1. The first is virtue. I gave a talk two weeks ago at the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia on "Virtue and Its Consequences." I've been trying to figure out whether the idea of philanthropy as a virtue would shed any light on what we do. Immediately prior to that lecture I spent a couple of days with a group of corporate contributions officers brought together by the Council on Foundations to talk about the ethics of corporate philanthropy. I suggested to the corporate seminar that it might be useful to think about corporate ethics in terms of classical and religious ideas about virtue. 

I met strong resistance. "Virtue" is an unattractive word. It conjures up memories of narrowness and repression rather than the effort to achieve the good life. Two ideas came out: the first is that there is better, more enlightened language available, and the second is that pragmatic, utilitarian values are preferable. "What works" is most important. 

That was just before the Gary Hart scandal, which seems to me to illustrate that the ancient virtue of prudence may still be important today. And, because I have been thinking about virtue, I read as many of the editorial commentaries on the Gary Hart case as I could. In the course of that I discovered that no one had pointed out the connection between the Hart case and three other important news stories. The first was the case of the Marine guards in the embassy in Moscow: the connection between someone's so-called "private" sexual life and national security. The second news story was about evangelist Jim Bakker: it reminded me that prominent people are vulnerable to scandal and may go to great lengths to repress word of it. As a consequence, public figures are susceptible to blackmail. Private sexual activity again becomes a security matter. Finally, the biggest news story of the decade is AIDS, yet none of the commentaries mentioned that AIDS is as much a threat to a philandering president as it is to everyone else. Mr. Reagan has suggested that we all be prepared to submit voluntarily to tests for drug abuse. While the Hart case was in fullest display, Secretary Bennett and Surgeon General Koop were debating whether testing for AIDS should be mandatory or voluntary. For presidential candidates, too? 

I am puzzled, thinking of that cluster of news stories, how we can continue to treat "fooling around" as if it were risk free for our generation and mortally dangerous for the next one. I am also puzzled about how we will deal with the problem of casual sex among prominent figures in public life once we face up to it. It is a dangerous subject, but it can't be left alone. I don't know whether the Miller Center will tackle it, but someone will have to. We won't be able to study the presidency seriously anymore without trying seriously to study presidential character, presidential vice as well as presidential virtue.

 2. The discussion of corporate ethics prompts me to mention the question of the ethics of the university. I have made two speeches, participated in a seminar and written an essay in recent weeks on the divestment controversy. There are two issues to be raised, I think, the first most directly affecting philanthropic values and practices, the second most directly affecting the mission of the university. 

Issue one: Should colleges and universities (and other organizations) which on moral grounds divest themselves of stock held in companies doing business in South Africa (or doing business there in ways that are thought to be morally unacceptable) continue to accept philanthropic contributions from those same companies? Should the companies retaliate in some way by cutting off contributions or by redirecting their grants elsewhere? Divestment is potentially a very large issue, because it raises the problem of the freedom of universities to criticize corporate practice, and because it is so difficult to put limits on its application. 

The second issue -- that of the mission of the university -- comes up because a significant number of people -- "significant" means enough to get my attention --believe that the university, like the church, must act as the conscience of the society. The university as an institution has two moral obligations with reference to South Africa, according to this argument: it must not contribute even indirectly to evil, and the university must also take aggressive collective action to raise the moral standards of the society. 

In a symposium last week on the future of the university at Ohio State, I tried to argue the alternative view that the unique mission of the university is to defend and sustain and improve the quality of thought and discourse. Should the university compromise its commitment to that aspect of its mission, for whatever reason, the society will be left without any institution qualified to perform that function. We would then be less free.