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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (April 27, 1971)
' - •*" » • • r. . . • Vote Wednesday in Sbisa, the guard room, MSC Che Battalion Partly cloudy, warm Vol. 66 No. 115 College Station, Texas Tuesday, April 27, 1971 WEDNESDAY—Cloudy. Winds southerly 10 to 15 m.p.h. High 86, low 72. THURSDAY — Cloudy, after noon rainshowers and thunder storms. Winds southerly 15 to 20 m.p.h. High 84, low 69. 845-2226 # iiMrl Roger Miller, left, and John Sharp discuss election issues in the Battalion offices Mon day night following their interviews. (Photo by Hayden Whitsett) Campaign issues similar, VP candidates agree By MIKE STEPHENS Battalion Staff Writer Admitting that many of their campaign issues were very sim ilar, with the major differences being in the order of priority given the issues, the candidates for Student Senate vice-presi dent, Bill Hartsfield and Mike Essmyer, discussed their plat forms in an interview with The Battalion Monday night. Both candidates have served on the Senate this year. Past achievements of Essmyer include: Senate parliamentarian, chair man of the Aggie Sweetheart re vision committee and the Campus Chest drive and member of the Senate public relations commit tee and the Constitutional Revi sions Committee. Essmyer is married and a member of Squad ron 13. Hartsfield was recording sec retary for the Student Senate this year. He was chairman of the pass-fail committee and mem ber of the constitution revision committee and the student serv ices fees watchdog committee. Hartsfield is a junior math major. How do you feel towards wom en’s housing? Essmyer: “Many male students want to move off campus. A logi cal solution to the problem would be to let women move on cam pus and males off if desired.” “A&M definitely needs women housing to improve social life.” Hartsfield: “On-campus hous ing would be safer for the wom an student.” “Women deserve a place to live on this campus. The university is discriminating un less women are allowed to live on campus.” “One of my major issues is to allow each residence hall, including women, to set their desired hours for visita tion.” If elected, what would be your stand on the proposed constitu tion change? Hartsfield: “I think the Stu dent Senate needs to have a change in structure in order to be more effective.” “There should be an executive branch, judicial branch and legislative branch. This would allow the Student Senate president to con centrate on his job of taking problems to the administration.” Essmyer: “I don’t feel the constitution is the important issue. It is a paper document and without students working for it, it is nothing more than paper.” “We have to take the needs of the students and try to do some thing about them.” “I feel that the committees should start do ing something about the little things and get something done t <■> ^ *... maLJfaaL mmSm : instead of just debating.” If elected, what will the first issue you take action on ? * Essmyer: “I would improve the living conditions and the social life of students. “The student must have the correct atmosphere to study.” I’d like to see ice boxes and beer in the dormitories as soon as possible.” Hartsfield: “I’m hoping for a computer registration and the ability to withdraw passing any time during a semester getting looked into as soon as possible.” Both candidates have issued platforms and each lists their major goals which they promise to work for. Hartsfield: A computerized registration system that will allow students to select their pro fessors and class schedules. A shuttle-bus system for off-cam pus students. Improvements in laundry service and to allow each residence hall to set their desired hours for visitation by women students. Essmyer: To open lines of com munication between students and the administration. Establish a shuttle-bus system for day stu dents. Establish a Better Busi ness Bureau and a day nursery for married students. To work for further student representa tion on faculty and administra tion committees. Valid fee slips needed to vote Voting for the spring general elections will start at 8 a.m. Wednesday, and the polls will re main open until 8 p.m., announced Dale Foster, vice-president for public relations of the Election Commission. “A valid fee slip for the cur rent semester is all that will be required to vote,” said Foster. “With the elimination of the ac tivity card as a requirement to vote, this will be the first year that every student at Texas A&M will be allowed to partici pate in the electoral process.” Miller, Sharp state their By SUE DAVIS What the election issues boil down to, Roger Miller says, is that “student government has been sadly lacking. What it has to have are student leaders who are able to communicate with administrators, and, more impor tantly, student leaders who are not afraid to stand strongly for student opinions and who won’t back down when working with university officials.” John Sharp believes that the biggest problem the Student Sen ate has is “the fact that the stu dents do not know what we (the