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Harvard. Seminary in Economics. Topics and Speakers, 1891/2-1907/8

 The inspiration for the research workshop goes back to the German tradition of the research seminar for which the English word “seminary” was used. A sole economics seminary was announced at Harvard for the period 1892-1933 according to the annual Announcement of Courses of Instructions. One presumes the division of workshops is limited by the extent of the graduate program and that, by the early 1930s, the scale and scope of the Harvard department supported greater differentiation of its research seminars. The later Hansen-Williams Fiscal Seminar is an example of the kind of specialized workshop that was to develop. 

This posting provides the names and topics of presenters at the seminary in economics as published in the Harvard University Catalogues up through the academic year 1907/08 after which time we need to draw on other sources, e.g. announcements of individual seminars published in the Harvard University Gazette or the Harvard Crimson. Where invited guest lecturers for the public were announced, e.g. John Commons and Thorstein Veblen, I have included the information for the corresponding year.

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[First announcement of the Seminary in Economics, 1892-93]

Economics 20. Seminary in Political Economy.

Professors Dunbar and Taussig, and Mr. Cummings, will guide competent students in research on topics assigned after consolation. The Seminary will hold weekly meetings; and in addition each student will confer individually, once a week, with the instructor under whose guidance he carries on his investigations.

Source:  Harvard University, Announcement of Courses of Instruction provided by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences for the Academic Year 1892-93, p. 32.

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[Last announcement of the Seminary in Economics, 1932-33]

The Seminary in Economics. Mon., at 7.45 P.M.

Meetings are held by instructors and advanced students for the presentation of the results of investigation.

Source: Harvard University, Announcement of Courses of Instruction provided by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences for the Academic Year 1932-33 (second edition), p. 130.

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1891-92

At the Seminaries of Political Economy and American History (Joint Meetings):

Colonial Tariffs. Mr. William Hill.
Periodical Literature and Collections. Professor Taussig.
Suppression of the African Slave Trade. Mr. W. E. B. DuBois.
The Episcopal Church and Slavery. Mr. W. L. Tenney.
The Pacific Railways. Mr. H. K. White.
The Central Pacific Railway. Mr. W. Olney.
Impeachment Trials. Mr. Melville E. Ingals, Jr.
Some Early Anti-Immigration Laws. Mr. E. E. Proper.
Reconstruction in South Carolina. Mr. D. F. Houston.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1892-93, p. 122.

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1892-93

At the Seminary in Economics:

The economic periodicals of France and England. Prof. C. F. Dunbar.
The economic periodicals of Germany and the United States. Professor F. W. Taussig.
Georgia’s experiment in state railway management. Mr. G. Walcott.
The theory of gluts, with special reference to earlier discussions. Mr. C. W. Mister.
Public works in Pennsylvania. Mr. A. M. Day.
Postal subsidies in Great Britain. Mr. H. C. Emery.
Internal improvement in Indiana. Mr. H. H. Cook.
Railway Pools in the United States. Mr. G. L. Sheldon.
The earlier history of the anthracite coal industry. Mr. G. O. Virtue.
The construction of the Union Pacific Railway. Mr. H. K. White.
The organization of Poor Relief in Massachusetts. Mr. H. K. White.

At the Seminaries of American History and Institutions and of Economics. (Joint Meetings):

Study of History and Economics in English Universities. Professor W. J. Ashley.
The Mark theory. President E. A. Bryan.
Tariff legislation in the United States from 1783-1789. Mr. William Hill.
The federal import and the tariff act of 1879. Mr. William Hill.
The currency situation in the United States. Professor F. W. Taussig.
Legislation by the states on the issue of bank notes. Mr. D. F. Houston.

 

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1893-94, pp. 129-130.

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1893-94

At the Seminary of Economics:

The economic congresses and meetings at Chicago. Professors Cummings and Taussig.
The economic and statistical meetings at Chicago. Professor Taussig.
Combinations among anthracite coal producers since 1873. Mr. Virtue.
Results of recent investigations on prices in the United States. Professor Taussig.
Some phases of public management of railways in Victoria (Australia). Mr. H. R. Meyer.
Local rivalry in the earlier development of internal improvements in the United States. Mr. A. M. Day.
Forestry legislation in the United States. Mr. C. C. Closson.
The Trunk Line Pool, and its effects on railway rates. Mr. G. L. Sheldon.
Sismondi and the theory of gluts. Mr. C. W. Mixter.
The earlier stages of the operation of the Erie canal. Mr. W. R. Buckminster.
The income tax of the civil war. Mr. J. A. Hill.
Internal improvements in Illinois. Mr. G. S. Callender.
Changes in the factory population of the United States. Mr. E. H. Vickers.
The Canadian Pacific Railway. Mr. G. W. Cox.
Public railway management in New South Wales. Mr. H. R. Meyer.
The development of the theory of gluts and over-accumulation. Mr. C. W. Mixter.
Compulsory insurance in Germany. Mr. J. G. Brooks.
The Erie canal. Mr. W. R. Buckminster.
The factory system in the United States. Mr. E. H. Vickers.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1894-95, p. 136.

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1894-95

At the Seminary of Economics:

Wilhelm Roscher. Professor Ashley.
The factory operatives in the United States. Mr. E. H. Vickers.
The classification of the Political Sciences. Professor Ashley.
The English Budget of 1894. Mr. F. R. Clow.
The antecedents of J. S. Mill’s “Principles.” Messrs. Aldrich, Estabrook, and Harper.
The theory of “House-Industry.” Mr. O. M. W. Sprague.
Definition and history of statistics. Mr. H. H. Cook.
The distribution of mediaeval fairs. Mr. J. Sullivan.
The United States and its mineral lands Mr. G. O. Virtue.
Child labor in the early factories. Mr. Hisa.
The economic condition of the South. Dr. E. von Halle.
The Chicago strike. Professor Ashley.
Legislation on arbitration in the United States. Rev. T. P. Berle.
The taxation of sugar in Germany. Mr. G. E. Chipman.
State railroads in New South Wales. Mr. H. R. Meyer.
Economic teaching in Germany. Rev. W. L. Bevan.
English industrial organization in the 17th and 18th centuries. Mr. O. M. W. Sprague.
Mediaeval fairs and the law merchant. Mr. J. Sullivan.
The antecedents of Mill’s “Doctrine of Value.” Mr. E. H. Harper.
The financing of internal improvements in the Northwest. Mr. G. S. Callender.
The antecedents of Mill’s chapters on Property and Land-Tenure. Mr. H. K. Estabrook.
Technical education in England. Mr. G. W. Cox.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue, 1895-96, p. 139.

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1895-96

Eight lectures by Francis A. Walker, LL.D., on Bimetallism since the Discovery of America.

Lecture. The Present Condition of the Currency of the United States. Professor F. W. Taussig.

At the Seminary of Economics: —

Economics in Italy. Professor Taussig.
The study of economics in German universities. Mr. C. W. Mixter.
The theory of the standard of living, from Adam Smith to J. S. Mill. Mr. R. Ware.
Financial operations by the loyal states during the Civil War (1861-1865). Mr. H. H. Cook.
International borrowing in its early stages, with special reference to England and the United States, 1820-1840. Mr. G. S. Callender.
The workman in the textile industries of England and the United States. Mr. S. N. D. North.
Attainment of the income tax in England. Mr. A. M. Chase.
Public management of railways in Victoria. Mr. H. R. Meyer.
The organization and regulation of certain domestic industries in England in the 18th century. Mr. O. M. W. Sprague.
The taxation of personal property in Massachusetts. Mr. E. W. Hooper.
The annual appropriation bill of the city of Boston. Mr. W. H. King.
The legal tender acts of 1862. Mr. D. C Barrett.
Fundamental errors in sociology. Dr. Frederick H. Wines.
International borrowing before 1850. Mr. G. S. Callender.
The tonnage laws and the shipping policy of the United States. Mr. P. D. Phair.
The internal revenue act of 1862. Mr. G. Thomas.
The beginning of liquor legislation. Mr. A. P. Andrew.
The international trade of the United States in its relation to recent currency legislation. Mr. A. Sweezey.
Beginnings of trade and industry in Scotland, with some account of the early Guilds. Mr. T. Allison.
The bimetallic situation. President Francis A. Walker.
The Intercolonial Railway of Canada. Mr. C. E. Seaman.
The railway situation in California. Mr. H. C. Marshall and Dr. F. E. Haynes.
The taxation of sugar in the United States since 1860. Mr. C. S. Griffin.
The economic basis of Irish emigration 1650-1850. Mr. H. H. Cook.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1896-97, pp. 138-9, 141-42.

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1896-97

Eight lectures on the Income Taxes in Germany, Switzerland, and England, by Dr. J. A. Hill. Subjects as follows: —

Income Taxes in Germany: Historical Development. The Taxpayers, the Taxable Income, and the Rates.
The Methods of Assessment. Income and Property Taxes in Switzerland: Their Development. The Rate and Exemptions. The Methods of Assessment.
The English Income Tax: Its History. The Assessment.

At the joint meetings of the Seminary of American History and Institutions and the Seminary of Economics: 

Methods and experience of historical investigation. Mr. J. F. Rhodes.
The financial procedure of a state legislature. Mr. F. C. Lowell.

At the Seminary of Economics:

French economic periodicals and other aids to economic study. Professor Dunbar.
Periodicals and other aids to economic study, in France. Professor Dunbar.
Periodicals and other aids to economic study, in England and the United States. Professor Ashley.
John Rae: A neglected economist. Mr. C. W. Mixter.
Some impressions of reformatories. Mr. W. H. Gratwick.
Sir Robert Giffen on prices in relation to material progress in England. Mr. F. Atherton.
The woolen manufacturer and the tariff. Mr. A. T. Lyman.
British capital and American resources, 1815-1850. Mr. G. S. Callender.
The taxation of sugar in the United States, 1789-1861. Mr. C. S. Griffin.
Recent immigration into the United States. Mr. E. H. Warren.
Apportionments of national bank currency. Mr. T. Cooke.
Some phases of the history of the Union Pacific Railway. Mr. S. P. West.
Some recent phases of economic thought in the United States. Mr. J. A. Tirrell.
The condition of coal-miners in the bituminous districts. Mr. H. E. George.
Certain phases of the history and literature of industrial depression from 1873 to 1886. Mr. C. Beardsley, Jr.
The financial history of the Pennsylvania Railway. Mr. R. D. Jenks.
Some aspects of the financial history of the Union Pacific Railway. Mr. S. P. West.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1897-98, p. 387-388, 391-392.

 

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1897-98

At the joint meetings of the Seminary of American History and Institutions and the Seminary of Economics:

Some results of an inquiry on taxation in Massachusetts. Professor F. W. Taussig.
The Making of a Tariff. Mr. S. N. D. North.
The currency reform plan of the Indianapolis convention. Professor Dunbar.

At the Seminary of Economics:

Trade-unions in Australia. Dr. M. A. Aldrich.
The coal miners’ strike of 1897. Mr. J. E. George.
An analysis of the law of diminishing returns. Dr. C. W. Mixter.
The Secretary of the Treasury and the currency, 1865-1879. Mr. H. C. Marshall.
An inquiry on government contract work in Canada. Mr. W. L. M. King.
The sugar industry in Europe as affected by taxes and bounties. Mr. C. S. Griffin.
The security of bank notes based on general assets, as indicated by experience under the national bank system. Mr. A. O. Eliason.
The inter-colonial railway. Mr. C. E. Seaman.
Some results of the new method of assessing the income tax in Prussia. Dr. J. A. Hill.
Antonio Serra and the beginnings of political economy in Italy. Mr. D. F. Grass.
The American Federation of Labor. Dr. M. A. Aldrich.
The earlier stages of the silver movement in the United States. Mr. Randolph Paine.
The land grant to the Union Pacific Railroad. Mr. R. W. Cone.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1898-99, pp. 400-1.

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1898-99

Fifteen lectures on Life Insurance by Charlton T. Lewis, of New York City.

At the Seminary of Economics: 

Aids in economic investigation. Professor Taussig.
Economic study in England. Dr. O. M. W. Sprague.
The growth and the constituent elements of the population of Boston. Mr. F. A. Bushée (2).
Some operations of the United States Treasury in 1894-96. Professor Taussig.
The Interstate Commerce Act as interpreted by the courts. Mr. F. Hendrick.
The English industrial crisis of 1622. Dr. O. M. W. Sprague.
The earlier history of the English income tax. Dr. J. A. Hill.
The theory of savers’ rent and some of its applications. Dr. C. W. Mixter.
The working of the French Railway Conventions of 1883. Mr. F. Hendrick.
The adoption of the gold standard by England in 1816. Mr. D. F. Grass.

 

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1899-1900, pp. 412, 417.

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1899-1900

Lecture. The United States census. Professor W. F. Willcox, of the Census Office.

At the Seminary of Economics:

Aids in Economic study: (1) Specialized publications in Germany. Professor F. W. Taussig.
(2) English and American literature. Professor Ashley.
(3) American publications. Professor Taussig.
The conference on trusts at Chicago. Mr. John Graham Brooks.
Legislation on combinations and trusts in the United States. Mr. R. C. Davis.
Judicial decisions on statutes relating to combinations and trusts. Mr. R. C. Davis.
The tenement house exhibition, and tenement conditions in Boston. Mr. F. A. Bushée.
The influence of the tariff on the iron and steel industry. Mr. D. S. Bobb.
The duties on wool and their effects, 1870-1899. Mr. F. W. Wose.
The duty on copper and its effects. Mr. W. D. Shue.
The duties on sugar and their effects. Mr. G. H. Johnston.
The economic aspects of close commercial relations with Hawaii. Mr. U. S. Parker.
The discussion of value at the hands of English writers before Adam Smith. Mr. C. Bowker.
The silk manufacture and the tariff. Mr. S. S. Fitzgerald.
The commercial crisis of 1857. Mr. C. Hobbs.
The economic significance of the Hebrew year of jubilee. Mr. R. J. Sprague.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1900-1, pp. 429, 432.

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1900-01

Six lectures on Statistics of Wages, by the Hon. Carroll D. Wright:—

Methods and Difficulties in Collecting Statistics of Wages.
Difficulties and Fallacies in Presentations of Wages.
Chief Sources of Statistical Information on Wages.
Value of the Various Collections of Wages Statistics.
Money Wages as shown by Statistics during last Half Century.
Real Wages for the same period.

At the Seminary of Economics:

The trusts and the tariff. Mr. Charles Beardsley.
Civil service reform in Australia: its successes and its failures. I. Victoria; II. New South Wales. Mr. H. R. Meyer.
The early history of the Standard Oil Combination. Mr. G. H. Montague.
Manufacturing industries in the South End of Boston. Mr. R. F. Phelps .
Notes on a transcontinental journey. Professor Taussig.
Relations of employers and workmen in the Boston building trades. Mr. W. H. Sayward.
Changes in the geographical distribution of the Southern negroes since the Civil War. Mr. R. J. Sprague.
Changes in the tenure and ownership of land in the South since the Civil War. Mr. R. J. Sprague.
The early history of the Erie Railway. Mr. A. J. Boynton.
The early history of banking in Massachusetts. Mr. F. L. Bugbee.
The work of the United States Industrial Commission. Professor E. D. Durand, of Stanford University.
The cotton-seed oil industry. Mr. W. D. Shue.
Combinations in the German iron trade. Mr. E. B. Stackpole.
Are the English payments to mail steamships subsidies? Mr. W. E. Stilwell.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1901-02, pp. 414, 419-420.

 

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1901-02

Seminary in EconomicsMon., at 4.30. Professor Ashley and Asst. Professor Carver.

In the Seminary, the instructors undertake the guidance of students in independent investigation, and give opportunity for the presentation and discussion of the result of investigation. Members of the Graduate School who propose to conduct inquiries having in view the preparation of theses to be presented for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, may select subjects agreed upon after conference with the instructors, and may carry on investigations on such subjects, as part of the work in the Seminary.
The general meetings of the Seminary are held on the first and third Mondays of each month. The members of the Seminary confer individually, at stated times arranged after consultation, with the instructors under whose special guidance they are conducting their researches.
At the regular meetings, the results of the investigations of members are presented and discussed. The instructors also at times present the results of their own work, and give accounts of the specialized literature of Economics. At intervals, other persons are invited to address the Seminary on subjects of theoretic or practical interest, giving opportunity for contact and discussion with the non-academic world.

Source: Harvard University Archives. Official Register of Harvard University 1901-1902. Box 1. Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Division of History and Political Science (June 21, 1901), University Publications, New Series, No. 16, p. 48.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Four lectures by Professor Edward A. Ross, on “The Growth and present Stage of the Literature of Sociology”:—

The Building of Sociology.
The Recent Tendencies of Sociology.
The Moot Points of Sociology.
The Desiderata of Sociology.

At the Seminary of Economics:

The Rise of the Oil Monopoly. Mr. G. H. Montague.
The Conditions of Employment and Housing of South End (Boston) Factory Operatives. Mr. R. Morris.
Principles Underlying the Demarcation between Public and Private Industries. Mr. R. Morris.
Restriction of Municipal Gas and Electric Plants in Massachusetts. Mr. A. D. Adams.
Economic Conditions in Nicaragua. Dr. C. W. Mixter.
Some Theoretical Possibilities of Protective Tariffs. Professor Carver.
A Study of some Records of the Associated Charities of Boston. Mr. H. R. Meyer.
The Rise and Regulation of Municipal Gas and Electric Plants in Massachusetts. Mr. A. D. Adams.
Le Solidarisme social de M. Leon Bourgeois. Professor Léopold Mabilleau.
A Review of the French and Italian Economic Journals. Professor Ripley, Dr. A. P. Andrew, Mr. C. W. Doten, and Mr. R. F. Phelps.
National Corporation Laws for Industrial Organizations. Mr. James B. Dill.
The Budgetary System of Canada. Mr. R. C. Matthews.
The Elements of Labor and Relief Departments in Railway Expenditure. Mr. A. L. Horst.
The Economics of Colonization. Professor E. A. Ross.
Elizabethan Mercantilism as seen in the Corn Trade. Mr. R. G. Usher.
The Present Position of Economics in Japan. Mr. Nobushiro Sakurai.
The Economic Theories of Josiah Tucker. Mr. Robert Morris.
Urban and Suburban Residence of South End (Boston)
Factory Employés. Mr. R. F. Phelps.
The Recent History of the Standard Oil Monopoly. Mr. G. H. Montague.
State v. Local Control of the Boston Police. Mr. F. R. Cope.
The Laws regulating Muncipal Gas and Electric Plants in Massachusetts. Mr. A. D. Adams.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1902-03, pp. 431, 434-435.

