Newspapers / Daily Tar Heel (Chapel … / May 18, 1965, edition 1 / Page 2
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o Page 2 Tuesday, May 18, 1965 SHy lath ar "3f l Opinions of the Daily Tar Heel are expressed fn Its editor ials. Letters and columns, covering a wide range of views, reflect the personal opinions of their authors. - - " The Gerrymander Backlash Some Raleigh Democrats are reportedly kicking around the idea of gerrymandering the state's two Repub lican Congressmen into the same district. Apparently they figure such a move would kill off one Republican and cut their Congressional worries in half. But they are not figuring on what the attitude the peo ple of the state might be toward such action. North Caro linians don't usually like to see anybody backed into a cor ner unfairly, even Republicans. The same sort of thing happened in the last state re apportionment of districts: Congressman Charles R. Jonas' district was gerrymandered so that he had to run against an incumbent Democrat, Paul Kitchin. The plan backfired and Jonas is now eighth district Congressman. The gerry mander also had something to do with Democrat Hugh Alexander's ouster from 4he ninth district. Republican James T. Broyhill was elected. One plausible theory is that if Jonas and Broyhill were 9 thrown into the same district, Jonas would withdraw from the race and run for the Senate. If history is any indicator of the future, the Demo crats should shy away from the gerrymander as a weapon against Republicans. o North Carolina could quite likely have a Republican Senator and several GOP Representatives, depending on the "gerrymander backlash." That Noisy Kid Stuff Students who have been making weekend pilgrimages to South Carolina beaches have been bringing back more than tans. "The calm Chapel Hill air is frequently split these nights by some of the most ear-cracking fireworks ever endured. Some injuries have already, been reported, and it is past time to call a screeching halt to the "fun." It seems there are always a few college students who are intent on proving they never really should have left high school, and we put the firecracker shooters at the head of this group. They are violating the state law, the Campus Code and the rights of their fellow students the right to study without being jolted out of a chair and the right to walk outside a residence hall without fear of being deafened or burned Men's Residence Council representatives are trying to -enforce anti-fireworks regulations, but they cannot be eve ry where at once. MRC: President Sonny Pepper said no convictions have beenmade this year, but anyone caught will" be sent to the Honor Council court with the recom mendation of suspension. For the protection of themselves and other students, campus residents must report these violations to their MRC hall representative or the Attorney General before more numerous and more serious injuries occur. A Look At The Speaker Ban The Norfolk Virginian-Pilot faorth Carolina's ill-conceived speaker-ban law has a new critic: the Southern Association of Schools and Col leges. W. A. Dees, Chairman of the State Board of Higher Education, has revealed that the accreditation of the State supported colleges may be, endangered by the measure rammed through the General Assembly in the final hours of its 1963 session. Governor Dan K. Moore in consequence has said he will confer on possible effects of the law "with the officials of the Southern Association of Schools and Colleges, rep resentatives of higher education in North Carolina, and members of the General Assembly." During his election campaign last year, he looked far too kindly upon the leg islation. - A movement to amend it is current in the General As sembly. It would allow the trustees of the various institu tions of higher learning to decide who may speak on their campuses. As now written, the law bars Communists and persons who have pleaded the Fifth Amendment from speaking on the campus of any State-supported college or university. Why it has taken the Southern Association of Schools and Colleges nearly two years to discover that the speaker ban law seems to violated its accreditation standards, we do not know. It is equally puzzling to us that North Caro lina, which usually follows its own cool head, needs pres sure from without to correct a mistake. There was no need for it to pass the speaker-ban law. No other state has such a statute. It was introduced not because Communist speakers on college campuses were a menace, or even a fact, but to extend legislative control over the independently inclined University of North Caro lina. When the idea of Virginia's copying the law was ad vanced last year, Governor Albertis S. Harrison was quick to reject it. North Carolina ought to repeal its silly gag on speech. If its college administrations and trustees are not compe tent to run their affairs without legislative shackles, they are worth neither accreditation nor their salt. Second Class Postage Paid at Chapel nm, N. C. 9 RWfWSM?! 5 k:;;js "They Could've At Least .Cleaned Tlie Covers!" The Center Ring if The Campus Radio Lesson In Shabby isnum: JL oii&ics A 7 r ' ' V v . lie?