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Although long before the close of the first half of the present century Phi Beta Kappa had become a scheme for indicating and rewarding scholastic attainments, the various Alphas continued to grant charters in their respective states, or to combine in placing chapters in states not before entered. Thus the Alpha of Ohio was instituted at Western Reserve in 1847, the Alpha of Vermont at the University of Vermont in 1848, and the Alpha of Alabama at the State University in 1850. Amherst received a charter in 1853, Kenyon in 1858, New York University in 1858, Marietta in 1860, Williams in 1864, the Free Academy (now the College of the City of New York) in 1867, Middlebury College in 1868,
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Rutgers and Columbia in 1869, Hamilton in 1870, Hobart in 1871, Colgate in 1878, and Cornell in 1883.
At the annual meeting of the Alpha of Massachusetts in 1880, a committee of five members, of which the Rev. Edward Everett Hale was chairman, was appointed to arrange for a convention of all the chapters of Phi Beta Kappa to be held in Cambridge the day after Commencement in 1881, in commemoration of the cen- tennial of the Harvard Chapter. Invitations requesting each chapter to send five delegates to the convention were issued by this committee. The convention assembled June 30, 1881, twelve chapters being represented by twenty-nine delegates. By a series of preliminary steps, the first of which were taken at this con- clave, a constitution has been adopted for "The United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa", and a National Council, or governing body, consisting of twenty Senators and of three delegates from each chapter, has been provided for. Every third year a meeting of the Council is held, and ten new senators are elected to succeed ten whose terms have expired. In the interval between the meet- ings of the Council the Senate acts for the United Chapters. The first triennial session was held in 1883. All of the existing chap- ters of Phi Beta Kappa have acceded to the new constitution; and the society, while incapable of an active undergraduate life, seems to be assured of a dignified and useful existence as a graduate institution.
Under the new regime chapters have been instituted at Dickinson, Lehigh, and Rochester, in 1887; at DePauw, in 1889; at Kansas, Northwestern, and Lafayette, in 1890; at Tufts and Minnesota, in 1892; at Pennsylvania, in 1893; at Colby, Syracuse, Swarthmore, Johns Hopkins, Iowa, and Nebraska, in 1895. The total number of living chapters is forty. Formerly there were chapters in the Universities of Alabama and Mississippi, but they are now extinct. As for the number of members, dead or living, it is about 19,000. Many of the chapters have printed their respective rolls, but a general catalogue has not been issued.
The original badge of Phi Beta Kappa was a square silver medal engraved on one side with an index hand, three stars, and the Greek initials of the society's motto, while on the reverse are the letters S. P., and the date December 5, 1776. This badge was worn suspended on a cord by an eyelet attached to the middle of one of the sides. At the North the medal was for a time worn suspended by a pink or blue ribbon, and afterwards the badge
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became a gold key with an oblong shape instead of a square. The number of stars varies somewhat in the different chapters.
Nearly fifty years ago a movement to organize a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa at Michigan was set on foot, but the absence of a marking system and the indifference or hostility of the Faculty defeated the project. It is to be regret- ted that there exists among us no society instituted for the purpose of high scholarship in classical studies; and perhaps the obstacles in the way of founding such a society are not insurmountable.
ФВК
As.has been related, a chapter of Phi Beta Kap- pa was organized at Union College in 1817. This branch of the old Virginian order never had more than an honorary existence, although membership in it, as in the three other Northern branches, was KEY OF PHI BETA KAPPA. valued as evidence of high scholarship. A few years after the institution of the chapter a company of about sixty students for out-door exercise and military drill was formed in the college. Upon the graduation, in 1825, of Cap- tain Edward Bayard, so warm a conflict for the command ensued that it was deemed advisable to divide the company. A reaction of feeling led to indifference; the military fever had run its course; and, to use the words of a founder of the oldest of the present Greek-letter societies, " there was left only an aching void, wait- ing to be filled by an inspiration of genius from some quarter, which was not long in coming". About the middle of Novem- ber, 1825, certain members of the military company mentioned, including two of its chief officers, determined to organize a new secret society for literary and social purposes; and, November 26, Messrs. Hunter, Jackson, and Hun, of the senior class, formally initiated two of their classmates, Young and Knox, after which action the name of Kappa Alpha was formally adopted. Early in the following month seven more members of '26 were initiated into the new order.
