Newspapers / Daily Tar Heel (Chapel … / March 21, 1990, edition 1 / Page 1
Part of Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.) / About this page
This page has errors
The date, title, or page description is wrong
This page has harmful content
This page contains sensitive or offensive material
fliPipf Sunny High 60 Fall schedule books available Thursday: Sunny High upper 60s z a Serving the students and the University community since 1893 Volume S3, Issue 13 Wednesday, March 21, 1SS9 Chapel Hill, North Carolina NewsSportsArts BusinessAdvertising 962-0245 962-1163 ill ii II it V , lil l! 8 fr (! Law allows runoff victory with 40 percent of vote RALEIGH The U.S. Justice Department has approved a change in North Carolina's election laws that would allow a candidate to win the primary if he draws at least 40 percent of the vote. Obern Rainey of the Civil Rights Division said Tuesday the change ap proved by the legislature last year has been "precleared," which means it can be put into effect for the May 8 primary. Blacks have long contended that the state's runoff system hurt them in pri maries because minority candidates who led the field against several white candidates in the initial primary rou tinely lost runoff primaries against a single white candidate. "I am glad to see that the United States Justice Department has approved the law enacted by the North Carolina General Assembly," U.S. Senate can didate Harvey Gantt said in a prepared statement. The state's former system required a primary candidate to win 50 percent of the balloting plus one vote to avoid a runoff. But the new law would declare the leading primary candidate the win ner if he gets at least 40 percent of the vote. A runoff between the top two vote-getters would be held only if nei ther candidate received 40 percent of the vote. Workers suing unions entitled to trial by jury WASHINGTON The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that workers who sue their unions for allegedly failing to represent them fairly may be entitled to jury trials to settle the issue. By a 6-3 vote, the court said union members must be given jury trials if their suits seek monetary compensa tion such as back pay. The decision is a victory for 27 truck drivers who sued a North Carolina local of the Teamsters union. 'The money damages (the drivers) seek are the type of relief traditionally awarded by courts of law," Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote for the court. "Thus, the (Constitution's) Seventh Amendment entitles (them) to a jury trial." Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Sandra Day O'Connor and Antonin Scalia dissented. Food trucks try to reach Ethiopian famine victims NAIROBI, Kenya Fifteen trucks loaded with 150,000 tons of food were ready to roll through a war zone in northern Ethiopia on Tuesday in an attempt to feed some of an estimated 4 million famine victims. Officials acknowledged, however, that at best they hoped to reach only about 1 million people in the provinces of Wollo and Tigre, about one-fourth of the vast number said by the UN to be in danger of dying this year. "We won't really know how well, or if, this is going to work until the first convoy gets through," said Hamed Bahget, deputy director of Catholic Relief Services in Ethiopia's capital of Addis Ababa. The convoy had been scheduled to leave Dessie, a government garrison town about 155 miles north of Addis Ababa, on S unday for the town of Kobo, about 75 miles farther north. From Associated Press reports Power of the press Speaker addresses rights to make all public meetings open 3 Keeping the Faith Baha'is address world peaceracial unity, social problems 5 Gone batty Baseball defeats Virginia Common wealth in fourth 10-run game 7 Campus and city ...1 3 Features 5 Sports . 6 Classified 8 Comics 9 mm olice to, By MYRON B. PITTS Assistant University Editor According to at least two members of the UNC Pol ice Department, changes in responsibilities and work schedules planned by management have been largely accepted by the officer corps. Starting on May 14, University po lice will no longer exclusively have the duty of aiding stranded drivers. The department of transportation and park ing will help motorists during the week until 7:30 a.m. daily. Also, beginning on July 1, Univer sity officers will work on rotating shifts instead of their traditional permanent shift system. Sgt. Ned Comar, who will be retiring at the end of this month, said he has noticed no widespread discontent with the changes. Many officers were handling the Brag legalization debated by authorities By NANCY WYKLE Assistant University Editor The effects of legalizing drugs such as marijuana and cocaine was the sub ject of a heated debate in Memorial Hall Tuesday night. Noted authorities for both sides of the issue were on hand to give their views to the crowd of about 300. The proponents of legalization were Ethan Nadelmann, a political science professor at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University, and Lester Grinspoon, a Harvard Medical School psychiatrist who has written several articles and books about drugs and drug abuse. State Attorney General Lacy Thorn burg and Lee Dogoloff, White House drug policy adviser during the Carter administration, spoke