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77 'ew.v Editorial Freedom
Wayne Hurder, Editor
Bill Staton, Business Manager
N
ew SG President
Faces Declining Prestige
Students go to the polls today to
complete one of the dullest
political campaigns in the last four
years. Only 25 per cent of the
student body bothered to vote last
week. Probably fewer will vote
today.
Despite this lack of interest by
students in the campaign and
despite the exceptionally low
turnout, the student government
politicos involved in the
campaigning arc continuing to
function as if this year were the
same as last year and the year
before and the year before. They
are continuing their door-to door
campaigns, replete with the same
promises of past ages. They arc
continuing to slip out early in the
morning and tear down posters and
put up their own.
Unfortunately these politicos in
their blind desire to win office arc
ignoring some very important
things that arc happening on
campus. If they don't wake up soon
they will find themselves occupying
a position which means nothing,
absolutely nothing. Some persons
would contend that Student
Government now means nothing.
Fhat is not so-not yet give it
time though and it might if student
government politicos don't wake
up. ,
VlVY .HE. pdwcVand prestige'- of ;
StudentnlC'OVernmcnt , is gradually ' '
waning-isr,evident. if one examines
the reason why persons participate
in Student Government and if one
examines what students on this
campus want done to improve their
lives.
The persons who form the core
of Student Government, who run
for president and vice president and
who run the party machinery
usually do it because they figure it
will improve their chances of
succeeding in business or politics in
the state of North Carolina when
they graduate. Just as the sandbox
of children provides them with the
opportunity to learn to interact
with other children so Student
Government participants learn the
patterns of behavior that will help
them succeed in the adult world of
politics and business. For this
reason they quickly adapt their
behavior to what they think would
be acceptable to the people of that
grown-up world.
Such a concept worked well
three or four years ago because for
the vast majority of students what
the adult world did was acceptable
to them When student politicos
duplicated that behavior it was
likewise acceptable to students
because they knew that they would
probably get from such behavior
that which they wanted.
Huncltr III NtMsnlttr. Switjtflf
"It't fermenting ..."
Qfcr
mm
Rebel Good, Managing Editor
J. D. Wilkinson, News Editor
Harvey Elliott, Features Editor
Art Chansky, Sports Editor
Scott Goodfellow, Associate Editor
Kermit Buckner, Jr., Advertising Manager
HOWEVER, in the past couple
of years the goals of students have
changed'; they no longer conform to
the goals of the parents as closely as
they did in prior times. Students
began . demanding self-limiting
hours, visitation, reforms in the
general college curriculum at the
local level. On a national level they
began demanding changes in the
selective service system, a rehauling
of our foreign policy, and greater
attention to the failure of the
society to realize the ideals
embodied in the American Creed.
Such a situation poses a
tremendous problem to the student
politician. He' wants to get the
students votes by promising them
the answers to their problems. At
the same time he doesn't want to
alienate the state power elite, the
trustees, legislators, and
businessman, who he is trying to
get in good with in order to
advance his own career.
The result has been, in the last
year, that student politicians have
made the promises that would
please the students but have done
little to implement those promises
so as not to offend the state power
structure.
A good example of this is Ken
Day's platform of last year. He
promised the elimination of
women's rule, ' the abolition of the
lecture ' system, arid ' the "?
restructuring of ; the General
College, among other things. All of
this appealed very much to students
and many of them voted for Day
on the basis of that platform.
Needless to say, not much has been
done to implement that program.
Much of this is because the students
involved in the job of implementing
the promises don't want change
enough to really try to pressure the
persons who have the power to
make the changes. The students
may want these changes very
strongly but the student
government leaders, who are
interested in their future, want to
protect that future by not pushing
too hard on the power structure in
the State.
! THE RESULT of these actions is
that students are beginning to rely
less and less on Student
Government to do anything and are
turning, in frustration, to groups
like the SSOC to bring about
reforms. This creates added
complication because the
Administration and state politicians
don't want to deal with a group like
SSOC, even though they manage to
represent the feeling of students
better than Student Government on
many occasions.
What is maybe developing is a
potentially explosive situation in
which the only student
organization recognized by the
Administration is not recognized by
the students as representing them
while the organization that best
represents students feelings is not
recognized by the Administration.
Tonight the first thing the
winner of the election needs to
recognize is that if he wants to head
off the development of a critical
solution he had best realize that
now, more than ever, he needs to
quit worrying about his political
future and worry about what the
students want.
This year the- independent
candidates for office, who more
than anyone else cared little for
their political future in the state,
were defeated bv the two oolitical
machines who arc geared to turning
out products pleasing to the people
of the state. We hope that
whichever of these two persons
wins will devote more time to
serving the students and less to
pleasing the state.
THE DAILY
7
r
'I Have Risht Here In My Hand ;
Demogoguery Decried
Kelly Hits Almond
By JOHN KELLY
Since I am now out of the running, I f
have tried to stay out of the fight
between Wilson and Albright. I took
forward to getting out of Student
Government and to working with Todd
Cohen on the Tar Heel. Both candidates
have solicited my aid should they win, "
and I am flattered. But being rather '
suspicious of politicians and party
machines, and rightly so, I have felt that -their
request was also a political -maneuver.
