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Tuesday, August 30, 1977
University Daily Kansan
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Comment
Unsigned editors represent the opinion of the Kansas editorial staff. Signed columns represent only the views of the writers.
KU casts for cure
With little fanfare but a lot of hope, Ralph O. Morgan Jr. recently became the first director of the Office of Physician Placement and Recruiting at the University of Kansas Medical Center.
Morgan could become one of the most closely watched men at the Med Center—closely watched by KU administrators and members of the Kansas Legislature.
The need for a $2,000-4-year placement director is closely tied to legislators' efforts to force Med Center graduates to stay in Kansas. Those efforts concentrate on plans to force graduates to practice medicine in rural areas of the state, areas that several studies indicate are chronically short of doctors.
THE WAYS AND MEANS Committees of both houses of the legislature passed bills during the past session that would have required Med Center graduates to stay in Kansas unless they paid $14,000 a year tuition (in the house bill) or up to $80,000 in penalties for leaving (in the Senate bill). The Senate also only passed by the full session, but both bills then languished at the bottom of the House calendar until the session ended.
It seems that only some last minute reservations about slave labor implications of the bills caused their relegation to the bottom of the busy end-of-session House calendar. Support from rural areas of the
state in particular is strong for such plans, even though the author of the Senate service requirement bill, State Sen. Wint Winter, R-Ottawa, readily admitted, "What we're talking about would be a massive change in the concept of state-paid education."
SUPPORTERS of such bills obviously think the Med Center's obligation extends beyond educating doctors to seeing that those doctors stay in Kansas. As Winter once summed up his bill's philosophy, "If you don't our state, you don't get our education."
The hope is that Morgan's placement in Med Center graduates to stay in Kansas.
Legislators repeatedly said they would use their budgetary muscle to see that the Med Center supplies what legislators think are needed to medical service problems in Kansas.
After Chancellor Archie R. Dykes explained the placement office program at budget hearings last February, Winter said, "I think I will ask, I think I want to have an idea of what to do."
For the sake of the Med Center, the placement office had better be as effective as hoped. If supporters of service-after-graduation legislation are not shown statistics that prove more graduates are staying in Kansas, similar legislation will reappear until passed into law.
Research ranks high
Chancellor Archie Dykes struck a true note midway through yesterday's convocative speech, which he devoted to declining the decline of support for basic research.
Dykes observed that a high percentage of the research funds in this country is devoted to defense and space programs, meaning that a relatively small percentage is devoted to such topics as cancer research. Thus, any decline in cancer research requires research for human strikes especially hard at humanitarian research, which is already overshadowed.
Public and private support for research
has slowly and quietly inroved in the past few years. The scientific community has realized this, but it has had a hard time convincing the public and the press. They have been more impressed by Sen. William Proxmire's (D-Wis.) golden fleece awards, which, while justly blasting useless projects, have tainted the image of all research.
Basic research is the foundation of our country's military-industrial complex, but it is also the source of technological advancement in virtually all other areas of life. Federal bankrollers are ill-advised to sacrifice research funds today, because the penalty for doing so may be great in the future.
Pay clash requires conciliation
A nettlesome dispute that could affect the safety of Lawrence residents continues to sour relations between city government and associations and obscure its policemen and firemen.
The employee groups are demanding 10 per cent salary increases in 1978, more money than they are likely to get. City commissioners remain with the associations because, they say, 6 per cent raises are adequate for all city employees.
The city has been inflexible. The 1978 budget according to Mike Wilden, assistant city manager, alright, he has to stay resumable. As chief negotiator for the city, Wilden says he won't discuss 1978 salary issues with the uniformed workers. Memphis city firefighters Association last week announced a work slowdown in an
attempt to win public support for its position.
John Mueller
Editorial Writer
DAVID REAVIS, association chairman, said the group was "prepared to continue the slowdown indefinitely. We could have activities at any time, conceivably into a strike." So far the slowdown has been just that—performance of only minimum duties. Issuing traffic report for example, apparently is out.
City Manager Buferd Watson, responding to the slowdown, said that police officers who didn't carry out duty orders did not get suspended. Suspensions are "likely" tools if such action is necessary, he
said, and the city also may bring in outside law enforcement assistance. University of Kansas police, the Douglas County sheriff's department and the Kansas Highway Patrol would provide that assistance.
