University of Virginia Library

The First Hurdle

Tuesday night, the Student Council, by a
narrow vote of 13-10, overruled its own
Committee on Organizations and Publications
and voted to give $5565 of the student
activities fee to the controversial Virginia
Weekly. We applaud this decision but remind
students that this decision was the clearing of
only the first hurdle for both the Weekly and
freedom of the press at the University.

The second hurdle in this controversy is
the meeting of the Student Activities
Committee next week. This University
committee, which is composed of students,
faculty, and administrators, and is chaired by
Vice President D Alan Williams, will certainly
hear appeals on the allocation to the Weekly.
The SAC has the authority to deny any or all
funds to the Weekly if it so desires.
Furthermore, according to high officials in
the Council, Mr. Williams is opposed to the
Weekly allocation. Considering the power that
a chairman has on a committee of such
nature, it seems doubtful that the Weekly will
be able to clear this second hurdle.

The Virginia Weekly, however, is only a
case in point that shows up several inequities
in the policy of allocating student fees. The
first of these inequities is that a committee that
is composed of six faculty members and
administrators and only three students has
the final say on how fees paid by students
shall be allocated to student-run activities.

The second inequality and the final hurdle,
however, is the question of freedom of the
press and freedom of speech at the University.
The reason that O&P initially refused money
to the Weekly was that the committee
members felt that the Weekly did not meet
standards set by the SAC for allocation of
funds. Those standards define the term
political activities are, in general, those
normally engaged in by political parties or
special interest groups, such as electioneering,
lobbying, and propagandizing. Electioneering
shall include any activity connected with the
electoral process in a partisan manner.
Lobbying shall include any activity whose
purpose is to influence governmental action
or policy. Propagandizing shall include any
activity whose purpose is to procure, or
prevent, the acceptance of any social,
economic or political theory as an operating
principle of polity: propagandizing shall not
be interpreted to include engaging in
non-partisan analyses, study, or research or
making those results available to the public."

We find this definition to be so vague as to
be applicable to almost any student group at
the University. In the past the Student
Council has supported grape strikes and
moratoriums. The Cavalier Daily has
supported political candidates, strikes, and
even Operation GM. Other groups base their
activities on a specific economic policy -
capitalism. Are not these activities lobbying,
electioneering and propagandizing? We do not
believe that any of these groups should have
funds denied under the present SAC
definition.

The present SAC rule was adopted last
year in direct response to an appeal against
the allocation of funds to The Virginia
Weekly. The intent of this rule, it was said,
was to avoid a vague definition of "political
activities." As various Council members
admitted last night, the rule has been a
failure. Decisions are still made on subjective
standards; what is legal for one group to do
(Council) is not for another (the Weekly).
These inequities will continue to exist until a
set policy is determined, applicable to all
student organizations and not just the
newspapers, which would dictate exactly what
the groups can do concerning political
questions. Until such a policy is determined,
no limits should be applied and no financial
threats should be made, especially in the
current haphazard manner.