Chapter L: Part X (5)

To this want of preparatory knowledge, maturity of mind, and taste for mathematical and military studies, do we attribute most of the difficulties of internal administration, and class-room instruction. So long as the cadet is a boy, or if full grown in body, a youth with only boyish tastes, and without scholarly and soldierly aspirations,--so long as not a few are in the Academy, not because they sought its privileges from an inward and irrepressible impulse to a military career, but for the eclat of a military position to be resigned when such position involves sacrifices; _so long_ will the admission of each new class, and especially, the period of encampment be signalized not only by boyish pranks, but by personal outrages on unoffending members of the same corps, which we had supposed to belong to the dark ages of collegiate institutions, when boyish inmates were congregated in large numbers, away from the restraints of family discipline;--so long will the time, skill, and patience of able professors, which should be devoted to the elucidation of difficult scientific principles and their applications to military art, be engrossed in supplying the defects of an elementary education, which should have been obtained by the cadet as well, or better, at home; so long will the severe mathematical studies, and their special applications, difficult enough to task a well disciplined mind even with the preparation provided in a thorough knowledge of arithmetic, algebra, and geometry,--be irksome in the extreme, and be never mastered to any useful purpose to the army of the United States, by more than one half of the graduates of the Academy;--so long will the country be disappointed in the subsequent career of many graduates, for whose military instruction and training all these appropriate and costly preparations have been made.

In view of these and other considerations the Board of Visitors unanimously recommend that the law and regulations relating to the military academy be so modified as to provide as follows:

I. The Cadet Corps of the army of the United States shall consist of four hundred members, to which each state and territory shall be entitled to a number equal to its representation in the Congress of the United States, and the remainder shall be designated by the President from the country at large, including the District of Columbia; and he shall also fill, in the same way, any vacancy which for any cause may remain unfilled, for three months after the annual examination in each year.

II. No person shall be appointed to the cadet corps until he has been found qualified in the particulars designated by law, after a public examination conducted in such places, at such times, and in such manner as Congress shall prescribe; from which examination no person resident of that portion of the country for which the same is held, shall be excluded, who shall present credentials from the teacher or teachers whom he had last attended, that he is over seventeen, and under twenty-one years of age, of unblemished moral character, and personal habits, of good physical strength and constitution, and has given evidence of aptitude and vigor of mind for the studies and duties of a military career. The examiners shall make return under oath to the Secretary of War, of the persons so presenting themselves, examined, and found qualified, arranged in the order of merit, specifying the residence and school or schools which they have attended in the two years previous, and the degree of merit exhibited in each subject of the examination. And all appointments to fill vacancies for any state or territory, or for the country at large, shall be made from these returns, and in the order of merit as assigned by the examiners, until the same shall be revised by new regulations of the Department.

III. No person shall be returned to the Secretary of War as a suitable candidate for admission to the Cadet Corps, unless he

1. Shall be _over_ seventeen, and under twenty-one years of age.

2. Shall possess an unblemished moral character and correct personal habits.

3. Shall be in good health, and in no way incapacitated by want of vigor and elasticity of physical constitution for military service.

4. Shall possess vigor and aptitude of mind for the studies of the Military Academy, and shall give evidence, oral and written, of a good English education, which, in view of the wide spread facilities of instruction in public and private schools, might very properly embrace

(_a._) The correct use of the English language, in speaking, reading, and writing the same.

(_b._) Penmanship, book-keeping, and elementary drawing.

(_c._) The ability to perform with facility and accuracy the various operations of arithmetic.

(_d._) The elementary principles of algebra and geometry.

(_e._) A thorough knowledge of American geography and history, and the leading features of the Constitution of the United States, and of the State of his residence.

(_f._) Or so much of the subjects above specified as shall be deemed indispensable to the immediate and profitable attention of the Cadets on their admission to the special studies and occupations of a military school.

5. Shall make a written declaration of his desire to obtain admission to the Cadet Corps for the purpose of qualifying himself for the military service of the United States, which service he assumes from the date of his appointment as cadet, to continue in the same for a period of at least sixteen years--bearing true faith and allegiance to the Constitution and government of the United States, against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and paramount to all obligations to any State government, authority, or constitution.