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1902-03

Eight lectures on “Some Leading Principles of Political Economy and Statistics,” by Professor F. Y. Edgeworth, of Oxford University, as follows: —

The Theory of Value applied to International Trade.
The Exceptions to the Rule of Free Trade.
Value in a Regime of Monopoly.
The Value of Land and other Factors of Production.
The Taxation of Urban Site Values.
The Higher Theory of Statistics.
Index Numbers.
Supplementary.

At the Seminary of Economics:

Reports on Current American and English Economic Periodicals, respectively by Messrs. R. W. Magrane and H. M. Kallen.
Gas Profits in Massachusetts. Mr. Alton D. Adams.
Economic Problems and Conditions in the Far Northwest. Professor C. Beardsley.
Report on Economics in Italy. Mr. D. H. Webster.
Reforms in Economic Teaching in the English Universities. Professor F. Y. Edgeworth.
Reports on Current German Periodicals and Literature. Messrs. W. H. Price and G. R. Lewis.
Recent Changes in the Rate of Wages. Dr. E. D. Durand.
Classification of Occupations in Relation to the Tariff. Mr. Edward Atkinson.
A Study of the Boston Ghetto. Mr. H. M. Kallen.
Report on Current French Literature. Mr. A. B. Wolfe.
The Anatomy of a Tenement Street. Mr. H. M. Kallen.
Railroad Reorganization in the United States. Mr. S. Daggett.
The Inclosure Movement and the English Rebellions of the Sixteenth Century. Dr. E. F. Gay.
A Stock Exchange Day. Mr. Sumner B. Pearmain.
The Lodging House Problem in Boston. Mr. A. B. Wolfe.
Jewish Trade Unions in Boston. Mr. Philip Davis.
Economics of the American Corn Belt. Mr. A. J. Boynton.
Movement of Real Estate Values in American Cities. Mr. Henry Whitmore.
Report on Labor Journals and Trades Union Publications. Mr. V. Custis.
Some Phases of the American Copper Mining Industry. Mr. G. R. Lewis.
The Determination of Franchise Values. Mr. C. W. Wright.
Initiation Ceremonies among Primitive Peoples. Mr. D. H. Webster.
The Indebtedness of English Mercantilism to Holland. Mr. E. T. Miller.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1903-04, pp. 466, 469.

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1903-04

At the Seminary of Economics:

A Trip through the Corn Country of the West. Professor Carver.
Early History of Economic Studies in American Colleges. Professor Bullock.
The Growth of Labor Organization in the United States. Professor Ripley.
Industrial Combinations in Germany, with special reference to Coal. Dr. F. Walker.
Our Trade Relations with Canada. Mr. Osborne Howes.
Supervision of National Banks, solvent and insolvent, by the Comptroller of the Currency. Mr. William A. Lamson (H. U. ’81), National Bank Examiner.
The Effect of Trade Unions upon Industrial Efficiency. Mr. Henry White, Secretary of the United Garment Workers of America.
The Financing of Corporations. Hon. Charles S. Fairchild.
A Remedy for Some Industrial Troubles. Hon. William B. Rice.
The Elizabethan Patents of Monopoly. Mr. W. H. Price.
The English Miner in the Middle Ages. Mr. G. R. Lewis.
The Northern Securities Case and the Supreme Court Decision. Mr. E. B. Whitney.
Progress in Manufactures in the United States. Hon. S. N. D. North, Director United States Census Bureau.
The Expansion Periods of 1878-85 and 1897-02 compared. Mr. Sumner B. Pearmain, ’83.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1904-05, p. 457.

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1904-05

Under the auspices of the Department of Economics, Professor W. F. Willcox, of Cornell University, gave three lectures on some results of the United States census enumeration of 1900: —

1. The Population of the United States.
2. Some Statistical Aspects of the Negro Problem.
3. The Birth Rate and Death Rate of the United States.

Three lectures on the “Relations between Trade Unions and Employers’ Organizations,” by Professor John R. Commons, of the University of Wisconsin: —

1. The Teamsters’ Organizations in Chicago.
2. Industrial Organizations in the Window-glass Manufacture.
3. Industrial Organizations in the Stove Manufacture.

At the Seminary of Economics:

The Forces in Industrial Consolidation. Mr. V. Custis.
Railroad Reorganization. Mr. S. Daggett.
The Specialized Literature of Economics: Periodicals, Dictionaries, and the Like. I. German Publications. Professor Taussig.
II. English and American. Professor T. N. Carver.
The French Corn Laws from 1515 to 1660. Mr. A. P. Usher.
The Meeting of the American Economic Association at Chicago. Professor Taussig.
Trade Unionism and Politics. Mr. Ray Stannard Baker.
Social Problems of American Farmers. President Kenyon L. Butterfield, of Rhode Island College of Agriculture.
Wool-growing in the United States. Mr. C. W. Wright.
Public Opinion as a Factor in Industrial Consolidation. Mr. V. Custis.
Marx’s Theory of Value. Mr. F. W. Johnston.
The Atchison System. Mr. S. Daggett.
Wool-growing in the United States since 1860. Mr. C. W. Wright.
The Negro in Boston. Mr. J. Daniels.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1905-06, pp. 456-457, 460-1.

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1905-06

Lecture. Followers of Karl Marx. Professor T. B. Veblen, of the University of Chicago.

Lecture. The Diffusion of Economic Knowledge. Professor Simon Newcomb.

At the Seminary of Economics:

Railroad Reorganization, The Philadelphia and Reading R. R. Mr. Stuart Daggett.
The Railway Rate Situation. Mr. C. A. Legg.
Stages of Economic Growth. Professor E. F. Gay.
The Finances of Boston, 1820-1860. Mr. C. P. Huse.
The Intendants and the Organization of the Corn Trade in France, 1683-1715.
Mr. A. P. Usher. Collateral Bond Issues. Mr. Thomas Warner Mitchell.
The Earlier History of the English Post-office. Mr. J. C. Hemmeon.
The Meeting of the American Economic Association at Baltimore. Professor Taussig.
The Organization of a Cooperative Business. Mr. E. A. Filene.
The Development of English Trade to the Levant. Miss G. F. Ward.
The Telephone Situation in Great Britain. Mr. A. N. Holcombe.
Characteristics of Railroad Reorganizations. Mr. Stuart Daggett.
The Distribution of Socialistic Sentiment. Professor T. B. Veblen, of the University of Chicago.
Transportation in Modern England, to 1830. Mr. W. Jackman.
The Dutch-English Rivalry, with Special Reference to Fisheries. Mr. H. L. Drury.
Recent History of the Glass Manufacture in the United States. Mr. D. F. Edwards.
A Discussion of Distribution. Mr. F. W. Johnston.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1906-07, pp. 536-7, 540.

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1906-07

Lectures on Municipal Ownership. Major Leonard Darwin, of London, England, gave a series of lectures on Municipal Ownership: —

1. The Main Issues connected with Municipal Ownership. The Regulation of Private Trade. Municipal Ownership and Local Taxation.
2. English Municipal Statistics. The Probability of Profit-Making by Municipal Ownership. Municipal Management.
3. Municipal Corruption. Wages under Municipal Ownership. The Direct Employment of Labour by Municipalities.
4. Municipal Ownership without Direct Employment. Municipal Ownership and Socialistic Ideals.

Through the courtesy of the National Civic Federation, a series of five public lectures on Socialism and the Allied Social and Economic Questions was given by W. H. Mallock, A.M.

Lecture. The New Interstate Commerce Act. Professor F. H. Dixon.

At the Seminary of Economics:

Impressions of Sociological Study in Foreign Countries. Mr. J. A. Field.
Field Observations on the Tobacco Industry. Mr. S. O. Martin.
The Financial Policy of Massachusetts from 1780 to 1800. Professor Bullock.
The Financial Policy of Alabama from 1819 to 1860. Mr. W. O. Scroggs.
The Finances of Boston, 1820-1860. Mr. C. P. Huse.
Some Aspects of the History of the English Mining Classes. Dr. G. R. Lewis.
Some Aspects of the Early Railway Era in Great Britain. Mr. William Jackman.
Land and Capital. Professor Fetter.
The Theory of Interest. Professor Fetter.
The Beet-Sugar Industry in the United States. Mr. M. H. Salz.
The Recent Tariff History of Canada. Mr. W. W. McLaren.
Commercial Education in American Universities. Mr. F. V. Thompson.
The English Board of Trade during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, and its Records. Mr. J. R. H. Moore.
The Cotton Manufacture in the United States since 1860. Mr. M. T. Copeland.
Some Discoveries in Economic History. M. le vicomte Georges d’Avenel.
A Course of Instruction in Business Management. Mr. H. S. Person.
Bank Reserves in England, Canada, and the United States. Mr. F. S. Mead.
A Journey into the Tobacco-raising Districts of the West and South. Mr. S. O. Martin.
Sketch of the Legislative History of Massachusetts Business Corporations. Mr. W. E. Rappard.
The English Fisheries, 1500-1800. Mr. H. L. Drury.
Municipal Ownership of Telephones in Great Britain. Mr. A. N. Holcombe.
Researches in a Manufacturing Suburb. Mr. E. L. Sheldon.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1907-08, pp. 431, 437-438.

 

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1907-08

Under the auspices of the Department of Economics, Dr. Victor S. Clark gave two lectures on Australian Economic Problems: —

1. Railways: History and Administration.
2. Railways: Description and Statistics.

Dr. Clark also gave two public lectures: —

1. State and Federal Finance in Australia.
2. The Tariff Policy of Australia.

At the Seminary of Economics:

General Principles of Railroad Reorganization. Dr. Stuart Daggett.
The Silk Manufacture. Mr. F. R. Mason.
The Silk Manufacture and the Tariff. Mr. F. R. Mason.
Certain Phases of the Theory of Population since Malthus. Mr. J. A. Field.
The Commercial Use of Credit Instruments previous to 1724. Mr. A. P. Usher.
The Conduct of Public Works in English Towns in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries. Miss S. L. Hadley.
The Growth of the Knit Goods Industry. Mr. M. T. Copeland.
The Foreign Trade of England during the Thirteenth Century, especially with regard to the Italian. Miss G. F. Ward.
A Statistical Survey of Italian Emigration. Mr. R. F. Foerster.
The Meetings of the Economic and Sociological Associations at Madison. Professor Carver and Mr. J. A. Field.
The Canadian Reciprocity Treaty of 1854. Mr. W. W. McLaren.
Factory Labor in Massachusetts: Legislation and Economic Condition, 1810-1880. Mr. C. E. Persons.
Tax Administration in New York City. Mr. Lawson Purdy.
The Recent History of the Standard Oil Company. Mr. H. B. Platt.
The Wool and Woolens Act of 1867. Mr. P. W. Saxton.
The Causes of the Rise in Prices since 1898. Mr. H. L. Lutz.
The Corn Law Policy in England up to 1689. Mr. N. S. B. Gras.
Agrarian Conditions in Southwest Germany from the Thirteenth to the Sixteenth Century. Mr. H. C. Dale.
The Land Policy of Australia. Dr. Victor S. Clark.
Proposed Old Age Pension Legislation in England. Mr. R. M. Davis.
The Anthracite Coal Roads and the Coal Companies. Mr. E. Jones.
The Greenback Movement, with Special Reference to Iowa and Wisconsin. Mr. C. O. Ruggles.
Fibres and Fibre Products. Mr. B. S. Foss.
A Study of the Population of Cambridgeport. Mr. A. J. Kennedy.

Source: Harvard University Catalogue 1908-09, pp. 450, 455-6.

 

 

Categories
Exam Questions Harvard

Harvard. Final Examination Questions. Economics Courses, 1912-13

 

 

For the academic years 1912-13 through 1915-16 there are complete (or at least nearly complete) sets of examinations for many departments, including economics available at hathitrust.org. In this posting we have final examinations for all economics courses but three for the 1912-13 academic year. Since courses are only identified in these collections by number, I have provided the course titles, instructors’ names and course registration figures available in the annual Harvard Presidential Report for that academic year.

The three courses for which no final examination questions (perhaps the grade was not even determined by examination) were:

Economics 13. Statistics. Theory, method, and practice. Professor Ripley. (6 Graduates, 1 Senior, 3 Radcliffe: Total 10)

Economics 24. Topics in the Economic History of the Nineteenth Century. Professor Gay. (4 Graduates, 1 Senior: Total 5)

Economics 33 1hf. Tariff Problems in the United States. Professor Taussig. (5 Graduates, 3 Seniors: Total 8)

FINAL EXAMINATIONS
1912-13

Economics 1. Principles of Economics
Economics 2a lhf. European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century
Economics 2b 2hf. Economic and Financial History of the United States
Economics 3. Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises
Economics 4a 1hf. Economics of Transportation
Economics 4b 2hf. Economics of Corporations
Economics 5. Public Finance, including the Theory and Methods of Taxation
Economics 6a lhf. Trade-Unionism and Allied Problems
Economics 6b 2hf. The Labor Movement in Europe
Economics 7. Theories of Distribution and Distributive Justice
Economics 8. Principles of Sociology
Economics 9. Principles of Accounting.
Economics 11. Economic Theory
Economics 12 lhf. Scope and Methods of Economic Investigation
Economics 14. History and Literature of Economics to the year 1848
Economics 16. The History of Modern Socialism
Economics 23. Economic History of Europe to the Middle of the Eighteenth Century
Economics 31. Public Finance
Economics 32 2hf. Economics of Agriculture, with special reference to American conditions

 

________________________________________

Economics 1. Principles of Economics.

Professor Taussig and Dr. E. E. Day, assisted by Messrs. Heilman, Jones, Burbank, Crosgrave, and Eldred.
1 Graduate, 21 Seniors, 93 Juniors, 307 Sophomores, 21 Freshmen, 38 Other. Total 481.

 

[p. 38-39]

ECONOMICS 1

  1. To what extent and in what manner do the following contribute to the formation of capital: (a) a government loan; (b) the stock exchange; (c) commercial banks; (d) the corporate form of business organization?
  1. Explain “margin of cultivation.” Distinguish between the intensive margin of cultivation and the extensive margin of cultivation. What is the relation between (a) the margin of cultivation in agriculture and the price of a bushel of wheat; (b) the margin in gold mining and the value of an ounce of gold?
  1. Assume that a monopoly produces a commodity under conditions of constant cost. What determines the extent to which the monopoly price will be above the price which competition, if existent, would establish? Illustrate by diagram.
  1. The rentals from a New York office building amount to $50,000 a year. The building is worth $200,000. To provide for insurance, depreciation and such fixed items, $10,000 is expended annually. The current rate of interest upon investments of equal security is 5%. What is the value of the land?
  1. What is “dumping “? What induces it? To what extent is it dependent upon (a) monopoly conditions; (b) tariff barriers?
  1. Explain briefly why (a) the rates of wages are generally higher in the United States than in Germany; (b) higher for plumbers than for unskilled laborers; (c) for domestic servants than for women employed in shops and factories. Suppose a socialist community apportioning wages on the basis of equality of sacrifice: would these differences persist?
  1. How are the wages and the number employed within a particular industry affected, immediately and ultimately, by the invention of labor-saving devices in that industry?
  1. Explain: (a) railroad rebates; (b) over-capitalization; (c) public service industries; (d) “reasonable restraint of trade”; (e) stoppage at the source.

 

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Economics 2a lhf. European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century.
Professor Gay, assisted by Dr. M. T. Copeland.
16 Graduates, 14 Seniors, 44 Juniors, 17 Sophomores, 3 Freshmen, 5 Other. Total 99.

 

[p. 39-40]

ECONOMICS 2a1

  1. “The effect of Peel’s measures of 1842-1845 was to demonstrate how much the trade and industry of the country might be encouraged by the readjustment of fiscal burdens.” Explain.
    Is a similar readjustment needed in England at the present time? Why or why not?
  1. (a) How was the capital for the construction of railroads prior to 1870 obtained in the different European countries? Why?
    (b) Why was the railroad policy of Prussia modified after 1870? With what results?
  1. Compare the organization of the wool manufacturing industries in England, Germany, and France at the present time, explaining to what the differences are due. How far are these differences typical?
  1. Compare the English and Belgian methods of relieving the recent agricultural depression.
  1. In which industries have Kartells been formed in Germany? Why? Compare with the movement for combination in England.
  1. Explain the statement in regard to English agriculture that “after the middle of the eighteenth century the two revolutions, the industrial and the agricultural, which are indeed only manifestations of the same scientific and commercial spirit, go hand in hand and supplement one another.” Does this statement apply also to Germany? Why or why not?
  1. Discuss briefly —

(a) English ” Friendly Societies.”
(b) Pitt’s Sinking Fund.
(c) Zollverein.
(d) French shipping subsidies.
(e) Charter and line traffic.

 

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Economics 2b 2hf. Economic and Financial History of the United States.
Professor Gay, assisted by Dr. M. T. Copeland.
18 Graduates, 22 Seniors, 50 Juniors, 27 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 6 Other. Total 124.

