UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN editorials Unsigned editors represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of only the writers. SenEx approval vital That strange creaking sound emanating from Strong Hall last week may have been the first sounds of progress toward a computerized pre-enrollment system at KU. But don't celebrate yet. A committee formed to study the possibilities of pre-enrollment submitted its report last week to Del Shankel, executive vice chancellor. The committee outlined two possible methods of pre-enrollment and endorsed the second of the methods, which would allow students to pre-enroll in November and December for the following spring semester. THAT PRE-ENROLLMENT would be augmented by a regular enrollment period in January in which students would pay fees and be allowed to complete any unfinished schedules. Despite endorsing the pre-enrollment proposal, some committee members expressed reservations. In a note attached to the committee's report, Dick Mann, chairman of the committee, said, "The committee was divided on the question of whether or not the university requires a pre-enrollment system." Of course, anyone who has weathered the monstrous lines and endured the numerous frustrations of the current enrollment procedure might find that statement a little difficult to swallow. The pre-enrollment committee itself was formed in response to petitions circulated among students last fall that noted a "grave concern" about the current enrollment process, and supported computerized pre-enrollment. Thus, the new proposal for pre-enrollment presents the University with the perfect opportunity to finally put the entire operation in motion. The proposal will be presented to the University Senate executive committee for its recommendation. THE ADVANTAGES of a pre-enrolment system at KU should be obvious even to the most casual observer. Yet, studies of the possibility have been continuing at KU since 1974. The University ever went so far as saying in May 1976 that pre-enrollment would be used by spring 1978. But, of course, the project is still buried deep in study. Students already have expressed their desire for a pre-enrollment system. At a university that prides itself on its modern image, the archaic methods now used for enrollment are unneeded. SenEx would be doing both the University and its students a major favor by recommending the new proposal to the administration. Perhaps that will be enough to spur the administration into action. Let's hope so. President Jimmy Carter is expected this week to deliver his proposed 1980 fiscal budget to Congress and the nation. But if early disclosures are correct, his budget proposal may very well turn out to be another invitation for blacks, poor and minority groups to become leaders of Democratic support, to begin looking elsewhere for help in 1980. Carter budget breaks social promises Hoping that austere politics in 1979 will make for astute politics in 1980, Carter is expected to propose a budget hovering around a record $323 billion, with a deficit below $30 billion. This is almost $40 billion more than this year's spending ceiling, but the president said what he needs to maintain all programs at current levels when inflation is figured in. His budget is expected to include $179 billion for welfare and income security programs, an increase of $20 billion, and $122.8 billion for defense, an increase of nearly $11 billion. But with his emphasis on "austerity," and with cuts into some American jobs, America has been worked Americans are proposed, it is beginning to look as if Carter has set aside his old book of promises for a new one, and this is troubling to many Democratic liberals. TWO YEARS ago, Jimmy Carter became president largely on his promise of jobs for minorities. The unemployment rate for black Americans was 12.5 percent, or 186 percent of the white rate of 6.7. Today the black unemployment rate is at a deplorable 40 percent. That means that the white rate of 5.2. Despite the high unemployment rates, Carter wants to reduce public service jobs from 625,000 to about 425,000, a cut which administration officials say would save $400 million. These are jobs in which blacks have found a much more affordable employment environment than could be found in private industry. Cuts in other domestic social programs such as job training, health programs and community services. Thus, on his pledge to increase defense outlays to our European allies, Carter agreed to cut the defense deficit below $30 billion, Carter delivers. But on his pledge to the people who were largely LOS ANGELES—In the aftermath of the Jonestown tragedy in Guyana, many critics have demanded U.S. government intervention with such groups as the Unification Church, Synchron and Hare Krishna, claiming that they preach distrust of society, demand absolute obedience of their members, and use psychologically manipulative tactics in recruiting and influencing them. N. Y. Times Feature Tactics of religious cults justify U.S. intervention Government spokesmen have replied that without evidence of specific criminal activity the state cannot act, for several reasons. The First Amendment forbids all interference with religious liberty; persons who undergo cultist inductionation do so willingly and freely; regulating thought reform by cult groups would also permit Jesuit