Newspapers / Daily Tar Heel (Chapel … / Dec. 15, 1967, edition 1 / Page 2
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Frr' December 15, 1067 Pamela Hatvkins E DAILY TAB HEFT. 75 Year of Editorial Freedom BiH Arnlong, Editor Don Walton, Business Manager See Yon In It's All Up i i I i p y Speeding Could Have Caused This rt n This is one of those times of year when the only way Chapel Hill can look good as if seen through a rear-view mir ror. And that's just how a lot of persons are going to be look ing at it during the next few days, as the annual mass ex odus for Christmas vacation begins. Literally thousands of students will get in cars to travel home. Most of the students driv ing home will get there safely. They'll return to Carolina the same way in one piece- But there will be others: There always have been. For each year, each vaca tion period, there have been highway accidents which have seriously injured or killed Carolina students. In the past it has always been the other ones besides you. Maybe it was a sorority sister. Maybe the guy who liv ... Or Was It That Six Pack? Don Campbell, Associate Editor Lytl Stamps, Managing Editor Hunter George, News Editor Brant Wansley, Advertising Manager January? To Yon ed down the hall. Or maybe even your best friend. How did the accidents hap pen? Who knows? Perhaps ex cessive speed caused them. Or falling asleep at the wheel. Or was it that six pack that the driver was guzzling as he wheeled onto the Interstate. Maybe it was even somebody else's fault. Who knows? What caused the accidents in the past isn't the important thing now, however. They should be remembered only so you can avoid making the same mistakes as someone else did. . Instead, the thing that mat ters now is, Just how do YOU plan to avoid being maimed or killed while driving home? After all, it's your life we're talking about. See you after the holidays? . I ! II ' The downtown Christmas lights were scrambled into garbled shades of red and green in the rain puddles that splotched the streets of Charlotte a couple of years ago. It was the day after Christmas. Driving to work early that moniin I could barely see outlines of houses on the side of -the road in the driving rain and fog. , Not much traffic that morning. It was only 6 a.m. Two headlights coming toward me on the other side cf the road median pierced the thickening mist. The car was in visible, but the lights moved noiselessly closer. "Silent Night" was playing on the radio. It was the kind of morning when you can even smile at the fog and rain. Christmas time ds like that . .a lot of ci hours .' U fieri Vcla p -Jtl uJlHi 1 w - . LaBarr e Replies .Om rHoite. C omurt- To The Editor: Although I rarely publicly answer such Earrow-mioded and uninformed articles, I should lake to make strong objection to ithe article Abolish the Honor Code (writ ten by Ray Stein). In the interest cf our Judicial System, and, hopefully, to better inform students, some clarification needs to be made on certain aspects of our system wlhidi have been so blatantly distorted Hn ithe case referred to by Stein, the student was not tried by the civil court since charges were mot preferred by the ahopowners. Although I too have had some thoughts about touble-jeopardy in connection wiHh our courts trying after civil court action, high counts have held that universities have a right to impose and enforce disaplinary action against students. . J As for his contention that the Honor Court is a "kangaroo court" this is a nar row, subjective opinion not supported by facts. The most obvious misconception of Stein's deals with the selection of the Honor Court. The Attorney-General does not and has never selected the members of the Honor Court. Electrons are held The Draft: By DICK LEVY I One group of anti-draft demonstrators last week opposed not the war, but the draft per se. Last summer NSA passed a similar policy , and reached similar conclusions. Their opposition is founded, it seems to cnei, on dubious grounds, both philosophical and pragmatic. To begin 'with, appeals to the Four teenth Amendment rat withstanding, ithe Constitution specifically spells out the right of the Government to conscript an army. There it is (and win be for quite awhile) in black and white. To counter this by an appeal to some higher authority, on the basis of "in voluntary servitude'' or "natural law" seems tenuous. If being drafted is com pulsion, so is having to attend school, or having a file a tax return. Further, each of these raises in some individuals the . moral qualms (e.g. the Amish) as in those who feel opposed to the draft on moral grounds. It may be countered that the draft ultimately involves killing other men. First, this may not be true. There needn't always be a war. Nor need one always accept a combatant position. Further, only about 20 per cent in such a position in WWII were found actually able to fire the trigger. Finally, one may always apply for, CO. "status, an increasingly popular pposed 1 smiles. The road was cosing to a slight curve buried under large chunks of red clay from a church construction site oa the side c the road. And the