On the 4th day of March, 1827, the fraternity of Sigma Phi was founded at Union by members of the class of '27, some of whom had belonged to the same military company in which were the originators of Kappa Alpha. Then came Delta Phi, organized in November, 1827, by nine men of '28. Psi Upsilon, also of Union College, was founded by seven undergraduates in November, 1833. In the meantime Sigma Phi had started a branch at Hamil-
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ton College, which may be said to have suggested-or hastened- the foundation of Alpha Delta Phi in the same college in January, 1832. Kappa Alpha placed a chapter in Williams College in 1833, and was followed there by Sigma Phi a year later. A third branch of Sigma Phi, organized in 1835 in New York University, found itself preceded there by Alpha Delta Phi, which, having placed a chapter at Miami University in 1834, had, one year later, entered New York. A third chapter of Kappa Alpha, the one at Hobart, was not organized until 1844, in which year Delta Kappa Epsilon was founded at Yale. Before that date both Alpha Delta Phi and Psi Upsilon had become widely extended fraternities, the former having formed a roll of twelve chapters, eight of which were alive at the close of 1843, while Psi Upsilon at the opening of 1844 had ten branches, all in active operation.
In 1839 Beta Theta Pi, the oldest of the societies of Western origin, was founded at Miami University, having been suggested by the five-year old chapter of Alpha Delta Phi in the same insti- tution. Chi Psi was organized at Union in 1841; and Theta Delta Chi, instituted in 1847, completes the roll of the fraternities now existing which trace their origin to the ancient college in Schenec- tady. Earlier in 1847, possibly in 1846, Zeta Psi arose in New York University, where it had for rivals Alpha Delta Phi, Sigma Phi, Psi Upsilon, and Delta Phi. The last named KA 7 fraternity was slower than most of its rivals in extending its boun- daries, for its chapters organized before 1844 were only four in num- ber, viz., Union, BADGE OF KAPPA ALPHA. Brown, New York, and Columbia. At the last-named college, and at the same time at New York University, Delta Psi, the ninth in age of the ten Eastern fraternities, was founded in 1847. Chi Psi, starting at Union in 1841, and D. K. E. at Yale in 1844, were extended very rapidly, as also were Zeta Psi and Theta Delta Chi. Delta Upsi-
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lon, the non-secret fraternity, took a Greek name in 1857-58, hav- ing previously existed as the "Anti-Secret Confederation ", of which the oldest branch was founded in 1834, at Williams College.
As has been said, Beta Theta Pi was the earliest fraternity of Western origin. Phi Gamma Delta, founded in 1848, at what was really a Western institution, Jefferson College in Western Pennsyl- vania, was the second. Phi Delta Theta arose in Miami Univer- sity in 1848, and there also Sigma Chi was organized seven years later. In the meantime a fraternity called Phi Kappa Sigma had been started in the University of Pennsylvania, and Phi Kappa Psi, now a widely-extended order, was instituted at Jefferson Col- lege early in 1852. Another society, which, until recently, was chiefly confined to the Western states, is Delta Tau Delta, founded in 1859 at Bethany College, West Virginia. All of these societies have branches in the Eastern, many of them in the Southern states.
In 1854 a fraternity called Chi Phi was organized in the Col- lege of New Jersey, now styled Princeton University. An attempt has been made to connect this society with an organization said to have existed in [824 at Princeton, and to have been known as XpIGToù Dedoi. Even if such a society really existed in 1824 no actual connection between it and the later Chi Phi has been shown or even claimed, nor is the name of any member of the earlier organization known. In view of these facts the claim of Chi Phi to seniority in age among the existing Greek-letter fraternities has not been allowed except within the limits of that order. The soci- ety as it exists at present is a combination of three distinct frater- nities, and has branches in widely separated states.
In 1856, at the University of Alabama, was founded the ear- liest of the present Greek-letter Southern fraternities. It had a somewhat rapid extension before the Civil War, and since then has spread into all parts of the country. Other fraternities of Southern origin are the Alpha Tau Omega and the Kappa Alpha, both founded in 1865, the Kappa Sigma, formed in 1867, the Pi Kappa Alpha organized in 1868, and the Sigma Nu, started in 1869.
