University of Virginia Library

Morris, Murphy Take Stands
On Strengthening Code

What would you do to insure the legality of
the System?

David L. Morris (JP)

"The legality of the System" is an
indeterminate expression because of a lack of
explicit legal precedent applicable to a form of
student self-government as unique as our Honor
System.

Those case briefs that do exist imply that a
system such as ours is "legal" if it satisfies the
"requirement of fundamental fairness." There
are three general areas in which the System
could come under legal scrutiny: the areas of
scope, penalty, and procedure.

Change or redefinition in one or more of
these areas will enhance the System's fairness
and insulate it from possible legal challenge.
Because of the interrelationship of scope and
penalty, I have proposed continued periodic
redefinition of the System's scope in light of
the student consensus of honor.

Procedural fairness should be enhanced by
the immediate incorporation of the right to
appellate review before elected student representatives,
a change under consideration by the
present Committee.

J. Michael Murphy (VPP)

To insure the legality of the Honor System
we must be concerned with two important
areas 1) a person's right to a "fair hearing"
and 2) the right to appeal. While I am in favor
of a clarification and an extension of the appeal
procedure to insure the legality of the System
and fairness to the individual, I also realize that
the Honor Committee itself has been working
on this question and that an appeal system is
forthcoming.

Ideally it would be best to allow an appeal
and a retrial to anyone who might desire such.
But realistically speaking, the workload of trials
could become overburdening if that were so.

I think that we should attempt to grant a
retrial to those who request it, but I also realize
that if this were done, it might be necessary to
have a third body of the Committee (aside from
the group which originally heard the trial, and
the group which would hear the trial de novo)
which would determine whether a person had
grounds to request an appeal.

Within a person's right to a "fair hearing" we
must also consider whether or not lawyers are
to represent the accused. However, the question
also arises as to whether we will be able to
prevent lawyers from representing students.

I do not think it is necessary to have lawyers
in the honor trials, but I also realize that we
must make sure we are insuring an individual's
right to a "fair hearing."

What particular changes would you make to
strengthen the System's operation? What
present programs or facets would you stress or
strengthen?

David L. Morris (JP)

Periodic redefinition of the Honor System's
scope in light of the student consensus of honor
and the immediate incorporation of an appeal
system will not only enhance the System's
"fairness" and thus "legality," but more
importantly will increase the respect and the
effectiveness of our System.

An appeal system which divides the Honor
Committee into two different bodies will
preserve total student control and the high
quality decision-making necessary for appellate
review.

Continuing dialogue between the student
body and Honor Committee will accomplish
more toward preserving and strengthening our
Honor System than any single operational
change. Polls and sample surveys are probably
the most effective and accurate means of
reflecting student opinion to the Honor
Committee.

To further increase the lines of communication
from the Honor Committee to the
students, the Committee should employ concerned
and capable students to enhance the
personal contract necessary for successful
orientation and student awareness of our
System.

J. Michael Murphy (VPP)

The time consumed by the increasing daily
workload of administrative matters of the
Committee is a very real problem facing the
Honor System.

One of my first priorities would be to set up
a "cabinet" of sorts to assist the Committee in
performance of the many routine tasks.

Hopefully, this would enable the members
of the Committee to devote their time more to
communication problems which exist. Through
continuing articles and questions in The
Cavalier Daily and more personal contact the
Committee could encourage more widespread
discussion of the Honor System.

They could direct this discussion to the
problem areas which could be determined by
the student opinion poll. Then the students
could be more aware of the problems which
have been facing the System and more prepared
to accept the decisions which the Honor
Committee makes.