- ml rt By JOIIX GREENBACKER Attempting to understand the complexi ties behind the defeat of campus radio for this semester may prove difficult for any one immitiated to the wiles of Student Leg islature, but the actual controversy was relatively simple. Campus radio was really defeated by in dividuals, not the force of back room pol itics or unnamed pressures. The key man behind the forces opposed to early passage of the radio legislation was Hugh Blackwell of the Student Par ty, and his personality was dominant throughout the fight. Blackwell is unquestionably a powerful figure in the legislature, mainly because of his seniority, and his outstnading ability to articulate his opinions. Blackwell is chairman of the SL Finance Committee, and he is well known in Student Government as a man who will do his utmost to ses that SG funds are not wasted in any project, no matter how valuable it might be to student welfare. With the scrutiny of a watchdog, he has picked at every financial bill to come through the legislature within the past two years, and in the grand tradition of Arthur Hays he squeezed excess appropriation from the accounts of organizations high and low in the SG power structure. Blackwell once said he was like "the conscience" of the legislature when it came to spending, and this may well be the case. His only problem is that, like a con science, he is frequently maligned and hat ed by his peers. Blackwell knows this, and fortunately it doesn't bother him. It was inevitable that campus radio and Hugh Blackwell would collide, for, regard less of the cause, an appropriation of near- Tale Of Two Teachers B lit Socrates W as A Troublemaker By TIMOTHY RAY DTII Columnist I might have called this article "The Case Against Socrates," for I respectfully disagree with the Chancellor's statement that if Socrates were to reappear on our campus, he would be made a full professor. If we did not repeat the crime of the Athenians who killed him, we would at least politely expel him from our midst. My reason for this conclusion is that Socrates was a very "controversial" trou blemaker, a man who devoted himself, among other things, to mocking highly re spected scholars, institutions and public leaders and distrubing the regular order of things, and a teacher who inspired the youth of his day to question established practices, policies, and procedures. Socrates was not tolerated in his own day, and I do not believe that a sufficient change has occurred in human nature so that he would be tolerated today. He was a man supported by others, a social para site whose friends, admirers, and students were so happy to have his presence that they gave him the respect that he more than deserved. That Socrates' attempts to lead men from the cave of spiritual darkness to the blinding perception of the good were met with condemnation by the state which he told men to respect establishes his life as a prototype of tragedy not an Aeschy lean tragedy which asserts a higher moral order in the universe, but a tragedy which exposes the immoral weakness of men and their institutions. Dr. William Goodykoontz is another tra gedy. A man who inspires his students to a love of literature and of the richness of life, he fails to deliver 50 - minute capsules of information, restricted to the subject matter. A teacher with a group of de voted students who rally to his defense, he is not one who works through the re gular orderly processes which the mod ern university has established for the hir ing and promotion of teachers, and the hearing of their grievances. One who inno cently respects his fellowman, he inter prets verbal enthusiasm as equivalent to a legal contract. Goodykoontz just doesn't fit in. The disciplined men of our faculty and administration want an efficient and pro fessionalized institution with a national re putation. They want to attract noted scho lars to come here and do research. They want the boundaries of knowledge driven forward inch by inch in a relentless war on ignorance till our flag waves proudly over conquered territory. The system of "up or out" by which a man is kept on if he shows promise of be ing a candidate for tenure, and given ten ure if he shows promise of leading frontal attacks in this war is a rational and logical way of pursuing these goals. Given all the premises of the complex system which the modern university is, there is no room for charismatic vagabonds whose careers are devoted solely to communicating love of literature and religious devotion to human dignity. " The ardor of students who complain to the public about the evils of publish or per ish will only succeed in adding strength to those who believe that North Carolina has no need for a real university. Decon tamination, deconsolidation, deprivation and dissipation of the university system are obstacles to be fought against if UNC is ever to raise its head in the group of great universities. Such fighting requires a closing of ranks and -a formalization of procedures. Stud ents who want to participate in the very innermost workings of the administrative machinery can only be sabots to obstruct the macinery and bring it to a grinding halt. The building of a great city requires factories that turn out great quantities of uniform produce. Unionization of the ple biahs can only slow up the process and weaken the city. Progress and logic are on the side of publish or perish. I cannot help wondering if the human