required of all college students concentrating in that division, in addition to their courses, and was to go into effect with the class entering the following autumn. Authority was also given to supplement by tutorial assistance the instruction given in the courses. Thus the complete system of a general examination and tutors was set up for all undergraduates in one division, and the one which at the time had the largest number of concentrators.

Trial Seems in Danger

The plan was put into effect without serious obstacles. The number of students concentrating in these subjects did, indeed, diminish, the weaker of more timid seeking departments where no such examination barred the way; out that was no harm, and proved to be in large part a temporary effect. The preparing of examination questions, which had been supposed very difficult, was exceedingly well done by an able committee. Yet the plan was not at once wholly successful. Tutorial work was new, and men equipped for it were not to be found. They had to learn the art by their own experience, and by what they derived from an exchange of tutors for a year with Oxford and Cambridge. In fact, after a few years of trial the plan seemed in danger of breaking down. The benefits were not at once evident; some of those formerly in favor of it became skeptical, while opponents were confirmed in their opinions. Until we entered the World War the only other field of concentration which had adopted a general examination of all students for graduation was that of History and Literature, although something of the kind had long been in common use in the case of candidates for distinction or honors.

Crisis Comes After War

The crisis came at the close of the war, when the changes made for military purposes in all instruction had left matters in a somewhat fluid state. A committee of the Faculty was appointed to consider what, if any, extension of the principle could profitably be made in other fields. There was a feeling that such a system ought not to be maintained in one class of subjects alone; that it should either be abolished or extended. After a study of the question in its various phases the committee reported, and in April, 1919, the Faculty voted, that general examinations should “be established for all students concentrating in Divisions or under Committees which signify their willingness to try such examinations,” and that they “be employed for the members of the present Freshman class.” Thereupon all the divisions under the Faculty, except those dealing with mathematics and the natural sciences, decided to make the experiment. Some of them did so reluctantly, with misgiving, and under a condition that they should not be obliged to employ tutors. By the academic year 1924-25, therefore, the students in all the divisions with a general examination had the benefit of tutoring.

Adopted by All Departments

Since that time the progress of the system has been gradual but continuous. In 1926 the departments of mathematics, biology, and bio-chemical sciences adopted it; and in 1928 geology and physics were added to the list; leaving chemistry as the only department with a large number of concentrators that still retains the older methods, and its work is done so much in laboratories that its position is peculiar. The only change in the system has come from a demand by the students themselves. There has been no desire on the part of the University to abandon teaching or examination in courses by copying the practice at Oxford and Cambridge of leaving instruction wholly to the tutor, as that would have seemed ill-adapted to the habits of the College.

Source: Harvard Crimson, January 10, 1933.

 

TUTORIAL SYSTEM HEREAFTER
Rules for Concentration in History, Government and Economics Will Apply Next Year.
April 10, 1914

Beginning with the class of 1917 and applying to all subsequent classes, a new rule in regard to concentration in the Division of History, Government and Economics has been adopted.

Concentration in this Division requires at least six courses which are related to each other. Under the new system all students concentrating in this division will be required to pass in their Senior year a final examination covering their special field within the Division, and consisting of a written examination early in the spring, and an oral examination toward the close of the year. In order to prepare students for these examinations the University will provide special tutors beginning with the Sophomore year.

Only Two Introductory Courses.

Every student intending to concentrate in History, Government, and Economics should state the Department in which he will take at least four courses and the Department in which he will take the remaining two. He will not be allowed to count towards his concentration more than two of the introductory courses, History 1, Government 1, and Economics A. The aim of the system is to enforce a more accurate knowledge and comprehension of studies as a whole. This aim has frequently not been achieved owing to the wide scattering of courses.

Source: Harvard Crimson, April 10, 1914.

