IF THE
PHID HOUSE COULD TALK By James Tobin
A
t the age of 99, the Georgian manse of Phi Delta Phi lives on like a roguish old gentleman, enjoying the peace of old age but still smiling over memories of a wild youth. Phi Delta Phi, the oldest of the three international law fraternities, was founded at Michigan in 1869. But the house at 502 E. Madison wasn’t built until 1914. (It was then, and remains, the only “Phid” chapter with its own residence.) The Phids were always a little older and more sophisticated than the undergraduate societies, and they soon became notorious for social outlawry. That reputation was sealed during the Prohibition days of 1921, when the Phids imported a troupe of Broadway chorus girls for an unsanctioned party. Dean Henry Bates disciplined 26 Phids but kept the matter quiet. Then word leaked to the Detroit Times, which trumpeted “wine, women and song days … at U. of M.”
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That put U-M President Marion LeRoy Burton on the defensive. “The university cannot be aloof in these matters,” he said. “There are a few students who still think they are independent of the community. For those who persist in this attitude, there is no room in the University of Michigan.”
In fact, the erring Phids stayed in school, and the house continued to make room for independence. After West Quad was built across the street, its youngsters often bore the brunt of Phid rowdiness. One such incident nearly got out of control late one Friday night in 1941. It started with a beer-soaked Phid football game under West Quad’s windows. When the Quaddies yelled for quiet, the Phids screamed back, and before long the cops were pulling the two groups away from an incipient brawl. The West Quad men pointed at one future attorney as the lead instigator; according to the official report, they “were unanimous in their opinion that this one fellow managed to shout the filthiest language they had ever heard, which is saying a lot.” Of course, Phid was hardly the only fraternity to get in trouble. The difference was the Phids’ special ability to get out of it. The transcript of a disciplinary hearing in 1949 shows the authorities had their hands full against Phids well trained in legal argument—especially in the era when many law students had survived combat against Germany or Japan. Every “mixed” party on campus—meaning a party of both sexes—had to get the University’s approval, with no intoxicants allowed. In this instance, police had found all three violations: