University of Virginia Library

The Honor Candidates

Tomorrow and Thursday students in most
of the University's schools will elect the men
and women who will administer the Honor
System in the coming year. In the College
there are more candidates for Chairman and
Vice Chairman of the Committee than ever
before and there will undoubtedly have to be
a runoff election since none of the seven
candidates for President or four candidates
for Vice President of the College are likely to
receive the necessary 40 per cent of the vote
required for election.

In the hierarchy of student government,
being a member of the Honor Committee has
always been a more prestigious office than
serving on he Student Council, Judiciary
Committee, or a student publication. This is
only proper, for serving on the Honor
Committee is a demanding task which
requires a deep understanding of fellow
students who some day might be tried for an
honor offense.

The Honor System is a tradition, a fact
which is the cause of many of the attacks
upon it by those who would agree with
Gilbert K. Chesterton who wrote "tradition
means giving votes to that obscurest of
classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of
the dead. Tradition refuses to surrender to the
arrogant oligarchy of those who merely
happen to be walking around." In the case of
the Honor System tradition is a tremendous
aid. Schools which have attempted to
establish honor codes in recent times have
met with insurmountable problems in many
cases. Certainly the Honor System is one of
our most usable traditions. The benefits of
living in a community which attempts to form
a collective sense of honor are numerous.

But the Honor System would become a
mere tradition in the Chesterton sense if it
operated now as it had earlier this century.
Those who claim that there is only one
standard of honor are wrong, we feel, as
wrong as the first-year law students who
condemn the Honor System merely because it
resembles nothing they have even seen in a
court of law.

Each student at the University is
responsible for enforcing the code of honor as
he understands it of course, but those serving
on the Honor Committee have to interpret
current student opinion, a most difficult task
though by no means impossible.

Years ago when this University was much
smaller there was undoubtedly a much more
uniform consensus on just what exactly
constituted a violation of the Honor System.
In those days students dressed the same,
enjoyed the same social life, and were
probably more in agreement on world events
than the current generation of students.

The University has changed since then. As
the academic quality of this school has
improved so have the pressures to get an "A."
The gentleman's "C" won't get a student into
graduate school and the pressure to do well
academically is great. With this pressure goes
mental stress and at times, it seems, there are
students with mental problems who cannot
tell the difference between right and wrong.
Also today many students consider the draft a
form of slavery, and have no reservations
about trying to get a physical deferment for a
nonexistent illness. Every time a student puts
a coin in a vending machine he is gambling in
a sense; sometimes he gets his drink or candy
bar or several for his money, other times he
receives nothing. It is up to the students who
will be elected to the Committee this week to
judge cases of this nature and determine
whether four-fifth of their peers would
condemn a student for his actions.

Changes in the system have to be made
from time to time if the system is to keep the
respect of the students. But the pressures to
keep the system the same are at times
incredible. Professors, alumni and fellow
students boil over in anger over any change,
no matter how minor or how rational that
change is. Members of the Committee and, by
implication, the students of the University,
are blamed for "destroying the System" and
causing the moral decline of a great University
when any change is made. Undoubtedly there
are changes which will have to be made in the
future and those elected to the Committee
will have to be strong enough to stick by their
decisions in the face of the vilification they
will surely encounter.

The members of the Committee need not
be leaders in the same mold as, say the
President of the Student Council. Their task is
not one of marshaling student support for
one plan over another or of haggling with
administrators over how many parking lots
will be allotted students. Their task is much
more demanding and requires more intellect
than leadership.

A lot of focus has been given in recent
weeks to the Honor Committee's decision to
declare null their guilty verdict in a case in
which a student took some soft drinks from
an open vending machine. Students who feel
that the decision to dismiss that student was
blatantly wrong have asked whether other
students have been dismissed for equally
blatant causes, causes which the students did
not know about due to the secrecy of the
Committee's decisions.

We think this question is absurd. No
decision of the Committee is totally secret.
The witnesses, lawyers, prosecutor and
student who run the tape recorder would yell
they thought an injustice had been
committed. Word gets out, although perhaps
the Committee could always have several
students who have no interest in a case sit in
on trials as an added safeguard.

This and other questions will be left
largely to the discretion of the students
elected this week. The character and views of
these individuals will determine the future
course of the Honor System. A strong system
benefits all of us and, in the long run, makes
all better for having lived under it.