 

 

[p. 40-1]

ECONOMICS 2b

  1. “The most important feature of life in a newly settled community is its commercial connection with the rest of the world.” Why? How is this illustrated (a) by the history of the American colonies and (b) by the history of the West?
  1. What were the causes for the decline of the American merchant marine? What attempts have been made to assist its recovery? With what results?
  1. Compare in its main features the economic history of the decade 1830-40 with that of the decade 1880-90.
  1. Compare the conditions which stimulated industrial combinations in the ’90’s with those which resulted in railroad combinations in the ’70’s.
  1. Within the last twelve months the New England Cotton Yarn Company, the U. S. Finishing Company, and the International Cotton Mills Corporation have each undergone reorganization. What was the earlier history of these companies and how far did that history foreshadow the necessity for such reorganizations?
  1. If you were to establish a mill for manufacturing silk goods at the present time, how would the conditions which you would meet in that industry differ from those which confronted a silk manufacturer forty or forty-five years ago? Why have these changes taken place? How far are they typical of the general industrial development of the United States during this period?
  1. (a) Comment on the following statement, which was made in a speech in Congress in 1846. “It is a protective tariff which gives to American industry the only effectual guaranty that it will not be brought down to a level with the degraded labor of Europe. It furnishes the only security that our standard of wages is not to be measured by the cost of production in those countries where the life of the laborer is but an incessant struggle for bread.”
    (b) Judging from the history of the years 1893-1900, as well as from present conditions, is the present year more or less opportune than 1909 for a downward revision of the tariff? Why?

 

________________________________________

 

Economics 3. Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.
Dr. E. E. Day, assisted by Messrs. Ise and F. E. Richter.
3 Graduates, 31 Seniors, 67 Juniors, 16 Sophomores, 1 Freshman, 1 Other. Total 119.

 

[p. 41-42]

ECONOMICS 3

  1. What factors favored the monetary rehabilitation of silver in the United States during the 70’s? Which of these factors are still operative? Explain the disappearance of the others.
  1. What banking abuses were most common in the United States early in the nineteenth century? When and how, if at all, have these since been eliminated?
  1. What is the relation between the Bank of England rate and the London market rate of discount when (a) funds are abundant; (b) funds are relatively scarce? In what ways does varying the Bank rate accomplish the protection of the English banking reserves?
  1. What is meant by a free gold market? Are the following such: London; Paris; Berlin; New York? In each case, why or why not?
  1. How will the rate of sterling exchange in New York be affected by: (a) a crop failure in the United States; (b) hoarding of specie in Europe; (c) a slump on the New York Stock Exchange; (d) a banking panic in this country?
  1. “The call-loan market . . . furnishes to the banks of the country under the present organization of banking, their only means of mobilizing their reserves, of liquifying their assets, and of securing flexibility in their lending power.” Explain and criticize. How, if at all, should this feature of our system be changed?
  1. In the equation of exchange given by Professor Fisher, what is the relation of M, M’, V, and T (a) during a period of rising prices; (b) during a period of settled prices?
  1. Describe the crisis of 1873 with reference to: (a) its general antecedents; (b) its more important causes in the United States; (c) its final outbreak in this country; (d) the territorial extent of the reaction; (e) the severity and duration of the subsequent depression.

 

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Economics 4a 1hf. Economics of Transportation.
Professor Ripley, assisted by Mr. Crosgrave.
6 Graduates, 2 G.B., 36 Seniors, 85 Juniors, 24 Sophomores, 3 Other. Total 156.

 

[p. 42-3]

ECONOMICS 4a

  1. Compare the lease with stock ownership as a means of combination, stating the advantages and disadvantages of each.
  1. Show how recent interpretation of the Federal law may conceivably affect the status of railway traffic agreements.
  1. State very briefly the point raised in the following cases: —

(a) Portland Gateway.
(b) Illinois Central car supply.
(c) Alabama Midland (Troy).
(d) Orange Routing.

  1. Have any of the above points been since corrected by legislation; if so in what manner?
  1. Give reasons for the following differences in net capitalization per mile of line:

Union Pacific $65,000         Reading $170,000
Pennsylvania    86,000        Erie            170,000

  1. What particular circumstance materially affects the success of Government ownership and operation:

(a) In Germany?
(b) In Italy?
(c) In Switzerland?

  1. What is the present attitude of the Federal courts toward the proper basis to be used in the determination of reasonable rates?
  1. How effective practically has been the ” Commodity Clause” of the law of 1906?
  1. To whom properly belongs the surplus earnings of a railroad over and above a rate of return requisite to provide an adequate supply of new capital for future development? State your own view, but set forth your reasons fully.

 

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Economics 4b 2hf. Economics of Corporations.
Professor Ripley, assisted by Mr. Crosgrave.
6 Graduates, 20 Seniors, 86 Juniors, 15 Sophomores, 3 Other. Total 130.

 

 

[p. 43-4]

ECONOMICS 4b

  1. Why was the dissolution of the “Tobacco Trust” more difficult than that of the Standard Oil Company? Explain fully.
  1. Indicate certain differences in the eye of the law between monopolization and restraint of trade.
  1. Herewith are two balance sheets of companies A and B respectively. Comment upon them, contrasting one with the other. Which apparently denotes the greater financial stability?
Co. A
Assets Liabilities
Plant $3,500,000 Preferred Stock $5,000,000
Merchandise 1,800,000 Common Stock 15,000,000
Bills Receivable 700,000 Accounts Payable 600,000
Cash 1,400,000
Good-will and Patents 13,200,000
$20,600,000 $20,600,000
 

Co. B

Assets Liabilities
Factories $15,000,000 Capital Stock $65,000,000
Securities owned 18,000,000 Debentures 15,000,000
Merchandise 20,000,000 Surplus 3,000,001
Accounts Receivable 30,000,000
Franchises and Good-will 1
$83,000,001 $83,000,001

 

  1. Name, with briefest possible description in each case, and in order of seriousness, at least five distinct forms of unfair competition in trade.
  1. Do all the foregoing forms of unfair competition affect thgeneral public as well as direct competitors? Does this factor apparently influence the attitude of the courts?
  1. What was the essence of the U. S. Steel Bond Conversion plan? What became of it?
  1. Contrast administrative and judicial forms of controlling monopoly, pointing out the merits of each.
  1. Outline the plan of reorganization of the National Cordage Company. Was it typical of industrial reorganizations in general?
  1. What are the three leading objections to the so-called “holding company “?
  1. Outline what most appeals to you as a feasible plan for dealing with the existing trust problem. State concisely in definite propositions covering all points at issue.

 

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Economics 5. Public Finance, including the Theory and Methods of Taxation.
Professor Bullock.
6 Seniors, 14 Juniors, 4 Sophomores, 1 Other. Total 25.

 

[p. 44]

ECONOMICS 5

  1. Explain and discuss critically the methods employed in the taxation of land in Germany, France, Great Britain, Australia, and the United States.
  1. Compare the general property tax with the general income tax, considering both the theory and the practical operation of these taxes.
  1. Compare the French, Prussian, and British systems of direct taxation.
  1. Compare the British system of indirect taxation with those of France and the United States.
  1. Discuss the taxation of mortgages in the United States.
  1. What changes in the taxation of personal property have recently occurred in the United States?
  1. Compare the British, Prussian, and Italian income taxes. .
  1. Outline what you consider a satisfactory theory of the just apportionment of public charges.

 

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Economics 6a lhf. Trade-Unionism and Allied Problems.
Professor Ripley, assisted by Mr. Crosgrave.
3 Graduates, 44 Seniors, 19 Juniors, 4 Sophomores, 2 Other. Total 72.

 

[p. 45]

ECONOMICS 6a

Answer the first five briefly

  1. What is sabotage?
  1. What is the ” extended ” closed shop?
  1. What is the principal practical difficulty in the “general strike”?
  1. Is it met by the adoption of any positive policy in France by the “syndicates”?
  1. In the syndicalist programme what is to be the unit in the reorganized state?
  1. Contrast collective bargaining under sanction of the law with its adoption by private arrangement; (a) from the point of view of advantage to the employer; (b) from that of the workman.
  1. What are the four main features of the New Zealand legislation. (Each in a sentence.)
  1. What is the principal demonstrated weakness in the above legislation?
  1. What are three disabilities of the individual workmen in negotiating a wage contract?
  1. Wages for women in domestic service and in manufactures seem out of line with one another. What main difference helps to explain this?
  1. What is the present condition of affairs respecting the closed shop in the United States? Outline the course of events for two decades.
  1. How does the law of conspiracy enter into the decision by courts in labor disputes? How has Great Britain settled it?

 

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Economics 6b 2hf. The Labor Movement in Europe.
Asst. Professor Rappard.
5 Graduates, 12 Seniors, 9 Juniors, 1 Sophomore, 3 Other. Total 30.

 

[p. 45-6]

ECONOMICS 6b

Arrange answers in order of questions. Students who wrote theses will omit the first three questions.

  1. Enumerate five of the effects which Engels says the Industrial Revolution had on the manufacturing population of England. What were Engel’s chief sources of information?
  1. How does Sombart distinguish between (a) Rational Socialism (Utopian Socialism and Anarchism) and (b) Historical Socialism?
  1. What effect, according to Marx, does machinery have

(a) Upon real wages?
(b) Upon nominal wages?
(c) Upon “relative surplus-value”?
(d) Upon “absolute surplus-value”?

  1. Why is it customary to mention the English enclosure movement in dealing with the history of labor in Europe in the 19th century?
  1. What were the historical relations between the doctrines of Godwin, Malthus and Darwin?
  1. What was Chartism? Saint-Simonism? Which was more radical? More socialistic? Give reasons.
  1. Write a biography of Marx (300 to 500 words).
  1. Compare the views of Marx and Vaudervelde on ” Capitalist Concentration.”
  1. Give chapter headings of a thesis on “The Socialist Movement in Germany, 1860-1890” in six or more chapters.
  1. Distinguish between (a) Socialism (b) Anarchism (c) Syndicalism.
  1. “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs … To every laborer the entire product of his labor … At first sight, these two formulas are absolutely contradictory. We believe, however, that it is possible and necessary to reconcile them and to complete each by the other.” — Vaudewelde.
    How does the author do this? What practical suggestions does he make for arranging distribution in the socialist state?
  1. What difficulties does Skelton think a socialist state would encounter

(a) In administering the government?
(b) In determining what commodities should be produced?
(c) In distributing wealth?

 

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Economics 7. Theories of Distribution and Distributive Justice.
Professor Carver.
3 Graduates, 7 Seniors, 13 Juniors, 1 Sophomore, 1 Other. Total 25.

 

[p. 47]

ECONOMICS 7

  1. Explain and illustrate the principle of marginal utility and its relation to the value of consumers’ goods.
  1. Explain and illustrate the law of variable proportions and its relation to the value of the factors of production.
  1. Discuss the various criteria of justice in the distribution of wealth.
  1. Explain and illustrate exactly what you understand by self-interest.
  1. How would the single tax probably affect the demand for labor? Would its effect probably be stronger on unskilled than on skilled labor? On skilled labor than on business talent?
  1. How do mechanical inventions affect the demand for capital and for different grades of labor?
  1. Describe one communistic society, giving some account of its origin, the causes of its success if it succeeded and of its failure if it failed.
  1. Outline a program for raising the wages of all the lower grades of labor.

 

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Economics 8. Principles of Sociology.
Professor Carver.
10 Graduates, 41 Seniors, 74 Juniors, 18 Sophomores, 4 Other. Total 147.

 

[p. 47-8]

ECONOMICS 8

  1. What, in your opinion, is the ultimate test of progress? Give your reasons.
  1. Compare the views of Buckle and Peschel as to the influence of geographical surroundings on religion.
  1. What is the relation between the institution of the family and the institution of property?
  1. What place has the genius in social progress? Give your own opinion and state the views on this question of authors whom you have read.
  1. Outline the leading forms of waste labor and of waste land, giving briefly the reasons why each form of waste exists at the present time.
  1. Compare the views of Mill and Ross as to the limits of social control.
  1. What, according to Ross, is the relation of resentment to social order?
  1. What are the reasons for the existence of the ballot? How far would these reasons justify the extension of the ballot?

 

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Economics 9. Principles of Accounting.
Asst. Professor Cole, assisted by Mr. Eliot Jones.
7 Graduates, 8 Graduates of Applied Sciences, 62 Graduates of Business School, 147 Seniors, 50 Juniors, 2 Sophomores. Total 276.

 

[p. 48-50]

ECONOMICS 9

Save one hour for the last question. It will count as one-third of the paper.

  1. Show by journal entries what should be debited and what credited for the following transactions:

(a) Granting a discount to a customer, for early payment of a bill, so that, though the amount of the bill was $100, he pays but $95.
(b) Paying a lawyer $50 for trying to collect a bill that proves uncollectible, and writing off the debt ($250) as bad.
(c) Collecting $75 as full payment, including interest to the amount of $17, for a debt previously written off as bad.
(d) Giving a friend whose credit at banks is not very good, because he is a new-comer in town, and for whom, therefore, you do not wish to endorse notes, your own note for $1000, with the understanding that he will discount it at a bank, and taking in exchange your friend’s note (for the same amount and time) which you intend to keep until maturity.
(e) Discounting at a bank your friend’s note mentioned in (d), because you find his credit has improved in the public mind and you need the money. [Discount $7.]
(f) Returning to the manufacturers, as unsatisfactory, goods billed at $500 and bought to be sold at $650.
(g) Delivering goods from the store as part payment of clerks’ wages, and allowing 5% discount to clerks. [Retail price $50, clerks’ price $47.50.]
(h) Issuing a stock dividend of $50,000.
(i) Selling a new $2,000,000 issue of stock for $2,100,000. [Corporation’s books.]

  1. A bond table gives the value of $10,000 of bonds for January 1 as $10,366.27, and for July 1 as $10,323.60. On the latter day you collect $250 interest. What entry shall you make for the interest?
    Assuming that the valuation of the bonds was determined on a 4% basis, how could you prove the correctness of the July 1 valuation if you knew that the valuation for January 1 was correct?
  1. Define and discuss the purpose of the following: —

(a) a machine rate,
(b) a life-insurance reserve,
(c) a national-bank redemption fund,
(d) a stores ledger,
(e) a machine ledger,
(f) a controlling account.

  1. Would expense burden enter into a plan of cost accounting for (a) a department store, (b) a hospital, (c) a college, (d) a gas company? Explain briefly how, or why not, in each case.

Remember in solving problems that time and confusion are often saved by the use of journal entries as guides in determining which accounts are affected.

  1. The balance sheet a year ago was as follows: —
Plant $125,000 Capital Stock $140,000
Accounts Receivable 33,000 Bills Payable 10,000
Merchandise 19,000 Accounts Payable 24,000
Cash 5,000 Surplus 8,000
$182,000 $182,000

An abbreviated tentative income sheet for the year just closing gave the following figures: —

Wages $85,000 Other Expenses $71,000
Materials 54,000 Gross Income 240,000

No items relating to the care of property were included in the “other expenses,” and they are now to be provided for. Such items are found on the debit side of the trial balance as follows:—

Depreciation $5,000 Replacement $4,000
Repairs 8,000 Additions 12,000

Supposing the only changes in the balance sheet are those caused by the items shown above (profit or loss and care of property) and that cash absorbs the net effect of changes not otherwise indicated, show the income sheet and the balance sheet for the new year.

  1. Prepare such a tabular statement or statements as an accountant should give to his employers or clients for a business yielding the following figures on three trial balances (of ledger balances) taken at the times indicated.
Trial balance at the opening of business, Jan. 1, 1912 Trial balance, Dec. 31, 1912, before the books are closed Trial balance at the opening of business, Jan. 1, 1913
Dr. Cr. Dr. Cr. Dr. Cr.
Capital Stock $200,000 $200,000 $200,000
Bills Payable 30,000 40,000 40,000
Accounts Payable 35,000 37,500 37,500
Surplus 7,000 7,000 9,000
Dividends declared 10,000 10,000
Real Estate and Plant $135,000 $137,500 $137,000
Accounts Receivable 88,200 80,200 80,200
Goods in process 17,000 17,000 20,000
Finished Goods 25,000 25,000 23,000
Raw Materials Inventory 15,000 15,000 35,000
Raw Materials 57,000
Wages 7,000 52,000 2,000
Taxes 200 2,300 200
Insurance 1,000 2,200 1,000
General Expenses 7,500
Sales 113,200
Cash 8,000 2,000 2,000
$289,200 $289,200 $397,700 $397,700 $298,700 $298,700

If you give more than one statement, prepare one at a time, and leave the reconciliation between statements until all are complete.

 

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Economics 11. Economic Theory.
Professor Taussig.
20 Graduates, 1 Graduate at Business School, 4 Seniors, 5 Juniors, 1 Other. Total 31.

 

[p. 50-3]

ECONOMICS 11

[Arrange your answers strictly in the order of the questions]

  1. Explain the connection between

(a) the rent of mines;
(b) Carey’s doctrine that the total rent received by land-owners is less than interest on the total investment for improving land;
(c) the earnings of barristers or opera-singers;
(d) the earnings of ” successful ” business men.

