Vote "Yes" on the Bill of Rights

Vote "Yes" on the Bill of Rights

Student newspapers and periodicals

Student government

Michael Mello writes on Mary Washington College's Bill of Rights and the upcoming vote to ratify it.

Mello, Michael A.

Mello, Michael A. "Vote 'Yes' to the Bill of Rights." The Bullet, March 21, 1978.

HIST 298, University of Mary Washington

1978-03-21

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The Constitutional Revision Committee has produced a generally excellent document. To briefly cite a few of its improvements over the present SA constitution: the Presidents of Residential Council and Day Students Association would be guaranteed access to Executive Cabinet meetings “on a regular basis”; the murky area of Senatorial districts, the subject of much confusion this year, would be clarified; the SA would have the formal power and responsibility to “study any matter affecting the welfare of the student body and the College”; the allotment of student fees would officially fall within the jurisdiction of a “special committee or committees” of the SA; a clearer demarcation between the Legislative and Executive sectors of SA would be accomplished by stipulating that Cabinet members would no longer be ex officio members of the Senate; numerous definitional ambiguities would be clarified. But all of these matters, positive and necessary as they are, come as a little surprise; most of them were expected.

The truly stunning accomplishment of the committee is their recommendation that the S.A. Constitution should contain a Student Bill of Rights. In doing so, the members of the committee exhibited a degree of courage and foresight not often seen on this campus. This Bill of Rights is an enormous gift to future generations of MWC students. It shall be a searchlight whose brilliance will continue to shine long after the Westmoreland Four and full-time student status controversies have faded from memory.

The idea of an MWC student Bill of Rights is not new; the essential principles embodied within the Constitutional Revisions Committee’s recommendations were first presented to the student body of this campus on April 28, 1970. That Bill, a ponderous document containing no less than 51 separate sections, was ratified by the students by a vote of 1,447 to 43, only to be vetoed by then-College Chancellor Grellet Simpson.
It has taken eight years for an MWC President to agree that the rights of his students should be made explicit, but Dr. Woodard has done just that. Now it is up to the students to decide how they feel, and they will do just that in the March 28 election. For once, the choice is ours.
Why do we need a written Bill of Rights? Why must we put in writing the rights we already seem to possess? These questions were well answered by Sue Cottingham, Campus Judicial Chairman in 1970, in a letter to THE BULLET: “. . . assurances from the present administration that our rights will not be abridged do not insure that this will be the case in the future. We must establish specific, written procedures to avoid misrepresentation and misunderstanding.”

The Bill of Rights can do this. The Bill has certain inherent limitations, but on the whole it is a sound document, and certainly the best we can expect at the present time. It is a foundation upon which to build.

Unfortunately, the phrases “student freedom” and “student rights” evoke an image in the minds of many administrators of a long-haired window smasher, while giving the student a come-and-go-as-I-please attitude that also has its extremes and excesses. Neither of these poles reflect the essence of the students’ rights issue, which is simply the attainment of the full constitutional rights due students as citizens and the matching responsibilities that must be met. The Bill of Rights will come before the campus for a vote in less than two weeks. I hope it will be ratified. Eight years ago, the students ratified the Bill and the Administration vetoed it. Would it not be a slashing irony if this year it was the Administration who embraced the Bill of Rights and the students who repudiated it?
MAM

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