RADICAL REPRESENTATION

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

I find one disturbing flaw in the structure of the proposed new Undergraduate Council. The manner in which students are elected to it may insure that "radical" views (by which that term is understood at Harvard) will go unrepresented. Election by Houses constitutes a classical case of gerrymandering. I doubt that any House contains a sufficient concentration of radicals to elect a spokesman of their point of view, thus excluding such opinion from legitimate expression. By locking these people out of the "system," we reinforce their tendency to engage in extra-legal forms of protest such as mass meetings. building take-overs, etc. An alternative would be to elect an additional number of students at-large by proportional representation.

Admittedly, the election of one or two members of WSA. for example, will hardly induce them to abstain from direct-action strategies. However, the proposed system, in a sense, does lend legitimacy to those activities.