NOV & 1915 American test, the UNIV. OF MICH SIGMA XI Published for the Society of the Sigma Xi Application made at the postoffice at Menasha, Wis., for admittance as second- ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION 50 CENTS SINGLE NUMBER 15 CENTS SIGMA XI QUARTERLY EDITORIAL COMMITTEE Edward Orton, Junior Floyd Karker Richtmyer Henry Baldwin Ward Published in the months of March, June, September and December, for the Society of Sigma Xi by George Banta, Menasha, Wisconsin. Volume III MARCH, 1915 Number I THE PHILADELPHIA CONVENTION Under the able leadership of President Cattell the business session of the Philadelphia Convention made great advances in adjusting the methods of the Society to present day conditions. Every member who reads carefully the new Constitution printed as a supplement to this number of the QUARTERLY must recognize that it is better calculated than the older form to direct the activities of a growing and complicated organization. A smaller group of leaders in the new Executive Committee takes the place of the former Council which had grown until its membership with the new chapters just added would have equalled forty. So large a group can not transact business by mail and scattered as it was from the eastern to the western limits of our land no one could hope to convene it even for a single annual session. The delays and confusion resulting from this condition were serious. In entrusting control to a smaller body the Society of the Sigma Xi is following a tendency thoroughly approved in modern business organization. Attention should also be directed to the radical change made in the method of granting new charters. Under the new law each application is considered by the Executive Committee and their recommendation is transmitted to the individual chapters for information merely since final action is taken by the annual convention. This is not likely to modify former standards for granting charters, but it will do away with the former unfortunate delays. It will also permit more accurate inquiry into the circumstances of an individual case and will place the Society in possession of fuller information when the time for final action arrives. The long pending question concerning types of membership and basis for elections to Sigma Xi was debated very earnestly and fully. The final vote shows that a considerable majority thinks that some |