Before the ink was dry on the press release announcing my election to the Board of Trustees last month, we were let in on a secret: a Board committee from which petition trustees have been excluded is exploring alternative methods of selecting Trustees -- a euphemism, really, for stripping Dartmouth alumni of their longstanding right to elect half of the Board.
The basis for this unprecedented assault on alumni rights is a series of false charges made by those who have again found themselves on the losing side of an election.
The leading charge is that I essentially "bought" the election. The amount I purportedly spent keeps going up, but the current claim is that I spent "as much as $200,000."
With all due respect, claims that I "bought" the election are not only absurd but insulting to alumni. As I told the Associated Press last month, I spent approximately $75,000 -- the same amount Sandy Alderson reported spending. Almost half of what I spent went to gathering signatures because, unlike my opponents, my place on the ballot was not guaranteed.
From start to finish, I spent money only on four items: letters to alumni, a website, ads in College media and a trip to Hanover. Although I am flattered by the unintended compliment, I used no public relations or political consultants to prepare my campaign materials, as some have speculated. (Evidently, the Dartmouth Writing and Composition Center knew what it was doing when it named me a "proficient writer" as a sophomore!)
I personally wrote my two alumni-wide letters (which cost $32,000 each), my thank-you letter to alumni who petitioned to get me on the ballot (which cost $5,000), and the content on my website (which a computer whiz-kid from Ohio designed for me for $1,600). My two print ads cost $3,900. I traveled to Hanover via Jet Blue ($125) and a rental car from Boston ($200), spending the night at my fraternity after a late night of pong (priceless).
Seen in light of the facts, claims that I outspent the field may soothe bruised egos, but they just are not true.
Truth be told, I was badly outspent because the administration spent lavishly to defeat me.
On the eve of balloting, the administration -- with much fanfare about "correcting the record" -- rolled out its "Ask Dartmouth" website. Throughout the balloting period, the site was devoted to rebutting claims I made on matters of concern to alumni, such as administrative bloat, class size and course over-enrollment.
The administration's numbers-crunchers generated factoid after factoid questioning my claims. Alumni Relations, with a gleeful assist from Alumni Councilors and class agents, quickly spread the word via e-mail. Alumni Relations followed up with glossy "Ask Dartmouth" postcards to all alumni and a separate mailing instructing alumni on how to use the "approval voting" method to ensure that their preferred candidate would be elected.
Furthermore, President Wright himself mailed a letter to the Dartmouth community weighing in on the trustee race, and key College administrators fanned out to speak to alumni clubs nationwide.
The administration has not disclosed how much it spent on this frenetic politicking. Clearly, however, the amount the administration spent, both in postage and employee time, was enormous. It dwarfed the amount I actually spent -- and, in all likelihood, the grossly inflated amount that critics claim I spent as well.
Alumni, however, were not fooled by the Hanover "spin" machine. With unusually high turnout, I received votes from 55 percent of the alumni who voted and the highest vote total of any prior petition candidate.
Accordingly, claims that runaway spending explains the result of the last election are false. Money does not win elections; ideas do -- and this is particularly so with an electorate as intelligent as Dartmouth alumni.
A second charge supporting current efforts to disenfranchise alumni is that petition candidates make elections, as one of my Board colleagues put it, "divisive." This charge, too, is wrong, but unlike the charge that Dartmouth alumni slavishly give their votes to the highest bidder, it at least has a kernel of truth.
It is not "divisive" for candidates to discuss the issues facing Dartmouth. It is democracy, pure and simple. All I did was tell voters where I stand on the issues. The only attacks and invective came from the other side.
Nevertheless, it is true that elections with petition candidates differ from contests between nominated candidates alone. Petition candidates are not anointed to run by a committee of insiders; they have to earn their place on the ballot by appealing to broad segments of alumni. The presence of petition candidates forces nominated candidates to talk about real issues -- eek! -- and thereby allows alumni to make an informed choice about who should represent them as trustees.
That, presumably, is why alumni turned out in droves in last year's constitution vote to reject efforts, strongly supported by the administration and the Board, to weaken the petition process. Alumni know that the petition process is an essential mechanism for achieving accountability and transparency in the governance of the College -- and, evidently, that is the last thing the administration and its allies want.
The current effort to disenfranchise alumni, though carefully masked behind talk of "best practices" and remedying deficient election procedures, is merely a brazen power play by insiders who resent alumni involvement in College affairs. It will be a sad day indeed if the Board of Trustees joins in that unprecedented assault on our alumni.
