Kansas University Weekly.
295
The Joint Debate.
The result of our second annual joint debate with the University of Nebraska has been satisfactory in every way but one. To have our representatives take two of the three highest places is victory enough; and though the formal decision was in favor of Nebraska, it was through an accident in the marking much like that which gave the decision to Kansas last year, so that we have no reason to complain. Our men were most highly commended for their easy address and their excellent rhetoric, wherein they surpassed their opponents, while in logic the jbdges' report tells that our University was never more creditably represented.
All this is well for us, and the committee desires to express its satisfaction and its appreciation of the efforts made by all interested in the debate to see it through. Nebraska has not even our single source of discontent. Popular interest in the debate was aroused by a reference to the initiative and referendum in a political platform; an opera house filled to the doors assured inspiration to each speaker, and a full treasury to the debating association. College and city papers alike gave to the debate as much space as is ordinarily accorded to a foot-ball game, and speak of it in the highest terms of commendation. From these reports, the writer wishes to quote two paragraphs before proceeding to the central point of this article.
From the Nebraskan: "Little interest seemingly has been taken in debate among the great mass of students in Kansas University. Here just the opposite conditions exist. Our preliminary debates attracted much deserved attention."
From the Nebraska State Journal: "It seems settled that these contests are to have more popularity in the University of Nebraska than the old oratorical meetings. The credit for inaugurating this series belongs to Prof. J. W. Adams, of the English Department."
It is true that last year Nebraska had great difficulty in carrying through its part in the debate, and was barely able to pay its expenses.
It is also true that the struggle of our own debate committee this year was out of all comparison more difficult than that of Nebraska last year. Great interest was taken in the preliminary debates; but this died out almost entirely before the final trial, when the debaters spoke to a house almost empty, and as a result the committee has had to beg for money to send our representatives to Lincoln, and has not yet secured enough to pay its way out, though the University has twice been canvassed, once with tickets, and once with subscription papers.
It is also true that the University in general and the Department of English in particular is being criticised for not "doing more" to foster oratory and debate. This criticism may be correct in substance, but its aim seems to the writer after two years of effort to make debating go, to be a little one-sided. Individuals can do nothing unless general University spirit is befind them. And the point is that not even what has been done this year can be done again, so far as debating is concerned, unless new interest is taken or matters are reestablished upon a different basis.
Two letters have been received from friends of the University, each strongly urging that the debate be not given up. One states that the University of Iowa is anxious to have us do so that she may take our place. Each letter contains a suggestion; one that the debate be made a part of the lecture bureau course, which would be impracticable, another that we adopt Nebraska's method of organization, or something similar.
Neuraska now has some money ahead, and expects us to meet her again next May. The joint debate will be held here next year if held at all, but even that will not guarantee expenses. We had the joint debate last year, but came out with a deficiency which the committee carried over, and is practically carrying still. After this unpleasant experience, no member of the present committee is likely to care to serve on it again in any capacity whatever.
Our present system of choosing representatives was devised to strengthen the literary