  1. “Men are not equal. . . . Those capable of organizing and leading industrial enterprise are in a minority, and are indeed few; hence they can put a price on their services which would be impossible if there were many. Their services are not worth more on this account, but they can get more for them. Because the community needs their services, and cannot perhaps get along without them, they can, if they like, put ” famine prices ” on the commodity (organizing and directing talent) which they have to sell; while, on the other hand, those who have only labor or physical skill, though they are just as necessary, are many, and hence can about as readily be taken advantage of as the others can take advantage.” What have you to say? Can the ” famine prices ” be justified?
  1. (a) “There are, in fact, few no-rent men in actual employment; and the reason for this is clear, since work involves a sacrifice, and it does not pay to incur the sacrifice unless the earnings be a positive quantity. In those times and places in which child labor has been employed, with little regard for the welfare of the victims, labor that was not at the no-rent point, but very near it, has been pressed into service. But, where the sacrifice entailed by labor is, in some way, neutralized by a benefit that work confers, labor which creates literally nothing may sometimes be employed. Lunatics or prisoners may be kept at work, in order that they may secure fresh air and exercise, even though the amount of capital that they use, if it were withdrawn from their hands and turned into marginal capital, would produce as much as it does when it is used by them. In such a case the product imputable to their labor is nil.
    The existence of any no-rent labor enables us to make the rent formula general and to apply it to every concrete agent of production.”
    (b) “The productivity of any capital, whether human or external, will differ with the capital. Men differ in quality, i. e., in productive power, as truly as lands or other instruments differ. Some men have a high degree of earning power and some have not.
    Some men can work twice as fast as others. Some men can do higher grades of work than others. The result is that we find men classified as common manual laborers, skilled manual laborers, common mental workers, superintending workers, and enterprisers.
    Just as we can measure the rent of any land by the difference in productivity between that and the low-rent, or no-rent, land, in exactly the same way we can measure the difference in productivity between men. There is no grade of workmen called the “no-wages men,” but there would be such a grade if it were customary for their employer to pay for their cost of support (as the employer of land pays for its cost), so that only the excess above this cost were to be called wages.”

Compare the two trains of reasoning; give your opinion; and state by what authors the passages were written.

  1. “If the proprietor of superior land were to say, ‘I will take no rent for it,’ this would not make wheat cheaper. The supply would not be changed; for the same quantity would be raised, the marginal amount raised on the no-rent land would be needed and would be bought at the former price, and all other parts of the supply would command the same rate. … It is a striking fact — but one hitherto much neglected — that similar conclusions apply to the product of every other agent ” [capital and labor]. Do similar conclusions apply? Who do you think is the author of this passage?
  1. What three grounds explain, according to Böhm-Bawerk, the preference for present goods over future? Which of them does he conclude to be the most important? State Fisher’s criticism; and give your own opinion on the controverted question.
  1. “In the present condition of industry, most sales are made by men who are producers and merchants by profession. . . .For them, the subjective use value of their own wares is, for the most part, very nearly nil. … In sales by them the limiting effect which, according to our theoretical formula, would be exerted by the valuation of the last seller, practically does not come into play.” — Böhm-Bawerk.
    What is the ” theoretical formula “? and what is the importance of the qualification here stated?
  1. In what sense are the terms “demand” and “increase of demand ” used in the following passages:

(a) “The democratization of society and the aping of the ways of the well-to-do by the lower classes have greatly increased the demand for silk fabrics.”
(b) “The lower price of sugar after 1890, when sugar was admitted free of duty, at once caused an increase of demand.”
(c) “The cheapening of a commodity may mean an increase of demand such that the total sum spent on it will be as great as before, even greater than before.”

  1. Explain the essentials of Veblen’s theory of crises, and state wherein you think it most tenable, wherein least so.

 

________________________________________

 

Economics 12 lhf. Scope and Methods of Economic Investigation.
Professor Carver.
2 Graduates, 1 Radcliffe. Total 3.

 

[p. 53]

ECONOMICS 12

  1. Explain verbally, and show by means of an outline, the relation between private and public economics and the main subdivisions of each.
  2. Into what main departments would you subdivide the subject of economics if you were going to write a general text book for college classes. Give your reasons.
  1. What are the characteristic methods of reasoning, methods of collecting information, and methods of exposition in economics? Mention examples, or give illustrations of each. What are the special advantages of each? To what class of problems is each especially adapted?
  1. Comment upon the following: —

“The economist may thus be considered at the outset of his researches as already in possession of those ultimate principles governing the phenomena which form the subject of his study, the discovery of which in the case of physical investigation constitutes for the inquirer his most arduous task; but, on the other hand, he is excluded from the use of experiment.” (Cairnes, pp. 89-90.)

  1. What, according to Warner, are the characteristic methods of determining the causes of poverty? What are the merits and defects of each method? Give illustrations.
  1. Comment upon the statement that “political economy depends more upon reasoning than on observation.” Is this the same as saying that the greatest present need is for sound reasoners rather than for close observers? Would either statement apply to all possible conditions and to all classes of problems?
  1. Discuss Clark’s reasons for describing capital as a sum of money.

 

________________________________________

 

Economics 14. History and Literature of Economics to the year 1848.
Professor Bullock.
7 Graduates. Total 7.

 

[p. 54]

ECONOMICS 14

  1. What significant analyses of economic structure and functions were made by the mercantilists?
  1. Discuss the development of economic opinions as reflected in the writings of Hales, Bodin, Montchrétien, Mun, Petty, Boisguilbert, Cantillon, Vanderlint, and Hume.
  1. Explain the structure and purpose of the “Wealth of Nations,” and give a brief analysis of the doctrines of the first two books.
  1. Discuss the treatment of the subject of population by Aristotle, the Schoolmen, Cantillon, Smith, and Malthus.
  1. At what points did the economic theories of Ricardo differ from those of Adam Smith?

 

________________________________________

 

Economics 16. The History of Modern Socialism.
Asst. Professor Rappard.
4 Graduates Total 4.

 

[p. 54-5]

ECONOMICS 16

  1. Fill out the blanks in the following table according to the Marxian phraseology and theory.
Con-stant capital Vari-able capital Rate of surplus value Capital con-sumed Indi-vidual rate of profit Value of commo-dities pro-duced Cost price of commodities prod-uced Average rate of profit Price of com-modities Deviation of price from value
90 10 50% 20
80 20 50% 10
70 30 50%
  1. “The theory of value which Marx presents is a variation of the familiar labor-value doctrine.” Discuss.
  1. State the Marxian theory of rent.
  1. What is meant by the Bernstein-Kautsky controversy? State three of the principal points involved, with the arguments advanced on both sides.
  1. What, according to Skelton, are the distinctive features of Utopianism? How does Shelton classify the Utopian doctrines?
    What, according to Skelton, are the two “quite distinct interpretations” of which the Marxian materialist conception of history is susceptible?
  1. “In spite of himself, Marx was the last of the classical economists.” How does Shelton justify this assertion?
  1. “Had the third volume of ‘Capital’ appeared at the same time as the first, little would have been heard about ‘exploitation’ from socialist platforms.” Why not, according to Skelton?

 

________________________________________

 

Economics 23. Economic History of Europe to the Middle of the Eighteenth Century.
Dr. Gray.
4 Graduates, 1 Radcliffe. Total 5.

 

[p. 55]

ECONOMICS 23

  1. Discuss the origin and early expansion of capital in Italy, the Low Countries, Germany and England. (One hour.)
  1. Compare the development of copyhold in England with that of Meierrecht in Germany. In what way were agrarian conditions in southwestern Germany different from conditions in the north-west at the beginning of the sixteenth century.
  1. Trace the growth of the mercantile system in England. Has Cunningham’s treatment any bias? Explain.
  1. Describe fully four of the following documents: —

Notularium Johannis Scribae.
An English Pipe Roll.
Royal licenses to export English wool in 1273.
De institutis Lundonie.
Chrysobullium Alexii I.

 

________________________________________

 

Economics 31. Public Finance.
Professor Bullock.
6 Graduates, 1 Junior. Total 7.

 

[p. 55-6]

ECONOMICS 31

  1. How far does the present British system of taxation conform to the maxims of Adam Smith?
  1. How far does the present French system of taxation conform to Smith’s maxims?
  1. How far does the present Prussian system of taxation conform to Smith’s maxims?
  1. How far would the single tax on land values conform to Smith’s maxims?
  1. Compare the general property tax in Switzerland with the same tax in the United States.
  1. What changes in the general property tax have occurred in the United States in recent years?
  1. Discuss fully the opinions of Leroy-Beaulieu or Eheberg concerning the income tax.
  1. Discuss fully the opinions of Leroy-Beaulieu or Eheberg concerning the inheritance tax.

 

________________________________________

Economics 32 2hf. Economics of Agriculture, with special reference to American conditions.
Professor Carver.
8 Graduates, 2 Seniors, 1 Junior. Total 11.

 

[p. 56]

ECONOMICS 32

  1. What are some of the larger characteristics which distinguish rural from urban life?
  1. Where would you draw the line between large scale and medium scale, and between medium scale and small scale farming, and what are the principal advantages and disadvantages of each?
  1. Exactly what is the distinction between intensive and extensive farming, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of each?
  1. To what system of culture does the horse as a draft animal belong, and what are some of the characteristics of that system?
  1. Where do we find the larger percentage of tenancy in this country, where land is highly productive or where its productivity is low? How would you explain the situation?
  1. Give your ideas as to the function of the middle-man, and to what extent and how that function may be performed by the farmers themselves.
  1. What are the advantages of diversified farming as compared with specialized farming?
  1. Give your ideas as to how country life may be made more attractive to men and women of education and culture.

________________________________________

Sources:

Harvard University Examinations. Papers set for final examinations in history, history of science, government, economics, philosophy, social ethics, education, fine arts, music in Harvard College. June, 1913. Cambridge, MA.

Harvard University. Reports of the President and the Treasurer of Harvard College, 1912-13, pp. 57-58.

 

 

Categories
Harvard

Harvard. Ph.D. General Examination Fields. Charles Beardsley, 1904

Historians need to deal with “missing values” in their archival work on a daily basis. For instance in the Harvard Archives there is a box with the promising title “Examinations for the Ph.D.” What you find in that box are officially printed lists of candidates (with their respective academic histories) and their general examinations by academic year in which the examiners and thesis advisers are identified together with the six fields covered in the general examination as well as the “special subject” field and the thesis subject. That is the good news.

The bad news is that these printed lists suffer significant gaps in coverage. In this box we find information for the academic years 1902-03 through 1904-05, 1906-07 through 1913-14, 1915-16, 1917-18 through 1918-19, and finally 1926-27. This gives me hope that perhaps in some departmental folder (not necessarily in the economics department) there still are copies of some of those missing listings to fill in the gap and/or extend the range of the examination lists.

This posting provides us the general examination information for Charles Beardsley, Jr. who it turns out was never awarded a Ph.D. from Harvard. More about Charles Beardsley’s life is found in my earlier posting taken from the Secretary’s Report of the Harvard Class of 1892 (1912).

________________________________

 

From:
Division of History and Political Science Examinations for the Degree of Ph.D., 1903-04, pp. 1-2.

 

  1. Charles Beardsley.

General Examination in Political Science, Wednesday, February 24, 1904.

Committee: Professors Ripley, Lowell, Haskins, Carver, Bullock, Gay and Dr. Sprague.

Academic History: Harvard College, 1888-92; Graduate School, 1893-94, 1896-97, 1902-03; Harvard, 1897[sic, he received his A.B. in 1892] (A.B.); Harvard, 1902 [sic, he received his A.M. in 1897] (A.M.).

(A) General Subjects.

1. Constitutional History of England since the beginning of the Tudor Period.
2. Modern Government and Comparative Constitutional Law.
3. Economic Theory and its History.
4. Applied Economics: Money and Banking, International Trade, Taxation and Finance.
5. Economic History of the United States, with special reference to the Tariff, Financial Legislation, and Industrial Combinations.
6. Sociology, including the Labor Question.
7. (Special subject.)

(B) Special Subject: Tariff Legislation and Controversy in England since the time of Adam Smith.

(C) Thesis Subject: “Huskisson’s Tariff Reforms in England.” (With Professors Taussig and Gay.)

Source: Harvard University Archives. HUC7000.70. Harvard University, Examinations for the Ph.D. Folder “1903-1904”.

A catalogue of the doctors of philosophy and of science and of the master of arts and of science of Harvard University, who have received their degrees after examination, 1873-1898, p. 68.

Image Source: John Harvard Statue (1904). Library of Congress. Photos, Prints and Drawings.

Categories
Bibliography Courses Economic History Harvard

Harvard. Recent Economic History. Readings, Edwin F. Gay, 1934-35

 

 

Edwin Francis Gay (1867-1946) came to Harvard in 1902 as an instructor of economic history taking over William Ashley’s courses after having spent a dozen years of training and advanced historical study in Europe (Berlin, Ph.D. in 1902 under Gustav Schmoller, also he was in Leipzig, Zurich and Florence). He and Abram Piatt Andrew received five-year contracts as assistant professors of economics in 1903. In just four years he actually advanced to the rank of professor. He served as a principal advisor to Harvard President Charles Eliot in establishing the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration in 1908. After the favored candidate to be the founding dean of the business school, William Lyon Mackenzie King (Ph.D., Harvard 1909) turned down the offer, instead continuing as deputy minister of labor in Canada then later becoming prime minister of Canada, President Eliot turned to Gay. In nine years Gay put his stamp on the Harvard Business School, apparently playing an instrumental role in the use of the case method (pedagogic transfer from the law school) with a strong emphasis on obtaining hands-on experience through practical assignments with actual businesses. He is credited with establishing the academic degree of the M.B.A. (Master of Business Administration), the credential of managers.

During WW I Gay worked as adviser to the U.S. Shipping Board and then went on to become editor of the New York Evening Post that would soon go under, giving Gay “an opportunity” to return to Harvard where he could teach economic history up through his retirement in 1936. Gay was among the co-founders of the National Bureau of Economic Research and the Council of Foreign Relations. He and his wife moved to California where he worked at the Huntington library where the bulk of his papers are to be found today. 

Since this item was first posted, I have transcribed the questions from the final examination for the course’s second semester

________________________________

[From Course Announcement]

Economics 23. Recent Economic History.

Tu., Th., at 4. Professor Gay.

Note: “A double dagger(‡) indicates that the course is open under certain conditions to properly qualified students of Radcliffe.”

 

Source: Announcement of the Courses of Instruction offered by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences During 1934-35. Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. 31, No. 38 (September 20, 1934), p. 128.

________________________________

[Course Enrollment]

[Economics] ‡23. Professor Gay.—Recent Economic History.

16 Graduates, 1 Senior, 1 Other, 4 Radcliffe: Total 22

 

Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College and reports of departments for 1934-1935, p. 82.

________________________________

ECONOMICS 23

First assignment [first semester]

Bertrand Russell, Freedom vs. Organization, 1814-1914. (W. W. Norton & Co., New York, 1934)

For review

P. Mantoux, The Industrial Revolution in the Eighteenth Century, (English translation) 1928
or
H. Heaton. Article: The Industrial Revolution in The Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences, Vol. 8, (1932), pp. 3-13.

J. H. Clapham, An Economic History of Modern Britain, 2 vol., 1926 (2nd ed.o 1932. Cambridge University Press.

Industrial History, Vol. I, chapters 5, 10, 14, Vol. II, chs. 3, 4, 11.
Agriculture, Vol. I, ch. 4; vol. II, ch. 7.
Transportation, Vol. I, chs. 3, 9.
Commerce and commercial policy, vol. I, ch. 12, vol. II, chs. 6, 8.
Also Vol. II, chs. 1, 2, 10.

J. H. Clapham, Economic Development of France and Germany, 1921 (1923), chs. 1-9 inclusive.

E. C. Kirkland, History of American Economic Life, chs. 1-9 inclusive.

L. H. Jenks, The Migration of British Capital to 1875. (1927), pp. 1-262.

A. E. Feavearyear, The Pound Sterling, Oxford, 1931. Chs. 8-11 inclusive (pp. 138-298)

Percy Ashley, Modern Tariff History, 1926

F. W. Taussig, Tariff History of the United States. (to and including tariff of 1890).

_____________________________

ECONOMICS 23                                           1935

Second assignment: [second semester] references in brackets are optional

Wells, D. A. Recent Economic Changes, 1890 (written 1887-9).

[Marshall, A. Industry and Trade (1919) Bk. I, chaps. 5-8, pp. 86-162]

Sharfman, I. L. Interstate Commerce Commission, vol. I. chaps. 1-4, pp. 11-176.

Royal Institute of International Affairs, World Agriculture (1932), pp. 1-252.

Nourse, E. G. Chapter on “Agriculture” in Recent Economic Changes, vol. II, chap. viii, pp. 547-602.

Black, J. D. Agricultural Reform in the United States (1929) Part I. The Setting, Chaps. 1-3, pp. 1-84.

Royal Institute of International Affairs. Monetary Policy in the Depression, (1933), pp. 1-81.

Committee on Finance and Industry. (Macmillan Report) (1931), pp. 1-185.

[Department of Commerce (U.S.) Bulletin on “Balance of International Payments” 1934 (for 1933)]

Mitchell, W. C. Business Cycles, the Problem in its Setting. (1927) pp. 61-188, 424-450.

Webb, Sidney and Beatrice. History of Trade Unionism (1920 or 1926), chaps. 7-11, pp. 358-704 (718).

Webb, Sidney and Beatrice. Consumers’ Cooperative Movement (1921) Chap. 6, pp. 383-487.

Clay, Henry. The Problem of Industrial Relations (1929), pp. 74-102.

Perlman, S. History of Trade Unionism in the United States.

Seager, H. R. and Gulick, C. A. Trust and Corporation Problems (1929) chaps. 5, 6, 18-26; pps. 49-85, 367-627.

Berle A. A. and Means, G. C. The Modern Corporation and Private Property (1933) Bk. I, chaps. 1-3, Bk. IV, chaps. 1-4, pp. 1-46, 333-356.

Mitchell, W. C. “A Review,” Recent Economic Changes, vol. II, pp. 841-910.

Hansen, A. H. Economic Stabilization in the Unbalanced World (1932), pp. 271-380.

Morrison, Herbert. Socialisation and Transport (1933) Chaps. 8, 9, 13, 15; ppps. 131-176, 213-242, 280-297.

 

Source: Harvard University Archives. Syllabi, course outlines and reading lists in Economics, 1894-2003 (HUC 8522.2.1), Box 2, Folder “1934-1935”.

Image Source: Harvard Class Album 1934.

