University of Virginia Library

Letters To The Editor

Honor System Is Not A Witch Hunt

This letter is prompted by a
report from a student currently
there that consideration is
being actively given to a system
of graduated penalties rather
than automatic dismissal for
honor offenses; and I was given
your office as a point of
contact for a possibly still
material comment.

For background I should
explain that I had the great
privilege of attending the
University of Virginia from
1929 to 1931 while making my
final decision to go to West
Point, where I graduated in
1936. I was accordingly
favored with the opportunity
to see essentially the same
honor system cover admirably
two quite different patterns of
life.

I am of course not aware of
all the arguments which have
been advanced there to support
the proposal for graduated
punishments of honor offenses,
so I cannot answer them
directly. In fact, I imagine
there is a close agreement
between its proponents and
myself that an honor-system
should never become a
witch-hunt or a procedure of
infinite hair-splitting. It must
by its very nature be kept
clear-cut and simple, and aimed
at intent and not technicalities.

The question of the validity
of graduated penalties hinges
on our concept of the purpose
of an honor system. If it is
conceived as a means of
enforcing school regulations,
then obviously different
offenses merit different
penalties. To my mind,
however, such a use, for which
campus police, dormitory
counsellors, officers of student
organizations, and proctors are
entirely adequate, represents
both gross misuse of the
system and also the assurance
of its disintegration under the
weight of trivia.

On the other hand, if the
purpose is to separate from the
student body those whose
conduct in the matter of lying,
cheating and stealing is so
deficient that their continued
acceptance in the student body
casts question on the honor of
the rest, and reduces life at the
institution to an unrestricted
contest of wits to the
detriment of true education,
then logically the only solution
for a breach of the code is
dismissal. The code, its
purpose, and the mechanics of
enforcement, should of course
first be thoroughly explained
to all, so that each person
knows clearly what is expected
in practical as well as ideal
terms.

The key point is that honor
offenses must comprise only
those cases where an individual
has deceived someone on a
material issue by lying,
cheating or stealing for his own
direct or indirect personal
benefit. The system should
normally have no application
to tellers of tall tales for
innocent purposes. It should
not cover a person's taking
several sheets of paper from
the nearest pad in an
emergency.

It should not cover the
normal minor liberties which
one student may take in good
faith, and usually on a
reciprocal basis, with his
roommate's property—unless,
for example, he were to lie
about it and thus keep his
roommate from protecting
himself from further
intolerable depredations by
breaking up the arrangement in
time.

Obviously innumerable
other examples might be
suggested, without being fully
delineated in the time
available. In each case,
however, it would be up to the
Honor Committee to
determine maturely, by its
analysis of intent, whether an
honest mistake, or even gross
carelessness, created a situation
involving an actual honor
offense.

In the light of the above, it
would appear that the essential
problem of rendering true
justice in honor cases consists
in determining what
constitutes a wilful honor
offense rather than attempting
to scale down the punishment
for a wilful offender. Once we
have excluded a large number
of technical situations which
do not constitute genuine
honor offenses, I fail to see a
basis for leniency in the real
honor cases.

Do we say that a man who
clearly steals $5.00 should get,
say, two weeks suspension and
a ten-dollar fine? How do we
know that he wouldn't have
stolen the figure requiring
dismissal if that had been
available? How do we know
that he hasn't already? Can we
expect him to be more honest
with larger sums than with
smaller ones?

And if we don't dismiss
him, how else can we protect
ourselves against increasing
numbers of others like him? Or