 

 

THE TUTORIAL SYSTEM.
April 10, 1914

There are two new features in the recently announced requirements of the Division of History, Government and Economics, namely, the general examination and the tutorial system. And they are complementary. The task of the tutor is to intelligently guide the student in his preparation for the final examination, to assist him in that organization and correlation of his work which is the key-note of the plan. His work begins where the adviser’s work ends. The adviser still superintends the choice of courses made by the student although it is to be expected, probably, that a capable tutor will tend to influence this choice. It will be impossible so sharply to distinguish the task of choosing courses and correlating them as to prevent this. The sanction of the adviser may approximate formal permission, with the guiding force held by the tutor.

The general examination on the other hand, modelled after the plan in use for doctorate examinations, including a general examination for the division work and a supplementary special test for the department or field, reaches over the whole matter of choice and organization and focuses the work of the adviser, tutor and student.

One result is inevitable, that is, the effect of producing a more serious scientific attitude toward the work. The student who chooses this Division will be presumed to have made the choice with serious intent to perfect himself in that line. The student who chose that work because he had to concentrate in something may well feel he is getting more than he bargained for. This is not a criticism; the result-to make study in that division more in the way of laboratory work, to lift it out of the region of inconsequent eclectic undergraduate education may be more serious. The decline or increase in the number of men in the Division will show to what an extent the work there is taken for serious reasons, not as a line of least resistance.

The effect in minimizing course grades, cramming, and mechanical study can only be helpful. To produce capable and broad-minded students, with a wide grasp of their field and an accurate knowledge of their specialty is the very desirable end to which the system aims. And that not by more work but by better organization.

 

Source: Harvard Crimson, April 10, 1914.

 

From the Annual Reports of the President of Harvard College

… the single course is not, and cannot be, the true unit in education. The real unit is the student. He is the only thing in education that is an end in itself. To send him forth as nearly a perfected product as possible is the aim of instruction, and anything else, the single course, the curriculum, the discipline, the influences surrounding him, are merely means to the end, which are to be judged by the way they contribute and fit into the ultimate purpose. To treat the single course as a self-sufficient unit, complete in itself, is to run a danger of losing sight of the end in the means thereto…

…In the College the problem of making the student, instead of the course, the unit in education is more difficult than in the other parts of the University, because general education is more intangible, more vague, less capable of precise analysis and definition, than training for a profession. Nevertheless, in the College, some significant steps have been taken which tend in this direction. The first was the requirement that every student must concentrate six of his seventeen courses in some definite field, must distribute six more among the other subjects of knowledge, and must do so after consulting an instructor appointed to advise him….

…The rule of concentration, coupled with the provision that no tmore than two of the six courses shall be of an elementary character, is intended to compel every man to study some subject with thoroughness, and acquire a systematic knowledge thereof….

…The second step in treating the student, instead of the course, as the unit in education, was taken by the Division of History, Government, and Economics, when, and with the approval of the Faculty, it set up the requirement of a general examination at graduation for students concentrating in that division. The examination, which is entrusted to a committee representing the three departments within the division, is to be distinct from that in the courses elected, and is to include not only the ground covered in them, but also the general field with which they have dealt, and the knowledge needed to connect them. This is a marked departure from the plan of earning a degree by scoring courses; and it will take time to adjust men’s conceptions of education to a basis new to the American college, though familiar in every European university. To assist the students in preparing themselves for the general examination each of them at the beginning of his Sophomore year is assigned to the charge of a tutor who confers with him about his work and guides his reading outside of that required in the courses. As the plan could be applied only to men entering after it was established, the first examinations will be held next spring [1916], and then only for men who graduate in three years.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1914-15, pp. 8-10.

Courses are merely a means to an end, and that end is the education of the student. One method of placing courses in their true light as a means of education is the provision of comprehensive examinations for graduation, covering the general field of the student’s principal work beyond the precise limits of the courses he has taken. This has long been done in the case of the doctorate of philosophy; and in the year covered by this report [1915-16] it was applied for the first time to undergraduates concentrating in the Division of History, Government, and Economics. Only twenty-four students of the Class of 1917, who finished their work in three years and concentrated in this field, came under its operation; but they were numerous enough to give a definite indication of the working of the plan. To that extent the results were satisfactory. The examination papers were well designed for measuring the knowledge and grasp of the subject, with a large enough range of options to include the various portions of the field covered by the different candidates; and the examiners themselves were satisfied with the plan as a fair means of testing the qualification of the students. During the coming year a much larger number of men will come up for this comprehensive examination, which promises to mark a new departure in American college methods.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1915-16, p.19.