spirit can survive such organized rational ity without something vital dying, but SFT, in fighting this war at this time and in this place, will fail to preserve that something vital. It will be pushed aside as a heavy stone, obstructing the war on ig norance, and the mighty guns of knowledge will roll on. Vagabond singers and prophets make poor infantrymen in this war. Unlike most wars, we may never know when we have won, but perhaps someday there will be a lull after a great victory and a brief span of time in which there will be a place for a Socrates or a Goodykoontz. Disservice To Liberalism Editor, The Daily Tar Heel: Many voices more significant than my own have already spoken thoughtfully to the question of the current move to recall the editor of the Daily Tar Heel, but I would like to add my own support to those who vigorously denounce the violation of the freedom of the press that the present recall movement represents or implies. Ernie McCrary was fairly elected by a -majority of the students on this campus to the highly responsible office he now holds after a free, open, and vigorous cam paign. In that campaign I voted for his opponent, but without emnity and with ev ery willingness to accept the mandate of the electorate. The current move against McCrary seems rooted in objections to his policy on a number of specific issues. However deeply I may, disagree with that policy or however disappointed I may have been by his failure to state clear policy on other matters, I think it a serious lack of un derstanding of the principles of a free press in a free society to seek the resig nation of an editor with whose judgments one may not agree. To my knowledge McCrary has gone to considerable pains to make ample space available in his pages to print the views of those with views other than his own. I regret that he has had on occasion to rely on spokesmen for a conservative point of view who seem inadequate to represent that view thoughtfully and effectively, but the editor is entitled to a fair amount of time to find the skill and talent I am sure he seeks to speak for any point of view. I urge those who now call for his re placement to abandon their efforts in favor of encouraging McCrary to seek out re sponsible spokesmen for all points of view and to use the opportunities he has pro vided them for the free and fair express ion of their own ideas. It would be a tra gic disservice to the whole commitment of liberalism to abandon, regardless to the irritants at work against it, one of its cardinal ideas the right of free express ion in a free public forum. James W. Gardner Jr. Part - time Instructor Evening College What About The Money? Letters The Daily Tar Heel welcomes let ters to the editor on any subject, par ticularly os matters of local or Uni versity interest. Letters should be typed, double spaced and include the name and address of sender. Names wiO cot be omitted in publication. Letters should be kept as brief as possible. The DTH reserves the right to edit for length. Editor, The Daily Tar Heel: In his editorial Thursday Ernie McCrary asserted: "An increase in fees is the only issue which really requires a referendum, and this issue does not exist." It is true that the $23,300 needed to ini tiate the radio and the $11,628 for the first year's operation would be taken from funds of the Student Government general surplus, which supposedly exists of about $77,000. But what of future yearly opera tional costs of $11,628, which 'will certainly not decrease but most likely expand? Is this money annually going to be pro vided from the general surplus or, if not, from what other source will the money be gotten? Does McCrary or proponents of a campus radio contend that the general surplus will indefinitely sustain the campus radio? Or will not the student fees have to be raised to provide the large amount of money needed yearly to finance the ra dio. It seems that this will be the case, and it is not, according to McCrary, an "issue ( which) does not exist." McCrary insistence that a referendum is not needed reminds me of the issue of NSA last fall. If the students were able to decide the continuance of a relatively small but controversial item such as this, why should not they have their voice heard on a large, financially controversial item such as the campus radio? After all, the stu dents are the ones who will be using the radio, and their fees will most probably be raised to support this project. McCrary probably doesn't realize that there is great concern among students over ' the cost and the need for the campus radio. Maybe McCrary should come down from his perch and realize that the students, not just McCrary, Gordon, or Carson are going to listen and finance the campus ra dio, and that they should properly have the deciding voice as to its initiation. I am personally in favor of campus ra dio, but I don't think democratic process es (i.e., full debate in the Student Leg islature and the student referendum) should be disregarded because a few self-serving politicians are too impatient to wait for the student voice to be expressed. Robert Farb 318 Teague ly $33,000 is a matter of grave importance in his eyes. The fact that experts from the Depart t ment of Radio, Television and Motion Pic tures here had spent many long hours com