Categories
Curriculum Harvard

Harvard. Stricter division between undergraduate and graduate courses. Ca. 1910-11

A copy of this report written by economics professors Charles J. Bullock and Thomas N. Carver is found in the papers of Harvard President Abbott Lawrence Lowell. The report itself is undated but a comparison with the course catalogues for the period 1909-1914 shows almost a perfect fit for the course staffing in the academic year 1910-11.

Harvard-wide courses were divided into three groups:

Courses primarily for Undergraduates (lower group);
Courses for Undergraduates and Graduates (middle group);
Courses primarily for Graduates (upper group).

In the 1912-13 Announcements of the Courses of Instruction, the recommendations of the committee were implemented to limit undergraduate access to the upper group of courses: only after a “special vote of the Department” or for undergraduate senior “candidates for the degree with distinction” would undergraduate students be admitted to courses designated “primarily for Graduates”. The new course numbering beginning with 1912-13 does not match the ordering of courses given in the report.

Handwritten names added to the Report have been placed within square brackets “[…]”.

_________________________________

REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE UPON COURSES OF INSTRUCTION

The Committee appointed at the last meeting of the Department to consider the courses of instruction in the Department of Economics, submits the following preliminary report as a basis for discussion at the next meeting of the Department:

The Committee recommends in the first place that there shall be hereafter a complete separation of the graduate and undergraduate courses. it seems to us that this can be done by adopting the principle that in undergraduate courses the work of the students is to be carefully supervised, and that in the graduate courses the students are to be thrown wholly upon their own resources and be tested only by the final examinations. This plan will enable the Department to concentrate its elementary instruction upon a smaller number of courses specially adapted to the needs of undergraduates, and will free the members from work of supervision in the courses offered for graduates.

It will not be inconsistent with this plan of separating graduate from undergraduate work to admit to the graduate courses undergraduates who are candidates for honors; and your Committee recommends that if the separation be effected this privilege be offered to undergraduates. The Department can safely assume that a candidate for honors in Economics can be trusted to pursue an advanced course without supervision, and can be treated precisely like a graduate student. Such an arrangement will prevent the proposed plan from reducing the opportunities offered to men of exceptional capacity and interest in economic study.

Nor will it be inconsistent with the plan to admit to the undergraduate courses graduate students whose previous training in economics has been deficient, provided such students be placed upon a somewhat different footing from undergraduates. Graduate students in the courses designed for undergraduates should not be subject to supervision, and should not be required to attend the weekly conferences or to take the weekly or fortnightly examinations. On the other hand they should be required to do somewhat more work than is expected from undergraduates; and this requirement might well take the form of a provision that such graduate students be required to do additional reading upon which one or two special questions will be set in the final examination. it would be possible also in the larger courses, where the instructor meets the class but twice a week, for him to have a fortnightly conference for the graduate students. This conference may be devoted to the discussion of the assigned reading. (Professor Carver suggests that this requirement might be made for candidates for the A. M. degree and not for candidates for the Ph. D. degree.)

If the separation of courses is effected, the Committee believes it desirable that hereafter the undergraduate courses should be considered a Department matter rather than a matter wholly under the control of the individual instructors. It seems to us that the Department should, in a general way, determine the scope and methods of the instruction offered, as well as the kind of examinations to be given in these courses. We also believe that there should be regular inspection of the work done in these courses. Inspection of the examination books is already provided for, but not carried out. In addition to this, we believe it is worth while for the Department to consider the desirability of securing inspection of the undergraduate courses by some competent person outside the Department.

There are two other matters which the Committee may later bring to the attention of the Department, but which need not be considered in connection with the proposed plan.

The first is the proposal to have instructors adopt hereafter a uniform system of lecture notes by which, if the Department ever cares to do so, it will be possible to make available to present and future members of the Department the notes used by instructors in giving the several courses. In this way the embers of the Department will gradually pool their experience; and whenever changes occur in the instructors conducting courses new men will have the benefit of the experience of their predecessors. Such a system would require not only uniform methods of keeping lecture notes, but uniform filing cards and filing cases.

The other matter is the question of whether the members of the Department can do more than is done at present in the direction of bringing students into direct contact with original sources of information. Something has already been done by books like Professor Dunbar’s Laws relating to Currency and Finance, and by Professor Ripley’s series of Selections and Documents. The Committee may desire later to raise the question whether, at least in our undergraduate courses, more systematic effort may not be made in this direction,

The Committee has examined our present list of courses with a view to determining which were best suited to the needs of undergraduates, and recommends that the following courses be hereafter offered in the undergraduate group:

  1. Economics I, as at present [Prof. Taussig.]
  2. The Economic History of England and the United States (the present Courses 6a and 6b) [Prof. Gay.]
  3. Money, Banking and Crises (the present Course 8) [Drs. Day & Huse]
  4. Public Finance (the present Courses 7a and 7b) [Prof. Bullock.]
  5. The Labor Problem and Socialism (the present Courses 9a and 14b) [Profs. Ripley & Carver.]
  6. Corporations and Railway Transportation (the present Courses 9b and 5) [Prof. Ripley.]
  7. Sociology (the present Course 3) [Prof Carver.]
  8. Accounting (the present Course 18) [Prof. Cole.]
  9. A course in Economic Theory (One suggestion is that this be a course in Classical English Economics. Professor Carver suggests a course in the Distribution of Wealth. The Committee confines itself to recommending one advanced course in Economic Theory for undergraduates. (the present Course 2) [Prof. Taussig.]

(Professor Carver would prefer to add to this list Economics 28, but the Committee merely raises this question, and makes no recommendation upon the point.)

With these courses placed in the undergraduate group, there would remain in our present offering a substantial amount of graduate instruction. The Committee suggests, but without making a definite recommendation, the following:

  1. Theories of Value and Distribution: with consideration of methods of economic investigation. Carver. (A consolidation of Courses 13 and 14a)
  2. Ripley.
  3. History of Economic Theory. Bullock. (In place of the one course, there could be offered two courses given in alternate years: the first covering the history of economics up to 1776; the other covering the period from 1776 to 1848, or even some later date.)
  4. French and German Economics. Gay. (The present Economics 22)
  5. Mediaeval Economic History. Gray. (The present Economics 10)
  6. Modern Economic History. Gay. (The present Economics 11)
  7. Economic History of Antiquity. Ferguson. (The present Economics 26) The committee recommends, however, that unless this course can be given next year, it shall be dropped from the Catalog.
  8. Economics of Agriculture. Carver. (The present economics 23, unless this be included in the list of courses offered undergraduates)
  9. Financial Aspects of Combinations. Dewing. (The present Economics 30)
  10. Bullock. (The present economics 16)
  11. Research Courses (20a, b, c, d, e ,f, g, h)

In addition to these courses, it may be possible to provide two or three new courses by members of our present staff, if additional assistants can be secured in the group of courses offered to undergraduates. Professor Taussig has expressed a desire sometime to undertake a course in International Trade. Then if the undergraduate courses in the Labor Problem and Socialism could be given by a new instructor, Professor Ripley would be free to offer another advanced course. But this matter, however, like some others, is obviously one that cannot be settled at the present time; and the Committee mentions it merely to point out the possibilities of its proposed plan.

Signed,

Charles J. Bullock
T. N. Carver

Source: Harvard University Archives. President Lowell’s Papers, 1909-1914, Box 15, Folder 410.

Image Source:  Harvard Class Album 1915.

Categories
Economists Harvard

Harvard. Early Evolution of Behavioral and Social Science Departments. Mason Report.

Today I generate another posting from the Mason Committee Report The Behavioral Sciences at Harvard published in June, 1954. Here we have a quick trot through Harvard’s own history of behavioral and social sciences, the splitting of some of its divisions into departments and the creation of new departments and schools. It is an extremely convenient collection of names and dates to help us see where economics  and economists fit into the larger academic community during the first half century or so following the emergence of political economy and government at Harvard College. You can tell an economist chaired the committee, it’s so much about us. I have added boldface to help readers of this blog find stuff they might (should) be interested in.

________________________

[p. 18]

HISTORY OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES AT HARVARD

The future historian of Harvard will note that a new term began to be prominent in University documents during 1953-1954. A reorganization of course offerings in the Graduate School of Education created the “behavioral sciences” as a prominent new rubric. Reports in the Business School allude to present and planned developments in the “behavioral sciences” and this survey utilizes the new term as an inclusive category to define the area of its inquiry.

If the term is of recent birth, Harvard’s activities in the area of the behavioral sciences certainly are not. Taking the loose definition of the behavioral sciences, which we have adopted (at least provisionally) for this survey, their cultivation at Harvard goes back at least to the emergence of Harvard as a modern university in the second half of the nineteenth century. At least some of the behavioral sciences shared in the rapid growth of Harvard to university stature at the end of the nineteenth century. The reorganization of 1890, establishing the system of Divisions and Departments of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, brought into existence a Division of History, Government, and Economics. Prior to this time there had been instruction in all of these fields, and Harvard could already point to distinguished scholars in some parts of them. History, after a “false dawn” in 1838 when Jared Sparks was appointed to the new McLean Professorship of Ancient and Modern History, was rapidly coming to strength under the inspiration of Henry Adams and the young men bringing new methods and standards from the German universities. Economics had begun its emergence from moral philosophy in the early Seventies when anxiety that sound currency doctrines be heard in Harvard College led to the appointment of Charles F. Dunbar as Professor of Political Economy. The study of government was comfortably developing in the work of a group of historians who were predominantly concerned with constitutional and institutional history.

1892 Dunbar
Charles F. Dunbar

Today the Division of History, Government, and Economics has been reduced to a shadowy holding company for three powerful and [p. 19] autonomous departments. In 1890-1891, the situation was different. Prior to the reorganization, the Harvard College faculty had indeed been subdivided into departments, but they were very loose and informal bodies, so casual in their operation that regular meetings were not held nor formal records kept. After 1891, a new structure of departments established itself firmly, and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences quickly became the nexus of self-contained subdivision that it is today. History and government naturally fell together in a department first labeled that of “History and Roman Law” which in 1895 became the Department of History and Government.1 The split of this joint department into the present Departments of History and Government took place considerably later, in 1911. A Department of Political Economy was in existence from 1879, and economics courses enjoyed a separate listing under this heading until the present Department of Economics became established in 1892.

Within this evolving framework, Harvard quickly pushed to a place of prominence in studies in this area. In history the dominant pattern of activity was clear:

“Institutional History was uppermost at Harvard in the last third of the nineteenth century. Maine and Stubbs in England, Waitz in Germany, Fustel de Coulangcs in France, initiated an eager search into the origins and development of political institutions, believing therein to find the true explanation of human progress. Henry Adams introduced the fashion to Harvard. To take a sample year, 1890-91, there was hardly a history course in the catalogue, save History I, and those given by Emerton, which did not smack of Verfassungsgeschichte. There was Constitutional Government (later Government 1), Constitutional History of England since George I, and Principles of Constitutional Law, by Professor Macvane; English Constitutional History from 1485 to George I, and Early Medieval History “with special reference to Institutions,” by Mr. Bendelari; French History to Louis XIV, with the same emphasis, by Dr. Snow; Constitutional History, Constitutional Development, and Federal Government by Professor Hart; Early American Institutions, by Professor Channing; and three more courses on English Constitutional History by Dr. Gross. Certainly no institutions in the United States or England today would offer so much constitutional history. . . “2

The doctoral dissertations accepted before 1900 in history and government reflect this concentration of interest. In a total of thirty-one accepted during the period 1873-1900, twelve were in United States national and colonial history, ten were in English institutional history, three were in “government and international law.”3 While Harvard initially lagged behind Johns Hopkins in its production of Ph.D.’s, it was early in the field, and its staff played a prominent role in the professionalization of historical study. They were active in the establishment of the American Historical Association (1884) and can claim [p. 20] to have been the prime movers in starting the American Historical Review. The intimate connection between political science and history which was fostered by the joint department and the nature of historical studies in this early period served to give the study of political science a strong historical cast. But instruction in political science extended beyond clearly historical courses, and Government 1 by 1900 was established as one of the great introductory courses with more than four hundred students.

After beginnings in the Seventies with the appointment of Charles F. Dunbar as Professor of Political Economy, Harvard’s work in economics quickly took on strength in the Eighties. The year 1886 is notable for two events: the establishment of the first professional economics journal in the English language, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, which has been continuously published under the auspices of the Department since that date; and the appointment of Frank W. Taussig, who became perhaps the central figure in a generation of growth in Harvard economics. As Professor Taussig modestly remarks in his own survey of department history, after 1886, the Department of Political Economy “was able to present a substantial offering.”4 From the first, the work of the Department showed a strong concern with contemporary issues of public policy, but it also reflected the late nineteenth-century concern with economic history in the appointments of William J. Ashley (1892) and Edwin F. Gay. Economics 1 took its place alongside History 1 and Government 1 as one of the famous introductory courses and like them attracted more than four hundred students by 1900.5 A temporary dip in activity occurred shortly after the turn of the century, but the foundations were laid for an exuberant later development.

The history of the other behavioral sciences in this early period is more varied, tentative, and uncertain. Anthropology got off to an early start with the Peabody bequest in 1866 establishing the Peabody Museum and the Peabody Professorship of American Archaeology and Ethnology. The terms of the bequest were such that part of it had to be left to accumulate until it had reached a specified level. The building which now houses the Peabody Museum was not begun until 1876, and the Professorship was not filled until 1887 (by Frederick Ward Putnam).6 The gathering of collections, however, began almost immediately after the Peabody bequest, and the first Report dates from 1868. By the Nineties the Museum collections had grown impressively, [p. 21] and the University acquired a major resource when the Museum became an integral part of it in 1897. Instruction in anthropology was almost lacking before 1890, there being no undergraduate courses and only a few graduate students. The reorganization of 1890 established a Division of American Archaeology and Ethnology, but no regular course in general anthropology was offered until 1894-1895. During the Nineties the Division shared in the general expansion of the University, increasing its staff and offerings so that by 1903 its old title was inappropriate, and it became the Department of Anthropology which still exists. The Nineties saw the beginning of a long series of archaeological and ethnological expeditions in the Americas and elsewhere which have enriched the collections of the Museum and the literature of the field. Studies and instruction in physical anthropology began at this time and have continued to the present day.

Psychology at Harvard is relatively old. Professor Boring when interviewed in the course of this survey has emphasized the point:

“America was very early in the development of experimental psychology, and the development was centered largely at Harvard. James had a very small laboratory as early as Wundt, actually — that is, in 1875. It is true that Germany led the world in experimental psychology in the 1890’s, but there was a great push in America to get psychological laboratories started, and I would say that they lagged behind Germany by less than ten years. In America there was a laboratory developed at Johns Hopkins in 1883, and ours here at Harvard officially began in 1892, although, as I said, there was a small laboratory before that.”

William James not only began experimental studies in psychology at an early date; in 1875 he offered a course in the Relations between Physiology and Psychology, and in the following year he presented another psychology course under the label of Natural History 2. His enthusiasm for experimental psychology led him to raise the necessary funds for the official establishment of the Psychology Laboratory in 1892. He did not, however, want to devote himself primarily to this work, and at his instigation Dr. Hugo Muensterberg was brought from Freiburg, first temporarily (in 1892), then after a brief interval, as a permanent Professor of Psychology in 1897. The early years of the new century saw important additions to the staff (in E. B. Holt and Robert M. Yerkes) and the availability of new space for the laboratories in Emerson Hall (1905). Instruction in psychology grew rapidly, but no independent department appeared. In 1913 psychology courses won separate listing, and the title of the sheltering department was expanded to become the Department of Philosophy and Psychology.

Sociology began its Harvard career in at least two places. The broad concern about social problems which swept over American society in the last third of the nineteenth century and did so much to establish sociology as an academic discipline had its representation at Harvard. The Reverend Francis Greenwood Peabody was giving a course in [p. 22] Practical Ethics in 1881, and from 1883 he offered another in Ethical Theories and Moral Reform. In 1905 it became possible, largely through the benefactions of Andrew Tredway White, to establish instruction of this sort more amply in a separate Department of Social Ethics. The early years of the new department saw expanded work in various types of social problems and a somewhat cautious venture in the direction of professional social work training.7

Not all of Harvard’s early sociology was contained in this lineal ancestor of its present work in sociology. The Department of Economics appointed an assistant professor of sociology in 1893, and after his appointment in 1901 Thomas Nixon Carver regularly gave sociology courses. There was further concern with sociology in connection with such subjects as labor problems, but in summing up the situation to 1929, Professor Taussig found cause to lament Harvard’s failure to “keep pace with the forward movement of economic science … in the field of the social applications or implications of the subject.”

Our sketch thus far has brought the account of the behavioral sciences at Harvard down to the years preceding the first World War. The subsequent years were crowded and active ones, but they have put their imprint so clearly on the present that we may hope to bridge them quickly, reserving details for the contemporary picture presented in Section B.

The organization of the behavioral sciences at Harvard has seen both fission and fusion in the twentieth century. We have noted the splitting off of Social Ethics in 1905 from its parent Department of Philosophy. The next fission was that between Government and History in 1911. In this, as in other organizational changes at Harvard, personalities and special local problems played their role, but the development of the fields themselves made the change a natural one. As Harvard developed rapidly into one of the major American centers of historical study, the heavy concentration in constitutional and institutional history yielded to more diversity. Many of Harvard’s great historians continued to write history in which political events and institutions bulked large, but the range of interests became increasingly catholic. In the history of religions George Foote Moore and others continued and ornamented an established Harvard tradition, Charles H. Haskins ranged over a vast field of medieval studies, Frederick J. Turner brought a sweeping perspective on American democracy, and by 1924 the University had a recognized practitioner of the “new” history in Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr. An era arrived in which social and economic history took established positions among the common varieties of historical writing so that they now look like older trends in the 1954 picture. A glance at the list of doctoral dissertations submitted [p. 23] to the Department shows a steady and strong growth in American and modern European history paralleling the over-all growth of the Department to a commanding position in the production of the professional historians.8

Since its independent establishment in 1911, the Department of Government has shown continued loyalty to its older union with History. In Charles Mcllwain it had an inspiring continuator of the tradition in English constitutional history and thought. The new Department rapidly expanded its concern with political theory and made new ventures in constitutional and international law, American national, state and local government, comparative government, and international relations. The establishment of the Graduate School of Public Administration in 1937 broadened and strengthened work on matters related to contemporary public policy. A steady rise in the popularity of government as a field of undergraduate concentration brought the Department in the years after World War II into the demanding position of caring for more undergraduates than any other department.

