University of Virginia Library

Opportunity

An unfortunate accident has produced an
excellent opportunity for those concerned
with the forthcoming elections for the Honor
Committee. The printing establishment with
which the Sceptre Society contracted to
produce its campaign posters burned down
over the break, causing a serious delay in
Sceptre's campaign.

As a result, the elections have been
postponed until later this month. The
postponement should be seized as an opportunity
not only to give Sceptre candidates an
equitable chance, but to allow this election to
precipitate a large scale discussion and
evaluation of the Honor System by the
students.

Over past months, the present Honor
Committee has been holding public and
private meetings to discuss possible changes in
the Honor System. It intends to propose some
important changes in the system for presentation
to the community, but due to an
understandable and laudable desire to consider
any changes carefully its deliberations
have been slow and painstaking. It appears
unlikely that the proposed changes will be
ready for presentation before the present date
of the college elections.

The Honor Committee owes it both to the
students whom it represents and the System
with which it is entrusted to allow the fullest
possible discussion and evaluation of whatever
proposals it decides to make and their
probable effects on the future of the Honor
System. We submit that the best possible
method for doing so would be to present the
changes in time for them to become a
campaign issue in rescheduled elections.
Undoubtedly, this would politicize elections
which have been characterized by personality
campaigns, but it might serve to inject a broad
spectrum of fresh thinking into the Honor
System - something which the System
deserves from those who wish to preserve it or
change it. The nature of the Honor System,
with its basis in prevailing student ethics,
makes it liable to a political process. The
University deserves only what the students,
through a political process, are willing and
capable of establishing as an Honor System.

We urge the Honor Committee to hasten
its work and present its proposals to the
students and the candidates for consideration
in the election, trusting that discussion and
voting will assure any necessary refinements.
We urge that a referendum on the proposals
and other relevant questions concerning the
Honor System be included on the ballot in
every school. The Honor Committee, in
discharging its obligation to a System and an
ethic which the University has cherished for
more than a century can do no less.