depression of the slick, black pavement at the curve had given rise to a swirling little stream. All of a sudden. . .the car. . it was sliding. . .spinning. . .I'm. . .those car light- . .I'm heading toward those car lights. Silence. . total, engulfing, saturating, silence in a silent rain that trickled through a shattered windsbield- Slowly, so very slowly, my mind .grasped semi-consciousness . . , wreck. . . . I've wrecked the car. consciousness. . .wreck. . .I've wrecked the car. "Oh God, why did it have to happen to me? within each legislative district each year after any aspiring candidate has been en dorsed by the Honor Systems Com mission. The students within each district vote for the candidate of their choosing. ; s The Attorney-General, along with his assistants, does appoint members of the Attorney-General's staff, after a careful process of interviews and testing on lec tures concerning the Honor System. My staff 3s composed of around fifty members of alt classes from all areas throughout the campus. For the most part each of them has hdgh quality point averages and has demonstrated his character and leadership ability through various activities. The members of the staff are anything but biased. Another distortion concerns the defense councils. The accused may have any member of his peer group to serve as his defense council. If the accused does not desire anyone in particular, I win ap point, with the accused's permission, a member of my staff who is experienced and qualified to represent him. The office of the Attorney General operates with the intention of getting the facts, without any preconceived assumptions, something which Mr. Stein has obviously failed to The Student Speaks Imperfect alternative with diminishing stigma at tached. And if it be said that the stigma is itself an imposition, let it not be forgot ten that living dn a democratic socity poses inherent discomfort to the minori ty. , Hopefully, however, principle is stronger than discomfort Remember, top, that there are few Americans who enjoy killing, that the division is not between man and beast in this case. Those of us who choose to serve are not Draculas or even Calibans. The draft, as stated yesterday, is not ideological. It as based on necessity however distasteful. If we assume that given a choice, few of us would volunteer to kill or be killed, how would the nation get men when we needed rapid mobiliza tion? In any sort of conventional con flictlike Viet Nam or even WWII we would be at a severe disadvantage. Clearly there be only one alternative to conscription: a volunteer army. To me, this alternative is frightening. The prohibitive cost is the least im portant reason, not the most Whatever semblances of national sani ty we have are due to the fact that you and I are drafted and that neither we cor our families like that Thus, committing the nation to war necessitates pursuading mothers everywhere that their sons are going to die for something worthwhile. History has proved this to be quite dif o Be All Seme man, a rice voice, Caa I he!? you?" "My shoulder, it . .the other car, did I bit the other car. . .those beadghis. . He said, no. I hadn't hurt anyone. Thank you God, I didn't hurt anyone." The man reached behind my limp body which was slung across the two front bucket seats and pushed out the back seat I rolled my head to face the dash and a telephone pole was the only thing I saw. It had come through the empty front trunk, between the wheels and was squashing my shoulder. Somebody with a pea and pad, "Your parents' names?" "Please don tell them. Don't let mother know. And daddy, I didn't mean to hurt the car. . ." do. After rambling on about unjust decision, again wi&out fact, Mr. Stein poses a question of those who get away. Are we to assume that we should abolish the system because some of the guilty parties escape punishment? The one point that Stein makes which deserves attention concerns signing a pledge. This is a point which has been discussed a great deal by members of the Judicial Branch. It does seem to be a questionable aspect of the system. Except for this point, the whole article blatantly distorts our current system. Stein has no facts to back up bis obvious misconceptions. It is this type of biased, narrow article which causes distrust and lack of respect for the system. In closing, I. would like to point out that interviews for the Attorney General's staff will be held in the fall of 1968. If Mr. Ray Stein would like to reap ply to the staff, we will seriously consider his application, although we prefer so meone who is open-minded and sticks to the facts. David LaBarre Attorney General of The Student Body But Better Alternative ficult Mistakes may be made, but the process is protective. And once we finally do get the boys overseas a million voices are already clamboring for their return. Even the politicians want their return because the nation is disrupted while they are gone. Talented ycung men, would be doctors or businessmen or teachers or even garbage men are taken out of commission, and the nation feels the loss. National growth is set back. But what about