| A. Lawrence Lowell |
Article Index for A |
Website Links For Abbott |
Information AboutA. Lawrence Lowell |
|
U.S. educator, historian, and President Of Harvard University (1909–33), Abbott Lawrence Lowell (January 1, 1856–January 6, 1943) was born to Augustus Lowell and his wife Katherine Bigelow Lowell at the families 10 acre estate in Brookline, MA . The Lowells, a prominent Boston Family , affectionately named this estate Sevenels for the fact that there were 7 members in their family. Abbott's siblings included poet Amy Lowell , astronomer Percival Lowell (Harvard 1876), and early activist for prenatal care Elizabeth Lowell Putnam . They were the great-grandchildren of John Lowell (Harvard 1760) and, on their mother's side, the grandchildren of Abbott Lawrence . EDUCATION AND CAREER A. Lawrence graduated from Harvard College in 1877 with highest honors in mathematics, and from Harvard Law School in 1880. He practiced law from 1880 to 1897 in partnership with his cousin, Francis Cabot Lowell (b. 1855), with whom he wrote ''Transfer of Stock in Corporations'' (1884). Lowell also wrote ''Essays on Government'' (1889), ''Governments and Parties in Continental Europe'' (2 vols., 1896), ''Colonial Civil Service'' (1900; with an account by H. Morse Stephens of the East India College at Haileybury ), and ''The Government of England'' (2 vols., 1908). In 1897, he became lecturer, and in 1898, professor of government at Harvard. In 1900, he succeeded his father as financial head of the Lowell Institute of Boston. And in 1909, he succeeded Charles William Eliot as president of the university. In the same year, he became president of the American Political Science Association . As president of Harvard University, A. Lawrence accomplished implementing the house system and co-founded the Harvard Society Of Fellows . He also commissioned his cousin and architect Guy Lowell (Harvard 1892) to build President's House at 17 Quincy St which remained the residence of succeeding Harvard Presidents until Derek Bok (1971–91) moved his young family into Elmwood (house) in 1971. Lowell also continued pressing for the evolution of "concentrations" (Harvard's name for Academic Majors ), which he had begun to develop while still a professor. His predecessor, Charles W. Eliot , had replaced the single standardized undergraduate course with a plethora of electives; Lowell began encouraging (and eventually requiring) students to concentrate the heft of their studies in some academic field or other. Lowell's 24 year stewardship over Harvard University is only surpassed by his predecessors Charles William Eliot , serving 40 years at the helm, and Edward Holyoke , serving for 32 years. CONTROVERSY Lowell's career was not without high profile controversies. Two, now infamous, circumstances exemplify just how far modern social values and morals have progressed. The Secret Court of 1920 A 2002 article by Amit R. Paley in The Harvard Crimson exposed Lowell's role in a secret Harvard court that expelled eight students and one philosophy Ph.D. candidate for being homosexual or associating with homosexuals. One of the expelled students committed suicide. Another killed himself 10 years later. This compelled Harvard President Lawrence Summers to reflect on The Court of 1920 more than 80 years after the fact: "These reports of events long ago are extremely disturbing. They are part of a past that we have rightly left behind." Summers apologized, "I want to express our deep regret for the way this situation was handled, as well as the anguish the students and their families must have experienced eight decades ago". And continued, "Whatever attitudes may have been prevalent then, persecuting individuals on the basis of sexual orientation is abhorrent and an affront to the values of our university. We are a better and more just community today because those attitudes have changed as much as they have." The Lowell Committee 1927 "...after all recourse in the Massachusetts courts had failed, Sacco And Vanzetti were sentenced to death. By then the dignity and the words of the two men had turned them into powerful symbols of social justice for many throughout the world. Public agitation on their behalf by radicals, workers, immigrants, and Italians had become international in scope, and many demonstrations in the world's great cities–Paris, London, Mexico City, Buenos Aires–protested the unfairness of their trial. This great public pressure, combined with influential behind-the-scenes interventions, finally persuaded the governor of Massachusetts, Alvan T. Fuller , to consider the question of Executive Clemency for the two men. He appointed an advisory committee, the "Lowell Committee," so-called because its most prominent member was A. Lawrence Lowell, president of Harvard University. The committee...concluded that the trial and Judicial Process had been just, "on the whole", and that clemency was not warranted. It only fueled controversy over the fate of the two men, and Harvard, because of Lowell's role, became stigmatized, in the words of one of its alumni, as "Hangman's House." {Link without Title} REFERENCES
|
|
|