OPINION
ASUO court ignores law, makes up its own
Congress shall make no law ...
abridging the frt'edom of speech,
or of the press. — First Amend
ment to the United States Con
stitution
No law shall he passed
restmining the free expression of
opinion, or restricting the right
to speak, write, or print freely on
any subject whatever — Article
I, Section H of the Oregon Con
stitution.
A curious creature, the
ASUO Constitution
X A. Court It is, perhaps, the
only court in the land that has at
least twice de< ided a rule was
violated but, through its powers
of prescience, has determined
action would he futile, and thus
has ruled not to right a wrong.
But even more curious, and
somewhat disturbing, is the
court’s recent willingness to
hear a case based on freedom of
speech. As you can see from
reading the federal and state free
speech clauses above, the basic
concept is fairly easy to under
stand.
There are. of course, excep
tions to these protections. In the
case of the media, the most com
mon of these exceptions is libel.
Generally, however, aside from
libel, the media are pretty much
free to print whatever they want.
Apparently, this minor tech
nicality was overlooked by the
constitution court when it
agreed to hear a complaint
against myself and the Emerald.
For those who missed it,
here’s a quick summary: The
day before the ASUO Primary
Flection, 1 wrote a column
announcing my write-in candi
dacy for every position on the
ballot. A student senator,
Michael Omogrosso, filed a
complaint alleging that the
Emerald and I violated various
election rules by publishing the
column. The Emerald refused to
respond to the complaint.
In an aside in the court's deci
sion. the Emerald was told it
was subject to the jurisdiction of
the constitution court, and had
Omogrosso's complaint had any
merit, the court would not hove
allowed the Emerald to refuse
comment.
This, of course, is completely
false The court, however, decid
ed that it could not only Inter
pret rules, but make them up as
well Actually, this is not too
surprising. Throughout the cam
pus there is a gross lack of
understanding as to the Emer
ald’* connection to the Univer
sity.
The court ruled that the Emer
ald “is the recipient of enor
mous amounts of student funds,
and is n student organization,
regardless of its corporate struc
ture "
There is some truth to that
statement; the Emerald receives
Si29,000 from the Incidental
Fee Committee. The money
makes up a hulk subscription to
the paper, and every last penny
of it goes to |>ay printing costs
The actual cost of printing the
Emerald is $138,649. thus IFC
money makes tip about 93 per
cent of the paper’s printing
costs.
It should he pointed out that
the I.ane Transit District is also
“the recipient of enormous
amounts of student funds." but
no one would make the argu
ment that, therefore, it is a “stu
dent organization, regardless of
its corporate structure.”
Because the Emerald receives
IFC money solely for printing,
the only possible instance the
ASUO could make a claim
against the Emerald would lie if
the IFC dollars were spent else
where. like for a staff retreat to
the Bahamas or « new Mercedes
for the editor.
The court went on to rule that
my original column was satiri
cal. and thus did not violate any
election rules. However,
whether it was satire is not an
issue. There is no law prevent
ing people from writing opinion
columns asking people to write
in them or anybody else Flec
tion rules would apply only if
the campaign extended beyond
the inert) publication of an opin
ion column.
This leads back to the First
Amendment and Artie.le I, Sec
tion H Because my write-in can
didacy went no further than the
publication of a column, there
can be no argument for a rules
violation tiased on anything oth
er than the column.
The column is. of course, pro
tected speech, and thus immune
Because the Emerald receives IFC
money solely for printing, the only
possible Instance the ASUO could make
a claim against the Emerald would be if
the IFC dollars were spent elsewhere,
like for a staff retreat to the Bahamas or
a new Mercedes for the editor.
from action under the ASUO
Constitution or the constitution
court. If the ASUO or any other
person wanted to claim the col
umn violated election (or any
other) rules, the proper (and
only legal) forum liegitis in Lane
County District Court, from
where the case could travel
through the state courts and up
to the U S. Supreme Court
This, of course, assumes the
case isn't laughed out of district
court first, which it would he
The very fact the constitution
court even heard the i ase sug
gests it believes it has the pow
er to rule upon a pun e of writing
in the Emerald.
Section 2 1 of the ASUO Con
stitution reads, "No agency or
program of the ASUO shall
make any rule or take any action
abridging the privileges and
immunities of any person or
program under the Constitution
and laws of the United States or
the State of Oregon "
Yet by hearing this case and
ruling on the basis it did. the
court implicitly assumed the
column was not inherently sub
ject to protection — a First
Amendment decision — and
thus violated its own constitu
tion.
As if the court's lack of under
standing of its constitution and
the Emeralds connection to the
ASUO weren't enough, it went
on to suggest students take
action that has been expressly
forbidden by the federal courts
The court said. "If an ASUO
member wishes to influence the
allocation of student funds for
such nebulous concepts as 'jour
nalistic ethics.- then the proper
forum would appear to be the
(1FC) budget hearings "
Wrong, wrong, wrong. The
IFC has absolutely no sav over
what goes into the Emerald or
how the paper's staff do their
jobs All the IFC may concern
itself with are fiscal issues, cost
and expense, debits and credits
Actually, there is no forum for
taking action against any mem
ber of the medio for violating
journalistic ethics. The media
i an be unethical, ns lung as they
break no laws The Mspecial
edition of The Student Insurgent
is a classic example
Hut bac k to the IFC question.
In 1983, the Hth U S Circuit
Court decided a c ase involving
the student paper at the Univer
sity of Minnesota. The Minneso
ta lknly The Doily published an
extremely offensive April Fool’s
issue, which i rented a huge out
i ry against the paper In
response, the school changed
the paper's funding pros edure to
allow students to get their mon
ey bac k
The court ruled the < hange in
funding would not leave
oc curred without the offensive
issue and that. "Reducing the
revenues available to the new s
paper is therefore forbidden by
the First Amendment
Ten years earlier, the 4th U S
Circuit Court ruled. "(P)ublica
tion (of a student newspaper)
c annot be suppressed bec ause
college officials dislike its edito
rial comment ... Censorship of
constitutionally protected
expression c annot be imposed
by ... withdrawing financial sup
port, or asserting any other form
of c ensorial oversight based on
the institution's power of the
purse."
Yet. this is exactly what the
constitution court suggested was
an appropriate course of action
And even more frightening,
some of these people were grad
uating law students.
This is a classic, example of
government (such as the ASUO
is) attempting to usurp addition
al powers that it does not have
and should remind students to
keep an eye on their govern
ment You never know what it's
going to do next
Martin Fisher is an editorial
editor for the Fmerald
HOW TO
GET A
JOB
SEE PAGE 7INSTUCTIONS
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