Bad Place For Politics

GOV. MICHAEL S. DUKAKIS will soon have to decide whether Massachusetts should be in line for a rather dubious honor.

Late last week, the state legislature passed and sent to the governor a bill which would deny state financial aid to students who have not registered for the draft. If Dukakis decides to sign the legislation into law, Massachusetts will be the first state to follow the federal government's lead in establishing such a statute.

Modeled after the law passed by Congress concerning federal aid, the state legislation would affect the $8 million in scholarships that Massachusetts will distribute in 1984. Dukakis has yet to comment publicly on the state bill, but a spokesman said last week that the governor has "serious questions" about the fairness and constitutionality of the federal legislation.

That in itself would seem to indicate that Dukakis will veto the proposal but the governor has in the past acted against his own beliefs because he thought the public felt otherwise. Most recently, he said that he would have signed the lately-defeated bill to hike the drinking age--even though he opposed it--because "there is considerable public sentiment to raise it."

In this case, Dukakis should follow his heart, not his political sense, and promptly veto this patently unfair piece of legislation. Linking financial aid to registration discriminates against students who rely on financial aid to go to college, making them more accountable than better-off students to the registration law. Rather than deciding whether to veto according to the weathervane of public opinion, the governor should use his veto power according to the stated ideals for which he was elected.

Regardless of "public sentiment" to sign the bill, Dukakis should still veto it, if only to postpone it for at least a year. This would allow time for the U.S. Supreme Court to rule on constitutionality of linking financial aid with draft registration on a national level--a law which opponents say violates the right to a fair trial and induces self-incrimination. Since the justices are expected to decide on the matter in the next few months, it would seem practical for Dukakis to delay implementation and see whether his "serious questions" are indeed justified.