Nevertheless, J have thus far a
refrained - from -making any ' public 1
' statements as tp&m? I 'ppoJteor
whom I feel the - better qualified.; .
However, in view of Mike Almond's
article in the Sunday Tar Heel, I feel I
have been drawn into the political arena
once more and must now make a few
statements.
My candid opinion of Mike Almond is
that he is a demagogue seeking the5
University Party nomination for President ,
in 1970. His understanding of the power;
structure in this university is immature.
Since he is one of Albright's primary,
campaign workers and supporters, this'; .
statement sheds some light on the;
character of Albright. u
Perhaps it is people like Almond and-'
the other UP political hacks who have led "
Albright to make such stupid and?
demogogistic statements like the one!
calling for the dismissal of Prillaman. !
hope that the students realize that the'
President of the Student Body has no
power to fire any administrative
personnel. This, like Albright's other
statements about such things as the
General College, is an empty political
promise characteristic of a demogogue.
Look at Almond's statement that I
didn't want the Presidency bad
enough that's right, I didn't want it bad
to lie and cheat, bad enough to be a '
demogogue and make hollow promises. !
As to my going to the beach the weekend
before the election, I believed it futile to
try to compete with party candidates and ;
their large budgets, which are filled with
funds from dubious sources, with my:
meager allotment of $50.00. That is why ;
Roadway Eliminated
To the Editor:
Although I didn't hear about the
planned construction on Carroll Hall until
two or three days ago, a representative of
the University Engineer's office assures
me that the plans were made public long
ago and that they were approved by
representatives of the faculty and
administration. I guess all I can say now is
that I hope they considered all the
consequences. There is not much to say
about the parking places that will be
eliminated; we all know that parking
places come and go. But eliminating the
road between the "gravel" (dirt) lot south
of Phillips and the lot south of Memorial
Hall is a serious matter which they may
have thought about.
Besides the inconvenient loss of
mobility between these lots," the
elimination of this road will have the
following effects:
Already the road is blocked with an
unmarked wire, and unsuspecting drivers
come co a irustratea nait unless their cars
are small enough to sneak under the wire
At night the wire and its supporting pipes
are practically invisible, and at least one
collision has occurred. (The University
Engineer's office has agreed to consider
making the wire more readily visible.)
Five o'clock rush hour trafficfrom the
Phillips lot 1 now be forced to exit
TAR HEEL
I went to the Supreme Court with my
complaint, and they agreed with me.
If all the little, petty politicians had let
the Court decision stand and the election
had been postponed, you would have
seen a serious committment of both time
' and money to my campaign. But the
party politicians knew this, and that is
why they reopened the case. It was a
political move on their part not mine.
Rather than the Court swallowing my
"bait", they swallowed the bait of the
political hacks.
v ;. - And even more ironical, -the students
: swallo wed & AJ bright'.? bait, - his hollow
promises and slick political manuevuring.
Amidst all the critical chaos of the
workers issue, Albright and his UP hacks
managed to skirt the major issues and
carry on the typical campaign making
dynamic statements about such things as
Resident Advisor programs. Almond
accused me of "having too much fun
making noise;" Albright made little noise.
The UP made little noise. And this is
indicative of what we can expect from
political animals; they make little noise as
they sell the students out to the
administration. Small talk combined with
no action is silent participation and yields
no results.
Now I do not endorse Bob Wilson for
President, and, although this article is
clearly a case against Albright even more
against his hacky friends and campaign
workers I by no means want the reader
to construe it as an endorsement. I simply
want the students to. do the following:
Be wary of demogogues like Mike
Almond and protect yourself.
Don't expect too much of whomever
wins.
Get ready to be sold out.
Get ready for another year of decadent
Student Government. You, as well as I,
have been screwed this year, but I
suppose that's the way things go.
However, there's always next year, and
maybe someone else will make a better
showing in a fight against the political
hacks and administration flunkies than I
did; but then again, that's what they said
all this year.
either via the exist onto Columbia, which
always requires a long wait, or via the
road between Peabody and Phillips,
whosy intersection at Cameron has not
up to now had a traffic officer during the
rush hour. In other words, it will now
take a long time to leave the Phillips
parking lot during the rush hour, even if
in the past you have been clever enough
to exit via the road east of Memorial
Hall.
When the construction area is fenced
off, the only pedestrian passage between
the southwest (Phillips parking lot,
Venable, Naval Armory, Whitehead,
fraternities, and sororities) and the
northeast (Memorial Hall, its parking lot,
Hanes, Phillips Annex, Y-Court, and
South Building) will be via a narrow path ,
which has just been created up against the
south wall of Phillips, or through or
around Phillips or Carroll. There is going
to be an awful lot of pedestrian traffic on
that path, and if it is not widened and
bricked it will soon be a miserable,
muddy channel and people will go
through Phillips instead.
