Dartblog

Robert Downey wrote:

I don’t know Peter Robinson, Dartmouth ‘79 and a trustee, but he’s obviously very smart based on his provocative piece in the Oct. 18 editorial page entitled “The Dartmouth fracas.” And we both love the same institution. What I find baffling, however, is his assertion that: “To ensure democracy at the college, vote against the proposed constitution.”

What am I missing here? To me what the Alumni Governance Task Force is seeking to accomplish in trustee elections under the proposed constitution surely promotes democracy. I am not a member of the AGTF nor of the Alumni Council, but I strongly support what they are trying to achieve, which is that trustees be elected by a majority of the votes cast.

The current system requires that the Nominating Committee put up three candidates to fill one vacancy. So they scour the 66,000-plus alumni to find the best, brightest, most accomplished graduates who have demonstrated their love for Dartmouth over the years by their contributions of work, wisdom and possibly, for those that can afford it, financial support. (In other words, they do what virtually all colleges, universities and other nonprofit organizations in America do in attempting to find first-rate trustees.)

A petition candidate with an agenda doesn’t need to have done much for Dartmouth over the years but the candidate must have a strong and often dissident point of view aimed at the disaffected. Any top college will have a large number of disaffected alumni at any given time. An articulate petition candidate can inherit a powerful base on day one, a base that resists supporting those whom they believe merely support the status quo. The predictable result can be devastating for the council-nominated candidates. For example, if those candidates receive cumulatively, say, 70% of the vote but that breaks down to 25%, 23% and 22% per candidate because they are similarly qualified, the petition candidate becomes the clear winner with the remaining 30%.

The proposed constitution is an infinite improvement over the current system for promoting two-person races. How can we continue to ask three of our best, brightest and most devoted Dartmouth alumni to continue to expose themselves to elections where they can be accused of being lackeys and insiders on the one hand, but with little chance of winning on the other since the three of them will cancel each other out in favor of a petition candidate with an agenda. What a recipe for burnout of our finest Dartmouth men and women, our most cherished alumni.

Now when you believe your cause is the right one but you have an unfair advantage such as that provided to petition candidates under the present system, I guess it may be human nature to rationalize that edge and fight to preserve it; what is not acceptable, however, is to accuse those seeking to elect trustees by a majority vote of being undemocratic.

Robert N. Downey
Dartmouth ‘58
New York