The Nixon Court
ooens crucial term
sen. gcorgo mc govern
Nixon - promises, promises
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Independence blues
Courier II, an independent weekly newspaper owned
by students, is attempting to place distribution boxes in
campus buildings. Unfortunately, the Courier is running
into red tape in its efforts to secure distribution rights
since there is no precedent to deal with the distribution
of an independent student newspaper.
It also appears that several University agencies have
not gone out of their way to help the Courier solve its
circulation problems. And for any newspaper to be
viable, it needs an effective and organized method of
distribution.
The Courier is running into problems since it is
currently not an official student organization and
according to University rules only recognized student
organizations can distribute items on campus.
The newspaper has applied for official status in order
tosetup distribution boxes, but Peter G. Wirtz,
coordinator of Student Activities, has said their present
constitution is not acceptable. Under University rules,
no private business like the Courier can qualify as a
student organization.
The Courier also took its case to the University
Publications Board, which acts as the publisher of The
Daily Nebraskan . The Board, which has had the
unofficial policy of ignoring the Courier, said the
question of the Courier's distribution is not in its
jurisdiction since it has control over only official
student publications.
The Board suggested to the University administration
that distribution of independent newspapers should be
allowed only in Nebraska Union booths and on public
walks and campus malls.
. The Council on Student Life at its meeting today will
discuss the question of jurisdiction over independent
newspapers. It appears that CSL will have to completely
change the current University distribution of
newspapers on campus if the Courier and other
independent newspapers are going to be allowed to
distribute in campus buildings.
Denying the Courier distribution rights has crippled
the newspaper and put the University in the position of
supressing information. Hopefully, CSL will correct this
situation by giving independent newspapers distribution
rights in campus buildings.
Make love number 1
It is refreshing to see that UNL spirit organizations
this year are taking a new approach to homecoming.
Tassels and Corn Cobs are urging all living units that
have built homecoming displays in the past to
contribute the money they would have spent on the
structures to a University Foundation fund set up to aid
Love Library.
Enthusiasm in building homecoming displays has
dwindled in recent years because students have felt the
displays are not worth the time, money and effort
involved for only a week-end project And they are
right
The goal of the spirit organizations in their fund
raising campaign is to "Make Love Number 1." Money
collected for the Library will be channeled where it can
do the most good for students providing learning
materials, additional volumes of books and needed
equipment
Without a doubt, the Library needs all the help it can
get A recent survey of 50 leading American and
Canadian, university libraries revealed that UNL's
libraries ranked 50th.
The fund raising drive should dramatize to the state
that Love Library is truly a Nebraska resource and the
only research library in the state.
The drive should also demonstrate to state senators
the need for the long overdue addition to the library.
The University has requested $3,320,000 for 1972-73 to
expand the overcrowded library.
However, the success of the drive will depend on the
response of students. Living units and individual
students who contribute to "Make Love Number 1" will
be helping themselves in the long run.
Gary Seacrest
PAGE 4
by Robert Shogan
Newsweek Feature Service
WASHINGTON -At exactly
10 a.m. on Monday, October 4,
a marshal will chant the ritual
"oyez," commanding "all
persons having business before
the honorable, the Supreme
Court of the United States,
to draw near and give their
attention...." As the spectators
rise, seven justices will file out
from behind the red velvet
drapes to take their places at
the gleaming mahogany bench.
Technically, that moment
will signify nothing more than
a new term for the Supreme
Court. But it will also mark the
beginning of another
portentous era in the history of
the nation's most powerful
judicial body.
The absence of two such
influential figures as Hugo
Black and John Harlan and the
eventual presence of two new
justices whose philosophical
and legal bents have yet to be
tested would be important at
any time.
But in its upcoming term
the "Nixon Court" will be
confronting more issues, of
more profound and lasting
import to all Americans, than
any Court has had to settle in
recent years.
The. Court will delay
consideration of some major
cases until it is officially joined
by its two new members. In all,
it will decide more man 300
cases. In addition, the Court
will probably hear arguments
on about 150 other cases and
decide another 150 to 200 on
their merits without hearing
arguments.
Perhaps the most important,
and certainly the most
dramatic, issue the Court has
agreed to decide upon this
term is whether capital
punishment violates the Eighth
Amendment's prohibition of
"cruel and unusual
punishment." Four cases two
involving murder, two
rape will be the pivotal ones,
but the Court's decision may
well decide the fate of more
than 600 men languishing in
death rows around the
country.
Another critical issue and
one in which the Earl Warren
Court was particularly active
(and controversial)-is the
protection of individual
liberties against the intrusion
of the government.
Sometime during the
winter, the Court will hear
arguments on an important
case challenging the Nixon
Administration's contention
that the Attorney General has
the right, on his own authority,
to conduct electronic
surveillance of persons
suspected of domestic
subversion.
