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Eighty-three years of editorial freedom
Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan

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News Phone: 764-0552

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 11, 1973

State abortion law needed

WHEN THE STATE legislature returns
from summer recess Oct. 16, the pas-
sage of an adequate abortion law to in-
sure that the public health of the state
will be best protected should be among
their top priorities. When the current ses-
sion ends Jan. 1, 1974, we strongly hope
that a, fair and constitutionally sound
abortion law will be listed among their
accomplishments.
Before the January U.S. Supreme Court
decision on abortion, the fight against
archaic abortion laws was carried out in
only a few states. The battleground on
the issue is now extended to almost all 50
states and the U. S. Congress.
Two bills are nown pending in Washing-
ton which would strike down the High
Court decision by way of a constitutional
amendment to return all abortion deci-
sions to state legislative control, and to
grant constitutional rights to the unborn
from the moment of conception.
WHILE THE dispute goes on in the U.S.
Congress, the state legislature now
has before it 14 bills relating to abortion
regulation which attempt in various ways
to fill the void left by the unconstitution-
al Michigan abortion law of 1846.
Four of these bills have already passed
Editorial Stff
CHRISTOPHER PARKS and EUGENE ROBINSON
Co-Editors in Chief
DIANE LEVICK.........................Arts Editor
MARTIN PORTER ...... ..............Sunday Editor
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ERIC SCHOCH ..................... Editorial Director
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TED STEIN ......................... Executive Editor
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Sports Editor
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Managing Sports Editor
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Business Manager
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either the House or the Senate and are
in committee. Now that the chance for
action is at hand, the people of Michigan
should no longer be left without proper
legislation and protection in this area.
State Senate Bill 345, written in accord-
ance with the Supreme Court decision
guidelines, is perhaps the most promising.
As introduced and authored by State Sen-
ator Gilbert Bursley (R-18th district), the
bill proposes that: "an induced abortion
or termination of pregnancy shall be per-
formed only by a medical or osteopathic
physician licensed to practice in this state
and reported to the director of public
health. An induced abortion or induced
termination of pregnancy in the second
trimester shall be performed on an inpa-
tient or outpatient basis in a hispital."
It also limits abortion after the second
trimester to cases to preserve the life or
health of woman or fetus,
;ENATE BILL 345 was passed by the Sen-
ate in May with only four dissenting
votes. It was then assigned to the House
Social Services and Corrections commit-
tee by House Speaker Ryan who is a self-
proclaimed abortion reform opponent.
It is, feared by the bill's supporters-
who include State Health Director Maur-
ice Reizen - that the proposal will die in
committee while the crucial need for ac-
tion on this legislation grows.
We believe the Bursley bill will provide
adequate protection and contains broad
enough statutes to accommodate future
change in medical care.
By no means is this bill a cure-all to
the many problems surrounding the abor-
tion issue such as possible rights of the
father or the right to refuse an abortion,
but these aspects have been dealt with by
the Supreme Court decision and are in-
herent in any state legislation on abor-
tion.
OTHER CONCERNS such as follow-up
care and state funding are not men-
tioned in this bill,-but the blueprint has
been laid and the responsibility will lie
with the department of public health.
Many observers feel that the bill would
pass in the House if it could be pried out
of committee and brought to the floor
for vote.
Those seeking abortions in the state,
whose procedures are still unregulated,
desperately need protection under the law
that Senator Bursley's bill can provide.
We therefore urge abortion reform sup-
porters to write Ryan, the House Social
Services and Corrections committee, and
members of the House asking them to
seek immediate action on the bill and to
pass it so that legal and medical protec-
tion will be insured for the women of
Michigan who seek abortions.
TODAY'S STAFF:
News: Penny Plank, James Schuster, Step-
hen Selbst, Ted Stein
Editorial Page: Marnie Heyn, Eric Schoch,
David Yalowitz
Arts Page: Diane Levick, Mara Shapiro
Photo Technician: Steve Kagan

