friday, may 2, 1975 lincoln, nebraska vol. 98 no. 122
Council, mayoral candidates peg major issues
Next week, voters in
lincoln will decide mayoral,
city council, school board and
airport authority races. City
elections are Tuesday and
today the Daily Nebraskan
presents the major platforms of
candidates for mayor and city
council.
Candidates for mayor are
Helen Boosalis and Sam
Schwartzkopf. City council
. candidates are Steve Cook,
Robert Sikyta, Robert
Jeambey, Richard Baker, Steve
Tiwald, William Theirstein, Jim
Carson and Mary Rogge.
Helen Boosalis, 16-year City
Council veteran, said the three
important issues which will
face Lincoln in the next several
years include completion of
the comprehensive plan,
rehabilitation of Lincoln's
older areas and openness and
response to citizens in the
mayor's office.
Redevelop
Efforts to rehabilitate and
redevelop older areas in
Lincoln should include
downtown, she said.
Boosalis has said she is
running for mayor because
"many people felt leadership
has not been clearly exerted
from that office in several
years."
She said she would like to
see the city become more
dnvolved in providing bus
transportation between the
two UNL campuses and to big
industries in Lincoln, such as
Goodyear.
"Maybe down the line there '
is a better way between the
campuses," she said. "The city
should take the leadership in
setting up a system of car
pooling."
Urbanize north
Boosalis said it is important
for Lincolnto urbanize toward
the north, south and west
before going east into the
Stephens Creek area. She also
mentioned that low-income
and elderly housing in Lincoln
are a "real problem," but that
problems with housing for
middle-income families also
exist.
Incumbent Mayor Sam
Schwartzkopf, who finished
second in the April primary
elections to Boosalis, has been
"encouraged" about the
elections in the past two weeks
as the campaign begins winding
to its May 6 close.
"I've talked to a lot of
people in the last two weeks,"
Schwartzkopf said. "I'm
encouraged by the feeling that
I'm getting from people.
Schwartzkopf views the
questions surrounding the
performance of the lincoln
police department as the major
issue in the campaign this year.
"We really haven't got any
primary issues, but the police
department question seems to
be the main one right now,
although it may not have been
brought out that well,"
Schwartzkopf said.
According to Schwartzkopf,
the issue involves Attorney Jim
Bruckner's report on Driving
While Intoxicated (DWI) arrest
procedures of the lincoln
Police Department and "the
whole thing."
'Good police'
"I think we have a very
good police department,"
Schwartzkopf said. "There's no
graft or corruption; we have a
low crime rate and, although
it's increased recently, it
started from a low level."
"I think we should continue
having the type of law
enforcement we have."
Attorney General Levi:
aive aun control ne
A system of gun control which actually will
deter crime is one of the Justice Department's
major considerations, U.S. Atty. Gen. Edward H.
Levi said Thursday.
Levi was in Lincoln to receive an honorary
Juris Doctor degree during the dedication
ceremonies of the new Law College Building on
East Campus. At a news conference before the
dedication, Levi said that "in about two weeks
we are going to have to make up our minds
whether we have a viable system" of gun control.
He and his staff have been talking with states
attorneys, people in the justice system and other
people both for and against gun control to find
an effective form, he said.
"We are trying to do a bit of social
engineering," he said. "I don't know, we may
fail. We shouldn't be afraid to fail."
'Blanketing'
Levi said he hopes to find a form of gun
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f - i f "-v v i
1 . : ' i ' mT-r t
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U.S. Atty. Gen. Edward Levi
So long, adieu,
auf wiedersehen
This is the final issue of the Daily Nebrstksn
for the 1974-75 school year. Publication will
resume in the fall.
Applications for staff positions, available in
Nebraska Union 34, will be accepted until noon
today.
control for those areas of the country that have
high crime rates and that need it, without
"blanketing" those parts which have low crime
rates and do not need it.
The answer, he said, is in a combination of
banning "Saturday evening specials" (inexpensive
and easily-obtained small handguns) and of
finding some way to make the flow of handguns
into high crime areas illegal.
The big question he said he asks when
someone suggests a possible solution is: "Will this
diminish the use of guns in violent crimes by 20
per cent? If it does, I think it is worth while."
The problem of crime, he said is high on his
list of priorities in the Department of Justice.
"My own assessment-which may be wrong-is
that it is not so much a problem on the street,
but that the prosecutorial level fails and the
judicial level faUs,"he said.
Recidivism rate
He said he would like to find some way to let
the prosecutorial level of government function
better-to get more judges, better pay and more
information on such things as the rate of
recidivism.