a volunteer army, highly paid and highly statused? An army made up of the frustrated killers, the op portunists, the alienated, the failures? The crusades over again. In the name of freedom, they would perform their tasks with ruthless efficiency and without com passion. The purpose of a professional army lies not dn national defense, but in con quest. Armies of that kind must fight. And none cf them would be yearning for home, nor would their mothers be calling for them. The nation would scarcely feel their loss domestically. - Except for one haunting fear. Such an army, with all its hostilities, might turn against the home populace. Professional armies often tend, because of the discipline, to be moralistic or puritanical, in doctrine if cot in practice. They also tend to resent civilian authority which, even under a man as Snniil TIME WAS JO IF ING around and the next thing my eyes focused on was a n? of bri lights oa a narrow ceillr- Mother was beside me. She ras crying. Dadiy was teH-ng me everything was alright. Then, sooehow, there was a doctor saying something, about 'an oral anesthetic for my ripped cpart knee as he cut th bloody stockings away frotn my legs. Daddy held my band, tight. "TaSc to me about something," I told him. And for three hours while the doctor worked on my leg, be talked. I thx'ght hard about everything he said, trying not to let my mind escape bis grasp and wander to think about what the doctor was doing to my leg. Then, snatches of day and then night tumbled over in my semi-conscious mind. Some people came in and looked at me and cried. Nobody g3e me a mirror. Nurses kept giving me shots and pushing mushy spoonfuls of food at my mouth. I couldn't move. They changed the bed around me and bathed me. I was theirstotally theirs. Doctors kept com ing around in the morning and wouldn't answer me when I asked if I would be able to walk again. At night everyone would leave. I was alone with four stark, green waus-abne with the reincarnation of the accident everytinie I closed my eyes. . .headlights through the fog. More days passed, and the doctor finally said I could sit in a wheelchair. The figure-eight bandage on my broken shoulder blade made it awkward to sit up, and any (movement of my leg caused blinding pain. But days dragged on, and I got weS enough to be bored with the four green walls. So, clumsily maneuvering my wheelchair, I ventured out into the hall. There was one room, just around the turn of the corridor, where the door was left open one day. I wheeled my way in to say Hello. A boy, about my age, lay on the bed, his leg in traction and all sorts of frightening medical equipment around the bed. His name was Rick. We became friends. Rick had been in a car accident a year ago when he was on his way home from college for Christmas vacation. He had been in the hospital ever since. The doc tors didn't give him much chance to live. I don't know that he really wanted to anyway. He had killed his girlfriend and an - elderly couple in his accident Even still, 4: he screamed out in,his sleep from the "ndghtmaresw...;, . , . Rick and I played penny poker every night when all the visitors left. We got to know each other pretty well, and the nurses would let us stay up after everyone else had gone to bed. . I got well enough to go home after a while. They said there was a chance that I could walk again if I worked at it Before I left, I wanted to tell Rick good-bye. I started wheeling toward his room, and a nurse stopped me. "Rick died last night," she said. AFTER SEVERAL months of physical therapy, casts, and crutches, I took my first steps. J could walk again, my shoulder had healed, and my face had been readjusted. I was alright But the memory cf Rick still haunts me. It all happened during Christmas time. . Jthe time when everyone is sup posed to be smiling. Maybe you can't learn from someone else though. Maybe you will have to kill someone or see a friend die before you understand. Maybe this Christmas you'll learn for yourself what it is not to be able to smile. God help you if you do. strong-willed as McNamara, was very difficult to apply. Thus, one is faced in abolishing the draft with two possibilities: an army with no morality following the President blind ly, without national checks, just so they get to fight, as in Germany; or an army takeover one morning, as in Greece. Either is bleak. The draft, however im perfect, is a superior alternative. Tomorrow: An objection to the draft and a modification. The Daily Tar Heel is published by the University of North Carolina Student Publication's Board, daily except Mondays, examinations periods and vacations. Offices are on the second flqpr cf Graham -Memorial. Telephone numbers: editorial, sports, new s S23-1011; business, circn latioa, advetising 933-11S3. Address: Box 1CS0, Chapel 1X32, N.C., 27514. Second class postage paid at U.S. Post Office in Chapel Ilill, N.C. Subscription rates: $3 per year; $5 per semester.
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
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Dec. 15, 1967, edition 1
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