Career
By CHUCK WILBUR
IT IS HARD to imagine the Nixon
administration advocating a
sweeping program. of change for
the nation's public schools which,
in its own words, amounts to "an
educational revolution." To many,
the administration's policies must
appear more a counter-revolution
that would destroy public educa-
tion in this country.
By far, the most striking aspect
of Nixon's education policies has
been the severe cutback of federal
aid. Direct federal aid for educa-
tion was often eliminated in favor
of revenue sharing grants which
frequently found their way into
areas where they were least need-
ed.
The New York Times described
the Nixon education budget for
1973 as "a retreat from virtually
all the advances made since 1965
in the Federal Government's in-
volvement in schools."
A N O T H E R PROMINENT
element of the Administration's
education program deals with fed-
eral support for non-public schools
either in the form of direct finan-
cial aid or in tuition tax credits
for parents who send their chil-
dren to private schools. While ing w
such support is highly questionable gram
on constitutional grounds, it ap- which
pears even more undesirable when portun
seen in tfe context of aid cutbacks in the
to faltering public schools. Gra
And we have all been witness to iod in
the spectacle of the Administration row hi
riding the issue of school busing eral c
for all the political mileage it is by no
worth. roadt
With all the clamor created by Ing
the policies mentioned above, it is is tos
no wonder we have taken little no- or his
tice of the Nixon team's pet edu- last tN
cational program, Career Educa- progra
tion. This is the "educational revo- studen
lution" which Washington hopes skillv
will revitalize public education. has cl
WHILE MUCH of the rhetoric tory u
surrounding Career Education has CAR
been purposely vague, the curric- not b
ulum program itself is quite spe- trainin
cific. Under the program, the first which
phase of Career Education would though
begin in kindergarten and continue educa
through grade 6.ucatio
During these years students uca
meant
would be exposed to a diversity
of jobs grouped in fifteen occupa- progra
tional clusters such as dtransporta- ta
tion, manufacturing and health. In Wh
addition to regular classwork deal- tin h

Ed: No cure

for irrelevance

mothers are relegated to "How
mommies help."
Even if we could accept the
means of Career Education, there
is little proof of a tangible end.
Narrow occupational specialization,
the final product of the program,
may well prove to be the shortest
road to economic suicide in to-
day's rapidly changing economy.
In the absence of planned devel-
opment for the national economy,
it is hard to imagine the cumber-
some educational bureaucracy
keeping pace with the changing
job market. 'According to a little
publicized HEW task force report
only a small per centage of high
school students find jobs requiring
their specific vocational training.
WHY THEN, with both the
means and ends of Career Educa-
tion so questionable, has the ad-
ministration given the program the
big push? The answers lies in the
general view the Nixon govern-
menthas takentoward spending
in the area of social services. Per-
haps never before has an adminis-
tration tailored an educational
program so clearly to fit its own
image.
If ideological roots for the Career
Education push are to be found
they are in the President's warning
that America must choose "be-
tween the work ethic that built this
nation's character and the new
welfare state ethic that could cause
the American character to 'weak-
en."
Career Education, as proposed
by the Administration, in a large
degree constitutes an effort to sell
the work ethic to a segment of the
American public that has found it
to be devoid of meaning in' their
own lives.
The alienation many Americans
feel towards their work stems from
the realization that the end result
of their labor is profit rolling into

Daily Photo by STEVE KAGAN
A potential work force or legitimate human beings?

'ith these clusters, the pro-
calls for field experience in
students would have the op-
nity to observe people at work
various occupations.
des 7 and 8 represent a per-
which the student is to nar-
is or her investigation to sev-
lusters. This is the first but
means the last step on the
to specialization.
grades 9 and 10 the student
select one cluster to find her
s prospective vocation. The
wo years of the high school
am are to be a time for the
nt to secure a specific job
within the cluster he or she
hosen, or complete prepara-
work for higher education.
BEER EDUCATION should
e confused with vocational
ng and career guidance
have come to be familiar,
h questionable parts of our
tional landscape. Career Ed-
n differs in that it is not
t to be a mere addition to the
ams of the nation's elemen-
nd secondary schools.
at the U. S. Office of Educa-
has proposed is that public
tion be restructured "around
eme of career development,"
Career Education would per-
every aspect of curriculum
public schools.
ording to Sydney Marland,
r Assistant Secretary for Ed-
n and the Administration's
proponent of the plan, Ca-
Education will not stop here.
r, "classes in basic academic
ts will use career oriented
ials." Marland and . others
that the total approach of
r Education will revive stud-
nterest in schools they have
to be irrelevant.
Career Education program
een received warmly by edu-
al authorities around the
ry, with several state depart-
of education developing their
rograms along federal guide-
S INTEREST is easy to un-
[nd, for on the surface much