Senate) are doing and the sena tors have not tried to find out what the students want. This has destroyed the effectiveness of the Senate. Students should be taught how to use the Senate effectively.” Roger Miller and John Sharp are candidates for Student Sen ate President. Both are now members of several committees; Sharp is Student Life Chairman and on the Executive Committee as well as other committees. Miller is a member of three university committees, Presi dent Williams’ Advisory Coun cil and the first student member of the University Student Publi cation Board. Sharp has estab lished the Legal Rights Commis sion, the Landscape Reform Com mittee and the Student Publica tions Committee and was the first student member of the University Disciplinary Appeals Panel. Miller says that the idea for the Student Publications Commit tee was his and that he wrote the resolution for it. He says that it was placed under Sharp’s Stu dent Life Committee. He also states that several students came to the Senate with the idea for the Landscape Reform Commit tee, which was also placed under the Life Committee. The Legal Rights Commission was established in ’69-’70 when Sharp was not chairman of the Student Life Committee, Miller said. Miller, a civilian, first became interested in student government through his student union when he was a freshman. He was elected senator his sophomore year. Cadet Sharp became involved when he heard people ask what was going on in the Senate. He came to the conclusion that “the Senate is where people take ego trips and it is not oriented to the student.” He decided he wanted to change that. The Office of the Dean of Stu dents has “very encompassing powers,” Miller says, because A&M still adheres to the “in- loco-parentis” doctrine, where the university functions as the stu dents’ guardian. “On too many occasions, the Office of the Dean has been insensitive to problems and prospectives of the student body. It exercises far too much control over the life of each in dividual student outside the class room. The government must change and give the student pow er to decide what to do with his life outside class.” “The ‘in-loco-parentis’ doctrine is ridiculous and should be strick en from the campus,” Sharp says. “The Supreme Court abolished it issues in race three years ago, but this has not yet reached the A&M campus. Anyone in the higher echelon of the Senate who has had dealings with the Office* of the Dean, knows it is hard to get any thing.” This year the Senate had to circumvent the Office of the Dean, Sharp said. This year the Senate tried to pass new a constitution which provided for “living area repre sentation and incorporated sev eral progressive changes,” Miller commented. “This constitution was blocked at the last minute by a small group of individuals who did not have the best inter ests of the entire student body at heart. If the student government is going to be effective, it must be restructured so that senators are allowed to live with their con stituents, Miller says. It must also allow the one-man, one-vote principle, he adds. Sharp was one of eight people who drafted the new constitution over the Christmas holidays. He believes it was “the best, most reasonable, most workable doc trine” they could come up with in that period of time. Later Sharp contacted several other universities to see how their student associations worked. He discovered that the one at the University of Texas lasted only four months because money was not allocated properly. “If we are going to have an effective constitution that is go ing to last at least 10 years, we are going to have to make sure that there is adequate student input in activities throughout the campus,” Sharp says. Things which should be done by the student government next year, Miller says, is “making sure the students’ voices are heard throughout the university.” This is especially important in choosing the Dean of Women and Dean of Students, when this becomes necessary, he said. The students should know ex actly what the student govern ment can do for them, Miller says. The field he calls “goods and services” has been neglected in the past, Miller feels. “This is a field I intend to do a lot of work in,” Miller stated. He especially will work for day care centers for children of mar ried students, student commodity discounts with local merchants, and a gasoline co-op, run by and for students. Sharp has established a Stu dent Better Business Bureau as a committee in the Senate, to be gin operation in the fall of ’71. This will help students who have problems with local merchants. If elected, Sharp plans an “ex tensive public relations program to show students how to use their Senate effectively.” He plans to establish book and gaso line co-ops. A shuttle-bus system will have to be enacted in a few years, Sharp commented. He also feels that students should be allowed to live off-campus, eat where they want, not have to pay for meals they do not eat, and have noncompulsory university laun dry. Milller believes that the Sen ate must examine all issues in volved in the