THE LABOR TENSION has been growing throughout August. Four weeks ago, commissioners met in executive session to discuss the issue. They said Wilden would give the employee groups a written statement explaining commissioners' feelings about negotiations. Mayor Marrie Anderson, commissioner, said she commissioned didn't want to directely with the employees.
Leaders of the association,
however, weren't satisfied.
Last week, they alleged that
'the responsibility for any disruption in services rests squarely on the shoulders of the
city commissioners." The police views and actions have been independent of whatever has been contemplated by Local 1596 of the International Association of Fire Fighters. But both groups have the same objective; getting more money.
They had that objective last summer. On July 12, police used "speedup" tactics to show sympathy for demands of fireman who wanted an immediate 2.5 per cent pay in compensation, slowdown, and both police and firemen who were off duty picketed City of Lawrence construction sites.
THE FIREMEN eventually dropped their insistence on the raise and accepted four extra days off this year as a compromise. But their action wasn't popular, especially when they were faced with two days for office zealously ticked people, for obscure traffic offenses and traditionally unenforced violations such as backing into parking stalls. Lawrence Municipal Court struck them out in several of the citation, calling them "frivolous."
Police Chief Richard Stanwix said most of the料test wires during the speedup were justified. But the five commissioners each reported getting telephone calls from fraudsters, the action. The opposition, they said, was overwhelming.
A strike obviously must be deplored. Calvin Coolidge was extreme when he said in 1919, "There is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, any time." But the thought of arson and chaos is sobering.
THE BIG HITCH in the Big Ditch: money.
THE CITY would be wise to consider a compromise. It is not unfair for the associations to point out that added risks on the
job require added compensation; the logic of lumping all city employees together for salary purposes seems dubious at best. It will not do for the system's 1978 budget already has been adopted; even talking about longevity pay for 1979, according to Wildeng, would be premature. Because longevity pay was an issue the city had to consider its role in discuss with the groups, a hard line may be permeating commissioners' thinking.
the workers also should consider a compromise. Their leadership occasionally has been juvenile; the police group, for example, should know who is stealing missioners are lars who have sunk to the "depths of deceit." able to side seeen able to communicate with complete rationality. But Commissioner Jack Rose was perceptive when he got into a big bouncing match. It's time for cool heads, not catchy phrases."
Until the year 2000, the United States will continue to operate the canal and the 14 military bases that dot the shores of the 51-mile-long waterway. The military bases will be plowed out of the treaty, but the United States remains free to step in with military force if the canal is threatened.
**NALLY**, the associations must carefully examine the questionable decision of hiring Arnold Berman as their attorney. Berman, a state senator, is supposed to be in charge of the entire district—not just the labor part of it. He has a right, of course, to represent any person or group, regardless of how controversial the cause may be. But when public employee legislation comes up in opeakers, he will be able to take an accurate pulse of the issue?
Lawrence landlords would love to have the U.S. government as a tenant. It has agreed to raise its annual rent to Panama from $2.3 million to $10 million and will kick in another
Speed is of essence if further deterioration of public services is to be avoided. Laws must be enforced, fires must be fought. Language must be learned and loaded language must never replace the safety of a city.
Leave rights issues in courts
CAMBRIAGE, Mass.—Legislative and judicial processes inevitably conflict. Legislators make the laws and judges interpret and occasionally overturn them.
ByGREGORY W. SMITH
BY GREGORY PUSHTH
N V Times Features
What the legislators hail as "in the public interest," courts sometimes reject as violating individual rights. The majority
Panama pact best possible deal for U.S.
Panama gradually will take control when more than half of the 648-square-mile Canal Zone is turned over to it as soon as the treaty is approved by both nations. Panamanians will do more of the operational duties. Americans working in the canals will be so long as their jobs last, but in three years they will be subject to Panamanian law except in certain cases.
After many Republican- decided to abandon ranks and vote for Jimmy Carter last fall, their friends promised to get in to "I told you so" notes earlier this week that he has the first big mistake. The notes have not been circulating, but that could change soon.
There was little second-guessing after Carter pardoned the draft resisters and renged on the $50 tax rebate. But it is reasonably certain there will be an angry avanche after details of the new Panama Canal treaty are released.
Granted, Carter could be faulted for his about-face after an election year in which he promised never to surrender "complete or practical control" of the canal. But if you believe that mission that Carter's support of the treaty is wrong, they will be waiting until the canal freezes over.
