More on the Council

To make an issue of Howie Phillips, particularly in these days when our wambly old world is sliding all to hell, smacks of the absurd. As 593 Harvard undergraduates were signing a petition to separate the Student Council presidency from ideological organizations, war began in Havana--which should put the Phillips case in some perspective. The problem does, however, contain some questions which require further discussion.

So far, people who feel that Phillips has misused his office have recommended two approaches. The first is through legislation that would bar the President of the Student Council from taking an active role in any ideological or partisan political organization. The second is through censureship or impeachment proceedings.

Although neither solution is particularly attractive, legislation seems the lesser of the two evils. The weaknesses of the impeachment-censure argument become perfectly clear when you read the text of a suggested Council resolution, issued by the group which yesterday petitioned for legislation: "Be it resolved that the Student Council hereby censures its President, Howard Phillips, for allowing the prestige of his office to be used in support of ideological causes and political organizations (in particular, for allowing the prestige of his office to appear on a press release of the Committee for a More Effective Peace Corps: "Chairman, Howard Phillips, President, Student Council Harvard'). . . ."

Clearly the parenthetic charge is the only specific piece of information that exists--the rest of the censure-impeachment arguments rests on statements which Phillips has made to various newspapers and magazines. It is hard to believe that anyone would find fault with these statements if Phillips' attitude were more attuned to the general opinion of the undergraduate body.

What will be the effect of censure--or of impeachment investigations? Censure will result, of course, in the widespread belief that Phillips' political attitudes have been repudiated and possibly he will no longer be able to answer the phone when a newspaper reporter is on the other end. Impeachment proceedings will produce the same sort of thing; Phillips' political statements will be hauled out and criticized under the guise of their impropriety.

But whether Phillips is Conservative or Liberal, whether he has or has not behaved with conscious propriety the problem still exists.

Perhaps the only answer is for the Council to define itself, not through one piece of legislation but through a general overhauling. The second part of yesterday's resolution (The Student Council "reaffirms its role as a non-ideological organization, and instructs its officers scrupulously to avoid the association of their personal or political views with their prestige or position as officers of the Harvard Student Council") seems to go part of the way toward doing this, except that it is demanding the impossible.

If the Council really wants to become non-ideological and can find no suitable pieces of specific legislation, it might begin by changing its title to suit its function--call itself, say, the College Service Committee and elect a coordinator instead of a President. At least this sort of action will allow its future leaders to express their opinions without allowing the purportedly non-political Student Council to become spokesmen for the College's political beliefs.