Besides the twenty-five fraternities already mentioned there have been many others which have died or which have been merged in some of the existing societies. None of these was im- portant, although some of them had individual chapters that were locally strong. There have also been many local societies, that is, organizations confined to a single college. Most of them have
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perished or have been absorbed by the intercollegiate fraternities, but some still flourish. Among the latter are the I. K. A. of Trin- ity, the Lambda Iota and Delta Psi of Vermont, the Phi Nu Theta of Wesleyan, the Kappa Kappa Kappa of Dartmouth, and the Berzelius and the Book and Snake of the Yale Scientific School.
It is usual to divide the collegiate fraternities into classes, according to the geographical distribution of their chapters. Ex- cept in the chronological sense this arrangement is somewhat mis- leading, for most of the Western and two or three of the Southern fraternities now have chapters in New England and New York. As a rule the Eastern societies, though older than the others, have shorter chapter rolls; OT and they have extended themselves very cau- TT TO tiously in the West, and almost not at all in VERITAS X01 the South. Kappa Alpha, the oldest of all רֹת the fraternities, has also the fewest chapters, having had only eight in all, of which six survive. Sigma Phi has had ten chapters, of which two are dead. Delta Phi has had SEAL OF YALE COLLEGE. sixteen in all, twelve of which remain. Delta Psi has granted nineteen charters, and now has eight branches. Of the twenty-two chapters instituted by Psi Upsilon, twenty-one
are living. Chi Psi retains eighteen of a list of twenty-eight branches. Alpha Delta Phi now has twenty-three active chapters, the total number of its charters thus far being thirty-one. Of the thirty-one branches started by Zeta Psi, twenty remain. Theta Delta Chi has instituted thirty-nine chapters and holds twenty-one, while D. K. E., the largest of all the Eastern fraternities, flourishes in thirty-five of the forty-eight colleges which it has entered. Many of the fraternities of Western or Southern origin surpass even Delta Kappa Epsilon in the number of their chapters, Phi Delta Theta having had eighty-six branches of which sixty-three survive, while Sigma Alpha Epsilon has had eighty-six in all, and has preserved fifty-five. Of the eighty-one chapters instituted by Beta Theta Pi sixty-two are in active operation. Sigma Chi has entered seventy- two different colleges and now has fifty branches. Of Phi Gamma Delta's seventy-two chapters, forty-five survive. Delta Tau Delta has been less fortunate, having preserved only thirty-eight of its sixty-seven charges. Phi Kappa Psi has granted fifty-seven char- ters, thirty-nine of which are held at the colleges for which they were issued. Delta Upsilon, the non-secret fraternity, has thirty- one living and only five inactive chapters.
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Kappa Alpha has fewer members than any of its younger rivals, having initiated only 1,360 men. Sigma Phi has 2, 100, Delta Phi 3,000, Delta Psi 3,000, Chi Psi 3,800, Theta Deta Chi 3,900, Zeta Psi 4,500, Delta Upsilon 6,500, Alpha Delta Phi 7,800, Psi Upsilon 8,800, and D. K. E., the largest of the Eastern fraternities, 13,000. Of the other fraternities, Beta Theta Pi and Phi Delta Theta have about 9,600 apiece, while Phi Kappa Psi has 7,300, Phi Gamma Delta 6,100, Sigma Chi 6,000, Delta Tau Delta 5,700, and Sigma Alpha Epsilon 5,000.
From insignificant groups of students the older Greek-letter orders have developed into select and powerful organizations which hand down their traditions from generation to generation, and which include in their ranks most of the eminent college graduates of the past sixty years. Half a century ago nearly all of the college presidents of the country were unfriendly to the secret orders; today the presidents of Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, Am- herst, Trinity, Vermont, Columbia, Union, Hamilton, Rochester, Rutgers, Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins, Michigan, Wisconsin, Min- nesota, California, and other prominent institutions, are men who during college life wore the badges of secret orders.
The first catalogue printed by any of the modern Greek-letter societies was issued by Sigma Phi in 1832. Kappa Alpha first pub- lished the roll of its members in 1835. Alpha Delta Phi, the first fraternity to secure a long list of chap- ters, issued a catalogue in 1837. Four years later appeared the first roll of Psi Upsilon. Delta Kappa Epsilon's earliest catalogue came out in 1851. Sigma Y Phi was the first society to print a geographical ar- rangement of its membership, and Psi Upsilon was the first to publish lists showing which of its mem ORIGINAL BADGE OF PSI UPSILON. bers were sons or brothers of other members; features which are included in all recent catalogues. The first catalogue illustrated with elaborate biographical data was emitted by Psi Upsilon nineteen years ago. This example has been admirably followed by Alpha Delta Phi, Chi Psi, D. K. E., Sigma Phi, Kappa Alpha, Delta Upsilon, Phi Delta Theta, Sigma Chi, Phi Kappa Psi, and Beta Theta Pi. Nearly fifty years ago Psi Upsilon issued the first song-book, and Alpha Delta Phi followed suit in 1851.