A significant event of the year [1915-16] was the inauguration by the Division of History, Government, and Economics of its new examination of candidates for the Bachelor’s degree who have concentrated in the Division. This examination was devised “not in order to place an additional burden upon candidates for the A.B., but for the purpose of securing better correlation of the student’s work, encouraging better methods of study, and furnishing a more adequate test of real power and attainment.” In their preparation students have from the beginning of the Sophomore year special tutorial instruction. The examination embraces three tests: first, a general paper, with a large number of alternative questions, treating comprehensively the subjects of the Division; second, a special paper, covering a chosen specific field; and lastly, a supplementary oral examination which may relate to either the general or the special paper, but ordinarily bears upon the specific field. The results of the first examination, taken by a comparatively small group of men graduating in three years, are in no way conclusive. The members of the examining committee, however, think them distinctly encouraging. Twenty-four candidates appeared, of whom twenty-two passed and two failed. Their selection of questions from the general paper indicated breadth of preparation and their bearing at the oral examination showed more than a little clearness and independence of thought.

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1915-16, pp.75-76.

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DIVISION OF HISTORY, GOVERNMENT AND ECONOMICS
DIVISION EXAMINATIONS FOR THE DEGREE OF A. B.
1915–16

GENERAL DIVISION EXAMINATION

Part I

The treatment of one of the following questions will be regarded as equivalent to one-third of the examination and should therefore occupy one hour. Write on one question only.

  1. Compare the Empires of Rome and of Charlemagne.
  2. Discus the influence of religious ideas on national life and institutions in the Americas.
  3. What were the principal factors in the development of the United States from (a) 1776 to 1818, or (b) 1818 to 1861, or (c) 1861 to 1898, or (d) 1898 to the present?
  4. Discuss and illustrate the economic bases of political party allegiance.
  5. Explain the influence of British policy upon international law.
  6. Why do the peoples of the temperate zones tend to assume leadership among the peoples of the earth?
  7. How does the federal form of government affect the life of a nation?
  8. Sketch the political and economic careers of two of the following: (a) Cobden, (b) Bright, (c) Hamilton, (d) Chase, (e) Colbert, (f) Jaurès.
  9. Compare English, French, and Spanish colonial methods and policies in the New World.

 

Part II

Five questions only from the following groups, A, B, and C, are to be answered, of which three must be from one group. The remaining questions must be taken, one from each of the other groups, or both from one of the other groups.

 

A

  1. In what respects has Roman political organization influenced Western Europe of modern times?
  2. What has been the effect of the embodiment of nationalities in political unities during the nineteenth century?
  3. Why was the influence of Metternich so potent?
  4. Discuss as to municipalities: “The citizens may have as good government as they care to demand.”
  5. To what extent are the constitutional principles of the United States common among Central and South American States?
  6. Why were spheres of interest claimed in Africa and in Asia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries?
  7. To what extent and why should national party preferences be followed in state and municipal elections?
  8. In what countries has municipal government been more highly developed; why and with what results for the citizen and for the municipality?

 

B

  1. The development of the idea of the Balance of Power up to the Peace of Utrecht.
  2. Show how Europe influenced the Far East in the second half of the nineteenth century.
  3. What services did the English colonies in America render to the mother country previous to 1763?
  4. Explain the influence of pro-slavery sentiment on the expansion of the United States.
  5. Explain causes and results of European immigration into the United States within the last fifty years.
  6. Show the development of steam transportation in Europe and its results.
  7. Why are recent constitutions of states in the United States generally lengthy documents?
  8. Write briefly on five of the following: (a) Abelard, (b) Copernicus, (c) Erasmus, (d) Vasco de Gama, (e) Grotius, (f) Huss, (g) Justinian, (h) Locke, (i) Petrarch, (j) Rousseau.

