Texas A&M Election Shows Trend
(The following editorial appeared in the Texas A&M Battalion last week and under the circumstances of the recent campus turmoil here, it is being carried as what may be the true picture on every campus. Ed.)
Yesterday's general election once again showed that A&M students don't really care who runs their student government.
About 1,300 students voted for student senators . . . student life committee representatives, and Battalion co-editors.
A&M has about 5,400 students. Subtracting graduating seniors, who were not eligible, there were 4,600 students who could vote. Around 28 per cent of the students eligible to vote decided yesterday who will run student government.
In the national election that made Eisenhower president, 51 per cent of America's eligible voters went to the polls.
Why don't A&M students vote?
One reason for the lack of interest in elections is that there is nothing done to stimulate interest in them. The student senate and the Student Life committee deliberately try to minimize publicity for elections and candidates by requesting and recommending that there be no campaigning except "verbal contact."
They give as reasons that "all A&M students should know each other" and "it clutters up the campus."
In a community with more than 5,000 persons, it is virtually impossible for a person to "know everybody." It is difficult to know even the members of your class, especially for the larger and newer freshman and sophomore classes.
As for "cluttering" the campus, rules governing the placing of posters and the amount of money spent would keep signs in their places, and candidates could be responsible for removing signs soon after the election. These rules are already in College Regulations. And if cluttering the campus is a reason, why are election signs prohibited from dormitory bulletin boards?
These "elections in the dark" are a bad training ground for life after college, where elections are always publicized and sometimes rough-and-tumble.
A&M student government will remain a figurehead until students become interested in it, and the place to start raising interest is in the elections.
(In the campus election here Tuesday there were 1,423 ballots cast, with approximately 7,000 students eligible to do so. This amounts to 23.8 per cent of the students voting. And Texas A&M thinks it is bad off! Ed.)
'First' May Have Been Lost By Loyalty to University
Two of the University's top sports figures, one a coach and one an athlete, took a bitter disappointment yesterday—but took it smiling.
With the running of the "Miracle Mile" yesterday, England's Roger Bannister accomplished a feat that has long been the dream of many milers, and more particularly the dream of Wes Santee and his coach Bill Easton.
Coach Easton, in reaction to Bannister's record, said "I think it's wonderful. It certainly is great that a personality from our sister country was the first to better the four-minute mile as long as an American has been unable to do it."
Santee said "It was a great performance, but I'm not exceptionally disappointed because it will still be a great challenge for the first American to break it and put it down where it belongs."
Regardless of the opinions of many people over Santee's cockiness in the past, there is one thought that enters our heads—the question of whether or not Santee might not have jeopardized his chances of being the first to run the four-minute mile because of a sense of loyalty to the University.
Whereas the other top milers in the world at the present time concentrate on one race, Santee runs as he put it, "everything from soup to nuts" in the way of races.
Santee said yesterday "we consider the University interests above those of any individual member of the team." This feeling on the part of Santee and Coach Easton has been demonstrated many times in the past two years, when Santee again and again turned down chances to run against top competition in open mile races so he could run with the team.
Our hats are off to a great runner who, although he may very well break four minutes in his career, put other interests above his own desire to have the title "first" —Don Tice
...LETTERS...
To The Editor:
After reading Howard Lydick's letter espousing the cause of Sen. McCarthy and the riotous endorsement by student Earle of Lydick's statements, I am of the opinion that Earle is a past master at the highly refined art of ridicule.
I don't know when I have read a more hilarious testimonial which did such a thorough job of debunking. I doff my hat to Earle. I don't know what your policy is in respect to letters sent to the editor from persons other than students, but I hope you'll convey my thanks to Earle for a hearty chuckle.
As for Lydick's eloquent appraisal of McCarthy and company, I am left with the impression that this young man has lost sight of a very important consideration in our evaluation of the junior senator from Wisconsin.
