Gabay's Referendum Decision Violates the U.C.'s Constitution

Anjalee C. Davis '96, the sponsor of the petition recently submitted to the Undergraduate Council, has asked me to advise her on various procedural issues concerning the petition. As the former Director of the Civil Liberties Union of Harvard and in other capacities, I have extensive experience in dealing with college administrators and administrative procedures; I do not at this time endorse or oppose any of the five questions that the petition would put to a campus-wide referendum.

However, based upon an article in The Crimson, "Executives Vote to Strike 4 Issues From U.C. Ballot" (April 12, 1994), it is my opinion and concern that if the Undergraduate Council upholds the recommendation of its executive boards to strike four of the five questions, the council will be in violation of its own procedures and have exceeded its authority under its own constitution.

Under the terms of the council constitution, "[a]ny question may be committed to a referendum or poll by the council or by a petition signed by one-tenth of the undergraduates." More than 1,100 signatures were submitted to the council, indicating that "[w]e, the undersigned Harvard-Radcliffe undergraduates, commit the attached questions to a referendum." The council does have a legitimate interest in assuring that the signatures submitted on such a petition are valid.

But council President Carey W. Gabay '94 has argued that the petition was conducted in a "procedurally incorrect" manner because students did not have the opportunity to endorse each question individually. While it may be true that some students therefore felt unable to sign the petition, this failing does not invalidate the 1,100 signatures that did endorse all five questions. The provisions of the council constitution have been fulfilled; Gabay's argument only suggest that more students would have signed the petition if it had been organized differently.

Further, Gabay argues in the Crimson article (April 14,1994) that many students signed the petition only to endorse a referendum on the first question, on reversing the council's recent decision to raise term-bill fees by $10. But if the executive board of the council seriously held that opinion, it should have recommended that the council invalidate the entire petition, or that it contact all of the students who signed the petition to confirm the validity of their signatures.

Instead, it chose a course of action which the council does not have the constitutional power to pursue. Based solely on anecdotal evidence, it chose to second-guess the intentions of the more than 1,100 students who signed the petition and pick and choose which items to put to a vote. Gabay has asserted that the petition was procedurally incorrect because it did not give students a choice. But neither does the council constitution give it the power of choice over which of the questions can be put to a referendum.

If the council does not on Sunday overturn this recommendation and either initiate proceedings to check all of the signatures on the petition or preparations for a campus-wide referendum on all five questions, the council will be operating in violation of the terms of its constitution.

If so, it is my opinion that its decision must be reviewed by the Committee on College Life. Under the council constitution its president is the final arbiter of the constitution. But page 221 of the Handbook for Students indicates that "[t]he Committee on College Life has the responsibility to grant official recognition to undergraduate organizations and to establish regulations for their governance...The College assumes that organizations will comply with the understandings reached at the time of Committee on College Life, a student organization fails to abide by these basic responsibilities, its charter may be revoked."

I certainly do not argue that the Committee on College Life should abolish the council. However, it is imperative that the Committee acts to ensure that in considering this petition the council complies with its own constitution, with its "basic responsibilities." If the council it allowed to thwart the will of its constituents by violating procedures set by its own constitution, its legitimacy as an organization, much less a student government, is threatened, and a dangerous message in sent to every other undergraduate organization. Jol Silversmith