The Department of Economics has continued to grow until it stands today among Harvard’s largest. The concern with the issues of the day which engaged Harvard economists from the first has persisted. The tradition of government consulting blossomed with the work of Taussig, Ripley, Gay and Day during World War I, and in the ill-fated Harvard Economic Service Harvard economists in the Twenties ventured predictions on the course of business conditions. Theoretical economics was pursued with distinction, and a rounded development of the field could be pointed to as a basis for a commonly recognized position of leadership. The Graduate School of Public Administration at its founding could draw on a department with vigorous interests in economic policy, and it in turn provided stimulus and facilities for such work.

Anthropology at Harvard during the early decades of this century continued activities on the wide front established in the Nineties. While Harvard could claim no single figure of such commanding leadership as Boas at Columbia, men like Dixon, Tozzer, and Hooton took major places in the development of American anthropology. A long series of Peabody Museum expeditions extended all over the globe and established Harvard’s position of leadership in Middle American archaeology, Southwestern archaeology, Old World prehistory, and other fields. The large-scale Irish expedition in the Thirties brought widely-known results, and it is perhaps less well remembered that the Yankee City study had its inception in the Department of Anthropology. The Forties brought an important organizational change in the establishment of the Department of Social Relations (1946). This move, which relocated part of the work in [p. 24] Social Anthropology in a new department, has resulted in a substantial expansion of the total numbers of anthropologists on the Harvard staff and of the range and quantity of anthropological investigation.

The chapter on psychology in an official history of Harvard published in 1930 was written by a philosopher, Ralph Parton Perry. Professor Perry notes at the beginning of his account: “Harvard is almost the only American university in which Philosophy and Psychology still constitute a single department.”9 This tardiness of Harvard in following the movement toward an independent status for psychology continued until 1934, when the Department of Psychology was established with Professor Boring as chairman. The lack of separate status had not meant inactivity. The work of the Psychological Laboratory begun under James and Muensterberg continued under the direction of Langfeld (until 1924) and later under Professor Boring. The range of work included that of Yerkes on animal psychology, Troland on physiological optics, and McDougall (after 1920) on social psychology. In 1926 a special bequest for work in abnormal and dynamic psychology led to the establishment of the Psychological Clinic, first under Dr. Morton Prince, and later under Professor Henry A. Murray. The appointment of Professor K. S. Lashley in 1936 brought new work in physiological psychology which was later transferred to the Yerkes Laboratories of Primate Biology, Orange Park, Florida. During the second World War, Harvard’s psychologists became heavily involved in work which led to the present Psycho-Acoustic Laboratory under the direction of Professor S. S. Stevens. Substantial uncertainty as to the ideal arrangements for psychology in the University persisted. A special commission was appointed in 1945, under the chairmanship of Dr. Alan Gregg to examine this question,10 but the work was overtaken by action from another quarter which issued in the founding of the Department of Social Relations in 1946. The consequences of this change will be evidenced at many places in this report; suffice to say here that work in clinical and social psychology was moved to the new department, experimental and physiological psychology remaining in the Department of Psychology.11

Sociology at Harvard continued under the departmental label of Social Ethics until 1929. In the early years of this department (after 1905) the ethical and practical concerns of its founder marked both instruction and research.12 Courses were taught in criminology and penology, radical social movements, juvenile delinquency, housing, immigration, and the typical range of “social problems” found in sociology [p. 25] curricula of this era. After World War I, when Dr. Richard C. Cabot was made Professor of Social Ethics and Chairman of the Department (1920), sociology extended its concerns into philosophical questions and some applied fields, while preserving the ethical orientation. As Professor Cabot’s retirement approached, the status of sociology was subject to a general re-examination. A new Department of Sociology was established under the direction of a committee drawn from various existing departments and including a new appointee, Pitirim A. Sorokin, as Chairman and Professor of Sociology. The new department continued through the Thirties, establishing a strong tradition in theoretical sociology and producing a small but distinguished group of Ph.D.’s. A need for further organizational change was felt by the beginning of the Forties,13 and when the Department of Social Relations emerged in 1946, it had absorbed the old Department of Sociology. Since that time, sociology has been without separate departmental status at Harvard, but it has been strongly represented in the new organization.

This rapid survey could include little more than the most conspicuous and central developments in the behavioral sciences within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard. It has neglected many interdisciplinary committees and degree programs, research organizations, area programs, and the growth of such indispensable facilities as the College Library. A great many of the most important special developments have appeared since World War II and are still in existence. As elsewhere throughout the country, much of the history of behavioral sciences at Harvard crowds onto the contemporary scene.

The history we have presented has been largely a history of departments, but we think this not improper. The departments have long been and remain the fundamental units in the organization of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. The historical record of the growth of the behavioral sciences at Harvard seems to show a common pattern. Harvard has not been unresponsive to new needs and the development of new fields, but it has moved cautiously, making its first ventures under the shelter of established departments. Government, psychology, and sociology at Harvard thus began under older departments, only slowly winning autonomous status. Ultimately, fields like these have taken their place in an extended roster of the same type of organization which fostered them, namely, as departments on the established model. The record is doubtless a conservative one, substantively and organizationally, but it is perhaps in keeping with President Eliot’s aim of building “securely and slowly, a university in the largest sense.”

Thus far the growth of the behavioral sciences in the professional [p. 26] schools has gone largely unmentioned. Their development will be sketched briefly near the end of Section B, but, to avoid too much repetition, the more detailed historical developments are reserved for Part VI of this report, where each professional school receives a unified and comprehensive analysis. Unless the reader familiarizes himself with the trends in the utilization of the behavioral sciences in the graduate schools of Business, Education, Law, Medicine and Public Health, and Public Administration he will have only a partial image of Harvard’s activities in this field.

[NOTES]

1 Emerton and Morison, in Morison, ed.. Development of Harvard University, 1869-1929 (1930) p. 153, n. 1.

2 Emerton and Morison, op. cit., pp. 159-160.

3 Tabulation in Emerton and Morison, op. cit., p. 164.

4 In Morison, op. cit., p. 190.

5 A graph in Morison (between pp. 194-195) traces the rise in enrollment in these courses. They followed roughly the over-all increase in college enrollment.

6 A delay in the approval of Putnam’s appointment by the Board of Overseers deprived Harvard of the distinction of having the first professorship of American archaeology. (Daniel S. Brinton was appointed Professor of American Archaeology and Linguistics at Pennsylvania in 1886.) Dixon in Morison, p. 211, n. 1.

7 Ford in Morison, op. at., p. 225.

8 Cf. tabulation in Morison, op. cit., p. 164, and data below in Section B.

9 Morison, op. cit., p. 216.

10 Cf. The Place of Psychology in an Ideal University (1947).

11 A contemporary report on the nature and rationale of the split may be found in a joint article by Professors Allport and Boring, American Psychologist, v. 1, 1946, pp. 119-122.

12 Cf. the chapter by James M. Ford in Morison, op. cit., pp. 223-230.

13 The Report of the Visiting Committee to the Department for 1944-1945 remarks, “Obviously, the Department should not be allowed to continue as at present constituted.” Report No. 32, p. 219.

 

Source: The behavioral sciences at Harvard; report by a faculty committee. June, 1954.

Image Source:  Faculty portraits of Professors Taussig, Ripley, Gay and Day from Harvard Album, 1916.

 

Categories
Courses Curriculum Harvard Regulations

Harvard Economics. Courses, Degree Requirements. 1911-12.

DIVISION OF HISTORY, GOVERNMENT, AND ECONOMICS
1911-12

FIRST EDITION

OFFICIAL REGISTER OF HARVARD UNIVERSITY
VOLUME VIII             JUNE 15, 1911          NUMBER 23
Published by Harvard University
CAMBRIDGE, MASS.

 

 

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DIVISION OF HISTORY, GOVERNMENT, AND ECONOMICS

The Division of History, Government, and Economics is one of the eighteen Divisions of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. It comprises the Departments of History, Government, and Economics. The administrative officers of the Division and its Departments are: —

Professor Charles Homer Haskins, Chairman of the Division of History, Government, and Economics.         23 University Hall.

Asst. Professor William Scott Ferguson, Acting Chairman of the Department of History.         17 Chauncy St.

Professor Albert Rushnell Hart, Chairman of the Department of Government.         5 Quincy Chambers.

Professor Frank William Taussig, Chairman of the Department of Economics.         2 Scott St.

Correspondence concerning the degrees of A.M. and of Ph.D. and the degree of A.B. with Distinction should be addressed to the Chairman of the Division; other correspondence should be addressed to the Chairman of the Department concerned.

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INSTRUCTORS
(Arranged in each Department on the basis of collegiate seniority)

 

History

Ephraim Emerton, Ph.D., Winn Professor of Ecclesiastical History. 19 Chauncy St.

George Foot Moore, A.M., D.D., LL.D., Frothingham Professor of the History of Religion. 3 Divinity Ave.

Edward Caldwell Moore, Ph.D., D.D., Parkman Professor of Theology. 21 Kirkland St.

Edward Channing, Ph.D., Professor of History. [Absent (hiring the first half of the year 1911-12.] 74 Sparks St.

Albert Bushnell Hart, Ph.D., LL.D., Litt.D., Eaton Professor of the Science of Government. [See below.]

Worthington Chauncey Ford, A.M., Lecturer on Historical Manuscripts. 1154 Boylston St., Boston.

Frederick Jackson Turner, Ph.D., LL.D., Litt.D., Professor of History. 153 Brattle St.

John Winthrop Platner, A.M., D.D., Andover Professor of Ecclesiastical History. 119 Walker St.

Archibald Cary Coolidge, Ph.D., Professor of History, and Director of the University Library. 4 Randolph Hall.

Charles Homer Haskins, Ph.D., Litt.D., Professor of History, Chairman of the Division of History, Government, and Economics, and Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. 15 Prescott Hall.

Robert Matteson Johnston, A.M., Assistant Professor of Modern History. [Absent during the first half of the year 1911-12.] 14 Appian Way.

Edwin Francis Gay, Ph.D., Professor of Economics. [See below.]

Charles Howard McIlwain, A.M., Assistant Professor of History.

William Scott Ferguson, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of History, and Acting Chairman of the Department of History. 17 Chauncy St.

Roger Bigelow Merriman, Litt.B., Ph.D., Assistant Professor of History. 175 Brattle St.

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Harold William Vazeille Temperley, A.M. (Fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge), Lecturer on History.

Howard Levi Gray, Ph.D., Instructor in History. 17 Conant Hall.

Robert Howard Lord, Ph.D., Instructor in History. 27 Perkins Hall.

 

Government

Frederic Jesup Stimson, A.B., LL.B., Professor of Comparative
Legislation
. [Absent during the year 1911-12.] 709 Exchange Bldg., Boston.

Albert Bushnell Hart, Ph.D., LL.D., Litt.D., Eaton Professor of the Science of Government, and Chairman of the Department of Government. [Absent during the second half of the year 1911-12.] 5 Quincy Chambers.

George Grafton Wilson, Ph.D., Professor of International Law. 38 Quincy St.

Charles Howard McIlwain, A.M., Assistant Professor of History. [See above.]

William Bennett Munro, LL.B., Ph.D., Assistant Professor of
Government.
21 Dana Chambers.

Joseph Warren, A.B., LL.B., Lecturer on Persons. 26 Quincy St.

Henry Aaron Yeomans, A.M., LL.B., Instructor in Government. 74 Trapelo Road, Belmont.

Arthur Norman Holcombe, Ph.D., Instructor in Government. 7 Exeter Park.

 

Economics

Francis Greenwood Peabody, A.M., D.D., LL.D., Plummer Professor of Christian Morals. 13 Kirkland St.

Frank William Taussig, LL.B., Ph.D., Henry Lee Professor of Economics, and Chairman of the Department of Economics. 2 Scott St.

Jeffrey Richardson Brackett, Ph.D., Instructor in Charity, Public Aid and Correction. 41 Marlborough St., Boston.

Charles Jesse Bullock, Ph.D., Professor of Economics. 1 Grays Hall.William Morse Cole, A.M., Assistant Professor of Accounting. 35 Langdon St.

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Edwin Francis Gay, Ph.D., Professor of Economics, and Dean of the Graduate School of Business Administration. 58 Highland St.

William Zebina Ripley, Ph.D., Professor of Political Economy. Newton Centre.

Thomas Nixon Carver, Ph.D., LL.D., David A. Wells Professor of Political Economy. 16 Kirkland Road.

Oliver Mitchell Wentworth Sprague, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Banking and Finance. 18 Sumner Road.

Bruce Wyman, A.M., LL.B., Professor of Law. 16 Quincy St.

Ray Madding McConnell, S.T.B., Ph.D., Instructor in Social Ethics. 5 Fuller Place.

William Emmanuel Rappard, Lic.-en-droit, J.D., Instructor in Commercial Organization.

Arthur Stone Dewing, Ph.D., Instructor in Economics. 469 Broadway.

Edmund Ezra Day, Ph.D., Instructor in Economics. 15 Perkins Hall.

James Ford, Ph.D., Instructor in Social Ethics. 35 Walker St.

Robert Franz Foerster, Ph.D., Instructor in Social Ethics. 71 Perkins Hall.

 

ASSISTANTS AND AUSTIN TEACHING FELLOWS

Harry Maxwell Varrell, A.M., in History 1.

Carl Stephenson, A.M., in History 1.

James Grover McDonald, A.M., in History 1.

Frank Erskine Crawford in History 1.

Robert Joseph Kerner, A.M., in History 2.

Samuel Eliot Morison, A.M., in History 13.

Oswald Ryan, in History 13.

Lloyd William Brooke, A.B., in History 17.

Henry Warren Cleary, A.B., in Government 1.

Charles Claflin Davis, S.B., LL.B., in Government 1.

Stuart Cameron McLeod, A.M., in Government 1.

Daniel Badger Priest, A.B., in Government 4.

Eliot Jones, A.M., in Economics 1.

Alfred Burpee Balcom, A.M., in Economics 1.

Joseph Stancliffe Davis, A.B., in Economics 1.

Harold Hitchings Burbank, A.M., in Economics 1.

Julius Klein, Litt.M., in Economics 6a and 6b.

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HISTORY, GOVERNMENT, AND ECONOMICS

HISTORY

Introductory Courses.

I. Ancient and Oriental History.

II. Mediaeval History.

III. Modern European History.

IV. American History.

V. Economic History.

VI. Church History.

VII. History of Religions.

 

GOVERNMENT

I. Introductory Course.

II. Modern Government.

III. Law and Political Theory.

IV. International Law and Diplomacy.

 

ECONOMICS

Introductory Course.

I. Economic Theory and Method.

II. Economic History.

III. Applied Economics.

IV. Courses Preparing for a Business Career.

V. Sociology.

VI. Courses of Research.

_____________________

SOCIAL ETHICS

Introductory Courses.

Intermediate Courses.

Courses of Research.

_____________________

 

[…]

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ECONOMICS

GENERAL STATEMENT

Course 1 is introductory to the other courses. It is intended to give a general survey of the subject for those who take but one course in Economics, and also to prepare for the further study of the subject in advanced courses. It is usually taken with most profit by undergraduates in the second year of their college career. It may not be taken by Freshmen without the consent of the instructor. History 1 or Government 1, or both of these courses, will usually be taken to advantage before Economics 1.

Before taking any of the advanced courses, students are strongly advised to consult the instructors. Courses 2, 4, 9b, 14b, 16, 18, 21, 23, 30 may not be taken without the previous consent of the instructors. It is advised that Course 1 be taken in all cases as a preparation for the advanced courses; but some of them may be taken without this preparation. The conditions of admission to the several courses are stated below in the detailed descriptions.

The courses of research are intended primarily for Graduate Students: but Seniors in Harvard College who have had adequate training in the subject may be admitted.

The attention of students who look forward to a business career, and who have already taken Course 1, is called to Courses 4, 5, 6a, 6b, 7a, 7b, 8, 9a, 9b, 11, 16, and 30. In addition, Courses 18 and 21 are offered with a special view to their usefulness in preparing for a business career. Of these courses more is said below, on page 67.

The courses preparatory to business, which are described in the pamphlet of the Graduate School of Business Administration, are open to Graduate Students in Economics.

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INTRODUCTORY COURSES

Primarily for Undergraduates

  1. Principles of Economies. Tu., Th., Sat., at 11. Professor Taussig, assisted by Dr. Day, and Messrs. Jones, Balcom, Davis, and Burbank. (XII)

Course 1 gives a general introduction to economic study, and a general view of Economics for those who have not further time to give to the subject. It undertakes a consideration of the principles of production, distribution, exchange, money, banking, international trade, and taxation. The relations of labor and capital, the present organization of industry, and the recent currency legislation of the United States will be treated in outline.

The course will be conducted partly by lectures, partly by oral discussion in sections. A course of reading will be laid down, and weekly written exercises will test the work of students in following systematically and continuously the lectures and the prescribed reading. Course 1 may not be taken by Freshmen without the consent of the instructor.

