cbiu
january 23, 1974
lincoln, nebraska vol. 97, no. 5
V
March protests
abortion ruling
By Lynn Silhasek
Spectators at the Kansas State-Nebraska
basketball game never saw the small group of
UNL students gathered outside the
Coliseum, holding lighted candles.
Police directing game traffic thought the
group was going to set the building on fire.
But the group, representing the
newly-formed State Youth Coalition Against
Abortion was holding a candlelight
procession, in memory and in protest of the
Supreme Court's Jan. 22, 1973, decision to
liberalize abortion laws.
Other groups in Nebraska and throughout
the nation marked the decision's first
anniversary with similar ceremonies,
according to Joan Kocina, executive
president of the Nebraska Coalition for Life,
Inc. in Omaha.
Recommendations for ways to protest
the decision stemmed from the National
Right to Life Committee and were adopted
by state anti-abortion organizations, Kocina
said. Protests staged in Nebraska included
the tolling of church bells 22 times, lowering
flags to half staff, having baby caskets at
church services, and people wearing and
sending roses, according to Kocina.
The Nebraska coalition sent a rose to
Governor Exon and to each state senator,
Kocina said. The coalition also sent a rose
to Omaha mayor Ed Zorinsky and Omaha
City Council members, she said.
The National Right to Life Committee
received $40,000 in individual donations to
buy roses to send to Congressmen to protest
the decision.
Offices of Nebraska's congressmen
received approximately 500 roses, according
to office reports.
Both Exon and Zorinsky named Jan. 22
Respect for Human Life Day, said Kocina.
Other observances on Nebraska campuses
included a group of Creighton University
students marching to the Douglas County
Courthouse in Omaha and along Dodge
Street, Kocina said.
The State Youth Coalition against
Abortion, a subcommittee of the Young
Americans for Freedom (YAF), will recruit
members at Nebraska Wesleyan, Wayne State
College and Concordia Teachers College, said
Terry Cannon, YAF state chairman. The
coalition will distribute anti-abortion
pamphlets on the college campuses, he
said.
Harper Hall
visitation suspended
A three-day suspension of RHA visitation hours began
Tuesday at Harper Hall, but the move was not made
warning, according to Steve Heldt, residence
without
director.
Heldt
meeting
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A marcher in a candlelight procession Tuesday night protests liberalized abortion
laws.
said residents were warned at a residence hall
last Monday that visitation hours would be
suspended if they refused to observe official RHA visitation
rules.
Heldt said the decision to suspend hours was made after
reports from students and from student staff members said
that residents' doors were closed during visitation hours
while female guests were present. Some residents continued
to close their doors, even after they were warned, he said.
RHA visitation rules state that residents must keep their
doors open et all times during visitation hours when
entertaining guests of the opposite sex.
Heldt said students told him many times they will not
keep their doors open during visitation times "no matter
what."
Heldt said he and Marie Hansen, Harper-Schramm-Smith
Residence Complex Director, have observed visitation hours
violations.
Heldt said he has heard voices in the halls after visitation
hours are over. He also has heard voices that were
"definitely female" from behind closed doors during
visitation hours, Heldt said.
He said he thought RHA sponsors generally did not
enforce the open door rule, but that Student Assistants
believe they are obligated to help enforce the rule.
"We don't feel we're in a position to ignore this, and
we're trying to use a method of enforcement that's fair and
equitable under the existing policy," Heldt said.
If there is no change regarding students' observation of
RHA hours, more hours will be taken away, he added.
"I can't measure how upset they really are," Heldt said,
referring to Harper residents' reaction to the suspension.
Ken Noeker, Harper Hall judicial chairman, said he
thinks students are opposed to the move.
"I personally feel that very few people back it, but I
don't think they can help but see how it's just. I think a
one-week warning was long enough, so I think we were
given a fair chance," Noeker said.
Some Harper residents don't share his view.
"I think, for as much as we pay for a room here, we
should be able to do what we want," student John Morey
from Omaha, said.
"I pay too much money to go through all this," he
added.
Ben Shomshor, a sophomore from Fremont, said he
observes no change in student behavior patterns since the
warning was given a week ago.
