Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1942 [PAGE 911]

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BOARD O F T R U S T E E S

[June 20

MATTERS P R E S E N T E D BY P R E S I D E N T WILLARD T h e B o a r d considered t h e following matters presented by t h e Presid e n t of t h e U n i v e r s i t y . INVESTIGATION BY GENERAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE (1) During the past several days there have appeared in the press certain statements and charges against the Board of Trustees and the University of Illinois, attributed to the Attorney General of the State. Because of the widespread publicity given these statements and the probable harmful and erroneous impression such statements will create in the minds of the citizens of the State, I recommend that the President of the University be authorized to request the General Advisory Committee of the University of Illinois to make an investigation and public report on the validity or falsity of these charges for the information of all citizens. T h e general direction of such an investigation could properly be handled by the Executive Committee of the General Committee, with each subcommittee studying its appropriate phase of the University's program. T h e r e are ten subcommittees, the chairmen of which could meet at the University with the Executive Committee or as a Special Committee to secure pertinent data as the basis for final judgment and report. No more representative or competent group of Illinois citizens could be found than the men and women now serving on the General Advisory Committee, all of whom except certain ex-officio members are non-alumni of this University. They are well known in their respective communities and after suitable study of the situation can bring their unbiased and intelligent judgments to bear on this matter which is of vital importance to the University of Illinois and its future. June 18, 1942 Dr. Karl A. Meyer, President Board of Trustees, University of Cook County Hospital Chicago, Illinois

DEAR PRESIDENT M E Y E R :

Illinois

In view of the published statements appearing in the press of the State and attributed to the Attorney General of Illinois that "I intend to prove that since 1934 a group of hand-picked political puppets have virtually built a political empire in Champaign and Urbana and have cloaked their operations and defended their illegal activities behind the shield of education. " T h e University has been on the downgrade since 1934 when control was taken over by a board of trustees who were not the choice of the people but were hand-picked by the downstate democratic machine and the Kelly-Nash machine in Cook County. "Myself and other alumni of the University have watched our school's decline since the political termites crept into the administration. " T h e Johnson exposure in itself is enough to warrant an investigation of the entire administrative branch of the University. If such irregularities have been committed in one department, they may have been committed in others." I wish to recommend the following procedure for the consideration of the Board of Trustees: That, because of the widespread publicity given these statements and the probable harmful and erroneous impression such statements will create in the minds of the citizens of the State, the President of the University be authorized to request the General Advisory Committee of the University of Illinois to make an investigation and public report on the validity or falsity of these charges for the information of all citizens. T h e general direction of such an investigation could properly be handled by the Executive Committee of the General Committee, with each subcommittee studying its appropriate phase of the University's program. T h e r e are ten subcommittees, the chairmen of which could meet at the University with the Executive Committee or as a Special Committee to secure pertinent data as the basis for final judgment and report.