_____________________

I
ECONOMIC THEORY AND METHOD

For Undergraduates and Graduates

*2. Economic Theory. Mon., Wed., Fri., at 2.30. Professor Taussig. (VII)

Course 2 is intended to acquaint the student with some of the later developments of economic thought, and at the same time to train him in the critical consideration of economic principles and the analysis of economic conditions. The exercises are accordingly conducted mainly by the discussion of selected passages from the leading writers; and in this discussion the students are expected to take an active part. The writings of F. A. Walker, Cairnes, Clark, Marshall, Bohm-Bawerk, and other recent authors, will be taken up. Attention will be given chiefly to the theory of exchange and distribution; but other subjects, such as international trade, and free trade and protection, will also be considered.

 

*4. Statistics. — Theory, Method, and Practice. Tu., Th., at 11. Professor Ripley. (XII)

This course is intended rather as an analysis of methods of research and sources of information than as embodying mere results. A brief

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history of statistics will be followed by an account of census and other statistical methods in the United States and abroad, with the scientific use and interpretation of results. The main divisions of vital statistics, relating to birth, marriage, morbidity and mortality, life tables, etc.; the statistics of trade and commerce, such as price indexes, etc.; industrial statistics relating to labor, wages, and employment; statistics of agriculture, manufactures, and transportation, will be then considered in order. Laboratory work, amounting to not less than two hours per week, in the preparation of charts, maps, and diagrams from original material, will be required. Course 4 is open to students who have taken Economics 1.

 

14a1hf. The Distribution of Wealth. Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., at 1.30. Professor Carver. (XIV)

This course begins with an analysis of the theory of value. The attempt is then made to formulate a positive theory of distribution helpful in explaining the actual incomes of the various classes of producers. Finally the question of justice in distribution is considered. This course is open only to students who have passed in Economics 1.

 

*14b2hf. Methods of Social Reform. — Socialism, Communism, the Single Tax, etc. Half-course (second half-year). Tu., Th., at 1.30. Professor Carver. (XIV)

A study of those plans of social amelioration which involve either a reorganization of society, or a considerable extension of the functions of the state. The course begins with a critical examination of the theories of the leading socialistic writers, with a view to getting a clear understanding of the reasoning which lies back of socialistic movements, and of the economic conditions which tend to make this reasoning acceptable. A similar study will be made of the Single Tax Movement, of State Socialism and the public ownership of monopolistic enterprises, and of Christian Socialism, so called.

This course is open only to those who have passed satisfactorily in Course 14a.

 

291hf. Socialism and the Social Movement in Europe. Half-course (first half-year). Mon., Wed., Fri., at 10. Dr. Rappard. (III)

A careful examination is made of the theories of the chief social reformers and of the leading socialists, both “Utopian ” and “scientific.” There follows a study of those revolutionary outbursts of the nineteenth century which were primarily economic in their origin and social in their aims. The course concludes with a summary of the positive political and institutional achievements of the social movement of the nineteenth century.

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Primarily for Graduates

  1. Methods of Economic Investigation. Hours to be arranged with the instructor. Professor Carver.

Course 13 will examine the methods by which the leading writers of modern times have approached economic questions, and the range which they have given their inquiries; and will consider the advantage of different methods, and the expediency of a wider or narrower field of investigation. Methods of reasoning, methods of investigation, and methods of exposition will be considered separately. Selected passages from the works of a considerable number of writers will be studied, with a view to analyzing the nature and scope of their reasoning.

Course 13 is designed mainly for students who take or have taken Course 2 or Course 15; but it is open to mature students having a general acquaintance with economic theory.

 

‡15. History and Literature of Economics to the year 1848. Mon., Wed., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Fri., at 11. Professor Bullock. (IV)

The purpose of this course is to trace the development of economic thought from classical antiquity to the middle of the nineteenth century. Emphasis is placed upon the relation of economics to philosophical and political theories, as well as to political and industrial conditions.

A considerable amount of reading of prominent writers will be assigned, and opportunity given for the preparation of theses. Much of the instruction is necessarily given by means of lectures.

No undergraduates will be admitted to the course who are not candidates for distinction in economics.

 

  1. German and French Economists of the Nineteenth Century. Two consecutive evening hours per week, to be arranged with the instructor. Professor Gay.

In this course selections from the works of a number of the more important German and French economists will be read and informally discussed. The influence of the English classical school will be traced, together with the criticism directed against this school by the socialists and the historical economists. Attention will also be given to the question of methods in economic investigation.

A moderate reading knowledge of German and French will of course be necessary.

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II
ECONOMIC HISTORY

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates

6a1hf. European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century. Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 9. Professor Gay, assisted by Mr. Klein. (X)

Course 6a undertakes to present the general outlines of the economic history of western Europe since the Industrial Revolution. Such topics as the following will be discussed: the economic aspects of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic regime, the Stein-Hardenberg reforms, the Zoll-Verein, Cobden and free trade in England, labor legislation and social reform, nationalism and the recrudescence of protectionism, railways and waterways, the effects of transoceanic competition, the rise of industrial Germany.

Since attention will be directed in this course to those phases of the subject which are related to the economic history of the United States, it may be taken usefully before Economics 6b. It is open to students who have passed in Economics 1, and, with the consent of the instructor, to students who have taken or are taking Economics 1.

 

6b2hf. Economic and Financial History of the United States. Halfcourse (second half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 9. Professor Gay, assisted by Mr. Klein. (X)

The following are among the subjects considered: aspects of the Revolution and commercial relations during the Confederation and the European wars; the history of the protective tariff policy and the growth of manufacturing industries; the settlement of the West and the history of transportation, including the early canal and turnpike enterprises of the states, the various phases of railway building and the establishment of public regulation of railways; banking and currency experiences; various aspects of agrarian history, such as the public land policy, the growth of foreign demand for American produce and the subsequent competition of other sources of supply; certain social topics, such as slavery and its economic basis, and the effects of immigration.

It is open to students who have passed in Economics 1, and, with the consent of the instructor, to all students except Freshmen who are taking Economics 1.

[p.62]

  1. Modern Economic History of Europe. Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 10. Professor Gay and Dr. Gray. (XI)

At the outset a survey will be made of economic and social conditions in the chief European countries at the close of the Middle Ages. The history of agriculture, industry, and commerce in the succeeding periods down to the beginning of the nineteenth century will then be treated in some detail. England will receive the emphasis due to its increasing importance during this period.

Course 11 is open to students who have passed satisfactorily in Economics 1 or History 1.

 

Primarily for Graduates

[102hf. Mediaeval Economic History of Europe. Half-course (second half-year). Mon., Wed., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Fri., at 2.30. Dr. Gray.] (VII)

Omitted in 1911-12.

After a preliminary examination of early economic and social institutions, this course aims to give a general view of the economic development of society during the Middle Ages. Among other topics, the following will be considered: mediaeval agriculture and serfdom; the manorial system and the economic aspects of feudalism; the beginnings of town life and the gild-system of industry; and the Italian and Hanseatic commercial supremacy.

It is essential that students should possess some reading knowledge of Latin.

 

[261hf. The Economic Development of Antiquity. Half-course (first half-year). Asst. Professor Ferguson.]

Omitted in 1911-12.

A series of lectures upon the agrarian, commercial, and industrial relations of the chief peoples of antiquity. Discussions of labor, money, banking, prices, transport, guilds, monopolies, and their economic, social, and political bearings.

_____________________

[p.63]

III

APPLIED ECONOMICS

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates

51hf. Economics of Transportation. Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 10. Professor Ripley, assisted by Dr. Dewing. (XI)

A brief outline of the historical development of rail and water transportation in the United States will be followed by a description of the condition of transportation systems at the present time. The four main subdivisions of rates and rate-making, finance, traffic operation, and legislation will be considered in turn. The first deals with the relation of the railroad to shippers, comprehending an analysis of the theory and practice of rate-making. An outline will be given of the nature of railroad securities, the principles of capitalization, and the interpretation of railroad accounts. Railroad operation will deal with the practical problems of the traffic department, such as the collection and interpretation of statistics of operation, pro-rating, the apportionment of cost, depreciation and maintenance, etc. Under legislation, the course of state regulation and control in the United States and Europe will be traced.

Course 5 is open only to students who have passed in Economics 1.

 

7a1hf. Introduction to Public Finance. Half-course (first half-year). Mon., Wed., Fri., at 9. Professor Bullock. (II)

This course covers the general field of public finance exclusive of taxation. After a brief survey of the history of public finance, the following subjects are studied: public expenditures, public revenues other than taxes, public debts, financial administration, and financial legislation. Attention is given both to the theory and to the practice of various countries.

A systematic course of readings is prescribed, and most of the exercises are conducted by the method of informal discussion. Candidates for honors will be given an opportunity to write theses. The course is open only to students who have passed in Economics 1. Graduate students are advised to take Economics 16. Course 7a is not open to students who in the year 1910-11 elected Economics 7, but such students may be admitted to Economics 1b with the consent of the instructor.

 

7b2hf. The Theory and Methods of Taxation. Half-course (second half-year). Mon., Wed., Fri., at 9. Professor Bullock. (II)

[p.64]

In this course the theory of taxation is first examined; then the tax systems of the United States and leading countries of Europe are studied. Finally proposals for reforming the methods employed in the United States are considered historically and critically.

The course will be conducted in the same manner as Economics 7a, and admission is subject to the same conditions. Students who do not elect this course at the beginning of the year will be admitted in February only with the consent of the instructor.

 

  1. Money, Banking, and Crises. Mon., Wed., Fri., at 1.30. Dr. Day. (VI)

This course aims to analyze the principal problems of money and credit. An examination is first made of the more important existing monetary systems. This is followed by a careful review of the more instructive chapters in the monetary history of England, Germany, France, the United States, Austria, British India, Mexico, and the Philippines.

The nature, origin, and early growth of commercial banking are considered. A thorough investigation of present banking practice in England, France, Germany, and Canada is followed by a study of banking history and present banking problems in the United States. In this connection foreign exchange and the money markets of London, Paris, Berlin, and New York are examined.

Finally attention is turned to those problems of money and credit which appear most prominently in connection with economic crises. Though emphasis is thrown upon the financial aspects of the trade cycle, the investigation covers the more fundamental factors causing commercial and industrial fluctuations.

Short papers upon assigned topics will be required of all students. The course is open to those only who have passed in Economics 1.

 

9a1hf. Problems of Labor. Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 1.30. Professor Ripley, assisted by Mr. ——. (XIV)

This course will deal mainly with the economic and social relations of employer and employed, with especial reference to legislation. Among the topics included will be: collective bargaining; labor organizations; factory legislation in the United States and Europe; strikes, strike legislation and legal decisions; conciliation and arbitration; employers’ liability and compulsory compensation; compulsory insurance with particular reference to European experience; the problem of the unemployed; apprenticeship, and trade and technical education.

[p. 65]

Each student will make at least one report upon a labor union, from the original documents. Two lectures a week, with one recitation, will be the usual practice. This course is open to students who hare passed in Economics 1 and to Juniors and Seniors of good standing who are taking Economics 1 at the same time.

 

*9b2hf. Economics of Corporations. Half-course (second half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 10. Professor Ripley, assisted by Dr. Dewing. (XI)

This course will treat of the fiscal and industrial organization of capital, especially in the corporate form. The principal topic considered will be industrial combination and the so-called trust problem. This will be broadly discussed, with comparative study of conditions in the United States and Europe. The development of corporate enterprise, promotion, and financing, accounting, liability of directors and underwriters, will be described, not from their legal but from their purely economic aspects; and the effects of industrial combination upon efficiency, profits, wages, prices, the development of export trade, and international competition will be considered in turn.

The course is open to those students only who have passed in Economics 1. Systematic reading and report work will be assigned from time to time.

 

*232hf. Economics of Agriculture, with special reference to American conditions. Half-course (second half-year). Tu., Th., at 2.30. Professor Carver. (XV)

A study of the relation of agriculture to the whole industrial system, the relative importance of rural and urban economics, the conditions of rural life in different parts of the United States, the forms of land tenure and methods of rent payment, the comparative merits of large and small holdings, the status and wages of farm labor, the influence of farm machinery, farmers’ organizations, the marketing and distribution of farm products, agricultural credit, the policy of the government toward agriculture, and the probable future of American agriculture.

This course is open to students who have passed in Economics 1, and, with the consent of the instructor, to Juniors and Seniors of good standing who are taking Economics 1 at the same time.

 

*301hf. The Financial Aspects of Combinations. Half-course (first half-year). Tu., Th., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Sat., at 12. Dr. Dewing. (XIII)

The course considers the financial aspects of combinations in the United States, giving attention, however, to the economic rather than to the

[p. 66]

business or legal problems involved. Examples of financial history and policy will be considered in some detail. The psychological as well as the economic conditions that determine the market price of railroad and industrial securities will be described with the purpose of formulating general principles. Each student will select a typical episode in the history of some combination and some general subject, such as promotion, minority rights, effect on prices, and will present reports at conferences which will sometimes replace the lectures of the course. This course is open only to those who have passed in Economics 1.

 

Attention is also called to the following courses :—

Government 32a1hf. Public Ownership and Control. Dr. Holcombe.

Government 32b2hf. Selected Problems in Public Ownership and Control. Dr. Holcombe.

 

Primarily for Graduates

*16. Public Finance (advanced course). Mon., Wed., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Fri., at 10. Professor Bullock. (III)

The course is devoted to the examination of the financial institutions of the principal modern countries, in the light of both theory and history. One or more reports calling for independent investigation will ordinarily be required. Special emphasis will be placed upon questions of American finance. Ability to read French or German is presupposed. Undergraduates are admitted only by consent of the instructor.

_____________________

IV
COURSES ESPECIALLY PREPARING FOR A BUSINESS CAREER

Among the courses described above, those on the industrial and financial phenomena of modern times are useful for students who propose to enter on a business career. Such are the courses on Money, Banking, and Crises (8), Economics of Transportation (5), Problems of Labor (9a), the Economics of Corporations (9b), the Economic and Financial History of the United States (6b), and European Industry and Commerce in the Nineteenth Century (6a). In addition, the following courses are designed more particularly to aid in the understanding of the problems likely to be met in business

[p. 67]

life, and are arranged with special regard to the needs of those looking to such a career. They are primarily for students who have reached or approached the close of their general education.

 

*18. Principles of Accounting. Mon., Wed., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Fri., at 11. Asst. Professor Cole and assistants. (IV)

This course is designed to show the processes by which the earnings and values of business properties are computed. It is not intended primarily to afford practice in book-keeping; but since intelligent construction and interpretation of accounts is impossible without a knowledge of certain main types of book-keeping, practice sufficient to give the student familiarity with elementary technique will form an important part of the work of the course. The chief work, however, will be a study of the principles that underlie the determination of profit, cost, and valuation. These will be considered as they appear in several types of business enterprise. Published accounts of corporations will be examined, and practice in interpretation will be afforded. The instruction will be chiefly by assigned readings, discussions, and written work.

Course 18 is not open to students before their last year of undergraduate work. For men completing their work at the end of the first half-year, it will be counted as a half-course. It is regularly open only to Seniors and to Graduates who have passed in Economics 1. Students intending to enter the Graduate School of Business Administration are expected to take this course in preparation for the advanced courses in accounting.

 

*211hf. The Law of Competition and Combination. Half-course (first half-year). Mon., Wed., Fri., at 12. Professor Wyman, assisted by Mr. —— . (V)

Course 21 is not open to students before their last year of undergraduate work, and is only open to those who have passed in Economics 1.

The course considers certain rules of the law governing the course of modern trade and the organization of modern industry. As the course deals with adjudication and legislation on questions of first importance in the economic development of modern times, it is of advantage to all those who wish to equip themselves for the intelligent discussion of issues having both legal and economic aspects. In 1911-12 four principal topics will be discussed: competition; combination; association; consolidation, — some very briefly, some with more detail. The conduct of the course will be by the reading and discussion of cases from the law reports, which are contained in an edited series of case books.

[p. 68]

Attention is also called to the following courses : —

Botany 5. Outlines of Economic Botany.

Engineering 4a. Surveying. Asst. Professor Hughes.

Engineering 4d. Railroad Engineering. Asst. Professor Hughes.

Engineering 11a2hf. Steam Machinery. Professor Hollis and Messrs. Markham and ——.

Geology 92hf. Geographic Influences in North America. Asst. Professor D. W. Johnson.

Geology 21hf. Geography of South America. Professor Ward.

_____________________

V
SOCIOLOGY
See further the courses in Social Ethics.

 

For Undergraduates and Graduates

Economics 3. Principles of Sociology.—Theories of Social Progress. Mon., Wed., and (at the pleasure of the instructor) Fri., at 1.30. Professor Carver, assisted by ——. (VI)

An analytical study of social life and of the factors and forces which hold society together and give it an orderly development. The leading social institutions will also be studied with a view to finding out their relation to social well-being and progress.

Spencer’s Principles of Sociology and Carver’s Sociology and Social Progress will be read in full. Students are expected to take part in the discussion of the books read and of the lectures delivered.

Course 3 is open only to students who have passed in Economics 1.

 

Anthropology 122hf. Primitive Sociology. Half-course (second half-year). Mon., Wed., Fri., at 1.30. Dr. Tozzer. (VI)

This course deals with the early history of such institutions as marriage, the family, property, government, law, and ethical standards. The social organization of primitive peoples will be examined. Totemism in its various phases will also be considered.

 

Attention is also called to the following courses : —

Philosophy 4. Ethics. Professor Palmer.

Philosophy 6a1hf. Philosophy of Religion. Professor E. C. Moore.

[p. 69]

Philosophy 32hf. Philosophy of Nature, with especial reference to Man’s Place in Nature. Asst. Professor G. P. Adams (University of California).

Philosophy 20d. Seminary in Ethics. Professor Palmer.

History of Religions 2. History of Religions in Outline. Professor G. F. Moore.

Anthropology 1. General Anthropology. Dr Tozzer.

Anthropology 5. American Archaeology and Ethnography. Asst. Professor Dixon and Drs. Farabee and Tozzer.

Anthropology 71hf. Ethnography of Oceania. Asst. Professor Dixon.

