Royal Commission of 1905–1906
In October 1905 Cody was appointed to the royal commission “to enquire into and report upon the system of administering the affairs of the University of Toronto and of University College.”1 The commission, known as the Royal Commission on the University of Toronto, was to consider not only the management and government of the university and of University College (UC) but also the advisability of incorporating the School of Practical Science with the university. In addition, it was to advise on such changes as should be brought about in the relations between U of T and the federated or affiliated colleges: Victoria, Trinity, Knox, Wycliffe, and St. Michael’s.
Cody’s appointment was a signal honour for such a young man (he was only 37), but he had obvious qualifications. He was a distinguished graduate of the university, an academic in the Department of Classics with an inside knowledge of the workings of U of T, a spokesman for the Anglican constituency, and (a necessary qualification) a resident of Toronto and thus able to attend what promised to be the numerous meetings of the commission.
The commissioners, under the chairmanship of Joseph Flavelle, the well-known financier and philanthropist, were a well-balanced and impressive group. In addition to the chairman and Cody, they included Sir William Meredith, the chief justice of Ontario and chancellor of U of T; B.E. Walker, president of the Bank of Commerce; D. Bruce Macdonald, the principal of St. Andrews College; A.H.U. Colquhoun, the news editor of the Toronto News; and Goldwin Smith, the famous historian and journalist. The Commission had two businessmen, Flavelle and Walker; two academics, Cody and Macdonald; two journalists, Goldwin Smith and Colquhoun; and a leading jurist, Meredith.
The problems confronting the commission were obvious. In fact, the whole university structure needed reorganization. President Louden had failed to maintain effective control, although this was not entirely his fault; he was partly the victim of a sadly decentralized university constitution. U of T had to be changed so that it could cope with the problems of the modern age. The rise of science and the consequent need to acquire expensive laboratory equipment presented a challenge. Furthermore, Cornell in the United States had presented the university with serious competition for students.
The appointment of the commission had stirred up old tensions within the university. Ever since the passage of the University Act of 1849,2 there had been rivalry between the university and the churchrelated colleges, Victoria, Queen’s, and from 1851, Trinity. In 1849–50 Robert Baldwin and Lord Elgin had hoped that Queen’s and Victoria would affiliate with U of T, giving up their degree-granting powers except in divinity, but the colleges had refused to do so. The university and the church colleges had gone their several ways for over thirty years. Finally, Victoria entered the university federation that was formed 1887–92, and Trinity followed in 1904.
Some of the mutual suspicion, however, persisted. Sir Daniel Wilson had been dubious about federation in the 1880s, confiding to his diary in 1884 that it was “neither more nor less than a revival of the attempt of the Methodists [i.e., Victoria] to lay hands on the university endowment.”3 Sir Daniel’s suspicions were still in evidence in the UC constituency in 1905. They were reciprocated by the church colleges. Victoria adherents thought that the commission would unduly favour the Anglican and Presbyterian interest, and UC; while UC people were jealous of any attempt to reduce their position, financial and otherwise, in U of T. Wycliffe and Knox Colleges both had a stake in maintaining the position of University College, since both sent their students to UC for arts training.4
Some of this rivalry brushed off on Cody. Burwash, the principal of Victoria, and Rev. M.L. Pearson of Berkeley Street Methodist Church complained to the government that the Methodists (i.e., Victoria) were underrepresented on the commission. Pearson pointed out that there were two Anglicans and two Presbyterians on the commission but only one Methodist, Flavelle. Burwash was distressed that Cody and Macdonald were sitting on the commission, since Wycliffe and Knox were “not deeply interested in the federation policy under which Victoria had moved to Toronto.” J.P. Whitney, the premier of Ontario, assured him that the government would do nothing “which would interfere in the slightest degree with the situation or the rights of any college under the Federation Act.” He then appointed Flavelle, the sole Methodist on the commission, as its chairman, an action that appeared to mollify the complainants.5
Cody was under pressure to uphold the interest of UC. Sheraton wrote him two letters (November and December 1905). He had been talking to two Knox professors, Kilpatrick and Ballantyne, and the three had agreed that UC should be supported: “Evidently the whole stress of battle will be round University College and its relation to U of T. This is where the shoe pinches. They [Victoria and Trinity] want to make University College just like themselves and reduce to a minimum its connection with the state.”6 Despite the welter of suspicion on the part of its various supporters, the commission soon began its deliberations placidly and constructively.
Only a man of Cody’s energy could have carried on his normal range of activities and at the same time have fulfilled the exacting demands of the royal commission. Between September 30, 1905, when the commissioners met Premier Whitney at the Normal School, and April 4, 1906, when they assembled at Goldwin Smith’s home, the Grange, they held some seventy meetings.
Most of the meetings were held at the Grange. Here the commissioners sat at the same mahogany table the old Family Compact had gathered around to discuss policy.
In addition to attending meetings, Cody (with Flavelle, Colquhoun and Macdonald) made an extended trip to the American Midwest, where they consulted university presidents and other authorities. In December the four were joined by Meredith and Walker for a tour of eastern American universities. Cody was impressed by several American university presidents, particularly Charles Eliot of Harvard. He met Woodrow Wilson in the stormy days of controversy between Wilson and Dean Andrew Fleming West.
The commissioners had many hearings with representatives of the various colleges within the university federation (Trinity, Victoria, UC, Wycliffe, and Knox). They spent a day at Guelph with President Creelman of the Ontario Agricultural College. They also submitted a questionnaire to the people interviewed. Cody’s marginal comments on some of the answers suggest they were frank (“Danger or weakness that men will not always talk out in faculty meeting” and “Better bear a poor professor than make a good professor restless”).
By early March the commissioners presented the government with a first draft. There was a mild flurry because two reporters from the World managed to steal a copy, and on March 12 the World published a lengthy account of the report. The Globe, while deploring the theft, also published a critique. It asserted that if the government unloaded its responsibility on a board of governors, the university’s relations with the province would come to an end.7
The commissioners also prepared a draft university bill to implement their findings. They conferred with the government on March 1, 1906, about the bill, and on April 4, after Goldwin Smiths dinner at the Grange, they all signed the report.
The report, one of the most famous in Ontario’s history, laid the groundwork for the modern University of Toronto, as well as exerting a profound influence on the development of other Canadian universities. The commissioners insisted that education in the humanities must be preserved and strengthened: “In the case of the University of Toronto, we hope that if thorough teaching in the humanities requires more money the expenditure will be unhesitatingly incurred.”8 They also asserted that scientific training must be strongly supported.
Well aware of the mistrust between University College and the other federated colleges, the commissioners sought to reassure all the contending parties: “The maintenance of UC, with adequate State endowment, and on strictly non-sectarian basis, has thus become firmly embedded in the educational policy of the Province,” and “The State supplies to its youth a complete system of higher education; the denominational colleges avail themselves of the State’s provision for scientific training, and add to it their own contribution of the humanities, with such a religious or denominational atmosphere as seems most desirable to themselves.”9
Although he could not have realized it, Cody was helping to prepare the position he was