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arch 22,1S89 University of Nebraska-Lincoln__Vol. 88 No. 126
ILB160 is unconstitutional, opinion states
I By Victoria Ayotte
Senior Editor _
y^kfficials had mixed reactions Tuesday to
B Bthe opinion by the state attorney gcn
^^eral that adding Kearney State College
to the University of Nebraska system would be
unconstitutional.
The opinion was given Monday by Deputy
Attorney General A. Eugene Crump and Attor
ney General Robert Spire in response to a
December request by state Sen. Jerome Warner
of Waverly. Warner is a co-sponsor of LB 160,
which would add KSC to the university system.
The opinion states that making KSC part of
the university system would be a violation of
legislative history, which states that the prin
ciple mission of the state colleges is to train
teachers.
The change also would be unconstitutional
because the Board of Trustees is charged with
governing the state colleges, the opinion says,
and previous court history states that none of
that responsibility can be taken away.
A constitutional amendment would be
needed to make KSC part of the NU system, the
opinion states.
Warner said he originally requested the
opinion because he had heard concerns that the
bill might be unconstitutional. In his request
for the attorney general’s opinion, Warner said
he thought the bill was constitutional since the
Nebraska constitution makes no mention of the
specific campuses to be governed by the uni
versity.
Warner said the constitution provides that
state colleges be governed by the Board of
Trustees. If a college is changed to a university,
it would be governed by the NU Board of
Regents, he said.
Warner said Tuesday that the attorney gen
eral’s opinion is inconsistent with the current
role and mission of KSC.
The opinion “suggests a very narrow scope
for the state colleges,” he said.
It declares that the role and mission is to
train teachers, he said, but “thatcertainly is not
the practice.”
“It raises the whole question of what the
role and mission is of the state colleges,”
Warner said.
Jean Lovell, chairperson of the Board of
Trustees, said the trustees have felt the change
of KSC to university status was unconstitu
tional.
The attorney general’s opinion is “pretty
much in line with what our position was,” she
said.
However, Lovell said, the role and mission
of the state colleges is * ‘a lot more comprehen
sive than teachers colleges.”
The reason the trustees think the change
would be unconstitutional, she said, is because
the trustees are granted governing power of the
four slate colleges by the constitution. To take
one college away from the trustees’ govern
ance would be unconstitutional, she said.
NU Regent Don Frickc of Lincoln said he
has not supported the change of KSC to the
university system all along.
Fricke said he had not considered that the
change might be unconstitutional, but the opin
ion has no affect on his position.
Warner said he is not sure what his next step
will be on the bill to change KSC’s status. The
bill currently is being considered by the Legis
lature’s Education Committee.
The Legislature could make a “test case”
by passing the bill, he said, or a constitutional
amendment may be considered, although it
could not happen this year.
Warner said the ruling in this case could
affect another bill in the Legislature to change
the names of Nebraska’s state colleges to uni
versities.
i Judge: South Africans’ lives haunted by police actions
I By Lisa Twiestmeyer
Staff Reporter
rTI he 16 South Africans whose
treason trial Nathan ial Jones
A observed were guilty of no
more than the basic freedoms pro
tected by America’s Bill of Rights,
the former general counsel for the
NAACP said Tuesday to a group of
30 in the Nebraska Union.
Jones, a federal appellate judge for
the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals,
was sent to South Africa in 1985 to
observe the trial of 16 South Africans
accused of forming a “revolutionary
alliance” with organizations the
government had banned.
Other charges against the 16 were
based on second- hand statements and
songs and slogans the defendants had
shouted at illegal meetings.
The defendants, Jones said, were
members of South Africa’s United
Democratic Front and were merely
practicing “peaceful and open tac
tics” in protest of elections which
would have given the white minority
in South Africa a monopoly over the
black majority.
Their membership in the UDF, he
said, violated South Africa’s Na
tional Security Act. That act gives the
police the right to act as “licensed
executioners’’ in order to control
dissent against the government
Townships throughout South Af
rica are under “states of emergency’’
so the National Security Act can be
enforced, he said, which grants
“sweeping powers’’ to the police.
