No Modest Proposal

JUST BEFORE the constitution committee released its proposal two weeks ago for the new Undergraduate Council, several committee members predicted that the proposal would win approval from various Faculty and student groups and would be voted through by the student body in time for the council to begin operations this spring. Although they knew some of the planks in the constitution were controversial--especially the one establishing minority representation on the council's administrative committee--several members said they expected the proposal to pass through the necessary channels with only minor changes. But judging from the reception their proposal has thus far received from students and Faculty members, their assumption was incorrect.

On October 21, members of the committee charged with implementing the constitution presented the proposal to the Faculty Council and received an overwhelmingly negative response. Faculty members said they disagreed with several aspects of the proposal and called it much too detailed and specific; several said later they considered the proposal at best a starting point for whatever the final constitution would turn out to be.

Response from students has echoed the Faculty's reaction, if perhaps a bit less vehemently. Members of the Student Assembly and the various House committee chairmen, in separate meetings with members of the constitution and implementation committees, have criticized the proposal. The most favorable response the proposal has received from members of these groups, in fact, has been cautious support for the basic ideas underlying the constitution.

By far the most controversial plank in the constitution is Article III, Section 3, which calls for seven minority groups to share two votes on the council's administrative committee. Reaction to this plank has ranged from disagreements with its wording to philosophical debate about whether minorities should have special representation at all.

Even students who would favor some kind of minority representation on the council have expressed doubts about the provision's wording. One problem with the plank is that seven specific groups would be represented--Asians, Blacks, disabled students, gay students, Mexican-Americans, Native Americans and Puerto Ricans. Students and Faculty question, and rightly so, why those particular groups have been singled out for representation. The constitution committee's method for choosing the groups seemed haphazard at best. Apparently, the groups that are included among the seven are ones that happened to be invited to join the committee, or who happened to hear about the meetings, which were often largely unpublicized.

Disabled students, for example, were not included on the list of groups to be represented until a representative of ABLE, the disabled students' organization, showed up at a meeting and asked why they had not been invited. Disabled students were promptly added to the list; it seems probable that had another group shown up at the constitution meetings, it too would have been placed on the list.

There is, to be fair, a provision for additional groups to ask for votes on the committee, but this, too, raises problems. The provision states that "the Council may, by two-thirds vote, confer or deny [representation on the administrative committee] to any other group." But as one Faculty Council member reportedly said at the meeting with the implementation committee, this provision automatically gives the seven groups already named a privileged position above any other groups who might seek representation. While any other group must apply for representation on the council, and may be denied such representation, the seven groups face no such difficulties. The constitution does not explain this discrepancy.

Many Faculty and students have also questioned how effectively the minority groups that gain seats on the council would represent members of their own minorities. What if, for example, a Black or gay student does not feel that the Black Students Association (BSA) or the Gay Students Association (GSA) properly represents his or her needs and desires? The constitution committee was very careful not to mention names of specific organizations that will represent the various minority groups, saying only that "the undergraduate organization which represents the most students in each of the above groups, or is mutually agreed upon by the various organizations within each group, will select the representative to fill this seat." But since it is highly unlikely that any groups will seriously challenge existing groups like BSA, GSA and ABLE, the constitution committee has only avoided the problem, not solved it. If, in fact, any group were to make a serious challenge, the possibility of two or three opposing groups "mutually agreeing" on who will fill a single seat seems highly unlikely.

MEMBERS OF THE CONSTITUTION and implementation committees have thus far provided few concrete answers for these problems. All too often during their recent meetings with Faculty and students, they have responded to these question by saying only things like, "We discussed this point at length during our meetings and this was the best possible compromise." No doubt the constitution committee did discuss the minority provision from nearly every angle. But the compromise which resulted in the minority plank seems one of expedience and not one on which to base a sound constitution. Through further discussion and the rethinking of compromises, the problems above could probably be ironed out without altering the basic intention of the provision--to provide some kind of assured minority representation on the council. But on the more basic issue of whether minority groups should have assured representation at all, it seems unlikely that any amount of compromise will settle the question. The response so far to the constitution proposal indicates that many Faculty members and students are philosophically opposed to assured minority voting seats on the council.

Members of the constitution committee have called assured seating the only way that minorities can be sure of being represented in what will largely prove a white-dominated council. The Hare proportional voting system, they have said, is not in itself enough to assure representation for these groups. But these statements rest on the assumption that most white students are somehow racist, or at least, that whites would not in large numbers support minority candidates. This is an assumption that many students, both whites and minorities, are not prepared to make.

E. Dennis Powell '82, chairman of the Winthrop House Committee and a Black student, said, for example, that the idea of being assured representation on the council is "insulting." Assured seating implies that minorities "don't have the ability" to earn positions in normal elections. "Student politics is a game," he said, adding, "It's simply a matter of learning the rules and doing it better than the next guy. Personally I don't want to be given any kind of special advantage."

And some Faculty Council members at the meeting with the implementation committee went so far as to say that assured minority seating might in fact reduce overall minority representation on the council. If people begin to assume, for example, that a minority student is already adequately represented through his or her minority seat on the administrative committee, that student's chances of being elected through regular channels might drop.

BUT WHATEVER the final decision is on this issue, or any of the document's other controversial provisions--including how the council will disburse funds and by what procedure the constitution will be ratified--it seems clear that the process toward implementing the new Undergraduate Council has only begun. While constitution committee members remain hopeful that the council will begin operating this spring, many others, especially Faculty members, have said they expect implementation of the council to be delayed at least until next fall. A constitutional convention of various student representatives and administrators will convene soon. In addition, a new committee, composed of three Faculty members and four students, will begin discussing various aspects of the constitution. These committees will almost certainly hit many of the same stumbling blocks and face the same problems in compromising that the constitution committee did in drawing up the original proposal. Perhaps these committees can, using the reaction to the initial proposal as a guideling, avoid some of the problems. Otherwise, fashioning a new student government could drag on interminably.