Opinion
The University Daily Kansan
4A
Laura Roddy, Editor Shauntae Blue, Business manager Sarah Hale, Managing editor Brad Bolyard, Retail sales manager Kristi Ellott, Managing editor Dan Simon, Sales and marketing adviser Tom Eblen, General manager, news adviser Scott Valler, Technology coordinator
Thursday, January 20, 2000
Editorials
Supreme Court's ruling gives police too much power, authority to chase
Police across the United States were handed another potentially dangerous baton of power by the Supreme Court. In 5-4 decision, the nation's highest court ruled that police now can stop and question individuals just because they run at the sight of a police officer.
The decision arose concerning the Illinois vs. Wardlow case. Wardlow was convicted of a weapons violation after he was chased down and arrested on a Chicago street while carrying a loaded handgun.
While Wardlow was indeed carrying a concealed weapon, the police did not know this when they began pursuing him. Rather, they acted on a hunch. Fortunately, this time their hunch was correct. But, always giving police
Because many people fear police officers, running away isn't a good indication of guilt
officers the power to act upon their instincts can lead to a variety of problems.
First, people who have been raised in environments where police are feared may indeed possess a natural tendency to run from them, regardless of whether they are engaged in illegal activity.
Allowing the police to chase merely because individuals run assumes that they are guilty until proven innocent. This idea undermines the very nature
of our judicial system.
Secondly, these police chases could lead to the harm of innocent bystanders. The person fleeing may become desperate enough to escape and put others in danger, and needless shoot-outs between police officers and individuals could become commonplace.
Finally, this decision places entirely too much power in the hands of the police. It is in essence pitting their word against the person they are chasing. The police determine what constitutes as "fleeing," and this could become a power easily abused.
Our Constitution provides for us to walk or run free of police restraint, and the Supreme Court's decision has hindered this right.
Heather Herrman for the editorial board
Innocent should not be affected by ruling
Just more than a week ago, the United States Supreme Court ruled that police may stop and search a person who flees at the sight of a police officer. The decision was met with mixed reviews.
Some fear the ruling will give police increased leeway amidst concern that they already wield too much power. The four dissenting justices believe the ruling is aimed at minorities and residents of high crime areas who "believe contact with the police can be dangerous."
While these fears may be legitimate, the core issue remains that the Supreme Court should not base its decisions upon cultural perceptions. Everyone is subject to the ruling, and innocent people are not affected by this ruling. Even if fleeing from the police is a natural reaction, unless the fugitive is breaking the law, innocent people are not in jeopardy.
Fleeing from the police may be natural reaction for some, but suggests wrongdoing
one thing — that they do not abuse the privilege the Supreme Court has given them. While we must be increasingly aware of an overactive federal judiciary, in this case what we must be wary of is an increasingly empowered police force.
The fear that this ruling will lend support to already aggressive police tactics is unfounded. Under recent and intense scrutiny by the media, the police must be careful of
The ruling itself is correct. As Chief Justice William Rehnquist wrote, "Headlong flight is the consumate act of evasion. It is not necessarily indicative of wrongdoing, but it is certainly suggestive of it."
It is now up to police nationwide to prove, within the parameters the Supreme Court has given them, how correct the ruling is.
Drew Ryun for the editorial board, dissenting
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Broaden your mind: Today's quote
"The person who knows how to laugh at himself will never cease to be amused." — Shirley Maclaine
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Skip the t-shirt and candy, reach for the checkbook
Perspective
id you spend more money than you anticipated during winter break?
Don't worry. There is someone waiting to help you solve.
to help you solve your money problems, you owe you too much—maybe even a lit-
Unlike the information you received at your orientation session, this resource cannot be found in any academic dean's office or advising center. In fact, you probably don't even realize how much they have influenced your habits.
They know you spent too much
te more than you had — and
they will be there for you.
Have you figured out who "they" are yet? Let me give you one more clue. Their benefits (if that's what you want to call them) stay with you for most of your life.
Tisha
McCoy
columnist
opinion@kansan.com
Give up? "They" are your credit card companies!
This semester they will await your presence at the Kansas Union and, if it's a nice day, at Wescoe Beach. If they don't catch you in either of those places, turn to page 88 of your spring timetable and look to your right. Yep, there's Associate's Visa welcoming you and your financial disparities back to school. Turn the page. Discover Card is at your service. They even offer a FREE data bank organizer. Notice that it will most certainly not organize your finances. Check the bottom of the bag that you got from the bookstore. I can't guarantee it, but more than likely it's Citibank Visa.
Only one more place left to check; your mailbox. Who knows which company this one if from, but who cares? Because this time you have been pre-approved for a $10,000 credit limit! You're thinking, "Do you know what I could do with a $10,000 credit limit? I could get this and that and maybe even have enough left over to pay for the things I shouldn't"
have purchased over winter break."
Listen up, because this is the lesson you don't want to learn the hard way. For many students, getting a credit card means spiraling debt that is almost impossible to pay back. Yes, at one point in your college career, you should get a credit card because this is the time in your life when you need to start establishing credit. But do it wisely.
Whoa baby, you hit the jackpot! Everything is working out perfectly. You have the instant credit that suddenly validates your independence, and they have you believing that they are here to help you.
Don't just buy anything and everything with the false notion that this is free money, because that is far from true. If you're not careful, you will end up like so many other college students. Instead of asking yourself what you could do with that credit limit, you will finding yourself asking "What did I buy?"