He overlooks the fact that the basic belief of American democracy is faith in the common man. Advocates of our democracy believe that the ordinary citizen has intelligence and character enough to participate in democratic government and that respect and consideration for the rights of the individual are an inseparable link in the American way of life.
The protection of these rights is the sacred duty of every American and especially so of our elected representatives. What is the record of the senator on this score? Who chose the punishment for the senator, will categorically state that McCartney has adhered to the practice of defending these rights? Sherman J. Oyler Jr., Onega, Kansas
To the editor:
In your article on the Foreign Student Festival (published in your issue dated May 3) you included a list of countries which contributed displays to the exhibition part of the program.
If your enumeration was intended as exhaustive, we would appreciate it if you added Greece to the nineteen "groups of countries" mentioned by your reporter.
We would feel much obliged if you would kindly publish this letter at us.
Andreas Michelakis
Demetrius Moutsanides
Andreas Gerakis
Graduate students
from Greece
Daily Hansan
Page 2 University Daily Kansan Friday. May 7,1954
University of Kansas Student Newspaper
News Room KU 251 Ad Room KU 378
Member of the Faculty Association Iland Press.
Assn. Associated Collegiate Press Assn.
Represented by the National Advertising
Service, 420 Madison Avenue, N.Y., City,
Missouri, 619-436-4700, www.madison.edu.
$4.50 year (add $1 a semester if in Lawrence).
Published in Lawrence, Kan.
every afternoon during the University
of Kansas University holidays and examination periods.
Entered second class matter Sept. 17, 1910,
at Lawrence, Kan. Post Office under act
מ. גרנספורמט, 1407
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS by Dick Bibler
业
"When he hands back your paper—watch out for th' mistletoe!"
Publick Occurrences BOTH FORREIGN AND DOMESTICK
Friday, May 7, 1954
CAMPUS
The comparative simplicity of Wednesday's All Student Council election will move the ASC to continue to use this method of balloting in future elections. The group may even do away with the 1-2-3 preferential method of voting as some members wish.
SPORTS
The KU baseball team will not win the Big Seven title, but that isn't its fault. Already three conference games have been cancelled due to rain, a deficit that's pretty hard to make up when the league leaders get to play all 12 contests.
The New York Yankees have been "staggering along" the last few weeks, as a national baseball writer puts it, and there are those who consider this a sign the Yankees won't repeat as American League champions. But it's too early to count them out.
STATE
Look for Charles D. Stough, local lawyer, to be appointed U.S. district attorney for Kansas to replace George Templar who resigned the post last week to enter the Republican gubernatorial race.
NATIONAL
An uneasy man these days is Cpl. Claude Batchelor, Kermit, Texas. After Cpl. Edward Dickenson was sentenced to 10 years for collaborating with the Chinese Communists while a prisoner, Cpl. Batchelor can't expect a much better fate.
President Eisenhower has stated that the McCarthy-Army feud has cost the U.S. loss of international prestige, as well as national self-esteem. Maybe some good will come of it though, if a certain somebody talks himself out of the picture.
There's one congressional inquiry that probably will accomplish something, and that's the investigation of alleged "codling" of Army athletes. In the future professional athletes can expect more strenuous duty after they're inducted.
The new president of the Chamber of Commerce of the U.S., Clem D. Johnson, admits he is an Eisenhower Democrat. A few more people with such "middle-of-the-road" views might solve some of our problems in Washington.
Expect soon the naming of a new Department of Agriculture aide to Secretary Ezra Taft Benson. The assistant will head a program of disposing of billions of dollars worth of surplus farm products the government has on its hands.
Look for Ike's program for broader coverage and higher benefits in old age and survivors' insurance to pass Congress soon with little opposition. The bill went to the House Ways and Means committee this week.
While Senate passage of the administration's omnibus tax reform bill in some form seems assured, don't be surprised if a fight ensues over the Democratic proposal to increase personal income tax exemptions.