Anthropology 112hf. Ethnography of Asia. Asst. Professor Dixon.

_____________________

VI
COURSES OF RESEARCH

The following courses indicate those fields within which the members of the Department ordinarily undertake to guide students in research: —

Economics 20a. The Economic History of England. Professor Gay.

Economics 20b. Economic Theory. Professor Carver.

Economics 20c. Principles of Corporation Finance. Professor Ripley.

Economics 20d. The Economic History of the United States, with special reference to Tariff Legislation. Professor Taussig.

Economics 20e. American Taxation and Finance. Professor Bullock.

Economics 20f. Currency and Crises. Asst. Professor Sprague.

Economics 20g. Banking. Asst. Professor Sprague.

Economics 20h. Mediaeval Economic History. Dr. Gray.

 

The Seminary in Economics. Mon., at 4.30.

Meetings are held each week by instructors and advanced students for the presentation of the results of investigation. At intervals, other persons are invited to address the Seminary on subjects of theoretic or practical interest, giving opportunity for contact and discussion with the non-academic world. All graduate students of economics are expected to attend.

[…]

[p. 75]

GENERAL INFORMATION

_____________________ 

ORGANIZATION

The Division of History, Government, and Economics comprises three departments: History; Government; and Economics. The Division has charge of the administration of the degree of A.B. with Distinction in History, in Economics, and in Political Science, and of the degrees of Ph.D. in History, in Political Science, and in Economics. The recommendation of candidates for assistantships, fellowships, and scholarships is in the hands of the respective Departments; and each Department has charge of all matters relating specially to its own instruction.

 

DEGREE OF A.B.

The degree of Bachelor of Arts is conferred usually after four years of residence, although a student who enters college without serious deficiency may complete the requirements for the degree in three years or three years and a half. At least one year of residence is required. Graduates of other colleges and students of the higher classes of other colleges are admitted to advanced standing in Harvard College, without examination, on presenting testimonials of scholarship and character, and satisfactory evidence of work well performed in the institutions previously attended.

 

THE DEGREE OF A.B. WITH DISTINCTION IN HISTORY, IN ECONOMICS, AND IN POLITICAL SCIENCE

In the opinion of the Faculty every undergraduate of superior ability should look to a considerable amount of advanced work in some subject or related subjects as a natural part of his undergraduate career; but it is not to be imagined that the Faculty intends to call for anything like original research on the part of undergraduates, or for the passing of examinations similar to those required for the higher degrees. The Degree with Distinction, it is believed, is so planned as to be within the reach of every student of good ability.

[p. 76]

General Regulations. — The candidate for the degree of A.B. with Distinction in History, Government, and Economics shall make application, not later than November 1 of the year in which he expects to receive the degree, to the Division of History, Government, and Economics; he shall, at the same time, record his name and purpose at the office of the Dean of Harvard College. Students intending to become candidates are urged to put themselves, as early as the beginning of their Sophomore year, under the guidance of the Division.

The requirements for the degree cum laude and magna cum laude are the same. The grade of distinction depends on the excellence of the student’s work, as determined by the Division. If his work be judged unworthy of distinction, but worthy of a degree, the Division may recommend him for a degree without distinction.

Special Regulations. — Not later than November 1 of his final year of preparation, the candidate must present, for approval by the Division, a plan of study, which shall comprise at least seven courses, selected from those offered by the Division, and not including more than two from the courses regularly open to Freshmen. This plan of study may, however, with the approval of the Division, include related courses offered by other Departments of the University, and also, by special vote of the Division, suitable work done outside of regular courses. If four or more of the seven courses are courses in History, the candidate, if successful, will be recommended for the Degree with Distinction in History; if four or more of them are courses in Economics, he will be recommended for the Degree with Distinction in Economics; if less than four of them are courses in History, and less than four are courses in Economics, he will be recommended for the Degree with Distinction in Political Science.

Besides this minimum requirement, the candidate may indicate in his plan of study any additional work done in History, Government, Economics, or in related subjects. The character and range of this work will be taken into account in determining the recommendation for the Degree with Distinction. The winning of a University prize in any of the subjects represented in the Division, such as a Bowdoin, Toppan, or Sumner prize, may, at the Division’s discretion, be accepted as evidence towards establishing a candidate’s qualification for the Degree with Distinction.

[p. 77]

Not later than May 1 of his Senior year, the candidate will present to the Chairman of the Division a thesis; and he will be required to pass an oral examination on the general field covered by the courses he offers, or on such portion of the field as the Division may determine. Successful candidates at the oral examination will be excused from the final examinations in their Senior year in the courses offered for the Degree with Distinction; and unsuccessful candidates at the oral examination may be recommended by the Division for the ordinary degree without taking the final examinations in such courses.

In the award of the Dillaway Fellowship preference will be given to the most successful candidate for the Degree with Distinction in History; and the Philip Washburn Prize is offered for the best thesis, of sufficient merit, on an historical subject presented by a successful candidate for the Degree with Distinction in History.

[…]

[p. 78]

Degree with Distinction in Philosophy and Economics

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences have established a degree with distinction in Philosophy and Economics, intended to represent special attainment in the study of social problems, theoretical and practical. This degree is to be administered by a standing committee of three under the following rules : —

As early as possible in his college career, and not later than November 1 of his final year, the candidate must present a plan of study to the Chairman of the Committee on Degrees with Distinction in Philosophy and Economics.

Such a plan must comprise at least eight courses, of which at least two must be in (1) Philosophy, (2) Social Ethics, and (3) Economics, respectively. Of these courses at least one in each of these

[p. 79]

groups and at least six in all must be of the grade not open to Freshmen. The courses in Economics and Philosophy which form a part of the plan must be approved by the Committee as suitable to the general purposes of the degree.

Not later than May 1 of his final year, the candidate must submit a thesis on some topic in social theory or practice. The subject must be approved by the Committee not later than the beginning of the second half of the candidate’s final year. This thesis may, with the instructors1 permission, replace the regular thesis work connected with the courses which the candidate is taking.

At some date after May 1 of the candidate’s final year, he will be examined on the field covered by the courses which he offers in his plan of study. With the consent of the instructors concerned he may be excused from the final examinations in those courses of his programme which fall in his final year.

 

DEGREE OF A.M.

The ordinary requirement for the degree of Master of Arts for a graduate of a college of good standing consists of at least one year of residence and study devoted to advanced work approved by the Administrative Board of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences as affording suitable preparation for the degree and completed with distinction. Graduates of colleges whose requirements for admission and graduation are considerably below those of Harvard College, or of colleges whose standing is not well known to the Administrative Board, and graduates of any college who have not sufficient preparation for advanced work in their particular subject of study, are ordinarily required to devote at least two years to their study for this degree. In special cases this period may be shortened to one year or one year and a half for students whose work in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences shows unusual excellence.

The programme of study for the degree of Master of Arts must form a consistent plan of work pursued with some definite aim, whether it lies wholly in a single department or field of study or in more than one; this work may be done either in, or in connection with, the regular courses of instruction, or independently of them. Programmes should he submitted early in the academic

[p. 80]

year, and no programme will ordinarily be approved that is received after January 15 of the academic year in which the degree is to be taken. All applications should be addressed to the Secretary of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

All candidates must possess an elementary knowledge of two modern foreign languages, ordinarily French and German.

 

DEGREE OF PH.D.

For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy not less than two years devoted to advanced studies, approved as affording suitable preparation for the degree, are required of graduates of colleges of good standing. This degree is not usually taken in less than three years after the attainment of the degree of Bachelor of Arts in Harvard College, or an equivalent. A graduate of another college may ascertain by writing to the Secretary of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences whether any special conditions will be imposed upon him. In order to be admitted to the degree the candidate must show a general training in the whole field of study, firm grasp of his special subject within the field, and independent research in some portion of that subject. He must present a thesis, showing original treatment or investigation, and must pass such examination or examinations as may be required by the Division. The degree is given on the ground of thorough study and high attainments. Appropriate studies carried on in the graduate school of another university may be recognized as a part of the candidate’s preparation for the degree. The minimum period of residence at Harvard University is one year.

The University confers the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History; in Political Science; and in Economics. Candidates for the degree under any of these heads are subject to supervision and examination by the Division of History, Government, and Economics. In order to indicate the grounds on which it is prepared to recommend candidates for the degree, the Division has adopted the following statements and suggestions.

 

All communications relative to the doctorate should be sent to the Chairman of the Division of History, Government, and Economics.

[p. 81]

General Preparation

Every candidate for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy is required, at an early stage in his preparation, to submit to the Division, through its chairman, evidence of the extent and quality of his general studies. A command of good English, spoken and written, the ability to make free use of French and German books, and a fair acquaintance with general history are expected in all cases. On the evidence presented, the Division will decide, provisionally, as to the sufficiency of the candidate’s general training. No set examinations will be held at this stage, but before he is admitted to the general examination each candidate must present a certificate from some member of the Division stating that he is able to make free use of French and German books. Such a certificate may be given on the basis either of a special test or of the candidate’s use of these languages in connection with the regular courses of instruction. Candidates may be required to make up deficiencies by pursuing specified College courses, or in such other way as the Division may designate. The provisional acceptance of a candidate, as regards this portion of his preparation, does not preclude the Division from rejecting him later, if, in the examination on specific subjects, it shall appear that his general education is insufficient.

Candidates must ordinarily pass two examinations: the first general, the second (after the acceptance of the thesis) on a special field, defined in each case by vote of the Division.

I. General Examination

The first examination will be held not later than the beginning of the last year of study for the degree, and candidates are recommended to present themselves for this examination in the course of the preceding academic year. The object of this test is to ascertain the applicant’s attainments within a considerable range of subjects in the field of History, Political Science, or Economics. He will ordinarily be examined in six subjects in all, chosen from the groups defined below under the respective departments of study, but the ground of his special field will not be covered in the general examination. Candidates are not required, however, to follow the details of these plans. They may present, for the consideration of the

[p. 82]

Division, reasonable substitutes for any of the topics named, and may offer appropriate combinations of parts of the separate subjects. They are advised, in all cases, to submit their plans of study for approval at an early date. In judging of the candidate’s fitness for the degree, regard will be had to the general grasp and maturity shown, as well as to the range and accuracy of his attainments in the specific subjects of examination.

II. Thesis

The thesis must be in the hands of the Chairman of the Division on or before April 1 of the year in which the degree is sought. It must be accepted as satisfactory before the candidate can be admitted to the final examination. It must show an original treatment of the subject, or give evidence of independent research, and must also be in good literary form and suitable for publication.*

_____________________

* A list of the theses which have been accepted for the Ph.D. in the Division of History, Government, and Economics will be found in the list of Doctors of Philosophy and Doctors of Science who have received their degree in course from Harvard University, 1873-1909, published by the University in 1910.

_____________________

III. Special Examination

The second examination will be on a single limited subject agreed upon in advance. It is intended that each candidate should have, as far as possible, freedom of choice in selecting his subject, but it is expected that he will submit, for approval, an outline of work to be presented in satisfaction of this requirement. It is desirable that this outline should be submitted a year in advance of the examination. Ordinarily the ground covered by the special examination will not be greater in extent than one of the subjects offered by the candidate at his general examination, and may be identical with one of these subjects. Or the candidate may limit his more special preparation to an approved portion of this field, which will regularly include the period or topic within which the thesis lies. At the final examination, the candidate will be expected to show such a mastery of his special field, and such an acquaintance with the literature, general and special, bearing on it, as would qualify him to give instruction to mature students.

[…]

[p. 85]

THE DEGREE OF PH.D. IN ECONOMICS

General Preparation

Candidates for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Economics must meet the general requirements stated on page 81. They should also be well grounded in the main outlines of European and American history, and should have had a general view of the nature and growth of political institutions and constitutional law.

[p. 86]

General Examination

This examination (the general conditions of which are stated on p. 81) will include six subjects, chosen from the following list. Of the six subjects, at least one must be taken from each of the groups A, B, C, and D, the first three of these groups being purely economic, while the fourth, more general in character, is intended to secure a somewhat broader basis of preparation. In all cases at least one of the subjects chosen must be historical in character, either economic history under group B or one of the historical fields defined under Group D.

 

Group A

  1. Economic Theory and its History.

 

Group B

  1. Economic History to 1750.
  2. Economic History since 1750.
  3. Sociology and Social Reform.
  4. Statistics (Literature, Methods, and Results).

 

Group C

  1. Money, Banking, and Commercial Crises.
  2. Public Finance and Financial History.
  3. Transportation and Foreign Commerce.
  4. Labor Problems and Industrial Organization.

 

Group D

Selected topics from one or more of the following fields : —

  1. History of Political Institutions in Mediaeval Europe, including England.
  2. History of Political Institutions since 1500 in Europe, including England.
  3. History of American Institutions.
  4. Modern Government and Comparative Constitutional Law.
  5. Jurisprudence.
  6. Philosophy.
  7. Anthropology

In the case of a candidate whose special subject is in the Department of Social Ethics, the six subjects for examination will be chosen

[p. 87]

from the two following groups. The candidate will be examined in all four of the subjects in Group E, and is expected to be proficient in the history of one of them. He will select two subjects from Group F.

Group E

  1. Ethical Theory.
  2. Economic Theory.
  3. Poor Relief.
  4. Social Reforms.

Group F

  1. Sociology.
  2. Statistics.
  3. Economic History.
  4. The Labor Question.
  5. Criminology and Penology.
  6. Problems of Municipal Government.
  7. Anthropology.

 

FELLOWSHIPS AND SCHOLARSHIPS

About $50,000 is distributed annually among undergraduate students, in amounts ranging from $40 to $450. About thirty-five fellowships and ninety scholarships are also annually assigned to graduate students, the former varying in amount from $400 to $1150, the latter from $150 to $400. Many of these appointments are open to persons not already members of the University. Some of the fellowships permit the holders to study abroad as travelling fellows; others require residence in Cambridge. There is also a special endowment of $350,000, the Frederick Sheldon Fund, for Travelling Fellowships. Non-resident appointments are awarded only to persons who have been resident students in some department of the University.

Eleven of the fellowships and scholarships have special reference to historical, political, and economic studies, namely: the Bayard Cutting Fellowship (income $1150), for the study of History; the Woodhury Lowery Fund (income $900), for research in Historical Archives; the Robert Treat Paine Fellowship (income $600), for the study of Social Science; the South End House Fellowship ($600), for the study of Social Problems; the Henry Lee Memorial Fellowship (income $525), for the study of Political

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Economy; the Henry Bromfield Rogers Memorial Fellowship (income $525), for the study of Ethics in its relation to Jurisprudence or to Sociology; the Ozias Goodwin Memorial Fellowship (income $525), assigned to students of Constitutional or International Law; the Charles Wyman Scholarship in History (income $450); the Adams Woods Fellowship ($400), for the study of heredity in American History; the George W. Dillaway Fellowship (income $250), “in favor of the graduate from year to year who passes his examination with highest honor in Modern History”; and a special fellowship of $600 in Social Ethics.

Applications for graduate fellowships and scholarships should be made upon a special form which may be obtained from the Secretary of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, 24 University Hall, Cambridge. Applications must be in the hands of the Committee on Fellowships by March 15. Full information concerning the various fellowships and scholarships will be found in the University Catalogue or in the announcement of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

Through the liberality of the École Libre des Sciences Politiques of Paris, Harvard University has the privilege each year of nominating a scholar for membership in the school without payment of fees.

 

PRIZES

The following prizes are open to competition by students of History, Government, or Economics: three Bowdoin Prizes for Undergraduates ($250, $100, $100) for dissertations upon any subject approved by the Chairman of the Committee on Bowdoin Prizes; a Bowdoin Prize for Graduates ($200) for essays within certain special fields of learning, open for the year 1911-12 to students of History and Political Science; the Philip Washburn Prize ($75) for the best thesis on an historical subject presented by a successful candidate for the degree of A.B. with Distinction in History or in Political Science; the Toppan Prize ($150) for Graduates “for the best essay (of sufficient merit) on a subject in Political Science”; the Sumner Prize ($100) open to any student “for the best dissertation on a subject connected with the topic of universal peace and the methods by which war may be permanently superseded”; the Bennett Prize ($40) open to

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Seniors and third or fourth year Special Students “for the best essay on some subject pi American governmental domestic or foreign policy of contemporaneous interest”; the Ricardo Prize Scholarship ($350) open to those who are Seniors or members of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in 1911-12, and awarded after a special examination; the David A. Wells Prize in Economics ($500) open to Seniors in the College and Graduates of any department of the University of not more than three years’ standing “for the best thesis embodying the results of original investigation” upon a subject within the field of Economics. The successful thesis will be printed by the University from the income of a fund likewise provided by the will of the late David A. Wells.

Further details concerning these prizes may be found in the University Catalogue.

[…]

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The Department of Economics publishes the Quarterly Journal of Economics, now in its twenty-fifth volume. It also publishes the Harvard Economic Studies, of which the following volumes have appeared:—

  1. The English Patents of Monopoly. By William Hyde Price, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Political Economy in Yale University.
  2. The Lodging House Problem in Boston. By Albert Benedict Wolfe, Ph.D., Professor of Economics and Sociology in Oberlin College.
  3. The Stannaries. A Study of the Early English Miner. By George Randall Lewis, Ph.D.
  4. Railroad Reorganizations. By Stuart Daggett, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Economics in the University of California.
  5. Wool-Growing and the Tariff. A Study in the Economic History of the United States. By Chester Whitney Wright, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Political Economy in the University of Chicago.
  6. Public Ownership of Telephones on the Continent of Europe. By Arthur Norman Holcombe, Ph.D., Instructor in Government in Harvard University.
  7. The British Post Office. By Joseph Clarence Hemmeon, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Economies in McGill University. (In press.)

 

Source: Division of History, Government, and Economics: 1911-12 (1st ed.). Official Register of Harvard University, Vol. VIII, No. 23 (June 15, 1911).