The case involves a
defendant, charged with
bombing a CIA office in
Michigan, whose phone
conversation were tapped by
the FBI. The government is
appealing a Federal District
Court ruling that such bugging,
without a court order, violates
the Fourth Amendment.
The press will also have its
day in court this term, in ctses
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
1 -
Chief Justice Warren E. Burger
deciding whether newsmen
have the right to be free from
governmental subpoenas
concerning their professional
work.
The most celebrated case
involves New York Times
reporter Earl Caldwell, who
refused to appear before a
Federal grand jury which
wanted to question him on
stories he had written about
the Black Panthers. Caldwell
contended that for him even to
talk to the jury would damage
his professional relationship
with confidential Panther
sources.
While some legal experts are
sure that the more conservative
Court of Chief Justice Warren
E. Burger will be less aggressive
than the Warren Court in such
areas as criminal law and civil
liberties, they agree that the
new Court may well set
important precedents in two
relatively free areas:
environmental and consumer
law.
On the environment, the
Court has agreed to hear
arguments on whether states
have the right to sue
neighboring states and their
cities in Federal courts because
they have permitted pollution
of rivers and lakes directly
affecting the plantiff state.
And it will take up the
question of whether
conservaton groups,
specifically the Sierra Club,
have the right to sue the
Interior Department to stop it
from turning over parts of the
national forest to commercial
firms for recreational
development.
Consumer law cases include
tests of the constitutionality of
such things as garnisheeing
wages and repossessing goods
without prior notice, and the
eviction of tenants who
withheld rent as a pressure
tactic to force landlords to
make necessary repairs.
Among the other vital
constitutional issues to be
heard this term are:
-In criminal law, whether
the guarantee of free counsel
applies only to offenses
carrying a penalty of more
than six months; whether state
laws permitting guilty verdicts
by less than a unanimous jury
vote should be allowed; and
whether the government can
compel a witness to testify
without granting him total
immunity from prosecution.
In the field of women's
rights, questions of the
propriety of state laws which
give male heirs precedence over
females in estate procedures,
and complex issues involving
state abortion laws.
And in birth control,
whether a Massachusetts law
prohibiting the sale of
contraceptive devices to
unmarried women is
constitutional.
Because of President
Nixon's new appointees, there
are those who predict that the
verdicts in many of these areas
will be conservative and will
represent a sharp break with
the recent past. But in view of
one respected legal expert,
Yale law professor Alexander
Bickel, the changes that are
bound to come in the Court
this session are not quite so
epic.
Rather, he says, they are
part of "the rhythm of events.
The cycle in the history of the
Court was upon us, and it
would have been upon us even
if the membership of the
Warren Court had remained
intact. There's a limit to what
any set of men can do. Now is
the time for digestion and
consolidation."
Telephones: editor: 42 2088, newt: 472 2589, advertising:
472 2590. Second clan povtaye rates paid at Lincoln, Nebraska.
The Daily Nebraskan is a student publication, independent of the
University of Nebraska's administration, faculty and student
government
Address: The Daily Nebraskan. 34 Nebraska Union, University of
Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska 68508.
Sen. George McGovern, the
first announced candidate for
the 1972 Democratic
Presidential nomination, will
deliver a "major address" in
the Nebraska Union 1:30 p.m.
Friday.
In his Inaugural Address,
President Nixon pledged to
increase the participation of
our nation's youth in the
decision making processes of
our country. I applauded that
pledge, and was encouraged by
the President's expressed
intentions.
Today, almost three years
later, it is dear that he has failed
to keep that pledge. In three
critical areas. Administration
inaction has left young people
without the means to
participate fully and equally in
American life.
In July, 1971, 18-year-olds
won the right to vote, and yet
millions of these newly
enfranchised voters will not
cast their ballots next year
because of unfair local
restrictions. In New York, state
party enrollment closes on
October 2 for a primary nine
months later. In New
Hampshire and North Carolina,
among other states, there are
no provisions for absentee
balloting in primary elections.
In 29 states, there are no
provisions for absentee
registration.
In the majority of states,
students are being denied the
right to register and vote where
they attend college, and
servicemen are unable to
register and vote in the
communities where they are
stationed. The combination of
these restrictions will prevent
millions of young people from
exercizing the right guaranteed
them in the Constitution.
The burden of defending
the Constitution and upholding
civil rights rests with the
exectutive branch. Only strong
action by the Nixon
Administration can ensure that
the right to vote for young
people will be a living reality
and not a paper promise. Yet
the Nixon Administration has
failed to take that action. The
Attorney General has
announced that the Nixon
HANOVER, N.H.-I had not paid much
attention to the movement for women's
liberation until the other day when I
discovered that I should have to cast a vote
on the question.
The notice came in the form of a letter
from the clerk of the board of trustees of
Dartmouth College. There would be a special
meeting of the board to consider "the
presence of women at Dartmouth."
