9mm

Oldest College Newspaper West of the Mississippi

 

Vol. LXXIl

Grinuell, Iowa, Friday. March 5. l965

No. I?

 

Faculty Committee Answers SGA
‘WitIi Statement on Due Process

By Bob Hadlema
and John Wolf

The Faculty Committee on Stu-
dent Affairs late this week issued
a founandoneshalf page state
ment of their feelings toward jur-
isdictional lines and due process
at Grinnell.

The statement, an answer to
last week's demands for clarifi-
cation on these points by son
and the student courts, began by
stating. “ The Committee on Stu-
dent Affairs regrets the tone of
the letters submitted to it by
members of the SGA.”

The FCSA members warned,
“The Committee wishes to remind
those students that no useful end
can be served by calling its good
will gratituitously into question.
In the long run, a strategy of im-
tagonism can only defeat or new
ﬂat valueless what ever purpose
it seeks.”

The FCSA asserted that the stu—
dent courts “may be taken to rep-
resent the ‘Student interest'," and
that those interests are “not iden-
tical with the community interest
in the sense of ‘the interest of the
College as a whole and as an on
going institution’."

The FCSA concluded that “Stu-
dent Courts may not be the proper
agency for handling cases in
which the community interest
most crucially at stake is that of
the College as a whole rather
than that of the student body
only."

On matters of jurisdiction, the
FCSA expressed its intention of
hearing cases where tile commu-
nity interest is involved or where
a hearing by the student courts
might endanger a student’s well-

Republicans Hear
Javils Via Phone

Sen. Jacob K, JaVits (Rep. N.Y.)
will speak to Grinnell students via
telephone at 9 pm. Monday.

His talk, “The Republican Party
—A Time of Change,” will origin-
ate in Washington, D.C., and will
be heard in the South Lounge of
the Forum. A question and answer
period Will follow the talk.

Now serving his second term in
the Senate. Javits has never lost
an election. He served in the House
of Representatives from 1946 to
1954, and was elected to the San-
ate in 1956.

Senator Javits’ telephone talk is
one of a series being sponsored by
the Young Republicans Club.

Sen. Everett Dirksen of Illinois,
who was scheduled to speak via
telephone last Tuesday, was
forced to cancel his talk due to
illness. Dirksen expressed hope
that his talk Could be given later
in March.

 

being. The FCSA did agree that
an SGA official should be con-
suited to determine which cases
would be heard by which judicial
body.

The report recommended that
cases of possible conduct proba-
tion be handled by the courts or
by the Deans' Committee. (The
Deans’ Committee »— comprising
the dean of men, dean of women,
and associate dean of the college
— was established early this year
by the Acting President to assure
a unified approach to the problems
handled by each dean.)

Concerning due process, the re-
port Stated, "it is felt the Commit-
tee should ossure the accused
those protections traditionally as-
sociated with fair hearings, rec-
ognizing that the student’s rights
and liabilities under college regu-
lations are not fully analogous to
the citizen’s rights and liabilities
under public law."

The report recommended that
the accused student be given writ<
ten notification of the charges
against him and that he have the
right to be present when evidence
is presented against him. In par-
entheses, the report noted, ” ‘Evl-
dence’ here refers to information
on the nature of the alleged vio-
lation actually introduced before
the judicial body and not to such
information as may have led to

notice or investigation of a viola< '

tion.”

Finally, the chn agreed to stu-
dent demands that in cases of
misconduct, the three deans will
not sit in judgement of the case.
They noted, however, that this
provision could be overturned by
a ruling of the faculty.

 

Acting President James H.
Stauss reminded students this
week that the FCSA report in-
cluded only recommendations and
was subject to his approval,

Stauss also said that these pro-
posals will be discussed with SGA
officials.

 

Siauss Makes Siaiemeni lo S&B.‘
Cites Pressures for Fair Hearing _,

The editor asked me to comment on ”due process" in
cases involving alleged misconduct. I think he wants to pm

me down on what he calls

“administration concerns" re-

garding the way in which college government operates in

these cases.

“Due process” is an honored rubric of law, especially
constitutional law, standing for the individual‘s right to “fair ’
governmental proceedings, It is a matter of “fair” procedure
on behalf of the individual in his transactions with the gov-
ernmental agency or official. It is a concept which has difs
ferent concrete meanings in different situations, though its
theme is always the rights of the individual.

In decisions as to the concrete meaning of due process,
a basic problem or issue requiring settlement is typically thist
——~*—'—@what belongs to the individual?

Petitions for SGA presi-
dent aro due this Sunday at
4:00 pm.

Applications for the position
of social coordinator and for
positions on the social coord-
inating committee may be ob-
tained from Palmer Hartl.

 

Nollen Lecturer W.

J. Ong to Explain

Effect of Mass Communication Media

Walter J. Ong, 5.1., distin-
guished Catholic literary schol-
ar of St. Louis University, will

Walter J. Orig, SJ.

give the annual Nollen lecture
at 3:00 p.m. Wednesday in Her-
rick Chapel, His topic will be

 

”The End of the Age of Liter-
acy.”

