Page Two. - THE COLLEGE NEWS Friday, March 3, 1967 _ THE COLLEGE NEWS ; Mlsciaties $ $3.75 ~ Mailing price $5.00 - Subscriptions may begin at any time Entered as eecont class matter at the Bryn Mawr, Pa. Post Office, under the Act of March 3, 1879, Application for re-entry at the Bryn Mawr, Pa. Post Office filed October ist, 1963, Second Class Postage paid at Bryn ‘Mawr, Pa. FOUNDED IN 1914 ing, Christmas and Easter holidays, and during examination pte in the interest of Bryn Mawr College at the R.K. Printing ° Company, Inc., Bryn Mawr, Pa., and Bryn Mawr College. The College News is fully protected oy copyright. Nothing that appegrs in it may be reprinted wholly or in part without permission of the- Editor-in-Chief, a EDITORIAL ‘BOARD I ky hoe ces ee tev ee tas '. , Christopher Bakke '68 » Managing Editor....... Rea aeieleta bree WEE Cb ele ete Kathy Murphey '69 Copy Editor........ Neeia CRIA 6 9.5 Sew Ooo aoa ees VE Cookie Poplin '69 6) a ah 8 6 oy hee 0s ON A Nancy Miller '69 eo 5 5 oh 5 Fk 46 oe 0 0 eho 0008 'e bb om Janet Oppenheim ’70 ‘Contributing Editors...... ¢ sees Nanette Holben 68, Marcia Ringel '68 I NE, ook so oe 6 cl vss 8 OVA Vw we Se Ellen Saftlas 70 Senweription Menager .... 0.0 sce cece tr eenee -, .Mary Ann Spreigel ’68 PMA iy MONG Oe oa aang enn tn an et OAT Ne i Valerie Hawkins '69 en aay CaS eas rarace ar Petee was «+». «Marian Scheuer '70 Offices in the Inn ‘Phone: LA 5-9458 ta ood Lecture Board "This year we -have-an-absence. of candidates-for Interfaith and a dearth for Alliance. Perhaps the reason for this lack of enthusiasm in the elections is not so much campus apathy as the nature of the two organizations involved, It is unfair to call Alliance and Interfaith ‘‘nothing’’ organizations. But it is true that they are largely meant to be alliances of smaller interest groups, without any definite character or affiliation of their own, - But these smaller groups seem a lot more willing and better able to carry on religious and political action on campus than the general organizations which loosely tie them together. There was a series of complaints at the beginning of this year about the lack of Jewish-oriented activities in Interfaith, Finally a few students jumped up and starteda Jewish discussion. group which now meets regularly... When Alliance tried last semester to take a poll of stu- ‘dent opinion on the war in Vietnam, it met with accusations that the distributed questionnaire was biased and not representative of conservative roves Most of the political action on campus is sponsored by groups like the Social Action Com- mittee, the International * Relations Club, and the new Committee of Responsibility. They can act without worrying about reconciling all shades of opinion at Bryn Mawr. One valuable function Alliance and Interfaith do perform consists in providing lectures. However, many of them are poorly ‘attended. Some of the Alliance lectures this fall were given to an audience of two or three, Smaller groups may have ~ wanted to invite speakers in whom they knew their members were interested. However, the budget of branch groups under Alliance and Interfaith is gen- erally limited. The Social Action Committee’s, for instance, is only $100 a semester, hardly enough to set up any program of outside speakers. ' We feel that Alliance and Interfaith should be replaced by a non-partisan board designated to coordinate lectures, The board would consider re- quests for speakers from various groups and individuals, It would delegate funds on the basis of available money, how many people were interested, and how many other requests had been made, It would also fix dates for lectures to keep any one week from becoming overloaded, . In this way the Social: Action Committee could ask for money to hold a teach-in on the CIA, while the Young Americans for Freedom could discuss the read of communism in Latin America. Eachcampus group would have equal claims on the lecture board, | If more people were curious about Zen Buddhism _. than about early Quakerism, the lectures would a ‘reflect this tendency. Alliance and Interfaith can’t manufacture enthusiasm. on campus, Furthermore both organizations are forced to constantly worry about taking a partisan stand on issues, and even about choosing issues, _ Students can’t expect Alliance and Interfaith to guess. ee oe menemated in a: then turn Bien esena hs al " Letters to the Editor i) ¥ * Published weekly during the College Year except during Thanks- | sie Interfaith Is Dead To the Editor: No one has accepted the nom- ination for the presidency of In- terfaith, Approximately ten stu-- 4-dents' were