<p>dchow08, I didn’t claim a position regarding the tense of “admit”. I just said the tense in the subordinate clause depends on the tense of the main verb. I don’t see what’s wrong with that. Mybe I should have been clearer: when referring to “main verb”, I did mean “main verb part”, which was “would have to admit”</p>
<p>Regarding the tense of the “admit” part, although I’m not 100% sure, I think “would have to admit” is still past, as “would”, by its definition, is the past tense of “will”. If it was present, it would have simply said “they have to admit” instead of “they would have to admit”</p>
<p>somekidinnyc, any sentence in English has a main verb.</p>
<p>^ If you are singling out one word from the whole verb part, “have” in that “would have to admit” is the main verb. It is the same thing as in “I have to go to bed”</p>
<p>Also, techniquely auxiliary verbs are also verbs. So I would say, although “would” and “will” are not the main verb here, they are still verbs. Auxiliary verbs indicate tenses. They are simply doing their job here.</p>
<p>You can’t just assume “the main verb is in the past”. “Would” tells you the action is in the past.</p>
<p>…continued.
There are also linguists arguing that “have to” should work as an auxiliary verb. It functions like words as “must/may/should/etc”, and in this case “admit” should be the main verb instead of “have”. If Ren the SAT’er sees this, maybe, assuming the argument for “have to” being an auxiliary verb is true, you would notice “to admit” is no longer infinitive here because “have to” works as a whole, and “admit” is simply the main verb following its auxiliary verb.</p>