University of Virginia Library

Proposed Penalties

Either the Student Council or
The Cavalier Daily is suffering
from a delusion if it actually
believes that the newly proposed
penalties for the operation of unregistered
motor vehicles are
"much more harsh than they were
under the old system (C.D., Wed.
1 May, 1968)." The truth is that,
if enacted as outlined in Mr.
Adams' report of council recommendations,
the new penalties
would be less harsh and, to be
sure, much more reasonable.

I speak, needless to say, from a
personal experience of the arbitrary
methods of dealing out punishment
in such cases employed by
the administration in the past. As
an Echols Scholar, an active fraternity
man (which point, I concede,
is but one point against
you, when dealing with the Dean's
office), and in good academic
standing, and with no prior probations
or suspensions of any kind
on my record, I was "awarded"
in November, 1965, a one year
suspension by the Dean of the
University for a first offense motor
vehicle violation. The "offense"
was operating an automobile unregistered
due to an insufficiently
high grade-point average.

Indeed, the Dean of the University,
in letters to myself, my
parents, the Department of Security,
the Registrar, and the Dean
of the college, professed his incredulous
shock that a student
would, without the required
G.P.A., operate a motor vehicle in
the forbidden areas. His shock,
however, stood in bold contrast
to the public statement which he
had made earlier that same year,
admitting that a large number of
students were doing just that.

Proposed revisions of motor vehicle
registration policy sound promising;
however, I would offer one
bit of advice to the potential "offender:"
beware of trusting too
much in the supposedly set regulations
now in existence, or in any
which may replace them in the
future—at least until there is a
new resident at Pavilion VIII,
East Lawn.