against legaliza tion. Nadelmann said legalizing drugs is an alternative to the war on drugs. Drugs should not be made available to every one at any place, but should be avail able to adults, he said. "Legalization means divergence of resources and putting them where they really make a difference," he said. "Deep down, I believe legalization is the moral approach to the drug prob lem." Thornburg said legalization is a simple idea, but a dangerous one. Drugs are involved in 70 percent of crimes in the U.S. Many people supporting le galization are doing so out of frustra tion with the difficulty and slowness of solving the problem, he said. Dogoloff said problems with a black market and distribution would result from legalization. "You can't solve a Native American chancellor urges cultural diversity in state schools By JENNIFER PILLA Staff Writer Chancellor Joseph Oxendine of Pembroke State University spoke Tues day about the special problems of Na tive American students in a mostly non Native American society. The event was sponsored by the Carolina Indian Circle and the anthropology depart ment as a part of Native American Cultural Week. Oxendine is the second Native American chancellor at Pembroke State University and the only Native Ameri can chancellor in the UNC system. He has held that position for eight months. In his speech, Oxendine encouraged Native American students to identify and nurture the tie which binds them as a culture. "We need to touch each other and work together and keep contact. Traditionally we haven't worked to gether enough." Native Americans also need to co operate and compete positively, Ox endine said. "Do your dead-level best without holding the other guy down," he said. "American Indians are particu larly prone to do that. It's very impor tant that we celebrate each other's successes." Native Americans must interact with other cultures while preserving their own cultural identities, Oxendine said. This was something he said he missed while growing up in Robeson County and being educated at an all-Native American school. "I had formed ideas about white people," he said. "Somehow, I had a feeling that they were smarter than me. We need to insist on universities and public schools that have diversity throughout." Oxendine praised the efforts of UNC See OXENDINE, page 3 Life is just one damn thing after another. Elbert Hubbard officers adapt to cfan transition better because the notion of scrapping the UNC Police department and replacing it with an outside secu rity force came up recently, Comar said. "Somehow or other, the idea that the department can be disbanded may have subconsciously shaped up some atti tudes a little bit (and) probably dimin ished some arrogance," he said. Keith Edwards, a University officer who has protested the department's hiring and promotion practices, calling them unfair and prejudiced, said she was unaffected by the prospect of de partmental break-up. "That didn't bother me at all," she said. "I had no reaction to that." An unarmed security force would not serve as a proper deter rent to violent crimes, she said. Edwards thought the changes in the department, especially those which problem just by redefining it." Grinspoon said, "He (Dogoloff) represents part of the problem mis information and miseducation in this area." Grinspoon said he changed his attitudes toward marijuana when he began doing research on it in 1967, and discovered several myths perpetuated about it. "I discovered I'd been brainwashed," he said. People were being told mari juana caused problems such as sexual excesses and addiction. Marijuana is actually the safest illicit drug, and safer than many pharmaceutical drugs, he said. Other myths about marijuana have developed and then have been invali dated by other studies, Grinspoon said. One study later proved false said it caused brain damage. Another said it caused chromosome breakage, and a third said it caused a testosterone defi ciency. Other studies have come to opposite conclusions, he said. 'Misinformation about the effects of drugs is part of the problem, Grinspoon said. Although President Bush said drug users are costing the workplace billions of dollars, some studies have shown either no effects or positive effects. The U.S. should examine other na tions' policies' costs and benefits, Nadelmann said. The criminal justice approach in the U.S. has been a failure, he said. "Legalization just might be a better approach than the current one." Dogoloff said in countries that have tried drug legalization, such as Britain and Iraq, drug problems have gotten out of control. Thornburg and Dogoloff agreed that abuse and addiction are likely when f ff f 1 iiMiiwii I i i i iiiiiirriiriihnmiMiiirnnw" frmii e "-ri DTHJoseph Muhl Joseph Oxendine discusses problems of Native American students were covered by the press, were posi tive. She said the primary reason the offi cers have adjusted well is because they have had more voice in deciding on changes than in the past. Regular corps officers have been involved in the proc ess of looking over ideas and sorting through documents, she said. 