nominated and de- clined, not because they are not interested, but because they are involved in other activities, For this reason, the Interfaith Board decided last week that an Inter- faith committee under the auspices of- Undergrad should be tried at least for a year, The issue will be brought up-and settled at-the March 6th meeting of Undergrad, This year Interfaith has concen- . trated mainly on the lecture ser- ies and has tried to present topics of universal interest, Interfaith has not, however, started any dis- cussions of an ecumenical nature, either on campus or with other schools, A committee could be set up so that the work in both these areas would be divided, For example, there might be two people to set up and carry out the lecture series, two to maintain contacts with the local churches and co- ordinate denominational groups on campus, two to establish contacts with other schools, and two to handle publicity, A chairmanwould be responsible for coordinating the committee, calling meetings, go- ing to Undergrad meetings, etc.; she would be elected by the com- mittee, For such a committee to be effective, its members must be committed and willing to think of new ideas and carry them out, Hopefully a committee such as this will give Interfaith enough flexibility so that it can re-evalu- ate its whole structure and, there- by, better serve students’ inter- ests, Madeleine Sloane ’68 News Crisis To the Editor: In connection with this week’s editorial I would like to submit that I find it intensely humiliating to have to concede that a news or- gan attached to a school such as Bryn Mawr should have to strug- gle to maintain its very existence, Whether the funds for the sup- port of the College News should be extracted from Undergrad or from the administration itself is of little relevance in the long run. What is infinitely more significant is the fact that the responsibility for the financial difficulties of the NEWS rests with the students them- selves, with those very individuals who are most intimately benefited by its presence, The obvious lack of active par- ticipation in the construct of the college paper can perhaps be’for- given but not the lack of aware- ness which manifests itself among the student body by a shockingly low number of student subscrip- tions to the NEWS, If the COL- LEGE NEWS should disappear from the campus, its loss would signal an eloquent reproach to all those who chose to overlook its value in a moment of crisis. Marina Wallach, ’70 Key Fears To the Editor: In last week’s COLLEGE NEWS Debbie Jackson voiced concern over the attitude behind the present - demands for increased freedom. Judy Chapman recognized the need tor thought and discussion before equated the Self of Self-Govern- ment with the individual, This equation is wrong. Self-Govern- ment. is the manner in which “this college community has chosen to deal with the human problems which inevitably arise where people are in contact and possibly conflict with each other. The Self of Self-Government refers to the student body as a whole, a unit, not to any individual self. But this does not mean that the individual self has no place within our system of government. It means ‘that neither the individual nor the . .system can operate without mutual consideration. Suppose Self-Government is interpreted as meaning that the government of each individual is to ‘be left entirely to that in- dividual. What will the con- sequences be? What changes will occur in the communal aspects of life here? What will Executive Board’s job.be? Executive Board. . will formulate policy in individual |Bella Lisook - cases. On what grounds? According to what guidelines? How will Ex- ecutive Board ever be able to take any action other than re- minding an offender of her responsibilities? Admonitions alone are impotent--barely heard and soon forgotten. Will we open ourselves. to internal conflict due to the relativity of honor? What will the Hall President’s job be? Will. she be unnecessary because we shall have achieved a utopia in which there are no rules to break? Will she assume the re- sponsibility of holding frequent meetings at which the spirit of the system will be made clear? Would any one come to these meetings? If you think many people would be willing to devote them- selves to the self-examination necessary to make. this idea work, please remember the shortness of memory and lack of response evident in the mén-in-the-rooms question. The government of every indi- vidual by herself alone tends, then, to encourage anarchy, Ulti- mate authority would not rest with the Executive Board (a lenient