seminaries, military academies and used-car salesmen. THESE ASSERTIONS invite analysis, if only because of the unsettling case to be drawn from them: If extremist groups may retire to a remote location, suspend their psychological integrity, and indoctrinate them in a world view in which the坠葬 and the establishment of a theocracy—justify the means-deceptive recruitment, fraudulent fundraising and the use of illegal weapons. A substantial body of evidence that has appeared in hearings, reports and court cases involving religious cultists, and considerable clinical material suggests that the indoctrination activities of these groups are not de minimis. By RICHARD DELGADO They include physical injury resulting from inadequate diet and sleep, self-mortification, and in some cases drug usage, and psychiatric harm such as thought disorders, guilt, depression and suicidal behavior. THE DEFERENCE尔然 afforded religiously motivated conduct is reduced with these groups by their lack of "sincerity," a requirement deriving from conscientious-objective cases, and the absence of any moralistic institute as essential, rather than merely optional point of practice. Measured by the standard of the Amish parents, members of a religious community with a long tradition of rejecting modernization who refused to send their children to high school for fear that they would learn world ways, or the California Indians who practiced rival pyelotism as a central tenet of their mythical religion, would practice norms practices do not present a very limiting case for protection. The balance would thus appear to tip toward intervention. It BECAUSE OUR political and legaldiscourse discourage intervention based solely on the desire to protect individuals from themselves, a finding that the harms were voluntarily incurred would greatly weaken the case for intervention. could be argued, however, that some of the harms by which intervention is justified are incurred freely by consenting adults to engage in risky behavior. the process by which cults attract and indoctrinate new members is arranged so that when the capacity for voluntary choice is high, the capacity for voluntary choice is reduced. At the outset, the target person's decision-making ability is unimpaired. It also predictable that if he were informed that the group whose meeting he is asked to attend is a well-known cult, he would react Later, he is given information about the identity of the group and the conditions of membership, but he is permitted to learn this information only as the cult perceived that he has become so weakened by fatigue, sensory bombardment, peer pressure and induced guilt and anxiety that he has lost the ability to assess it in his ordinary frames of reference. THE CONVERT THUS never has full capacity and knowledge simultaneously; one or the other is limited in a manner A final, practical objection is the purported difficulty of distinguishing—"of drawing the line"—between the thought-reform practices of culls and the "brainwashing" of Jesuits, military schools, salesmen and others who use some degree of persuasion, influence or moral exhortation in their dealings with others. But while other institutions may use some of the techniques of classic thought reform, few apply them in such a variety or with such intensity as do cults. Jesuits may isolate the seminarian to nomenclature reflection and a deepening of his spiritual resources. BUT THE ISOLATION is temporary, and the order does not seek to accelerate the process by physiological depletion or sensory overstimulation. Nor do mainstream denominations conceal the duties and obligations of the priesthood. Thus few, if any, other social institutions use conditioning techniques as peratively, intensely or deceptively as do others. Decisions to intervene in connection with these latter groups do not, therefore, require by their logic alone intervention in other cases. responsible for his being elected, Carter throws a curve. Richard Delgado is visiting professor of law at the University of California at Los Angeles. "These people would leave Carter tomorrow if Kennedy gave the word." Now, with the Carter administration bent on cutting inflation by holding down federal spending, it becomes more unlikely that any major attempts to aid the poor will be launched. Funding for the Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act, which was passed last month of thick leaders and finally approved by the president, probably will be delayed. Kennedy already has said that he will not seek election in 1980, which should make Carter rest a little easier at night. But his speech in Atlanta was clearly a message to the Southerner in the White House who somehow thinks he owns the black vote. LAST WEEK, in the pulpit of Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church, Carter received much applause when he told his audience that he had been brought to the ideals of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. IT'S VERY easy to eliminate programs for low-income people because they're defenseless, voiceless and normally don't vote. They're an easy target. But the applause he received did not compare with that given by the same audience to Sen. Edward Kennedy only 48 hours earlier. Kennedy moved his audience in much the same way King did before leading his followers to protest. And without naming names, he was clearly critical of the