Excerpt from Jackson's LL. D: A Tempest in a Tea-Pot

From 1780 to 1880 inclusive, the gubernatorial chair of the State of Massachusetts was filled by twenty-eight persons, each of whom, with the exception of Increase Sumner, who was governor from 1797 to 1799, received from Harvard College, either before or during his term of service, the degree of LL. D. By far the greater number of these degrees was conferred at the first Commencement after the incumbent was inducted into office. Many of the governors were elected from year to year, and were present at Commencements on several successive occasions, passive spectators after their official presence had been once thus recognized. The effect of this was of course that the number of degrees thus conferred was much smaller than the years of service, but an analysis of the records shows that out of the twenty-eight persons who held the office of governor of Massachusetts during this period, twenty-three were made honorary Doctors of Law by Harvard College simply because they were governors of the State, that four when elected had already received the degree, and that of the whole number one alone was not thus honored.

The election of Benjamin F. Butler in 1883 furnished an opportunity for those who were opposed to this custom to break away from it, and since his day no governor of Massachusetts has received a degree while in office as a part of the regular Commencement exercises. It is true, a degree was conferred upon Butlers successor, while governor, but it was on the occasion of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the college and not on Commencement day, and was not a purely ex officio degree.

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