 

C

  1. Is the trust a desirable feature of modern economic organization?
  2. Should England modify her policy of free trade?
  3. Trace and explain the history of the Interstate Commerce Commission.
  4. What caused the failure of the Confederacy?
  5. Analyze the three most important political aspects of the socialist movement; the three most important economic aspects.
  6. To what extent was the failure of the first Bank of the United States to secure a renewal of its charter due to political factors; to what extent, to economic?
  7. What have been the economic and political consequences of state ownership of the railways of Prussia?
  8. Account for the modern increase of public expenditures in (a) Europe; (b) American city government; (c) the Federal government of the United States.

April 27, 1916.

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DIVISION SPECIAL EXAMINATION
Economic history

Answer six questions.

A
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. Considered in its theoretical aspects the tariff policy of the United States since 1845.
  2. What factors have contributed most to changes in the distribution of wealth in the United States since 1870?
  3. Trace the development of uniform accounting for railroads in this country. Indicate any connections between your uniform accounting and government regulation of the railroads.
  4. Analyze the merits and defects of our current statistics of (a) imports and exports; or (b) wholesale prices; or (c) wages; or  (d) industrial organization.

 

B
Take from this group at least two and not more than four.

  1. Compare tariff changes in England and Germany during the nineteenth century.
  2. Discuss the essential features of the labor movement in England from 1825 to 1850.
  3. What have been the different lines of development in the combination movement in England?
  4. Discussing the economic aspects of the American Revolution with respect to (a) factors contributing to the revolution; (b) resources affecting the outcome; (c) consequences of the War.
  5. Explaining any important national policies developed in the United States between 1815 and 1830.
  6. Write the monetary history of United States during one of the following periods: (a) 1792-1837; (b) 1879-1893; (c) 1893-date.
  7. Trace the history of our mercantile marine, giving special attention to significant government policies.
  8. Give a brief account of organized labor in the United States.
  9. Indicate any important changes in American agriculture since 1900.

 

C
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. Has private ownership of the railroads justified itself in the United States? What is the case for and against government ownership of railroads in this country?
  2. Explain and criticise the presence policy of the Federal government regarding industrial combinations.
  3. Discuss critically the project of a non-partisan Federal tariff board.
  4. Discuss the causes, extent, and consequences of the change in the price level since 1897.

May 5, 1916.

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DIVISION SPECIAL EXAMINATION
Money and Banking

Answer six questions.

A
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. State and criticise the quantity theory of money.
  2. Analyze a typical bank statement.
  3. Discuss index numbers of prices with reference to (a) the purposes they may serve; (b) various methods of construction; (c) the best index numbers for wholesale prices in the United States.
  4. Where should you look for statistics of the following : (a) bank clearings of England and the United States; (b) resources and liabilities of banks in Massachusetts; (c) foreign exchange rates in New York in 1903; (d) the monetary stock of the United States; (e) current changes in the value of gold?

 

B
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. Compare the adoption of the single gold standard by England and by Germany.
  2. To what extent, and by what means, has the financial administration of the Federal government in the United States influenced our monetary history?
  3. Give a critical account of the greenbacks from 1862 to 1878. Indicate all factors, political and other, connected with this episode of monetary history.
  4. Analyze the factors leading to the adoption of the Federal Reserve banking system. Compare these factors with those leading to the establishment of the National banking system.

 

C
Take from this group at least two and not more than four.