body, always willing to consider individual circumstances), not with the Hall President, but with the individual. The philosophy behind the suggestions of the Con- stitutional Revision Committee is a philosophy of isolationism. It makes a girl responsible to herself for her actions and to herself alone. Responsibility to others is not thought to be im- plicit in self-responsibility. If indeed the student body is calling for isolationism it should attack the definition of Bryn Mawr as a residential college, and stop merely pretending to support a system which holds respect. for the community and responsibility to that community in high regard, The plea is--don’t confuse the issues. Perhaps we would like.to suggest that the Board of Trustees reconsider the definition of Bryn Mawr College. If so, our sug- gestion--can be made and con- sidered. But for the present and the immediate future we dolive here as a community. And as a community we cannot afford to submerge ourselves in the chaos of freedom from law. What is true of the student com- munity is true of the individual; if she is to preserve an integrity a wholeness, in her life she cannot submerge herself in the freedom from law which is chaos. We subject our academic work to a rule of carefulness, thorough- and thoughtfulness, that ‘freedom WITHIN law. If ire whole people, the same — s and principles must be do not reveal any awareness of the FACT that, as of now, we do not live our lives in isolationfrom one another, nor do they reflect any thoughtful consideration of the im- ~ plications of living an in- dividual WHOLE life. As Hall Presidents we have had practical experience with the per- sonal problems ‘engendered - by our system of Self-Government. The doubts we express, the ob- servations we make, directly from that experience and are offered to you as their result. We hope you will remember that we. condemn. the proposals less than the spirit which permeates them. Unfortunately, experience tell us the proposals seek license-- not principle, but license. We call on you to consider the ramifications of the choice pre- sented for your vote--and to choose with care, : Sandy Gilluly - Batten House Peggy Heston - Pembroke East Pembroke West Paishy Meigs -. Wyndham Ann Platt - Rockefeller Unwarranted Fears To the Editor; | Recent letters and editorials in the NEWS about the proposed con- stitutional -revision, both those which support the changes and those which express reservations, all make the unwarranted assump- tion that the revisions will bring about fundamental changes in the attitudes and behavior of students. I doubt that they will. Most of the controversy has been about the elimination of the cur- few and the initiation of a ‘‘key system’’, The hall presidents who wrote the above letter represent the concern that without a curfew people will tend to spend more time out of the dorm and destroy what sense of community that there is there. I think that is highly unlikely, under the present system gives a girl*the option of being out of the dorm all the time if she wants to be, and yet overnights aren’t used extensively during the week. By eliminating the 2:00 curfew the proposed rule change elimi- nates an arbitrary limit, I can- not imagine that-suddenly large numbers of people will want to come in between 2:00 and 8:00. It is very possible that having no cur- few will make it easier for a girl to come in earlier than 2:00, since that will no longer be a limit to be pushed toward. : The hall presidents who wrote the above letter state that they are concerned not so much with specific rules changes, but with the spirit of ‘isolationism’? of the individual in which they were made. [ think they are wrong in assuming that in giving the in- dividual the freedom to make choices, such as when to come in at night or what to wear on a giv- en occasion, we are fostering anarchy. They object to the fact that under the revised constitution ‘cultimate authority will rest not with executive board ( a lenient body always willing to consider individual circumstances), not with the hall president, but with the in- dividual.” | firmly believe that that is exactly where it should rest, The role of executive board should not be to stand over us all and be ‘lenient’, but rather to administer a system which pro- vides a framework in. which its members can make responsible decisions, We agree that we all should participate more in our self-go- participation is fostered if the in- ‘dividual must make decisions as . _ to what her responsibilities toher~_ aera Oe eer come . The overnight signout _Vernmient “system. Responsible te +