Jim Scott, Graduate Student
Dept. of Computer & Information
Science
l"
Mike Cozza
On
SG Non-entity
This has been an interesting year
for Student Government. So far:
-Alan Albright led last week's
presidential race with a promise
that "Student Government offices
will be open one day in the month
so the president can meet with any
students who are not associated
with Student Government." . Just
one day,; (Soucex a UP "Albright
for President'5 pamphlet)
UP Chairman Harry Diffendal
told Student Legislature they didn't
have to represent the student body
because they were "an elite."
The Student Legislature'
double jeopardy amendment got 48
percent approval in a referendum.
A student-initiated amendment got
75 percent.
Ken Day spent official student
government money to influence the
outcome of that referendum.
The Student Supreme Court
ruled the presidential election
should be postponed because it had
been conducted under
discriminatory, unconstitutional
regulations. The court reversed its
decision a few hours later at the
now-infamous 3 a.m. meeting of
party politicians.
The SG defense counsel in that
hearing, a law student named Don
Carsons, told the court they didn't
have the power to set a new
elections date. He neglected to
remind the justices it had been
ruled in 1966 in a case he was
involved in-that they had exactly
that power.
The court then refused last
Sunday even to hear evidence that
the elections should be declared
invalid and students be given a fair
choice.
When I came back to the DTH
this fall, I told the editors I wanted
to cover student government in
depth. I thought regular, in-depth
coverage might give the student
body a sense of what SG really .was
and what it could be. So far, I have
probably written more stories on
Student Government than anyone
else on the Tar Heel Staff.
I spent a semester as Student
Legislature correspondent. I wrote
columns about the issues and their
relevance to campus life. I spent
Lett
ers
The Daily Tar Heel accepts all
letters for publication provided
they are typed, double - spaced
and signed. Letters should be no
longer than 300 words in length.
We reserve tne right to edit for
libelous statements.
Tuesday, April 1, 1969
V"."--'- - -------------------- " J-i
I Letters l
Nude Nonsense
Knocks Maryland
To the Editor:
Your article and attending photo of .
the "Nude Runners" printed in today's "
"DTH" was in particularly poor taste.
Though that appraisal needs no
rational support I offer you this:
It was hardly newsworthy on the basis .
of popular mass phenomena since you
only referred to one incident that
coming from ' a most obscure and
questionable "college?".
It is hardly newsworthy as being
imitable, charismatic, or deserving
attention in that it was instigated by four
freshman from that questionable
institution all of whom have less than
noteworthy credentials as either scholars .
(1.6 GPA), sexual prodigies, substantial
or very happy young boys. Not only are
sex, life, studies, and their psyches flaccid
and pointless for them but their run .
seemed to be as well.
And the nonsense from the supposed
psychologists, besides being contradictory
to the "runners" own testimony, was
little more than an arcane attempt at
explanation-justification.
And, if you must flash four asses at us
in an attempt to shock or outrage, please
be good enough to delete the tumescent
statistics concerning their inane and
stunted non-sexuality.
Maybe it is the most newsworthy item
to come off a college campus
(particularly Maryland) for a long time.-
That hardly makes it news.
Sincerely,
Leon Festinger Jr.
hours talking to politicos, listening
to speeches, reading bills, following
campaigns, and writing stories.
I urged SSOC, the HayakawaJ
Society, and scores of individuals to.
study the issues and get into SG if
they weren't happy with what was
going on. Frequently people told
me -I was crazy, that nothing the "
politicos did was relevant to anyone
but themselves.
No one has tried to make
Student Government worlc more
than I have. After covering this
presidential election-probably
more closely than anyone on
campus-I was appalled by the
tactics of a few party officials.
I was so appalled 1 filed suit
against Ken Day in the Student
Supreme Court to have the election
declared invalid. I wanted to put
Albright and Diffendal and Day on
the stand and have them produce
the financial records of their party's
expenditures.
I was prepared to prove the
extent of the discriminatory, unfair' ;
circumstances surrounding the .
election, circumstances that had
deprived students of a fair choice..
The Student Supreme Court"
declined to hear the case. Student
Government trembled in its boots
at the thought of having financial
records made public. It trembled at
having a fair election which would
give all candidates an equal chance.
It trembled at what the student
body might do. The court ruled it
didn't matter whether the election
was fair or not.
Well, you can only beat your
head against the wall for so long.
From now on, so far as I'm
concerned, Student Government is
a non-entity. Like so many others, I
have finally come to the conclusion
that it just doesn't matter anymore.
One SG official, Cliff Tuttle, says
I ' A I " t
i in nui uemg a gooa sport. INo,
Cliff, I guess I'm not. You can't be:
a good sport when you hear people
say an election doesn't have to be
fair and that Student Government
has no
students.
responsibility to the
,This will be the last
ever write about
Government. As far
concerned, Albright,
column I
C. . ,1
as I'm
Diffendal,
Day. Tuttle, and Carsons can all rot
in tneir executive mahogony graves.