University of Virginia Library

Charles Weir

The Evasive Senator Scott

For those of you who know or
know of Sen. Hugh Scott, R-Pa.,
you will already have an opinion of
him. I recently had the pleasure of
talking with him and have formed
an opinion somewhat dissimilar to
most that I have heard.

It should be remembered as a
background that United States
Senators are professional politicians
first and foremost. Their number
one goal is election and then
re-election. Once in Washington,
they tend to become self-protecting
of their own interests.

Granted, that our time together
was limited, but his responses to
my questions seemed very evasive. I
had the opportunity to meet him
again the next evening at a meeting
of the Jefferson Literary and
Debating Society. After a few
opening remarks about his
recollections of the hall, the floor
was thrown open to questions.
Once again, he was more intent on
being witty than in meeting the
questions head on.

This type of action is not too
surprising if you study the United
States Senate. It does become
alarming when you consider this
man to be one of the members of
the Board of Visitors. If these were
representative showings of his
feelings about students and their
concerns, then I found him to be
very callous and uninterested.

An example of my beliefs
surround a question that I asked
him about equality of justice and
punishment to fit the crime. I asked
him if he thought a system that
would sentence a man to twenty
years in jail for possession of a
small amount of hashish while the
government still knows very little
about its overall effects and then
fine a multi-billion dollar
corporation not more than ten
thousand dollars for dumping raw
sewage or mercury into rivers that
the government knows fully well
will impair the environment and
possibly human life was just.

In reply to my question he
stated. "I see no correlation
between the two incidents." What
he did know was "we are still
looking into thy laws dealing with
marijuana." On the issue of
pollution he stated that new laws
were on the way to rectify the
situation.

While these may be general
guidelines for future direction, they
contain no hard, cold facts and no
daring stand. Let me state once
again that Senator Scott is no
better or no worse than the next
Senator, only this one is one of our
visitors.

Senator Scott may not have
been the best choice for one of the
three appointments by Governor
Holton last January, but I do think
that his concerns are admirable. He
is opposed to a rapid expansion, on
the grounds that he wants to
maintain our greater traditions that
would be destroyed under the
weight of a bulging mega university.
The high rises on Lambeth Field are
another area that he has expressed
concern over. His selection and
subsequent appearances here on the
Grounds have irritated few. He will
no doubt serve as best he can while
remaining a United States Senator
first and foremost. Next January,
let us hope that the Governor of
Virginia will take a bold step
forward by appointing someone
who will engender the widespread
support of students, faculty, and
the voters for our university to
make innovative and sweeping
changes to reverse the present trend
of expanding and allowing our
strengths to weaken.