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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 5, 1973)
Reaction slight to ERA Senate okay By NAN HENDERSON Of the Emerald SALEM (Special) — The Senate support of the Equal Rights Amendment Thursday evoked little visible strong reaction from any group or person around the Capitol. Peter Blythe, chairer of the committee for the Preservation of Womanhood, told the Emerald after the vote that he was “surprised” that more senators did not vote against ratification. Gretchen Kafoury, paid lob byist for the Women’s Equal Rights Alliance, however, said the vote was “just about what we had figured, except that a couple of senators that were in question voted in favor of it.” Blythe said be knew that “at least 12 senators did not support the amendment” but speculated six voted for it anyway “because they knew it was going to pass and they didn’t want to contend with the harassment they knew they’d get from women’s lib if they voted no.” Blythe said his group now plans to mail letters to each one of the senators “again outlining the real issues involved” with the hope that the senate will reconsider the issue later in the session. Both Blythe and Kafoury felt certain the amendment would have little difficulty passing the House because, as Blythe put it, “The House is much more liberal than the Senate.” Several women from the Committee for the Preservation of Womanhood testified against ratification in legislative com mittee hearings on the issue. They expressed concern mainly about “taking a shotgun approach” to ending discrimination by ratifying an amendment and said Oregon should, instead, establish laws to end discrimination on the state level — the same argument Sen. Tom Hartung (R-Portland) used in speaking against ratification on the senate floor. “I was just dying to scream from the balcony when he said that,” Kafoury said in an in terview. “Just because the laws in Oregon aren’t that bad doesn’t mean we should worry about the status of women in all states.” She said the members of the Equal Rights Alliance, an organization comprised of six Portland feminist groups, are lobbying legislators to support "about 10 bills that have been drawn up to date” that will eliminate legal discrimination in Oregon. Kafoury said the amendment probably won’t be ratified by the 38 necessary states “until late summer. It won’t go into effect until two years after that, and we want to get Oregon’s laws changed by this summer,” she said. Legislation being sponsored oy the alliance includes bills that would make each spouse equally liable for family debts after a divorce, repeal the existing abortion laws, add “sex” to existing anti-discrimination laws governing housing and public accommodation and assure every person the right to retain or change his or her surname upon marriage. Kafoury said the alliance was formed in December “to make sure this legislation was drafted and passed.” She said the group did not anticipate intense opposition to the ERA but “we were glad we were organized when the op position appeared.” Blacks need more interest in science field, says speaker By DAVE HANSON Of the Emerald Only about ten per cent of the Black students mi campus this year are registered in science and math. Paul Simms wants to change that. Simms, who spoke on Black mental health Thursday evening in the EMU, is the founder of the National Black Science Students Association (NBSSA) an organization which promotes and reports involvement of Black students in the sciences on 25 campuses. He is hoping to generate enough interest for a chapter of the organization at the Univer sity. “We came up from San Diego to let people know there’s a new force in this country,” Simms said in a speech which dealt with Black helplessness and vic timization in a society which has technological control over them. “When a group of people does not have control over their health and technology they become subject to outside forces.” Simms said. He cited national statistics which show 300,000 White physicians to 7,000 Black ones. “A Black person who goes to a White physician receives con scious or unconscious mistreatment or distrust,” he said. Other areas of control over the mental and physical health of Blacks which Simms noted were medical experimentation in prisons and hospitals, biased intelligence testing, and population control. Especially ominous to Blades is the threat of population control. Simms cited a recent private report from Chicago on national population control, which called for “screening for intelligence and health in determining who will reproduce.” He believed a “target grouD” mentioned in the report to indude Blacks. -He didn’t elaborate on the source of the report. “We are victims of an organized system—a force known collectively as Western Man,” he said. According to Simms, this force is one which opposes nature— Western Man has a “non necessitated” technology, one which provides unnatural solutions for natural problems. He noted the taking of birth control pills as being opposed to nature, as an example of this. “We maintain the problem is not the technology, it’s the technologists,” he said. The deceptive nature of Western Man is something African Man doesn’t have, Simms said. A unified minority force in the sciences is needed to “bring our being back to a natural balance,” he said. Simms finished his speech with information his organization has received for Blacks in science. “We have two brothers who discovered a cure for sickle-cell anemia. European Man said that couldn’t be done,” he said. EWEB gets share of nuclear plant The Eugene Water and Electric Board okayed a contract com miting them to a $35,000 per year share of the rebuilt Hanford nuclear plant in a special meeting held Friday afternoon. The Hanford plant, located in Hanford, Wash., was originally a dual purpose plant designed to produce plutonium for bombs along with a power capability of 860 megawatts. The Washington Public Power Supply System will complete full conversion of the plant expanding the output to 1230 megawatts. The scheduled completion date is September i960. The cost will be $605 million and will be split up between 104 participating utilities. John Reynolds, newest board member and associate professor of architecture at the University, was the sole dissenting vote on the five man board. A second contract agreed upon by the board extended EWEB’s commitment in the existing Hanford facility another year, through 1975. The vote was again 4-1 with Reynolds the only negative vote. “It’s not in the long range interest of the Nor thwest to operate the reactor for another year,” he explained. Simms and NBSSO chairer Sam Correathers spent most of the day talking with Blacks on campus. Recently they have begun tutorial programs to prepare California’s Black youth for college careers in science. 180PIC8O0 180PjC8-QQ m.+ehy RULES OF THE r 177La 800 AZUKI • VICTORIA • BIANCHI C GITANE • ASTRA • ROSS V. AND MANY OTHIRS . . . 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