  1. Describe and criticise the existing monetary system of the United States.
  2. Explain and illustrate the gold exchange monetary standard.
  3. What different meanings have been suggested for stabilizing the value of our monetary standards? What objections, if any, are to be raised against each of the proposed measures?
  4. Distinguish the different kinds of banking. To what extent should they be conducted by the same institutions? To what extent have they been combined in the United States? In any other countries?
  5. What measures have been adopted before 1914 by the Bank of England to prevent or allay financial panics? What action was taken in 1914 to meet the banking conditions created by the outbreak of the European War?
  6. Indicate any connections which have existed between the banks and the railroads within the United States.
  7. How and why has the European War affected foreign exchange between United States and other countries?
  8. Account for the financial panic of 1907. To what extent, and by what means, does the Federal Reserve system promise to prevent the recurrence of the conditions of 1907?

May 5, 1916.

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DIVISION SPECIAL EXAMINATION
Corporate Organization, including Railroads

Answer six questions.

A
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. Discussed critically the “economies of industrial combination.”
  2. What official statistics throw light upon industrial organization in the United States? Criticize the available statistics of the subject.
  3. Trace the development of uniform accounting for railroads in this country. Indicate any connections between uniform accounting and government regulation of the railroads.
  4. Enumerate the principal sources of railway statistics at the present time, Shelbi and show the content, importance, and deficiencies (if any) of each.

 

B
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. What has been the policy of American states with respect to business corporations?
  2. What have been the different lines of development in the combination movement in England?
  3. Compare the history of water transportation in the United States, England, and Germany.
  4. Give an account of the “trust movement” in the United States since 1898.

 

C
Take from this group at least two and not more than four.

  1. Describe in detail how control is vested and exercised in a typical modern business corporation.
  2. Describes the formation of some large industrial combination effected in the United States since 1898.
  3. What have been the more important economic and social consequences of the corporate organization of industry?
  4. What connections exist between banks and industrial combinations in the United States? Contrast the situation here with that in Germany.
  5. Discuss the Federal Trade Commission with respect to (a) the reasons for its establishment; (b) its tenure of office and powers; (c) its probable future.
  6. Upon what different bases may railway systems be appraised? What are the merits and defects of each of the bases indicated?
  7. Discuss standards of reasonableness (a) for the general level of railway rates; (b) for rates on particular commodities.
  8. Give an account of the relations between organize labor and our railroads.
  9. What different relationships as to ownership, management, and regulation may exist between the government and public service industries? Criticise in turn each of these possible relationships.

May 5, 1916.

 

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DIVISION SPECIAL EXAMINATION
Public Finance

Answer six questions.

A
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. Discuss critically the different theories of justice and taxation.
  2. From an accounting point of view, wherein are municipal accounts essentially unlike business accounts? What factors impair the value of municipal accounts?
  3. Outline a system of uniform municipal accounts. What provisions have been made in the United States for the use of the uniform municipal accounts?
  4. What are the chief sources of public finance statistics in the United States?

 

B
Take from this group at least one and not more than two.

  1. Give the history of the Federal public land policy to 1835. Show any connections between the public land policy and the treatment of the public debt.
  2. Sketch the development and present status of the general property tax in this country.
  3. Givs a critical account of the Independent Treasury of the United States.
  4. Distinguish “direct” and “indirect” taxes. Describe the separation of direct and indirect taxation under our system of national and state governments. What were the reasons for this separation? What have been its consequences, economic and political?

C
Take from this group at least two and not more than four.

  1. For what different objects has taxation been employed? Give illustrations. What is to be said for and against the employment of taxation for each of the purposes indicated?
  2. Formulate and defend a plan for a state income tax.
  3. Discuss inheritance taxes in the United States with reference to (a) the employment of inheritance taxes by state and Federal governments; (b) The rates applied; (c) the use of progressive rates; (d) the maximum advisable rates; (e) possible effects upon the distribution of wealth.
  4. What is the case for and against the partial or complete exemption of improvements from taxation under the general property tax? Where, if at all, have such a policy been adopted?
  5. What is “double taxation”? Under what circumstances, if any, is it objectionable? Why is the problem of double taxation a serious one today in the United States? What solution can be suggested?
  6. Suppose the Federal government abolishes all import duties upon sugar and substitutes equivalent bounties on sugar production in the United States. How, if at all, does this tend to affect the distribution of wealth? When, and for what reasons, has a change similar to that supposed been actually made in the United States?
  7. To what extent, and by what process, is a tax shifted to consumers when levied upon a commodity produced (a) at constant cost? (b) at decreasing cost? (c) at increasing cost? (d) by a monopoly? Illustrate by diagrams.