Bonfire question. If an activity that retains the spirit and tradition can be found to replace the Bonfire, he is in favor of the change. “The simple fact of the matter is that we are presently destroy ing thousands of trees a year,” Miller says. “We must make every effort to find an acceptable alternative without sacrificing the spirit of the present tradition. “We should continue with the bonfire, so long as the trees which are burned are going to be destroyed anyway,” Sharp says. “If a better use for the trees is found, then perhaps we should look for other Bonfire material.” “There is no excuse for Texas A&M not to provide housing for women next fall,” Miller stated. “It now has an equal responsi bility as a university to each stu dent regardless of sex. There are available facilities on campus which would be more than ade quate to house women next fall. Since the board decision last month, I have been actively working to see that this issue is reconsidered.” “I definitely think that if this is going to be a university that lets women become coeds, we should follow state statutes and provide adequate housing,” Sharp said, “this is no longer a ques tion of individual opinion.” ' HHHi REACTING TO HER SELECTION as Civilian Student Sweetheart Saturday night is Claudia Jackson, a sophomore at Tarrant County Junior College. The 20-year-old blond was representing Schumacher Hall. (Photo by Randy Freeman) Police state facing U. S., black historian declares By DOUG GIBBS Battalion Staff Writer A police-type state is one of the alternatives facing America if we don’t improve the situation for blacks, Dr. Letita Brown said Monday in the Memorial Student Center. The black historian was pre- New commandant named CELEBRATE! CELEBRATE! was the word at the Three Dog Night concert Saturday night. Most people rated the concert as great. A crowd that danced in the aisles and on chairs for most of the performance seemed to enhance the praise. (Photo by Randy Freeman) Army Col. Billy M. Vaughn, brigade commander and II Field Force staff member in Vietnam, has been named to head the A&M reserve officer training program. Vaughn will succeed Col. Jim H. McCoy as commandant of cadets and professor of military science. The new commandant’s as signment is effective Aug. 23. A 1948 A&M graduate, Vaughn was deputy corps commander as a senior cadet and 1st Regiment liaison sergeant as a junior. The Troy native was graduated with a degree in accounting. Vaughn, 42, currently serves as brigade commander in the 1st Cavalry Division. The former Command and General Staff Col lege instructor also has been II Field Force operations and in telligence officer on his present Vietnam tour. He was a 1st Cavalry Division battalion commander and deputy operations officer of the I Field Force during a 1966-67 tour in Southeast Asia. Vaughn is a graduate of the Command and General Staff Col lege, the Armed Forces Staff Col lege and National War College, the latter in 1966. He completed Army aviation training last year. The 23-year veteran lead a platoon of the 24th Infantry Divi sion in 1950-51 and commanded a 1st Infantry Division company in 1955-56. During four years in the Pentagon in the early 196ds, Vaughn was Department of the Army personnel officer and Con gressional officer. He served on the U. S. Army Infantry School staff in 1967-69. The officer and his wife Clean have three children, Virginia 19, Taylor 17 and Patricia 15. sented as the last in the Great Issues Committee’s Black Issues Seminar. “The only way to stop hostility is to do a large amount of polic ing,” she said, “and I don’t think anyone wants that.” Through examples, Dr. Brown attempted to show that Ameri cans have traditionally placed blacks in an inferior position to the point of making violation of their rights a tradition in itself. Dr. Brown told students that many people believe the move ment for civil rights started in the 1960’s, but in reality it start ed earlier. Among the more radi cal early movements cited were the “back to Africa” and “get a gun” appeals. She then named what she con sidered one of the first civil rights leaders and asked if any one knew him. No one did. “Don’t have much Black His tory taught here, do you,” she commented. Laughter, clapping, and more laughter followed. “I said that jokingly,” she added. Dr. Brown cited the emergence of two basic trends today among blacks. First, a political central ization, caused by rapid techno logical developments in such areas as communication tech niques. Second, a general democ ratization, with emphasis on the masses instead of classes. The federal government was blamed by Dr. Brown for not implementing early civil rights bills, and at times, for underwrit ing them. But what of the future ? “We’ve had a change in the locale of blacks. The percentage of blacks in many large cities, Washington, D.C., for example, is high. In general, blacks are moving into the inner city, and whites are moving out, creating a ring of suburbs. A prolonged situation such as this can only be explosive.” University National Bank “On the side of Texas A&M.” —Adv.