Smoker Joker

The Applegate affair, which nearly resulted in the election of a figment of the imagination to the Freshman Smoker Committee, has implications beyond its obviously humorous aspects. It constitutes a vivid illustration of the election irregularities that can pass unnoticed when the Council employs election procedures that ignore the most elementary precautions necessary to insure a reasonably fair election.

The men who instituted the "hoax" deserve the thanks of the college for emphasizing the lax manner in which Council supervised elections are conducted. the men who actually supervised the election were "victims of the system." Final responsibility for permitting conditions under which such a thing could happen must be placed on the attitude of the Council as a whole, which has failed to follow the simplest and most obvious recommendations of its own Committee on class Affairs.

That committee stated in its report, "The sloppy and disorganized way the Student Council has been conducting elections during the last two years is an outrage to any sense of craftsmanship and responsibility and results in pure evil for everyone concerned." The report further recommended that, "The Student Council member in charge of Class Affairs shall be responsible for seeing that all candidates nominated are members of the class and in good academic standing." If this elementary precaution had been taken the Applegate episode could never have occurred.

If the Council does not see fit to invalidate the whole Smoker Committee election, it should at least alter the election methods which permitted such a staggering irregularity. A well thought out and practical election procedure is already in the hands of the Council in the form of the report of its own committee. How long before that report is adopted and put into practice?