THE PROVISIONS of the treaty are as equitable as could be worked out, given the political and economic climates of the United States and Panama. The treaty specifies that the State shall execute full control of the canal to Panama in the year 2000.
Dave Johnson
Editorial Writer
$10 million a year from canal revenues if the economy allows.
The $10 million rent is considerably less than Brig. Gen. Omar Torrijos, the Panamanian dictator, originally requested for $1 billion down and $200 million annually until the United States gives up complete control of the canal.
On paper, the treaty does not appear to be a sound business proposition. The United States must take a cut in canal revenues and leaves itself open to being cut off from using the canal or letting it fall into unfriendly hands.
BUT LOOK at the deal from a different perspective. In a time of growing Third World independence, it is questionable
whether the United States can continue to retain control of the canal. Judging by the tension between Iran in Panama and the Tortijors dictatorship, the canal threatens to become another Vietnam—with America on one side and Iran on the other, implying nations on the other.
From a military standpoint, it would be difficult to defend the canal if an attempt should materialize. As George Brown, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has said, "You'd be fighting men you can't identify in the war." Choosing that not the way, in my judgment, to assure continued operation of the canal.
TO ENSURE continued operation of the canal, the United States has the catchall proviso that it may intervene at any time J.U.S. or canal security might be endangered. Thus, the canal could remain under a U.S. security blanket without the
From the standpoint of U.S. defense, the canal is strategically somewhat obsolete. Since the canal opened in 1814, the canals are used by a large ocean force. Many of its warships are too big to pass through the waterway. Today, only about 4 per cent of U.S. coast-to-coast trade passes through the canal, compared with 9 per cent of trade across the economic utility has been reduced significantly.
Perhaps the most compelling argument for turning over the canal is that it is morally correct to do it. Forget Reagan's campaign remarks, "We bought it, we paid for it, we built it. And we are going to keep it."
unsetting presence of U.S. military bases.
FIRST, WE don't own the canal. We merely have full operating rights over it. It's similar to our military bases sprinkled throughout the world. Also, our hold on the canal is
tantamount to China's demanding partial ownership of a U.S. transcontinental railroad or Germany's staking a claim on the U.S. space program for its work on it.
The question of who has the right to control it brings us to a final argument. The canal is like the Berlin Wall to the Panamanians: It divides the nation in half—if politically, it remains anthem to Panama, a vestige of mercantilism and America's "Big Stick" policy of colonialism.
As Sol Linowitz, U.S. negotiator to Panama, has said: "In the world as a whole, Panama is regarded as a colonial enclave. The treaty sets off a whole new relationship between the U.S. and Latin America. We can prove how a great country can be continuously with a small nation at a time when Third World and North-South relations are at stake."
College is a chaotic apartment
Coming back to the University of Kansas means another shot at the foul side of washing dishes, cleaning, cooking and laundry.
MY MOTHER would be aghast to see my room in its sloppy print. Clothes on the floor, papers strenth about, pencils in the rug-a rat's playground. A mouse on counter, cookie crumbs on my pillow, a squashed grape on the table—a cockraak's delight.
To most students, leaving home for college at the end of the summer is the gateway to getting away. It's the door back to the piggy.
As a result, time and studies become good justification for letting things pile up to the point that "schoolboy scrap pile" best describes what should be a bedroom.
Lint balls that would choke a
I realize they're essentials.
I realize they're not that much trouble. But they are blue collar, mind, and I detest those chores.
cat no doubt are growing under the mounds of moss. Poor mother would never understand how to handle her use to find my belongings. Pro Keds—third layer, left near the box of Cheer. Baggy socks with orange stripes—bottom layer, next to the empty Cobra can.
Despite the scruffiness of the apartment, none of the three roommates can motivate them to learn. A study for a philosophy test (for the 15th time). One has frequent gains from a childhood case of the buobonic plague. I was a student in the school, garbage, brags, rags and air.
WHEN THERE is but one safe path through the house, action is taken. We draw straws from a pitcher and spoon scruples when cleaning the
Rick
Tbaemert
Editorial Writer
Washing clothes isn't much better. Spending hours in a stuffy Laundromat with women discussing Eddie's dirty undies isn't a lavish experience. Nor is it a damping off session of sweeps肿成 pink and seeing new T-shirts shrink to nothing. Clothing that endanger circulation to the upper part of my body may be fine for Jethro to wear. Or "The Rewerty Hillhillies, but I can do without them."