One thins he would like to do is to decrease
judicial discretion, he said, because many judges
"do not take seriously that the point of the
criminal justice system is to deter crime."
This determent must be under a much more
limiting, "or what we sometimes call
mandatory," rule, he said.
Later, at a Law College-Law Day banquet
sponsored by the College of Law and the lincoln
Bar Association, Levi said that because courts
phrase their judgments in terms of reasoned
application of principle, what courts say too
often has been mistaken for the single voice of
the law.
Go to the courts
In the last few years, he said, the practice has
been to go to the courts when legislators and
officials of the executive branch fail to live up to
their responsibility.
"The appointment of legislatures, the
operation of public schools, even the conduct of
the war in Vietnam have all been brought up to
courts by those who would have the judges state
the single rule of law," he said.
Sometimes, Levi said, judges have wisely
refused to comment, but sometimes they have
not.
"In any case," he said, "the appeal to the
judges as the only spokesmen of justice results
fiom a failure to recognize the more subtle
nature of the rule of law in this nation."
Schwartzkopf said he backs
the Centrum downtown
redevelopment program.
"We need it as a catalyst to
redevelop downtown,"
according to Schwartzkopf.
"My administration began the
program and I'd like to see it
to completion."
The incumbent also said he
supports building the .West
Bypass, a project to ease the
traffic congestion around the
State Fairgrounds area which
recently was approved by the
Lancaster County Board of
Commissioners.
Continued on p. 7
Davis urges audience
to fight oppression
By John Kalkowski
Omaha Political activist Angela Davis Thursday urged an
audience of more than 1,000 people to join in fighting sexism and
racial oppression.
Davis, in Omaha at the invitation of the International Women's
Year Consortium, asked that all revolutionary organizations,
despite their many differences, unite around issues affecting "all of
us."
Davis visited Omaha to raise money for the legal fund of
Edward Poindexter and David Rice, who were charged with the
1970 murder of Omaha policeman Larry Minard.
After her speech at the Omaha Civic Auditorium, she began
forming a committee to work in "the struggle for the lives of our
brothers, Poindexter and Rice." r
"These two brothers were sincerely committed to freeing all
black people," she said. Again Davis appealed for involvement in
their case, "because they struggled for you."
District Court Judge Warren Urbom has ordered Rice released
from the state penitentiary because of an illegal search of his home
and clothing. However, the verdict on Poindexter still stands.
According to Davis, justice has not been done in the case.
"If the rights of Poindexter and Rice can be violated, tomorrow
your rights might be, too."
She said there is no question that the two men were the victims
of "hysteria" against blacks.
Concerning Rice's release on a technicality, she said
"constitutional rights are not a technicality." She added that due
process of law does not mean anything in cases concerning black
people.
The oppression of Poindexter and Rice and "all minorities stems
from United States imperialism," she said. Davis is a member of the
American Communist Party.
The "noise" about her speaking in Omaha as a Communist
"could have been directed to brothers and sisters who need it," she
said.
For instance, she said, Americans must never forget "the
tragedy of the Vietnamese people by the barbaric war machine of
thcU.S."
Davis, on tour for the National Alliance Against Racist and
Political Repression, called the Communist takeover of South
Vietnam "a victory."
"People all over the world are celebrating the final, unequivocal
defeat of the U.S. in Vietnam," she said.
She said the Vietnam War was a racist war and would have been
inconceivable if the Vietnamese had not been "people of color."
Referring to International Women's Year, Davis said women
played a critical role in the Vietnam War. Prior to their
"liberation" by the Viet Cong, she said, half of the 250,000
political prisoners under the Thieu regime were women.
Women in the United States also are severely persecuted, she
said.
Of 2.5 million hired domestic workers, 20 per cent are black
women, Davis said. She added that their average annual income is
$1 ,000, far below what she called the government poverty level.
Davis called for "all people, wherever they may be, to get into
the streets" in protest. She said there is no power unless there is a
mass movement of the people.
No changes in the struggle against "the enemy" can be made
Accused by a member of the press of advocating violence, she
replied that whenever violence arises, it comes from the hands of
"our enemies."
She said the "enemies" are large American-based international
corporations, which she said are trying to regain "what they lost in
Viet Nam-a source of profits-by turning against people in
America and around the world.
Memorial Day move
alters summer school
Because of the Memorial Day holiday UNL will be closed May
26 and will open May 30. Prescssion and eight week summer school
classes also will be postponed.
The holiday date, which had been set for May 30, was changed
to May 26 by the Legislature.
Prescssion and eight-week session schedules will be adjusted to
accommodate the change, said William Scsow, associate director of
UNL summer sessions. A makeup day, which had been scheduled
for May 24, will be May 31.
