Seventy-Seven Years of Editorial Freedom
EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
UNDER AUTHORITY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS
re Opinions Are Free, 420 MAYNARD ST., ANN ARBOR, MICH. NEWS PHONE: 764-0552
'ruth Will Prevail
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Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers
or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints.
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SUNDAY, FEFlRUARY 4, 1968
NIGHT EDITOR:DAVID KNOKE
The Appropriations Squeeze
4
IT'S THE SAME old story.
Every year, University administra-
tors, armed with graphs, charts and a
thick budget request, invade the com-
mittee chambers of state legislators to
explain why they think the University
should get more money.
And for the past three or four years
the Univesrity has clearly taken a beat-
ing at the hands of the legislators. Or
as one administrator judiciously put
it, the state has "ceased to support the
University in the manner to which she
has become accustomed."
It is not that the graphs, charts and
requests are not convincing; they are.
Rather, the legislators seem more im-
pressed by quantity than by quality.
Inst tutions of higher learning that set
little or no limits on enrollment are apt
to receive more funds than a selective
institution like the Univesrity.
o BETTER SERVE the needs of the
state, and to get more money the
University tried to plan an increasing'
enrollment. In 1963, projections were
made by the Office of Academic Af-
fairs predicting that by 1968 over 36,-
000 students would be attending the
University. :By 1975, the number would
be close to 47,000.
Until this year the University has
planned on keeping in line with these
figures. Last fall, 34,514 students were
enrolled as residence-credit students
and a 2.6 per cent increase was plan-
ned for next year.
But the Univesrity couldn't afford
to keep'playing the numbers game with
the legislature. For while the Univer-
sity continued to accept and enroll,
more students, the legislature failed to
appropriate the funds to support them.
And thus, yesterday's report that the
literary college intends to cut back en-
rolment came as no surprise. The col-
lege has received neither the funds nor
the buildings to support more students.
According to the University's 1968-
69 budget request," clearly, in terms of
enrollment increase and price inflation,
tho state investment in the Univesrity
of Michigan has not increased, but has
decreased. Between 1957-58 and 1966-
67, enrollment increased 42.5 per cent
while state appropriations in constant
dollars increased only 33.7 per cent."
This discrepancy between the num-
ber of students and the number of ap-
propriated dollars becomes even more
significant when it is noted that the
purchasing power of the dollar has de-
clined immensely. Two hundred million
dollars in appropriations are only worth
about $150 million in purchasing
power.
Furthermore, the legislature ignores
the fact that the University grants al-
most half the post-bacculaureate de-
grees in the entire state. And it costs
seven times in direct teaching cost to
educate a doctoral candidate in phil-
osophy as it does to instruct a fresh-
man taking Philosophy 101.
Enrollment is only one of the prob-
lems. Ii the University doesn't get more
money for its building fund, the enrol-
lment problem is answered right there.
"We're banging our heads on the ceil-
ing until we get more space," one ad-
ministrator complained recently.
And teachers must be attracted to
fitl the buildings the University should
but does not have. Teachers will not be
attracted - and will not stay - unless
salary hikes are given. Salaries, are in-
creasing, but not in step with the na-
tional average.
While most administratores would
agree that the University has not yet
come to the point of losing teachers
purely and simply for dollars, the dan-
ger of that happening is approaching.
WHA.T IS NOTEWORTHY is that the
University has managed so well. Al-
though it has suffered a relative decline
in position among the top ten univer-
sities of the nation, it has continued
to serve the state well. While granting
28 per cent of the degrees in the state,
and the bulk of the most expensive
kind of education, the University has
received only 29 per cent of the state
appropriations to four year institutions
of higher learning,
The University has maintained its
position by depending on private con-
tributions, the research dollar, and by
making cutbacks. Teachers and sec-
retaries aren't hired, equipment isn't
replaced and educational experiments,
notably the Residential College, aren't
fully supported.
The Univesrity can take only a few
years of belt tightening. Unlike a cor-
poration, which can tolerate a bad year
then bounce back, the University can-
not easily regain quality once it has
declined. Good teachers and students
aren't attracted to a University that
"used to have" a good reputation.
Specifically, it is the University's
well-earned reputation for academic
excelence that is at stake. Legislators
who have ceased to adequately support
the University will not only be}harm-
irg the school, but risking the loss of
a state asset as well.
-HENRY GRIX
a
" . . What the hell's Ho Chi Minh doing answering our Saigon
embassy phone ... ?"
"FOR WHAT CAN WAR but endless war still breed," wrote poet John
Milton 300 years ago. And, as this past week has so tragically
taught, man may have improved his weapons, but not his humanity.
"Enemy fighters were killed at a rate of 124 plus per hour during
the 102 hour period from 6 p.m Monday through Friday midnight,"
boasts the U.S Command in Saigon, rattling off statistics of slaughter
like beef at the market.
"Fifteen planes and 23 helicopters were destroyed, and about 100
other planes were so severly damaged that they would have to be re-
placed," reports American headquarters. Cost per plane: $2 million.
"Saigon, Hue . are open cities, where the Viet Cong are in-
distinguisable from the South Vietnamese," writes columnist James
Reston. And the whole bloody war is just as confusing, for the Viet
Cong are "South Vietnamese"-whatever that means-and Ky and
Thieu are "North Vietnamese" living in the South.
But it pis after weeks like thest past few-days of stolen ships, mis-
sing bombs, troop build-ups, deaths in the tens of thousands-it is
times like these that make one pause and wonder and realize that the
world is being brutalized and hardened to accept conditions that
shouldn't exist.
"We Americans will never yield," pledges President Johnson, pin-
ning the Medal of Honor on a Vietnam fighter pilot. "We are using our
greatest resources-of industry, of technology, of skilled and courageous
men-to conduct a limited war at the lowest possible cost in human
life." But the war is no longer "limited" nor the human cost "low." And
the pronouncements and predictions of our government are becoming
more equivocating and ludicrous misleading the nation on the war's
meaning and progress.
"Everything's Okay-They Never Reached
The Mimeograph Machine"
WEEKS
OFc:
CRISISAnd
~Saigon, t
war. Bu
we kille
We
is in Vi
have we
we conti
tured c
pawns in
The
its claim
its deed
ASIA have die
in Vetn
Pre
enough.
country
no long
patriotic
"or a ba
mam ks
wl
next week, when the death totals are finally calculated in
the U.S. will announce th. highest week of casualties of the
t after all, they, will certainly say, look how many of the enemy
d! And that, of course, makes it worth the price.
are told that "aggression" must be stopped now, that the U.S.
etnam-and Korea-waging war to end war. How many wars
fought-and will we fight again-to end war? How long can
inue to delude ourselves about what we are dong to that tor-
irner of the world, and the people we have made expendable
a game of power?
United States is being isolated from the world community as
ns become more suspect and its words deviate further from
s. No pious plea for freedom, no pledge that the dead will not
ed in vain-none of this can erase a legacy America is making
am, as wetl as on the lives and minds of her own people.
sident Johnson assures us he prays at night, but this is not
None of his prayers, or bombs, or troops have helped patch a
torn by a civil war that our leaders refuse to admit. One can
er excuse the administration's defense of the war as noble,
e, and benign. "There never was a good war," said Ben Franklin,
ad peace." Perhaps this week of war will remind us all of that.
-ROBERT KLIVANS
Editorial Director
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