University of Virginia Library

Tom King

The students of the College will be asked to
take sides on two critical issues during the
forthcoming Student Council elections. The
most crucial of these involves the question of
whether there really need be a Student Council.
During the past several years, the Council has
been reluctant to assume its role as the director
of student action and opinion and has
abdicated in favor of ad hoc groups, strike
committees, and student coalitions. This is not
to say that these groups did not perform the
task well. However, the actions of past Student
Councils have raised serious questions as to the
need for the organization. The present Student
Council has refused to abdicate responsibility
and has met the issue of student rules head-on;
and in our minds reached a satisfactory
solution. We see this action as an indication of a
return to relevance by the Council. The
referendum has called for another ad hoc group
to draw up a code of conduct. Some candidates
have supported this type of response to the
problem and either consciously or not have cast
their votes in favor of a continued abdication of
Council responsibility. Allen Freeman and I see
the voters choice as a choice between ad hoc
control of Student Affairs and responsible
action by a representative Council. We ask you
to choose the latter and pledge our efforts
towards that goal.

The second question is whether students'
wishes can be obtained more easily by demands
thrust upon the Board of Visitors and the
Administration, or by dealing with them in
what Allen calls a spirit of trust tempered with
skepticism. Allen and myself opt for the second
solution. We have found that past experience
demonstrates that the Administration is more
willing to accede to the wishes of Student
leaders if these ideas are formulated and
discussed with an eye toward the reality of the
situation and toward the demands placed on
both groups. In our platform, we have further
stated that work needs to be done in the State
legislature in order to enable the
Administration to deal with students with less
pressure from Richmond. We are asking the
students of the College to choose this method
of action: the method which we will pursue if
elected. We feel a casual glance at the new
Judiciary Committee (for the first time subject
to total student control by action of the Board
of Visitors) demonstrates the validity of our
thinking.

We ask you to read our platform, and
consider it in light of these two key issues.
Respectfully submitted,
Tom King