May 5, 1916.

 

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OTHER DIVISION SPECIAL EXAMINATIONS (Not transcribed here)

Modern History since 1789 including American History
American Government
Municipal Government
Political Theory

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Divisional and general examinations, 1915-1975(HUC 7000.18). Box 6, Bound Volume (stamped “Private Library Arthur H. Cole”) “Divisional Examinations 1916-1927”.

Image Source:  1875 Gate at Harvard Yard. From the Wallace Nutting photographic Collection at the Historic New England website.

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Political Economy Examinations. Bowen, Green, and Dunbar, 1868-1872.

 

Today’s post provides transcriptions for five examinations in political economy used at Harvard between 1868 and 1872. Links to two previously transcribed examinations from that time are provided as well. Information about course enrollments and textbooks come from the annual reports of the President of Harvard College.

Before Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations and John Stuart Mill’s Principles of Political Economy were assigned beginning with the 1870-71 academic year, the following textbooks were listed for Harvard’s  political economy courses:

As an introductory textbook for the junior year course in political economy:

James E. Thorold Rogers, A Manual of Political Economy for Schools and Colleges. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1868.

“Advanced” Textbooks in political economy for senior year courses by Francis Bowen:

The Principles of Political Economy applied to the Condition, the Resources, and the Institutions of the American People (2ndedition, 1859). American Political Economy; including Strictures of the Currency and the Finances since 1861 (1870). One might presume Bowen’s lectures were closer to what is found in the later of these two books. 

About the instructors…

Harvard Crimson’s obituary for Francis Bowen. Profile of “Francis Bowen, 1811-1890” at the History of Economics Website.

Obituary for Nicholas St. John Green in the Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Vol. 12 (May, 1876-May 1877), pp. 289-291.

Frank Taussig’s 1900 obituary for Charles Franklin Dunbar. Profile of  “Charles Franklin Dunbar, 1830-1900” at the History of Economics Website.

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Academic Year 1867-68.

Seniors.

“During the First Academic Term, the Senior Class recited six times a week in Bowen’s Logic, and Bowen’s Political Economy.”

Source: Annual Report of the President of Harvard College, 1867-68, p. 24.

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POLITICAL ECONOMY

SENIORS, JANUARY, 1868.

  1. Wherein does value differ from utility? What are the two elements of value, and what becomes of the value, when either of these elements is wanting?
  2. Explain the nature of Capital, wherein it differs from Wealth, and what is its source or the means of its increase. Distinguish productive from unproductive consumption.
  3. Which are the three functions of banks, and which of these three is unessential, so that banks could exist and do their work without it? Wherein do our present National Banks differ from the old State banks?
  4. What is the operation of funding a National Debt? By what vicious method of funding was the English National Debt made over 40 per cent. larger than the amount actually received by the government as a loan? In what different way was our own National Debt, contracted during the Civil War, made largely to exceed the amount received?
  5. Distinguish Direct from Indirect Taxes? Why is our present Income Tax said to be unconstitutional? Why are legacy taxes and other taxes on succession to property said to be the best of all forms of taxation?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943 (HUC 7000.55), Box 1, Folder “Mid-year examinations, 1867-1868”.

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Academic Year 1868-69.

Seniors.

“During the First Academic Term the Senior Class recited three times a week in Bowen’s Ethics and Metaphysics, and Bowen’s Political Economy.”

Source: Annual Report of the President of Harvard College, 1868-69, p. 32.

 

Exam Questions in Political Economy for Seniors, June 1869.

 

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Academic Year 1869-70.

Seniors. First Term.

Prof. Bowen. Political Economy.