What you do next will be the stupidest mistake you ever make. You will come to the conclusion that the bills are not going to pay themselves, so you begin to make payments. Your mistake is that you only pay the $10 minimum payment required. "What's the harm in that?" you ask.
Perhaps no body told you, so let me be the first. That 'minimum payment required' is only a portion of the interest payment on the principle you owe. Students, be honest with yourselves. If you know you cannot control your spending habits, don't sign up for a credit card, thinking it's the easy way out. Don't let yourself be flattered by those cheap cotton T-shirts and old candy, because your future is worth more than either of the two.
Yes, the objective of attending college is to become educated, but what good is that without common sense? After all, life is only 10 percent learned. The other 90 percent is street knowledge.
McCoy is a Kansas City, Mo., senior in business administration.
Threats at high schools justify student's fears
manda says she's nervous.
A As her older sister, I sense some fear inside her as well. After all, Feb. 1 is drawing near.
It could be another Columbine copycat. Perhaps a student or staff member is getting a kick out of a sick practical joke. Maybe someone couldn't pass up a dare.
It's a day many have dreaded at Maize High School, a 6A school north of Wichita, since a message mysteriously appeared on a chalkboard in the teachers' lounge last semester: "The shootings will continue. Maize is next — Feb. 1, 2000."
Such threats never occurred at Maize when I was a student there only three years ago, and it saddens me that my younger sister can't find security within the same building.
In this regard, it is a very different school than the one I attended. My classmates and I never worried about whether a chalkboard threat would come true.
Lori
O'Toole
columnist
opinion@kansan.com
Maize isn't alone; similar fear and concern surround many other Kansas high schools.
In an attempt to reduce the fear and concern surrounding Feb. 1 at Maize, the principal has declared that absences on that day will be counted as excused for any of the 1,525 students who do not want to risk being at school if the chalkboard threat materializes.
The Wichita Eagle reported last month that other high schools in Kansas, including Colby and Nickerson, had dealt with recent threats of violence. It also reported such threats at Maize rival high schools, Goddard and Andover, in April. Fortunately, these threats did not result in any physical harm. I pray that the chalkboard threat at Maize will prove the same.
The Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, a nongovernmental organization out of the University of Colorado, reported in 1998 that about 100,000 students across the country are assaulted at school each day. In another study the organization conducted, one in every eight students reported carrying a weapon to school.
My sister, a junior, plans to visit a college. She, like many of her friends and classmates, does not want to be at Maize that day.
No violence occurred that day.
Sadly the chalkboard threat is not Maize's first threat of violence this school year. In early December, a counselor informed police about a report of a violent act at the school planned for Dec. 8. That day police used metal detectors and searched students' bags when they arrived at school. The administration allowed students to leave early. Amanda didn't leave early because she thought the administration had everything under control. But many of her friends went home early, and her classes were almost empty.
It is not only the threats at Maize that have made it a very different school from when I was a student there. For increased security, Amanda and her classmates must enter the school through the front door rather than any other entrances of the large, sprawling building. Students are not allowed to carry backpacks or other large bags to and from classes.
Schools across the country are taking similar actions, as well as installing video cameras and metal detectors and implementing policies for uniforms and identification badges.
I don't know why Maize has changed so much. It could be a combination of 100 small factors, such as the social environment, that could bring change in any U.S. high school. If anyone did know, they would possess the key to solving the problem of violence in schools that has plagued the nation in an increasing capacity since I graduated in 1997.
For now, school administrators need to take threats seriously and do everything possible to find who instigated them. They also need to develop harsh punishments, such as expelling or firing individuals who issue violent threats.
It's the upcoming high school students I should be worried about. For these students, everyday may contain an element of lingering fear and uncertainty — the same element that may grow more powerful at Maize as Feb. 1 draws nearer.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it will be just another day at school.
I miss the old Maize and the type of high school I knew only a few years ago. I wish Amanda could know what it was like. I told her this once, and she said I shouldn't be worried for her. In a little more than a year, she'll graduate and move on. She won't be there to witness instances such as the chalkboard threat becoming more frequent, more commonplace.
O'Toole is a Wichita junior in journalism and English.
Feedback Save the Jaybowl
I am writing in regard to the proposal to remove the lanes from the Jaybowl.
I am a member of the KU bowling team, and I have worked at the Jaybow behind the counter and as a bowling class teacher since transferring to KU two years ago, and I think it is a terrible idea to remove the lanes from the Jaybow.
The proposal to turn that area into a "Cyber Cafe" with a coffee shop, convince store, video games, billiards, and move the computer lab from the computing center to the first floor of the Union is a good one, but there is
more than enough space down there to include at least eight of the lanes and still have all of the other ideas incorporated.
Currently about 500 students per year take the HSES 108 bowling classes that are taught at the Jaybowl. Also, the chancellor is so strongly in favor of trying to offer non-alcoholic entertainment to students, and the Jaybowl provides just that. Many campus groups, date dashes, parties and individuals or groups of friends can walk to the Jaybowl from their apartments or residence halls and bowl a few games at half of what Royal Crest charges, and they can do it in an alcohol-free
environment.
The bowling team, one of the oldest in the country, has been part of campus for nearly 50 years, and it attracts students every year who would not have chosen KU if not for the quality bowling program that we have.
I strongly encourage all students, faculty, staff and alumni to voice your opinions that the lanes in the Jaybowl need to stay. I am not against the idea of the "Cyer Cafe," but I think it would be better if all or most of the lanes could be included in the plan.
Tom Partridge Lawrence senior
.