The first chapter-house acquired by a Greek-letter fraternity- if we except the log-cabin of Chi Psi at Michigan-was the build-
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ing purchased by Sigma Phi at Williams College in 1857. Other buildings built or purchased at early dates were the lodge of D. K. E. at Yale, built in 1861, and the house of Kappa Kappa Kappa at Dartmouth, bought in 1862. Psi Upsilon, which has the largest number of buildings, viz., fifteen, built its first lodge in 1870 at Yale. The eight living branches of Delta Psi are all provided with buildings, and so are all but one of the eight chapters of Sigma Phi. Delta Kappa Epsilon has many chapter- houses and lodges, as also has Alpha Delta Phi. The finest society lodge is the one recently purchased by Chi Psi at Cornell, which originally cost $150,000. Among other valuable structures owned by the fraternities are the marble house of Alpha Delta Phi at Amherst, the Pompeiian brick and stone residence of Psi Upsilon at Wesleyan, the chapter-house of Zeta Psi at Cornell, the stone dormitory and lodge of Delta Psi in New Haven, and the mansion of Sigma Phi at Williams.
In 1844-45, when Michigan was about to graduate its first class, and when the initial steps to establish fraternities at Ann Arbor were taking, only eight intercollegiate Greek-letter orders were in existence. These were Kappa Alpha, Sigma Phi, Delta Phi, Alpha Delta Phi, Psi Upsilon, Chi Psi, and Delta Kappa Epsi- lon, all Eastern societies, and Beta Theta Pi, a Western fraternity. In 1844 the Alpha Alpha, a local society, was formed at Ann Arbor for the purpose of securing a charter from Alpha Delta Phi; and in 1845 organizations preliminary to Chi Psi and Beta Theta Pi were formed. Chi Psi claims to have installed its chapter early in the autumn of 1845; Beta Theta Pi was started in November, 1845, and Alpha Delta Phi was not instituted until Commencement in 1846. All three had men in the class of '45. Chi Psi and Beta Theta Pi for many years claimed priority, but the former is con- ceded to have made its public appearance first. The establishment of these secret orders led to a long and bitter conflict with the Faculty.
In 1840, before any student had been matriculated, a code of by-laws for the government of the prospective undergraduates was prepared. Rule 20 of this code was as follows:
" No student shall be or become a member of any Society connected with the University or consisting of students, which has not first submitted its constitu- tion to the Faculty and received their approbation."
Professor Williams, the author of the code, afterward declared that Rule 20 was designed as a check on the too numerous
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multiplication of literary societies. or debating clubs. It was, however, used as a weapon by the Faculty in the struggle between the latter and the secret societies.
Soon after its organization the chapter of Chi Psi had built for itself a log cabin in the depths of what was then known as the
LODGE OF CHI PSI (1846).
Black Forest, extending far east of the campus. The site of this prototype of the scores of chapter houses now owned by the Greek-letter fraternities was in the neighborhood of the present Forest Hill Cemetery. The building was of roughly-hewn oak logs. Its dimensions were twenty-four by twenty feet. At one end was a huge fireplace.
In the summer of 1846, while some nocturnal depredations and certain unofficial ringings at midnight of the chapel bell were undergoing inquiry by the Faculty, some of the students were traced by one of the professors to the log cabin of Chi Psi; and being questioned they refused to tell what had occurred within, saying that they were pledged to secrecy. They, however, frankly informed him that the building was their society lodge, and they explained to him the nature of the Greek-letter societies, suggest- ing their affiliations with similar organizations in other colleges, and intimating that they were too strong to be dealt with harshly. When he attempted to enter-as he conceived himself entitled to do under a rule then in force that students' rooms should at all times be accessible to the officers-he was firmly repulsed. All of which was duly reported to the Faculty. Just before Commence- ment a member of Alpha Delta Phi who had been graduated else- where called upon the Faculty and asked that the organization of a chapter in the University might be permitted, offering to exhibit so much of the constitution as he had authority to reveal. Busied with a meeting of the Regents and with preparations for Commence- ment, the Faculty promised future attention to the matter, where- upon the new society was organized immediately.