Text-Book: Bowen’s Political Economy.
Number of students: 129
Number of Sections: 2 & 3
Number of exercises per week: 3
Number of hours per week: 3

Source: Annual Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1869-70, p. 36.

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Academic Year 1869-70.

POLITICAL ECONOMY

SENIORS, DECEMBER, 1869.

  1. Explain the distinction between Property and Wealth; between Wealth and Capital; between the Price of a commodity and its natural Exchangeable Value; between Simple and Complex Coöperation, the two kinds of Division of Labor. What are the two elements of Exchangeable Value, and what is its measure?
  2. What is Wakefield’s theory of Colonization, and how did it work? In what respects was an ancient Colony unlike a modern one? Explain the United States system of disposing of the public lands.
  3. What were the old guilds of trade, and the old meaning of the word University? How does Caste, or the fixity of ranks and classes, affect the Increase of Capital?
  4. Explain briefly the Malthusian theory of population; refute it by facts and arguments.
  5. Give an outline of Ricardo’s theory of Rent, Wages, and Profits, showing the connection in each case with Malthusianism. How does Ricardo explain the steady decline of the rate of Profit? What better explanation can be given of this phenomenon?
  6. Explain Bills of Exchange; the course and par of exchange between London, New York, and Paris; the difference between the nominal and the real par.
  7. Prove that a gradual decline is now taking place in the value of money, — e.of the two precious metals; and show how this decline will affect the value of different investments and various kinds of property.
  8. What change was made in the dollar by the law of 1834, and again by the law of 1853? Why was the gold dollar altered in the former case, and the silver dollar in the latter?
  9. Distinguish Paper Money properly so called from Bank Currency; and trace the causes and consequences of the issue of the former in Revolutionary times.
  10. Explain the three functions of a Bank: prove that convertible Bank-bills cannot be issued in excess. What was the “Allied Bank” system in Boston, and what circumstances led to its adoption?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943 (HUC 7000.55), Box 1, Folder “Mid-year examinations, 1869-1870”.

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Academic Year 1869-70.

Juniors. Second Term.

Mr. N. St. John Green. Instructor in Philosophy

Text-Books: Hamilton’s Metaphysics and Rogers’s Political Economy.
Number of students: 158
Number of Sections: 3
Number of exercises per week: 3
Number of hours per week [for instructor]: 9

Source: Annual Reports of the President and Treasurer of Harvard College, 1869-70, p. 38.

 

Examination questions in Political Economy for Juniors, June 1870.

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Academic Year 1870-71.

Seniors.

Mr. N. St. John Green. Instructor in Political Economy.

Text-Books: Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. — J. S. Mill’s Political Economy.
Number of students: 99
Number of Sections: 2
Number of exercises per week for students: 3
Number of hours per week for instructor: 6

Source: Annual Report of the President of Harvard College, 1870-71, p. 52.

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POLITICAL ECONOMY.

SENIORS, FEBRUARY 1871.

  1. What are the laws which fix the natural rate of wages?
  2. What are the laws which fix the natural rate of profit?
  3. What is the nature of rent?
  4. How does rent enter into the price of commodities?
  5. What is capital, and what is the difference between fixed and circulating capital?
  6. What are the principles which determine the rate of interest?
  7. What are the advantages of a division of labor, and how far can the division of labor be carried to advantage?
  8. What is price and what [is] the difference between nominal and real, natural and market price?
  9. Suppose a prosperous people hitherto untaxed. It becomes necessary to raise a moderate amount of money by taxation. What kind of tax should, in your opinion, be resorted to? Why? To what objections would such a tax be liable?
  10. Boswell, in his Life of Johnson, says, “I put a question to him (Johnson) upon a fact in common life which he could not answer, nor have I found any one else who could: What is the reason that women servants, though obliged to be at the expense of purchasing their own clothes, have much lower wages than men servants, to whom a great proportion of that article is furnished, and when in fact our female house servants work much harder than the male?” How do you answer Boswell’s question?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943 (HUC 7000.55), Box 1, Folder “Mid-year examinations, 1870-1871”.