My Laudromat blues are compounded because I haven't the patience to endure an entire drying cycle. Dragging damp clamps from the dryer leaves me with a neatly wrinkled wardrobe. My friends compare me to a bed ummde for weeks.
toilet is at stake. Cheating runs rampant among three pantywaists.
THE LAST OF THE domestic arts is washing dishes. There's something about touching the stitches in that chills me to the bone.
Another deterrent is that no
The turmil is why coming back to KU isn't all peach. There are advantages to college: freedom, responsibilities, education. But there indeed is no place like home.
one relishes the possibility of being smitten by flying forks and spoons if the disposal should be turned on.
And I commit sacrilege against home by lugging 50-pound bags of laundry to dump on my mom, who never complains or reveals me for the cad I am.
Nor do I really thank my parents for great meals, a far cry from the canned spaghetti sautéed in water and the turkey pot pie souffles I so exquisitely prepare.
Perhaps this year, when I begin wallowing in the untidy doldrums, I'll remember home and school and assignment. If I get my little Kelvinator in gear, i might even alter my home away from home from a house to a dorm room or a decor of a newly organized college student.
inevitably seeks its vindication in Congress, the minorities in court.
What has kept these two branches of government working more or less cooperatively has often been a formal division of power (checks and balances) and an informal recognition by each branch of the other's traditional functions. Courts leave discernment over Congress. Congress leaves the detection and protection of rights to the courts.
RECENTLY, HOWEVER,
that informal working
arrangement has begun to
break down. Congress, perhaps
in search of new constituencies,
has made efforts in protecting individual rights.
This is not, of itself, bad. But
because congressmen, unlike
judges, must answer politically
for their commitments, the
state should take this traditionally judicial function can be disastrous.
The most recent example of this usurpation is Congress' well-intentioned effort on behalf of "gray rights"—that is, the people not to be discriminated against because of their age.
A House bill, Amendments to the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, would further advance gray rights by eliminating the mandatory retirement policies of the disabled, and protecting employers. If the bill passes, as seems likely, a person may retire at 65 but cannot legally be required to do so.
SUPPORTERS of the legislation praise it as a major advancement of individual civil liberties. What they have failed well-intentioned legistie's mandate in one area of discrimination may prevent full and rapid implementation of a carefully formulated judicial system in another area of discrimination.
While the legislators have been triumphing in their defense of this politically attractive "minority," the courts have been left with the arduous and politically volatile job of systematically removing women and sexual discrimination and insuring equal employment opportunities for minorities and women. To make opportunity more than a promise, the courts have consistently ordered the hiring of specific groups as positions become available, sometimes in court-decreed ratios.
THE CONFLICT is clear. If the House bill becomes law, the inevitable consequence will be a
freezing up of the job market and especially of opportunities for advancement. The government estimates that almost three million people past the mandatory retirement age are in the labor force and that the numbers will get bigger.
OBVIOUSLY, having fewer people to replace will mean fewer people hired. Because of the rapid growth of government, operate under relatively rigid economic and practical constraints that limit the total number of people they will be forced to make choices.
This logjam at career's end inevitably will slow the assimilation of minorities and women into positions from which they can effectively excluded in the past. The fact is, many employers under orders to meet affirmative action guidelines have carefully calculated and relied upon a predictable rate of employment (with white male) employees to make room for minorities and women.
The potential dilemma for the employer is serious. If Congress directs that such choices be made in favor of older people, the courts are likely to retrain, while the courts direct that efforts toward the inclusion of
nunities and women continue unabated, what is the employer to do? Nor is the dilemma distant in light of recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions apparently that the violence over the right of affirmative action employment.
TO RESCURE employers and ultimately the public from this uncomfortable position, perhaps legislators should refrain from championing any rights.
They have been quick to declare their abhorrence of discrimination in principle, but for political reasons, they consistently have refused to deal with the difficult and sensitive question that principle. What has Congress said specifically about busing, affirmative action or exclusionary zoning?
In the end, general legislative pronouncements of equality must yield to the specific needs of oppressed groups as identified by the courts, or the whole delicate business of shaping a more tolerant society will become a hopeless muddle.
Gregory W. Smith is affiliated with the Harvard University Law School and Graduate School of Education.
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