Father Ong's lecture will
concern the clients of the 0mm
munication media on man’s re-
lationships to himself and to
his fellow men. He has written

. extensively on this themef his
~ latest book is The Barbarian
' Within, a collection of essays
‘ published in 1962.

His scholarly achievements

' are matched by a great diver

sity of interests. He has lec-
tured extensively, bod) in this
country and in Europe. Last
year he gave the Terry Lectures
at Yale,

Ong has published widely in
several languages.

The annual Nollen lecture is
sponsored by Friars, senior
men’s honorary organization.
Mike Young, president, said,
“We may expect that Father
Ong's treatment will be both
rigorous and sympathetic, both
objective and optimistic, and
that his Nollen lecture will
provide the stimulus for much
reflection,"

 

Panel Discussion on Scholarship
Fails To Develop Issues Clearly

By Bob Hodierne

A panel discussion before a
floor-lull of Grinnell students in
the South Lounge of the Forum
last night was a masterpiece of
misunderstanding.

The panel was composed of a
promising lot. Reginald Archam-
bault (education) was moderator.
Sheldon Zitner (English) was
there, Al Jones (history) was
there. Mike Young (Friar) was
there. And Pete Read (Coil-IF)
was there.

The only thing that wasn't
there was a discussion worthy of
such a distinguished gathering.

Read started the discussion after
a short reading by Archambault.
Read argued that the “reason for

college is to produce people, not
scholars."

Read stressed that scholastl~
Cism should have a practical pur-
pose and should not be an end in
itself.

Young countered by saying in a
reasonably direct manner that
scholary habits “must be pursued
for their own sake to be success-
ful,"

Jones, who claims to have
trouble talking with Edgar Mul-
lins (mathematics), said that per-
haps the only “integrating force"
in college education today is fuot<
ball,

And then, strangely, the topic
became a faint memory.

Instead of a dlscussion on
whether or not a student should
be a scholar for the sheer satis»
faction of being a scholar, the dis-
cussmn disintegrated, as Archam-
bault pointed out, into more of a

discussion of how best to produce
a scholar.

Read’s rather provocative topic
was, to use football jargon, which
should please Jones, completely
lost in an “end nln.” The topic
was lost in spite of a valiant effort
by Archambault to keep the panel
on the right track.

The best suggestion of the eve-
ning was proffered by Zitner. He
suggested the discussion be
dropped at halftime. It wasn't.

The next best suggestion of the
evening was Ai‘chambault’s. He
suggested at the outset that Zit<
ner offer a rendition of “Winter
Wonderland.” Zitner didn't,

Other than those two sugges.
tiorls, nothing came out of last
night's discussion that Couldn’t
have come out of a dull faculty
committee meeting on curriculum.

 

what comes within governmental
authority? Adjudication: involv.
ing due process, or its meaning in
different situations, usually come
to some kind of pragmatic adjust-
ment of individual right and free-
dom to governmental authority.
Anyone who studies the volumi.
nous literature of constitutional law
on due process will see repeatedly
the fact of this pragmatic adjust.
merit, “These standards of justice
are not authoritatively formulated
anywhere as though they were pro.
scriptions in a pharmacopoeia."
(332 U. s. 68.)

An important area of due pro«
cess, in which the individual hill
an equipment of rights, is "ade-
quate notice" and "fair hearing,"
1 emphasize this area, because it
is the topic of current campus dis-
cussion and because I believe that
individual claims to have adequate
notice and fair hearing should be
respected and protected in col-
lege governmental operations.
Among other essentials, “the right
to a hearing embraces not only
the right to present evidence but
also a reasonable opportunity to
know the claims of the opposing
party and to meet them,” (304 U.S.
18.)

In constitutional cases involving
standards of fair hearing. courts
are frequently troubled by maneu<
vers and problems attending the
ability and effort of one party to
prevent or suppress evidence use-
ful to the other party. in courts of
law, the individual has many liabil-
ities (or restrictions of freedom),
such as subpoena, oath, and con<
tempt liability, as well as certain
safeguards, relevant to this prob-
lem of prevention or suppression of
evidence. These liabilities are not
typical of hearings on the college
campus. Yet, the same problem of
doing justice to each side recurs
in the circumstances of some cases
on the campus.

Accordingly, the problem centerl
in the conditions and extent of the
accused’s Claim to know the
sources of evidence against him.
In View of two beliefs, I am not
congenial to any absolute pres-
cription. My first belief is, that
various pressures on the individual
may lead to unfair suppression o!
evidence in ways that in fact sup.
press responsible individual actiol
and are detrimental to the col-
lege. My second belief is, that w.
must avoid a system of secret [to
formants. I think it possible to
have a “fair” adjustment of these
considerations within the scopﬂ
D! a “fair" hearing.

James H. Siam
March 4. 196'

ADDRESS HERE:

‘10“UHD

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