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Academic Year 1871-72.

Seniors.

Prof. Dunbar. Political Economy. (elective)

Text-Books: Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. — J. S. Mill’s Political Economy.
Number of students: 75
Number of Sections: 2
Number of exercises per week for students: 3
Number of hours per week for instructor: 6

Source: Annual Report of the President of Harvard College, 1871-72, p. 48.

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POLITICAL ECONOMY.

SENIORS, January 1872.

  1. What is the distinction between wealth and capital?
  2. What is the difference between fixed and circulating capitals? — and to which does money belong?
  3. When either of the precious metals becomes more abundant, and the remedy of over-valuation and limitation of the right of tender is to be applied, does it make any difference which metal is over-valued, and if so, what difference?
  4. On what basis is the circulation of the Bank of England established?
  5. How does Smith distinguish between productive laborers and unproductive?
  6. Explain the paradox that “what is annually saved is as regularly consumed as what is annually spent?”
  7. What was the error of Locke and Montesquieu as to the supposed connection between the depreciation of value of gold and silver and the lowering of the rate of interest?
  8. What is Adam Smith’s view as to the point at which the rate of interest should be fixed by law, and what is his mistake?
  9. How can a paper currency be kept at a par with gold?
  10. What was the theory of the balance of trade, and in what respect was it fallacious?
  11. Why do manufactures often flourish while a nation is carrying on a foreign war?
  12. What was the theory of the agricultural system, and what was its great error?
  13. State the general objection to any system for the extraordinary encouragement of a particular branch of industry, and such partial or complete answers to that objection as may occur to you.
  14. What is the chronological relation of the several systems of Political Economy?

For Consideration.

[From a Report of the Comptroller of the Currency, December, 1871.]

“The tenacity with which the Pacific States adhere to a gold currency is quite notable. Whether it is equally praiseworthy, is another thing. It is not clear that those States derive any substantial benefit from the course they have pursued, and it is beginning to be manifest that the United States are not at all benefited by it. The substitution of a paper currency in California and the other gold-producing States for their present hard money would probably set free for the use of the government and the whole country some thirty or forty millions of gold, and at the same time provide those communities with a more economical, active, and accommodating circulating medium.”

Source: Harvard University Archives. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943 (HUC 7000.55), Box 1, Folder “Mid-year examinations, 1871-1872”.

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Academic Year 1871-72.

Juniors.

Prof. Dunbar. Political Economy [required course]

Text-Books: Rogers’s Political Economy.
Number of students: 128
Number of Sections: 3
Number of exercises per week for students: 1
Number of hours per week for instructor: 3 (for a half-year)

Source: Annual Report of the President of Harvard College, 1871-72, p. 46.

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POLITICAL ECONOMY.

Juniors, February 1872.

  1. What is the difference between price and value?
  2. What is capital, and whence is it derived?
  3. Is a legal tender note of the United States money? If not then what is it?
  4. What effect has an excessive issue of paper currency upon prices?
  5. In an estimate of public wealth, what kinds of individual wealth are excluded? And why?
  6. Why is the rate of interest high in a newly settled western state?
  7. What determines the rate of wages?
  8. What was the theory of Malthus as to the growth of population?
  9. What effect has the introduction of machinery upon the rate of wages?
  10. What is rent and how does it depend upon the cost of production?
  11. In the trade between nations, how is the transmission of gold and silver for the most part avoided?
  12. If there is a scarcity of some article of which there are several qualities of different prices, will the cheapest or the dearest quality rise most? And why?
  13. What is the difference between direct and indirect taxation, and what are their respective advantages?
  14. Why is a tax on raw materials a bad tax?
  15. How does our national debt differ in form from the English, and what advantage has either form?

Source: Harvard University Archives. Mid-year examinations, 1852-1943 (HUC 7000.55), Box 1, Folder “Mid-year examinations, 1871-1872”.

Image: Memorial Hall (ca. 1900), Harvard University from Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.