piling and researching the materials ne cessary to have a student radio station was really of no consequence to Black well. He had doubts just the same. Standard procedure in the Finance Com mittee would have decreed many long and agonizing hours spent checking each item of equipment to be purchased for the ra dio, and Blackwell readily insisted that such a procedure be followed. A referendum to the student body, in the estimation of Blackwell and his sup porters, was almost a necessity in deter mining whether such a large -amount of money was to be appropriated. Enter the opposing forces, composed of Don Carson, former student body vice pre sident, John Stupak, chairman of the Cam pus Radio Committee of Student Govern ment, and various other individuals who had a hand in the mammoth labor invol ved in planning the radio system. They were proud of their work, express ed in the form of three complicated pieces of legislation, and they were fired with the powerful enthusiasm which only a project of this magnitude can produce. The leaders of the campus radio movement had a dream which they thought was about to come true, and the legislature was the only thing that stood in their way. As a consequence, Carson and others started to "talk up" the radio,' hoping to produce the . type of snowball effect that would whisk the entire radio package through committee and the legislature floor in short order. Here the big drive was stopped dead " in its tracks. Members of the Finance and Rules Committees wanted to check each item in each bill. As time passed, passions flared. Car son and Stupak propagandized the radio with a fast array of facts and suspicions, and many of the Blackwell supporters re acted in the same manner. Carson injected the fear that if the campus radio snowball were to be halted this semester, it would never be passed. It is difficult to comment on the validity of such an impression, and even now the fate of campus radio lies to a large de gree in the hands of the radio's suppor ters. Blackwell's able assistants, Jim Little and Joe Chandler, supported the cause of further investigation, and were even more strongly committed to the idea of holding a referendum on t'ie issue. The extreme amount of infighting which occurred took immeasurable toll in rela tions within, the legislature. Many indivi duals onlbdlh sides of the question looked at their opponents not as fellow politicians and friends who happened to disagree on a big issue, but rather as ideological ene mies. The opposite side was regarded as a group of hideous conspirators who spoke nothing but lies and whose motives were sinister and ulterior. At this point, . the participants ceased to be politicians, but became bitter dogma tists for whom every aspect of the contro versy was a matter of black and white. Politics, the art of the possible, was never more shabbily treated. It is difficult to say whether campus radio should have been passsed this semes ter. Blackwell might weil have been wrong in trying to see that every aspect of the radio legislation conformed to his desires. Carson might well have been wrong in try ing to force the issue and in opposing major revision to the legislation. A few facts can be noted, however, about the nature of the Student Party cau cus. Student Body President Paul Dickson appealed to his party to pass the radio legislation, but the SP block against early passage was unmoved. Serious questions about Dickson's personal influence within his party are certain to arise. Student Party Floor leader Don Wilson, who tried unsuccessfully to affect a com promise on the issue, found his position as floor leader challenged by the powerful Little - Blackwell - Chandler coalition. He will have to strengthen his own position in the future if he is to be more effective in inter - party disputes of this nature. Whether by chance or otherwise, the University Party suffered no problems cf this nature during the radio controversy. Hopefully, the campus radio issue is fin ished for this academic year, for only after some time will the participants in Stu dent Legislature be able to cool off and attempt to patch up the seriously damaged relationships which now exist. The one ingredient necessary now is im partial understanding, and the members of the legislature must realize that issues cf this sort are disputes among friends, not among irreconcilable ideologies. If not, then the legislature might just as well disband as continue. The interesting aspect of the whole thin? is that all parties concerned expressed their belief that campus radio is a good idea, and to fail to enact it would likely be a detriment to the student body. At the end of the special session in which radio was debated, Carson, the old showman, calmly struck a match and watched his copies of the radio legisla tion burn. As the flames crept up the paper, he slowly extended his hand out the fourth story window and watched fcr a brief instant as the fire floated to the ground below. The only question which remains is who will take up the torch of campus radio and student communication when fall again comes to Chapel HiJl?
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
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May 18, 1965, edition 1
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