present administration's laggard attitude in social and domestic reform. After Kennedy's speech, one black Georgian said, with tears in his eyes. In all, the nation's books have been in balance only eight times since World War II. It is very doubtful that Carter will accomplish this feat. However, if Carter has any plans to seek re-election in 1980 then it would certainly be his advantage to begin taking serious note of Kennedy's position, because that voiceless minority is slowly becoming a political force with which to be reckoned. The senator from Massachusetts realizes that the most important budgets to be balanced are in the households of the people. The senator from Massachusetts 1800, would be well advised to do the same. CARTER MAINTAIN that a "lean and tight" spending program is needed in order to hold down prices and halt the dollar's decline. Close advisers to the president say that such a policy is good politics, particularly in light of the conservative tide that allegedly swept the country last summer under the title of Proposition 62, which imposes less, say Carter's advisers, so the president is in tune with the public sentiment. The public may be willing to settle for less, as administration officials maintain, but for that segment of the populus that has an economic advantage Carter's auction率 will not sit well at all. Voter needs sharp eye Newly elected GOP members in the House want to expel Diggs from Congress if he refuses to comply with a proposed sanction barring him from casting votes on the House floor. Diggs, the ranking black in Congress, has appealed his conviction. Of vital importance and concern in the corruption of these politicians, is their subsequent elections and re-elections to political office. Some people might consider the words politician, corruption and money to be synonymous. Unfortunately, there are at least two methods glaring examples where such is the case. *first, the is folly of Tennessee's former governor, Ray Blanton. Last Monday, six days before his term as governor, he sent a letter to Mr. Trump and 49 commutations to convicts, of whom 23 were serving long-term sentences for murder. Thirty of the convicts became eligible for immediate release—13 have been sent to jail and the other 24 had their sentences cut.* Blanton's administration, throughout his term as governor, was accused of operating under the table. Did Tennesseans get what they voted for? Of course they did. A THIRD politician corrupted by money is Rep. Charles Diggs, D-Mich., who has been convicted of taking kickbacks from his congressional employees. Diggs was using the money of congressional aides in order to buy expensive expenses, and was also engaged in mail fraud. Blanton's alarming action has left newly-elected governor Lamar Alexander in a There also is the case of Rep. Daniel J. Flood, D-Pa. W flood was sworn into the 96th Congress during a recess of his perjury-bribery trial. Both Flood and Diggs were re-elected. Flood, from the affluent Wilkes-Barre and Hazelton, Pa., district, was elected to his 19th term. Diggs himself is no obscure Blanton's action was not out of mercy. A federal grand jury is investigating his administration for an apparent clementry-for-sale racket. Stephen Elko, a former administrative assistant to Flood, currently serving a three-year prison term for accepting bribes to influence Flood's decisions, has testified that Flood had received bribes from 1971 to 1975. ONE MONTH ago, two members of Blanton's legal staff, who both have resigned, and a highway patrolman, a Blanton family friend who is now suspended, were arrested and charged with offenses related to sentences, and tardions for a price. "I didn't want to miss that." Flood, known as "Dapper Dan" for his silk suits and fur coat, said of the scene. A root is charged with nine counts of bribery, three counts of perjury and one conspiracy count—all in connection with trading of his political clout as chairman of a House appropriations subcommittee for $25,000 cars and favors. THE AMERICAN voter, if he is going to In the November elections, five members of Congress charged with wrongdoing wore masks. point a finger at the corrupt politician, must elect a candidate to elect compulsory and ethical politicians. Voting is one of our most basic rights —yet it seems as if we have not learned to fully investigate the candidates, a basic prerequisite before casting a vote. Richmond, D-N.Y., who acknowledged soliciting two boys for sex. The public cannot afford to sit back and allow politicians to pass on a polished image. More probing of political candidates, their platforms and history is needed. Perhaps even worse is the apparent inability of voters to demand personal ethics as a major criteria for being elected to public office. If the politician has the power, enough people will fork over the dollars to see that their personal interests are met. Last year alone, political action committees, not to mention private and corporate contributors, donated $40 million legally and illegally to politicians. The voter must decide whether he wants ethics in politics or politicians who can control it. THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN (USPS 600-640) Published at the University of Kansas daily August through May and June. Second-class postage paid at Lawrence, Kansas 60455. 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