University of Virginia Library

On SDS Injunction

Council Authorizes Legal Consultation

By Barry Levine
Cavalier Daily Staff Writer

Emerging from a web of legal
ignorance and parliamentary snafus, the
Student Council last night passed a series
of motions and amendments to counter a
Corporation Court injunction against the
allocation of student funds to the
Students for a Democratic Society
including one motion to consult with a
lawyer to consider alternatives.

Council representatives Steve Hayes
and Charles Murdock are to confer with
Charlottesville attorney Philip Hirschkop
over the legal alternatives available to the
Student Council, whose members were
served with a 60 day injunction enjoining
them from allocating funds to the SDS
yesterday.

The consultation would consider the
possibility of "Student Council initiating
a suit against the Student Activities
Committee with the purpose of having all
Faculty and administration and unpopularity
elected students [Presidents of Raven Society
and ODK] removed from the Committee."

Student Council President Bud Ogle said
that the "issue is clearly over whether Student
Council should control its own funds and
whether SDS is politically oriented."

Representative Tom Gardner was more
specific: "The issue is whether students, taxing
themselves, have any control over the spending
of their taxes. . . Any fool in the country could
get a court injunction preventing even God
from giving money to SDS."

Ron Cas moved approval of Mr. Ogle's
series of motions which included the following
provisions:

1) "Council send a letter to Sam Man
censuring him for being unwilling to cooperate
with Council officers on a matter of mutual
concern and expressing our disapproval of
wasting taxpayers' money through unnecessary
judicial proceedings and requiring the Council
to consult legal counsel.

2) "Council send a letter to the local SDS
chapter expressing our apologies for
harassment, delay, and inconsiderate handling
of their request for SAC funds.

3) "That the Council committee
investigating the comprehensive fee and SAC
reevaluating the Student Activities Fee and give
serious consideration to the pros and cons of
making various portions of the comprehensive
fee voluntary.

4) "The Council committee on Equal
Opportunity conduct a study on pertinent and
valuable information on racism and allocate
$50 toward a preliminary study, purchase of
literature, etc."

The students initiating the injunction
(Samuel Manly, Harry Rayburn, and Brian
Donato) did not appear at the meeting.

Mr. Ogle said that the original intention of
Council's actions for funds for SDS was to
secure "information on racism" and that the
major dispute was that Council considers SDS
not to be "primarily concerned with the
electoral process, and therefore not "politically
oriented."

Council member Ron Hickman contended
that "legal action could have been avoided. . . if
we had not gone outside the means available to
appropriate money. The best course now would
be to reconsider the motion. . ."

However, a two-thirds majority of those
voting was needed to ind the previous
action of the Council concerning the SDS
funds, and the motion of Mr. Majors to this
effect failed to reach two-thirds by three votes.

The Council defeated only one section of
Mr. Ogle's package, which would have created a
$100 "slush fund" for administrative details.
His proposals arose primarily from the
confusion that existed as to whom was
authorized to write checks for the students who
do administrative work for student government.