Aware that three secret societies, including a majority of the-
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students, were in active operation in defiance of Rule 20, the Faculty decided not to proceed to extreme measures, but to secure the ultimate extinction of the obnoxious orders. This was to be accomplished by requiring the members of the societies to promise not to initiate any more men, and by exacting of all candidates for matriculation a pledge not to join societies not approved by the Faculty. Alpha Delta Phi however, claiming that it existed if not with the approval at least by sufferance of the Faculty, initiated new matriculates. This the professors learned in March, 1847, and after suspensions and readmissions the new initiates were obliged to withdraw from the society, and the original members, to save themselves from expulsion, were compelled to sign a stringent pledge. In November, 1847, Alpha Delta Phi offered a second time to submit its constitution to the Faculty, but was informed that the latter body "had no authority to legalize them as a soci- ety in the University of Michigan". Therefore the students con- tended that if the Faculty could not legalize the society it could not forbid it; and as a further precaution the chapter changed its style and address. In July, 1848, Beta Theta Pi sought recogni- tion, and was informed that it came "under the prohibition of the law ".
Toward the close of the college year 1847-48 the Faculty sent letters to the Presidents of several Eastern colleges asking opinions concerning the desirability and feasibility of suppressing the Greek- letter societies. The answers, condensed, amounted to this: "de- sirable but impracticable". President Woolsey of Yale thought the influence of the societies to be "either not good or question- able". He also declared "It is doubtful whether a college gov- ernment can suppress such societies, so long as some cause or other in the feelings or fashions of college keeps them up". Chan- 1795 NECESSARIIS UNITA CONC cellor Frelinghuysen of New York Univer- sity said: "We believe them (secret soci- אוֹ eties) to be of no use, and often of great OMNICUS CARITAS injury ". He intimated, however, that. so IN DUBUIS LIBERTAS many of the lawyers and other literary grad- 1873 UNIVERSITAS uates belonged to them that suppression would be difficult. President Hitchcock of SEAL OF UNION COLLEGE. Amherst wrote that the society system was a "giant evil, which, in secret, is blasting the hopes of many par- ents", but he thought that to suppress the societies "would not
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be to kill them but to put them more out of sight and make them more objectionable ".
These replies, together with a report from the Faculty, were placed before the Regents, who by a tie vote rejected a resolution favorable to the societies. With but slight check the initiation of new students went on, a fact which, though suspected, was not positively known to the authorities until, in 1849, a professor found on the campus a copy-evidently intended to be sent abroad-of the recently issued catalogue of the University, in which, printed on a loose leaf, were the names of eleven undergraduate Chi Psis, among them several new students. The eleven, when questioned, admitted that the names were on the paper by their consent. At the same time Alpha Delta Phi furnished the Faculty with a list of its men. The defence in each case was substantially that the society was no longer styled a chapter in the University but in Ann Arbor, that the members did not meet on University premises, and that as persons not connected with any college had been admitted to membership, the society could not be regarded as " consisting of students". Overruling this plea, the Faculty an- nounced to the members of Alpha Delta Phi and Chi Psi that their connection with the University would cease at the opening of the next term, unless they renounced their affiliations. Seven men ostensibly withdrew from their societies, and the rest were expelled. The members of Beta Theta Pi were not dismissed until Septem- ber, 1850, they having made the plea that their constitution was not signed. Many of the expelled students went to Union, others were graduated at Rochester, some returned to Ann Arbor, and some never finished their college courses. Among the men permanently lost to Michigan were not a few who have gained distinction in professional or business careers.
Appealed to by the expelled undergraduates the Regents asked the Faculty the reason of the expulsion of so many students. The reply, as has been well said, "is notable because of its lack of calm dispassionate argument, and because of the abundance of indefinite unsupported statements". It recites that the "whole history of these societies is a detail of obliquities", that "these extended affiliations are a great irresponsible authority", that "they are exclusive and oligarchic", that their meetings "are liable to become, and often are, lawless and convivial", that they are "a great and unnecessary expense to the poor student who joins them," that "the regular literary societies are neglected",
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