"I don't think it's fair that, being 19 years of age and
independent, I should put up with the hassle of being told
where and when I can have my visitors," he said.
GOYA victories alter priorities for Overing
This is the sixond of two stories
examining the achievements of the
1973-74 ASUN Senate, in the light of
campaign promises made last spring.
Sue Overing, ASUN second vice
president, and Bill Frcudenhurg, both
UP candidates, offer their opinions.
Sue Overing, elected ASUN second
vice president in 1973, was the lone
UP (Unity and Progress Party)
candidate placed in an executive slot.
Being elected to work with another
party's candidates, who had a different
party platform, meant her "priorities
had to be rearranged," Overing said
"If the slate had been totally UP,
we would have done things
differently."
The main difference between the
GOYA (Get Off Your Apathy Party)
and the UP parties, Overing said, was
in the "ways certain persons handled
things.
"The same kind of questions would
have come up, but some ix;ople would
have been handled differently," she
said.
Ann Henry, ASUN president and
GOYA candidate, also pointod lo
personality problems as hindering the
1973-74 senate's work.
"Some senators dropped out
without even being talked to. That
should not have happened."
Overing said her party probably
would have arranged the budget a lol
differently, and standing committees
would have gotten nunc money.
The UP platform called for ASUN
to assume a "student advocate'" io!e.
It suggested initiating an "academic
bankruptcy" system, whereby
students would receive "uu credit,"
instead of a failing grade. It proposed
that students evalujte nil UNL
teachers regularly and that the diop
and add system lie revis"l
As second vice-president, Overing
said she primarily has worked with the
Free University nnd me Student
Services Committee
"Free University his gone well
because its chairman Dave Hewlett did
a good job. Wc are trying to rjet it
expanded, and to have some courses
offered for credit.
"The book exchanet ., particulary
on East Campus and in i'ip run mi tot ies
also is working well," she s ni.
The main thrust of the UP
platform, faculty evaluation, "still
needs work" Over ing said. "If we can
get the Center for Educational Chanrjr;
strengthened, I hope something can
happen with it (the evaluation) yet."
One of the year's disappointments
has been tin? Consumer Aid Group,
which "also needs more woik. "It
reolly needs a manager," Ovenng said.
"We tried to look at the !-op and
add system when we first got into
office, she said, "but the
administration says most of the
problems are related to budgeting."
She shrugged and laughed.
"We suggested that it be done in
alphabetical order to get rid of the
lines, but there seems to be no real
benefit to trying that."
She said some senators are working
on extending the free drop and add
period.
"At UNO, a student can drop a
class until the last day of the semester.
There is no reason why such
inconsistency should exist between
campuses," she said.
"No progress" in achieving
platform promises has been made by
either party, according to Bill
Freudenburg, defeated UP presidential
candidate.
Freudenburg, a member of the
Council on Student Life, the College
nf Arts and Sciences Advisory Board,
Teaching Council and the College of
Arts and Sciences Curriculum
Committee, said he is most critical of
ASUN's lack of action in the
educational reform area.
"Maybe some things are happening
in ASUN that I can't see, bu; I'm on
quite a number of committees, and
I'm interested in it personally, and
nothing has been done that I can see,"
he said.
"I have a good perception of what
was promised and what has come
about," Freudenburg said.
He said he suggested several times
to a few ASUN senators that they
form a committee to write resolutions
to establish and review registration,
drop and add and advising in general.
The senate committee was to have
been made up of ASUN senators,
students, faculty and staff. "No one
reacted to my proposal in any way,
shape or form," he said.
Freudenburg introduced his
resolution to CSL, he said, and a CSL
Task Force has been established to
work on the same issues.
"Changes in the advising system
have been less than magnificent. If
anything is happening in ASUN," he
said, "it is incredibly well hidden."
Freudenburg said this year's lack of
changes in education "are especially
unfortunate" because "that's one of
the areas where ASUN could make a
difference. In the past that's where it's
made some significant changes."
Freudenburg said he thought a
number of elected UP senators
believed they "had to put up with a
lot of mutual distrust and suspicion."
Rather than create disharmony,
they "let a lot of their particular ideals
go" that had been in the UP platform,
"just to get things accomplished in the
end," he said.
