Friday, September 26, 2003
Good news... or is it?
A letter from Prezident Kris, and a few other folks who probably did all the reasearch suggests that recent Supreme Court cases may show that CalSERVE's actions regarding Prop 54 are legal. They say that student rights to use mandatory student fees are protected. The two issues are:
a) No on Prop 54 is a student group, just like any other student group, and student groups can do political thingies.
b) Southworth v. University of Wisconsin, a Supreme Court case, gives student groups the authority to spend money on these things.
BUT! In a sight stranger than the bicyclist I saw today carrying his crutches, I found that The Daily Planet has this issue covered rather well.
As far as a) goes, the No on 54 comapaign has far too close ties to the ASUC and GA to be considered seperate, according to the UC Office of the President. "If UC officials determine the campaign was actually an extension of the student government, it would be illegal..." UCOP may, of course determine that it wasn't an extension of the student government, not out of any truth, but just to bury the issue (which is probably best for UCOP).
On the supreme court case, here is the opinion. "The First Amendment permits a public university to charge its students an activity fee used to fund a program to facilitate extracurricular student speech, provided that the program is viewpoint neutral." Is it viewpoint neutral? Since no one (that I know of) went asking for "Yes on Prop 54" funds, the case can't really be made that the funding was not viewpoint neutral. (Do a google search to learn more on the case)
But the key word in the decision is "permits." There is no requirement. While there is talk of modifying the UC Policy on Student Governments, no changes had been made by the time of the Prop 54 funding, so it's not really relevant. (even if you look at one of the new policies, it doesn't allow funding of such things, only taking positions on them) This means that while the university has the capacity to make such spending legal, it is under no obligation to do so. This means that the UC Policy on Student Governments is in no way overruled or obsolete.
The UCOP knows these things, but students in general do not. All they've heard is what's written in Prez Kris's letter. Spread the word, Daily Cal!
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