Page:The Fraternity and the Undergraduate (1923).pdf/67

 After the members of the chapter reach home there is usually a discussion, however, and men who have been seen in this inadequate way are not infrequently elected. I have known cases where men voted for fellows whom they had scarcely seen, if, indeed, they had seen at all. "What does that fellow look like, that we voted in tonight?" I heard an indifferent "rusher" ask last fall; "I don't remember whether he was a blonde or a brunette." And all the information that his companions could give him was that the prospective brother was decidedly a "good looker."

A mistake which many fraternities make in their selection of men seems to me to be seen in the tendency to rush men of one type or from one town or locality. The fraternity, a majority of whose members are athletes, is likely to be a weak one. The fraternity which chooses a majority of its members from a single town or locality is likely to be a narrow one. Such a tendency is sure to develop clannishness and factions. "Our fraternity has been almost broken up this year," a fraternity officer confessed to me, "by our Chicago men. Half of our men come from one high school, and they always hang together and defeat anything which the other men may propose. We might with propriety be called the Hyde Park Club. We should be far better off if we chose our