'The transition is smoother because the officers have more involvement," Edwards said. "That is a first in our department." The department is developing stan dard promotion policies, Edwards said. Despite her impending court case against the department, Edwards said management had failed so far to change police policy on promotions. She noted the "continuation of management to promote officers without other officers knowing." Edwards, who has filed a drugs are cheap and available. Many expensive. Legal sanctions work to modify soldiers in Vietnam became addicted to "When you take away prohibition, behavior, he said. If availability de opium during the war because it fit the use increases and the variety of creases and sanctions increase, drug these criteria, but broke their addiction illnesses and so on increase," Thorn- in the U.S. where it was more rare and burg said. See DRUGS, page 9 new grievance with the department, said this practice is what gave rise to her previous grievance, filed in 1987. Officers should be given notifica tion of a position opening so they can compete fairly for it, she said. A particular measure that has upset some officers has been the idea of rota tional shifts, Edwards added. The per manent shift policy used, now divides the workday into three shifts in which new officers fill vacancies on shifts, allowing officers with seniority to move to the shifts they want. Edwards said she had worked on a permanent shift for 16 years, and now that she is finally working on morning shift, she does not want to change. "I've done my time," she said. "I thought this was it. Some officers are very upset about rotating." The stability of a permanent shift t: -f Si V 1 - - ' ' i- v. . 0 k . X. Lee Dogoloff speaks against drug legalization during a Runoff By SARAH KIRKMAN Staff Writer Student Body President candidates Mark Bibbs and Bill Hildebolt said Tuesday night they were pleased with Monday's Student Supreme Court ruling that overturned a previous Elections Board decision and set next Tuesday as a runoff election date. The court's specific reasons for its decision will be released Sunday in a formal ruling. Bibbs said he was glad the election was finally going to occur. "In the past weeks I think issues have gotten lost," he said. "It's time to bring an end to the politics of the campaign and get back to what's really impor tant: the issues and the people. "By the court making this deci sion, it has shown that it wants to bring the focus of this campaign back to the issues. I think the Supreme Court has made a fair decision based on the evidence and their interpreta tion of the law." The ruling shows that the court thinks the student body does not want a re-election, Bibbs said. 'The stu dents had their opportunity to vote on Feb. 20, and a re-election is totally unnecessary and unwarranted," he said. "The court has shown that the student body does not need, want or deserve to go through another one. "I hope they (the students) haven't gotten so fed up with this election that they lose sight of the importance of voting." Hildebolt said he hoped the court decision would clear up students' minds about his actions. "I don't think the laws clearly stated that what I did was wrong," he said. "I just can't conceive of how chalk can be ex- allows officers to structure their sched ules around their working hours, Ed wards added. "You can rearrange your life around that shift." Comar supports a rotating shift. "I think that rotation is the fair way to handle it," he said. Rotation helps cross-train officers by giving them experience at all three shifts. An officer may be called in on emergency at any time, Comar said.; "(The officer) needs to know what's going on all around the clock." The overall departmental changes will move the police force back toward its major role of policing, Comar said. "Ninety percent of what we're doing is service." According to Comar, the department can be more effective after being re lieved of duties which border on "make work chores." DTHKathy Michel forum Tuesday night lease JL pected to stay on a sidewalk; it's not like a sign." Hildebolt also said he wanted to apologize to students because they have had to wait so long for the runoff. "They (the Elections Board) took an incident which should not have been a big deal at all and blew it way out of proportion," he said. "The runoff should have been three weeks ago." Voter turnout will probably be low, Hildebolt said. "I know stu dents are frustrated, but I think they should vote so we can give someone a mandate so they can run student government and clean up election laws," he said. David Smith, Elections Board chairman, said he felt the court took power away from the Elections Board. "The court seemed to take away the power of the Elections Board to make an interpretative decision which has always been its right," he said. "I feel right now that the Elections Board is powerless all we are now are the proprietors of the poll boxes." The ruling would have serious effects on future elections, Smith said. "Innovative ideas in campaigns are definitely going to die," he said. "Now candidates are limited to post ers only. "The dangerous precedent is that now students know it's all right to do See COURT, page 3 c a m p u s rr
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
March 21, 1990, edition 1
1
Click "Submit" to request a review of this page. NCDHC staff will check .
0 / 75