During his stay, Jones said, he
visited various townships to observe
the conditions under the state of
emergency. He and his colleagues
1
were arrested for violating the state of
emergency because they entered one <
township without a permit
“Unlimited police powers intrude I
into the lives of South Africans day i
and night,” Jones said. “It is a cruel \
system enforced by whips, police i
dogs, arson, torture and even death.”
For example, Jones said, one of
the defense attorneys who invited <
Jones to observe the trial was hacked
with machetes and shot with pistols in
the presence of her children on the
morning that Jones was to leave
South Africa.
% T 1
Innocent people and children are
>ften detained by police and tortured,
ones said. A 15-year-old boy he
alked to had been walking down a
itreet in his neighborhood and had
>art of his leg blown off by police tor
10 reason, he said.
Jones said there is a “war being
vaged against South African chil
iren.”
More than 10,000 children under
18 have been detained and charged
for crimes without trial, he said, and
See JONES on 3
I> Spring chickenr
Michael Elwood, a junior physical education major, serves a slice of ham to his pet
chicken "Earwax” Tuesday afternoon at Broyhill Fountain. “I believe that all chickens
deserve to be kept as pets and not to be eaten,” Elwood said.
rsew general requirement
program to be implemented
By Eric Pfanner
Staff Reporter.
In order to obtain a “more co
herent curriculum ’ ’ at the Uni
versity of Nebraska-Lincoln,
general education requirements for
all students will change over the next
few years, according to UNL offi
cials.
Ellen Baird, associate vice chan
cellor for academic affairs, said the
changes will not involve “the num
ber of hours per se,” that students
would be required to take. Instead,
she said, students will be required to
take a program of broad, liberal edu
cation courses.
About two years ago, Baird said, a
chancellor’s commission on general
liberal education proposed a “Pro
gram for the Advancement of Gen
eral Education’’ at UNL.
Raymond Haggh, chairman of the
implementation committee for the
program, said the UNL program is
part of a national trend to improve the
general education of college stu
dents.
what one expects of an educated per
son,” he said.
The program, when implemented,
will require students in all UNL col
leges to take about 30 hours of
courses in five basic knowledge ar
eas, Haggh said.
The plan calls for required courses
in “culture and society,” “the arts
and humanities,” “basic and applied
science,” “mathematics” and
“written and oral communications.”
All students also will have to take an
“integrative senior seminar” before
they graduate.
Haggh said the courses in these
areas will encourage students to be
more open-minded and flexible in
their education.
There will be about five to eight
courses to choose from in each of the
five areas of study, in order to give
students some flexibility, he said.
Baird, who also is chairman of the
implementation subcommittee for
arts and humanities, said some pilot
courses for the program, in communi
cations, math and chemistry, already
i ne idea oi general education is see MtuumtiwitN i s on j
ASUN Electoral Commission
makes election results official
By Eve Nations
Staff Reporter
The AS UN Electoral Commis
sion officially certified last
week’s student government
elections and announced the results
of the tied races Tuesday.
Bryan Hill, Devi Bohling and Jon
Bruning were certified as president,
first vice president and second vice
president of the Association of Stu
dents of the University of Nebraska.
Some senatorial and student advi
sory board positions, which were not
announced previously because of
lies, were chosen by the commission
by picking numbers out of a cup
.J Tuesday. In many cases, the ties were
caused by numerous write-in voles.
The winners of advisory board
positions were Andy Hahn of the
vocational and adult education de
partment; Jill Douglas from the
School of Health, Physical Education
and Recreation; Kaleen Micck of the
special education and communica
tion disorders department; Lisa
Boohar from speech pathology; and
John Campbell from pre-veterinary
science.
The winner of the fifth graduate
college senator position was Jay
Ovsiovitch.
Mark Fahleson, the director of the
Electoral Commission, said the ccrti
See ELECTION on 3