Shots In The Dark: Of Gifts and Power

Friday, December 30, 2023

Of Gifts and Power

For those of you interested in the ethics of gift-giving—or, in the case of the Summers-New wedding registration, gift-asking—here's an interesting story: In Florida, the Republican speaker of the House has just proposed a complete ban on gift-giving to state legislators.

(Currently Wisconsin is the only state that bans such gifts, which tells you a little something about the state of state legislatures. )

In the 1990s, according to the St. Petersburg Times, "a scandal in which lobbyists provided lawmakers with free trips to hunting lodges, ski chalets and even the French Riviera led to nearly two dozen lawmakers being charged with misdemeanors. A chastened Legislature rewrote state law to compel disclosure of all gifts worth more than $25 and a ban on gifts worth more than $100."

Of course, there are differences between lobbyists' gifts to legislators and wedding gifts to a university president, but the ethical question is the same: People can give them for reasons of influence-peddling, and people who receive them can be influenced. I'm not suggesting that President Summers institute a ban on wedding gifts...just that he ask people to direct their gifts to Harvard. It's an easy, appropriate step. Does he really need that $150 ice cream-maker anyway?

This is hardly Harvard's most pressing issue. But sometimes these small incidents have bearing on larger issues of ethics and character.

¶ 9:19 AM

Comments:

richard, i really think you've gone a little too far about this one. it's one thing for the man to accept/not accept something such as, for example, birthday or holiday gifts. but it's his wedding. and more so, it's his bride's wedding.

people will bring/give gifts no matter what you tell them to do (or not to do) so best to get something you want/like.

more so, it's deeply inappropriate to ask them to give $$ to harvard; if they're going to suggest anything it should be to a charity. (though i can tell you from personal experience that when you offer a place to give donations those who give them couldn't give a rat's ass who *you* want donations sent to... they send them to whatever charity they support.)

# posted by grumpygirl : 10:17 AM

Well, as I say, I don't think this is the biggest issue in the world. But when you have your wedding at Harvard, and invite Harvard employees, it invariably becomes a university event as well as a personal one, and so I don't think these questions are inappropriate to consider. I know—people hear the word "wedding," and their critical faculties recede into the background. We think that nothing could be more important and that wedding gifts are a sacred tradition. Why? I know it's unromantic of me to pose the question, but that doesn't mean the question is invalid. Certainly there are lots of weddings where business and love intermingle: Remember the Godfather?
Let me ask another question: If you were a Harvard employee who worked for Summers, would you feel pressure to buy Summers and New a wedding present because buying one (or not) could help/hurt you professionally? And if anyone felt that kind of pressure, haven't the bride and groom erred by asking for gifts?

# posted by richard : 11:02 AM

Grumpygirl could not be more correct!
You seem to have lost your head over this really rather bizarre matter. What gives? I suspect that people around here are going to begin wondering why you are so hung up on this when they return from vacation.

Directing guests at your wedding to give a gift of a donation to Harvard is incredibly inappropriate. Incredibly. My wife is insisting that you have confused your point and that a gift to Harvard would be the asskissing move more so than an ice cream maker.

Donald Trump was registered all over the place for gifts for his wedding. It's all about the bride. Listen to Grumpygirl and my wife!

Dan

# posted by Anonymous : 11:11 AM

Okay, okay! I give up. Everyone should buy the new couple everything on their registry as soon as possible. Nothing is more important than the right to ask for wedding presents.

And just for the record, I hope nobody interprets my feelings on this question as any aspersion on the new couple's good fortune. I certainly wish them much happiness in their new life together.

# posted by richard : 11:17 AM

Maybe it is and maybe it isn't appropriate to ask for a gift to be donated to Harvard…maybe it isn't…and maybe it isn't any more appropriate to ask for gifts to be given to charity…it is definitely inappropriate for two very mature people, getting married for the second time, to be asking anyone for a $49 waffle iron (that one got me even more than the $150 ice cream maker) when the groom is President of Harvard making $750,000 a year plus expenses and a car. We are not talking about a young groom and his first time blushing bride here. This is one time Grumpy Girl isn't grumpy enough. He can throw a dinner for his guests to celebrate his happiness and to my mind, specify "no gifts please" on the invitation. That would be the kind of taste I would expect from that particular social level or any other. But Richard is right...by all means...buy 'em everything on the list.

# posted by lmpaulsen : 3:19 PM

Guess I'm late to the party. Rich, it was a wise decision to back down. Would you really attend a wedding and not send or show up with a gift? I know who not to invite to my nuptials.

So what if Summers' bride wants an ice cream maker from William Sonoma. Think of it this way, more ice cream for Larry to dribble down the front of his shirt.

# posted by Anonymous : 4:56 PM

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