Education: Alexander Hamilton

Just as the traducers of a cinematic Alexander Hamilton were defeated last week (see p. 30), so were silenced critics of Alexander Hamilton Institute, international correspondence school of business. Last fortnight it was reported that the Institute had lost money during the year, that its stockholders were seeking to oust its president, Dean John Thomas Madden of the School of Commerce, Accounts & Finance of New York University (TIME, Sept. 21). These reports arose from a suit brought in Manhattan by Caroline Beardslee, granddaughter and heir of the late Dean Joseph French Johnson of the Commerce School of N. Y. U., who founded the Institute; and by two of the three trustees of Dean Johnson’s estate. Alleging that the Institute had lost money, that a change in management would help it, they asked the Supreme Court to order Dean Madden, third trustee of the estate, to vote with them at the stockholders’ meeting. (In New Jersey, where the estate was filed, trustees must vote stock unanimously or not at all.) The stock held by the estate, they claimed, represented the balance of power which kept Dean Madden in office co long as he controlled the vote.

A similar suit had been brought and dismissed the week before. The second one was dismissed last week when Dean Madden proved that it misrepresented the financial state of the Institute, showing only that one division of the Institute had declined during six months in 1931. The whole Institute has made $350,088 net since November, 1930.

Thus upheld by the Supreme Court, Dean Madden was re-elected president at last week’s stockholders’ meeting. Among other directors re-elected were Dean Dexter Simpson Kimball of the College of Engineering of Cornell University (board chairman); Leo Greendlinger (vice president,treasurer and general manager); Dr. Lee Galloway and Bernard Lichtenberg (vice presidents).