<p>Princeton's 100-year war</p>
<p>By Matt Hoberg
Princetonian Columnist</p>
<pre><code>In 1907, University president Woodrow Wilson, Class of 1879, launched the first salvo in the perpetual conflict between the eating clubs and the University when he proposed replacing the clubs with residential colleges. One hundred years later, it's the same old wine in a brand new bottle.
With the advent of the four-year college system, the tensions between the clubs and the University are particularly striking. Nassau Hall pooh-poohs any suggestion that it intends to weaken the club system, but many club members are deeply suspicious of the University's intentions toward Prospect Avenue. All parties seem to harbor suspicions: the University and the Borough toward the clubs, and the clubs toward the University and the Borough.
Three crucial reforms can help resolve these suspicions. First, club presidents need to take full legal responsibility for all alcohol-related incidents. I realize this proposal flies in the face of recent conventional wisdom: Terrace Club's graduate board took the heat for then-president Patti Chao '07 after an intoxicated underage student fell down a staircase and suffered a minor concussion in February last year; and, most recently, all the memebers of Colonial Club and not just its president, Tommy Curry '08, will be completing mandatory community service following the injury this May of an intoxicated underage student who claimed to have been drinking at Colonial.
Both presidents understandably wanted to leave Princeton without criminal records, and neither seems to have been directly involved in the incidents. And, much of the responsibility in these types of incidents ultimately rests with the student who has been drinking. The fact remains, however, that presidents are more responsible than any other individual connected with the clubs. Graduate boards cannot be at clubs during parties to ensure that entrances are secure and wristband systems (like the one used at Colonial) are being properly enforced but the club president certainly can take these necessary precautions.
Unfortunately, these precautions are not enough to prevent dangerous incidents, as Colonial learned. Yet when those incidents occur, club presidents must ultimately be held responsible, even if they were not directly involved. Why? If we require that club presidents be directly involved in an incident in order to bear legal responsibility as individuals, then it is much more difficult for presidents ever to be charged for any club-related crimes. They could, for instance, simply deny any knowledge of the incident, and it is notoriously difficult to prove what someone did or did not know at a particular time.
While some presidents might welcome this gaping loophole, it seems to exemplify the sheltered naïveté often attributed to our University. Since 2003, five different club presidents have faced charges of serving alcohol to a minor or maintaining a nuisance; none have been found guilty of those charges as individuals. Isn't it interesting that the possibility of club presidents ducking responsibility accompanies a significant number of club-related alcohol infractions? I suppose it hasn't occurred to anyone that the more responsible presidents are for their actions, the more they will do to maintain secure premises; after all, we know how much Princeton students care about having an unblemished resume. Let's close the loophole and have a safer club environment.
Second, the University should increase its financial aid board allotment to better match the true costs of joining an eating club. Despite the $1,500 increase from last year, many students find it difficult to pay clubs' social fees, which were not included in the University's aid calculations. Thus, Prospect Avenue continues to be a rather exclusive locale, a fact which Borough Council members like Roger Martindale have harped on when discussing the tax status of Cottage Club. If the University can increase the board allotment, which at present costs a mere $2 million per annum, even by fifty percent, we would see a much less exclusive Street and a much less hostile Borough Council.
Third, the University and club graduate boards should work together to increase the availability of shared meal plans in every eating club. The reason for this is that the smaller the number of shared meal plans, the more the residential colleges and the eating clubs are involved in a zero-sum game; whenever a student chooses to join a residential college, that is one less student joining an eating club, and vice versa. The University's official stance, that four-year colleges merely create alternatives to the Street and are not meant to take students away from it, can only be true, therefore, when shared meal plans are available in sufficient numbers. As shared meal plans take money away from the clubs, the University should consider reimbursing the clubs for any lost income as a result of these plans.
I suspect that no one will be happy with all of these proposals, and that's precisely the mark of a reasonable compromise.
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<p>Matt Hoberg is a philosophy major from Kennett Square, Pa. He can be reached at <a href="mailto:mhoberg@princeton.edu">mhoberg@princeton.edu</a>.</p>