As a trustee-albett very junior-l am
aware that some graduates of Dartmouth
might have phrased the notice differently.
They might have put it as follows: "Would
you reverse more than 200 years of tradition
and admit women to a men's school?'"
They have a point. As a freshman at
Dartmouth, one learns the words of a song
by an early American poet named Richard
Hovey. It includes the lines, "Men of
Darmouth, give a rouse, lest the old
traditions fail."
But traditions are not meant to imprison
intelligence. As Amy Lowell wrote in a
rebellious line, which might have been an
answer to Hovey, "Christ, what are patterns
for?" It seems to me that the advocates of
women's liberation have an equally strong
tradition. It is that women in this country
have been treated very badly for more than
200 years, and that it is time we set about
righting the wrongs.
I say this with a certain querulousness
about the phrase. Women's Lib. It smacks of
the Third World, the New Left, four-letter
words from somebody named Kate Millet
and a lot of other baggage which doesn't
have anything to do with the treatment of
women. "The feminist movement" is a
better phrase. It has history behind it,
although it is history of a largely
unsuccessful cause.
We do not treat women equally in this
country. They do not get equal pay for
equal work. They do not get equal job
opportunity, or equal chance for promotion.
or even equal treatment under law.
"Remanded for determination as to whether
a woman with children under six is a poor
employment risk," said a recent court
decision. Would the same court have
questioned whether a man with children
under six might be a poor employment risk?
But law is a sanctifier of prevailing
thought, and prevailing thought on the role
of women is marvelously expressed by Dr
Benjamin Spock: "If a mother realizes
clearly how vital is her care for a small
child," Dr. Spock advises working mothers,
"it makes it easier for her to decide that
extra money or the satisfaction she might
receive from an outside job is not so
important after all."
The feminist movement does not deny
the physical fact that women have a special
responsibility toward children. It does deny
that this special responsiblity implies a
lifetime of child care. But child care is the
general consensus. General consensus will be
changed by education long before it is
changed by law.
Here in Hanover, the argument goes hot
and heavy. A number of Dartmouth alumni,
quite naturally like to think that the four
wears thev sDent on one of the most
beautiful of American campuses was a good
way to spend four years. That being so, why
change?
The faculty on the other hand is largely
convinced that education without women is
less than the best. It is, they say an
anachronism, a relic of the warrior society
which regarded women as bearers of
children, perferably male.
My own vote is in favor of a tradition
even older than Dartmouth but which
Dartmouth, as always, upheld. It is that the
best way to right wrongs, make
improvements and advances is through
education. If educated men can't make
responsible change, what's the point of
Dartmouth?
Administration opposes the
right of students to vote in the
communities where they go to
school.
I have introduced legislation
in the Senate along with
Senator Alan Cranston of
California which would allow
students to register and vote
where they attend college. I
will introduce legislation which
will allow our approximately
800,000 servicemen to vote
where they are stationed.
I call upon President Nixon
to support these measures. I
call upon the Justice
Department to meet its
responsibilities to defend
Constitutional rights by
extablishing uniform guidelines
for voter registration
throughout the country so
local barriers do not negate the
most significant Constitutional
reform of our time.
In a second area, the
President .has failed to match
action to promise: he has
appointed only scant numbers
of young people to Federal
Boards and Commissions.
He did not place a single
person under 30 on the
President's Commission on
Marijuana and Drug Abuse, an
area in which young people are
directly involved and about
which they have a great deal of
knowledge. He did not appoint
one student or young person to
the Task Force on Priorities in
Higher Education even though
higher education exists for and
because of students, and even
though education is one area in
which young people have the
most experience.
The youngest person on the
Citizens Council on Youth
Opportunity was 35, and the
President has since abolished
that commission. There were
no students or young people
on the Commission on
Vietnam Veterans. He did not
appoint one person under 30
to the Commission on
All-Volunteer Armed Forces,
even though young people are
the ones who are drafted.
There is a third area of our
national life, directly affecting
young people, in which the
Federal Administration can
and must do better. That is
youth unemployment. Under
the Nixon Administration,
unemployment among persons
16-21 years of age has risen 50
per cent to 17.3 per cent.
Unemployment among black
youth is close to 40 per cent.
The President was urged to
take action which would have
prevented the rise in summer
unemployment. The mayors of
a number of major cities told
him that $145 million would
be needed to adequately fund
the summer youth
employment program this past
summer. Incredibly, he
requested from the Congress
only $64 million.
It is an indication of the
mistaken sense of priorities of
this Administration that it can
request billions of dollars for
atomic missiles, billions for
senseless slaughter in
Indochina, and billions for a
snob appeal airplane to take
the rich to Paris, while it
cannot summon the effort even
to request enough to put eager
young men and women to
work.
torn braden
The woman
fiid question
IwS Sr).
Sm ' 3'' to defeat W worthy opponents
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1971
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
PAGE 5
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1971