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We are gravely disappointed<br />
with the actions of Illinois Rep.<br />
Paul Stone, D-Sullivan on bills that<br />
deal with student needs.<br />
As a member of the House<br />
Higher Education Committee,<br />
Stone voted against bills that would<br />
place student representatives on<br />
the <strong>University</strong> Board of Trustees.<br />
And this week, Stone was instrumental<br />
in killing a bill which<br />
would have allowed the sale of<br />
liquor in the Illini Union. In the first<br />
committee vote , the bill was<br />
defeated six to five. One legislator<br />
was going to change his vote, which<br />
would have allowed the bill to pass,<br />
but Stone called for a quorum.<br />
Some committee members had left<br />
the committee chambers since the<br />
first vote, so a quorum was not<br />
present and the bill failed.<br />
Although Stone was technically<br />
correct in asking for a quorum<br />
count, there is a long-standing<br />
custom that the proper time for a<br />
quorum count is when a bill is first<br />
voted on, and committee members<br />
may later change their votes even<br />
Stone's record disappointing<br />
if a quorum is no longer present.<br />
Stone's action kept the vote from<br />
reflecting the true sentiments of<br />
the committee, and resulted the bill<br />
being killed through parliamentary<br />
trickery.<br />
The reason for Stone's actions on<br />
these two issues is clearly the opposition<br />
of the <strong>University</strong>, which<br />
strongly opposes having liquor sold<br />
in the Union (although it has a<br />
special-interests bill pending in the<br />
General Assembly to allow it to be<br />
sold at the Levis Faculty Center )<br />
and wishes to keep students off the<br />
Board of Trustees, preferring to<br />
deal with them through powerless<br />
committees and professional flak<br />
men.<br />
We would remind Stone that<br />
many of the votes that elected him<br />
last fall came from the large<br />
student population in Champaign-<br />
Urbana, and that his primary<br />
responsibility is to his constituency,<br />
not the special interests<br />
located in his district.<br />
And we would warn students to<br />
take note of this example and not<br />
follow the habit of blindly voting<br />
Democratic in local elections, as<br />
they have shown a distressing tendency<br />
to do in recent elections.<br />
Although we do not condemn<br />
Stone completely as a state<br />
legislator—we support, for example,<br />
his bill to increase the financial<br />
aid benefits made available in<br />
Illinois—we suggest he compare<br />
the number of votes the <strong>University</strong><br />
administration can cast with the<br />
number students control the next<br />
time he considers taking a stand<br />
like those he's taken in the last two<br />
weeks.<br />
Ed Epstein /On Nixonian gobbledygook<br />
I promise to try to be fair , to respect the<br />
man's lofty position and all that.<br />
But , still I must confess that President<br />
Nixon has me confused. I have subjected<br />
myself to the ordea l of wading through his<br />
two most recent statements on the sordid<br />
Watergate affair and find- myself left with<br />
more questions about who did what and<br />
when than before I started .<br />
The President's first statement on April<br />
30, in which he axed his Prussian guards<br />
Wright<br />
We are glad to see that Joe Blaze,<br />
director of parking and transportation,<br />
has agreed to reconsider<br />
his plans to build a bicycle<br />
parking lot on the south end of the<br />
Quadrangle, and we hope he will<br />
make a sincere effort to find<br />
another location for the lot.<br />
The Quad has already been<br />
greatly reduced in size by the fencing<br />
off of the north end to allow<br />
grass to grow back, and is now<br />
barely large enough for the number<br />
of people who wish to use it during<br />
good weather. We would think that<br />
Haldeman and Ehrlichman and excommunicated<br />
John Dean, was a masterpiece<br />
of political mumbo-jumbo. In his little<br />
speech "from my heart" Nixon placed the<br />
blame on everyone else, but graciously accepted<br />
the responsibility for himself.<br />
Now, you may ask, and you should, just<br />
what does this mean? Well, if you did ask<br />
you wouldn't get an answer because, you<br />
see, the President has more important<br />
things to do, like rehearsing the Marine<br />
* iWJtl HWS TO SC05B HM/KWte TH^I^<br />
Keep bike lots off the Quad<br />
maintaining the quality of one of<br />
the few pleasant places on this<br />
campus would take priority over<br />
building another parking lot . \<br />
A number of alternative<br />
locations have been proposed for<br />
the parking lot. Even if none of<br />
them prove to be completely<br />
suitable, we strongly urge that they<br />
be used instead of the Quad. The<br />
<strong>University</strong> will always need space,<br />
particularly in the central Quad<br />
area, and if the principle of using<br />
Quad space gets started now, we<br />
Band in the "Internationale" in preparation<br />
for Big Leonid's big visit.<br />
At the time of that speech Nixon left the<br />
impression with his audience that this was<br />
his final, definitive statement on the matter<br />
that "has claimed far too much of my time<br />
and my attention."<br />
But, things being what they are in the U.S.<br />
of A. the President recently found it<br />
necessary to issue another, longer tract ,<br />
which (will surprises never cease ) actually<br />
can easily foresee the day when it<br />
will be completely used up by<br />
parking lots , sidewalks, and<br />
buildings.<br />
At an institution as enormous,<br />
complicated and impersonal as the<br />
<strong>University</strong> of Illinois, a line has to<br />
be drawn between fulfilling the<br />
physical requirements of the institution<br />
and fulfilling the spiritual<br />
requirements of its students. We<br />
feel that line should, be drawn<br />
clearly and irrevocably around the<br />
Quad.<br />
said something. It told us that at heart<br />
Nixon is really a junior G-man and J. Edgar<br />
Hoover, in his closing years, was something<br />
of a civil libertarian.<br />
It seems Nixon wanted to improve<br />
domestic intelligence operations just after<br />
the college campuses blew up over his invasion<br />
of Cambodia . His plans included<br />
authorization for bugging and "surreptitious<br />
entry," or breaking and entering, or<br />
how about just plain burglary, which Illinois<br />
law says is good for not less than one year in<br />
prison. It also seems that Old J. Edgar, who<br />
according to some recent* reports, was<br />
slightly gaga during the last few years of his<br />
omnipotent rule of the FBI, regained<br />
lucidity long enough to kill off the plan.<br />
And, as we travel along the twisting route<br />
of Nixon's pronouncement, we learn that a<br />
special group was formed in the White<br />
House to stop leaks to the press and that<br />
other nasty group, the public. Cleverly<br />
called the "plumbers," these fellows undertook<br />
the patriotic effort to burglarize<br />
Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office. Apparently<br />
President Nixon wanted to convince<br />
the public that Ellsberg was not only a<br />
traitor but also a screwball.<br />
All these are pretty minor when compared<br />
with another revelation from Nixon.<br />
"Elements of the early post-Watergate<br />
reports led me to suspect, incorrectly, that<br />
the C.I.A. had been in some way involved,"<br />
his speechwriter wrote.<br />
Now as an innocent, young American I<br />
would like to know why on earth the CIA, the<br />
FBI, the Committee to Reelect the<br />
President, the Women's Christian Temperance<br />
Union, the Audobon Society or the<br />
Marching Illini should bug and burglarize<br />
the headquarters of the Democratic<br />
National Committee. And I would like to<br />
know why the President thought the CIA<br />
might be involved in such a crime.<br />
These questions might even provide Nixon<br />
with enough material for Phase 3 of his explanation<br />
of his. involvement in his<br />
Watergate affair.