of the program appears to be an
improvement over haphazard ca-
reer guidance and vocational edu-
cational education programs that
exist presently.
Once this thin veneer is cracked
however, one finds in the program
an educational nightmare replete
with the problems and contradic-
tions that plague education in this
country today.
To begin with, Career Educa-
tions' approach. to the question of
relevance of our schools is essen-
tially a product of. the line of rea-
soning that makes schools as irre-
levant to student's lives as they
are.
For years the emphasis in our
educational system has been on
preparing students for situations
they. will encounter later in life,
even if only for the next Septem-
ber. Essentially, a student is treat-
ed as someone about to become
something, whether that something
is called a citizen, an adult, a
worker, or more often a student
further up the educational hier-
archy.
ANOTHER APPROACH, a n d
one that might make schools more
relevant would be to treat stud-
ents as what they really are, peo-
ple who already -are something,
living thinking human beings with
legitimate wants, needs, and inter-
ests.
Career Education never seems to
take this fact into account, rather
it merely attempts to change the
nature of preparation in schools,
assuming this will automatically
create relevance.
Another questionable aspect of
the program is its scope, for it
would leave virtually no part of
present school curriculums un-
touched. Implementation of the full
Career Education package would
meanr gearing traditional parts of
the school curriculum to occupa-
tional themes.
What this would mean for the
student is that his or her under-
standing of history, literature, gov-
ernment, music, art, science and
math would all be tied to a spe-

cific occupational course. Such an
approach would not merely pre-
pare people for jobs, it would turn
people into their jobs.
SCHOOLS AT PRESENT fall far
short in trying to develop the vari-
ous abilities and interests students
have, but the adoption of Career
Education could only make mat-
ters worse.
Marland and other advocates of,
the program stress that an import-
ant role of the program is to de-
velop in students an understanding
of the social significance and the
dignity of all jobs.
While this may sound like a nice
idea, what it amounts to is an at;
tempt to gloss over the harsh re-

".. . one finds in the Career Education pro-
gram an educational nightmare replete with the
problems and contradictions that plague duC
Lion in this country today."
.. .. : .ti. r.{gm fi

educat
the th
thus C
vade
in our
Acc
forme
ucatio
chief
reer F
Aathe
subjec
mater
argue
Career
ent in
found
The
has be
cation
countr
ments
own p
lines.
THI
dersta

alities of economic life in America.
It ignores the fact that for mil-
lions of Americans their jobs have
no "social significance" and pre-
cious little dignity.
As Career Education critic Lee
Sproul points out, "the curricu-
lum guides makes the questionable
point that all jobs are important,
thus implying that this society
honors doctors and garbagemen
equally."
The intrinsic inequality of the
occupational hierarchy in this
country has not found its way into
the Career Education curriculum.
Neither for that matter has any
serious attempt to deal with sexism
in American economic life.
RATHER, CAREER Education
reinforces ideas that would perpet-
uate feminine inequality. The Cali-
fornia state guide for Career Edu-
cation calls upon first grade stu-
dents to act out a song "This is
the way my father works," while

corporate coffers. Career. Educa-
tion is an attempt to use the na-
tion's schools to mask the struc-
tural injustice of our economic sys-
tem.
A MORE RELEVANT and hon-
est approach to career guidance
might well fill a serious gap in our
schools. However, any attempt to
idealize work in America like the
Career Education program hardly
fits the bill.
A more realistic program might
be entitled Economic Survival, for
that is precisely what work is for
most Americans. Such a program
could explore racism, sexism, alie-
nation, and exploitation in the
American economy and help the
students find their own lifestyles
within it.
Perhaps the most legitimate
function of an Economic Survival
program would be to suggest alter-
natives to an economic system
which values not human happiness
but corporate profit.

Sidney Marland

Let them eat instant chocolate pudding

"YtOU ASM E 6Itlt4& 1EARY. $.A .VBRV YWEARY '...e * 0 F' WXISQAT S ! t

By ROBIN OSBORNE
1HE THREE VILLAGE elders
nervously bowed their way into
the room, hands clasped together
in traditional greeting. After a
tentative start, each said his brief
piece, then as one they fell to
their knees on the carpet.
An air-conditioned office is an
unusual place to see men beg. But
begging they were, for immediate
food relief to save their village of
230 people. Their crops had failed,
they said. They could borrow no
more from their neighbors, the fu-
ture was hopeless.
For half an hour, Larry Martin
listened to their problems, asking
questions in the Lao language he
speaks fluently. Finally he agreed
to visit their home next morning to
investigate the claim. They. left
smiling, feeling they had come to
the right man. Indeed they had,
for the young American is the lo-
cal chief of USAID, the agency
which daily feeds 315,000 full-time
refugees in Laos.
OVER THE YEARS, much cri-
ticism has been levelled at the
United States Agency for Interna-
tional Development. It is a cover
for another more sinister agency,
the CIA. It aims at gaining po-
litical loyalty in return for free
handouts, in the hope that the
aided will not bite the hand that
feeds hem.
Providing the service costs their
mighty benefactor US $17 million

money, and as yet no chance to re-
turn home. The result of years on
charity has been the emergence of
a mass beggars mentality, a psy-
chological wasteland where dreams
and hopes cannot survive.
MOSTLY THEY WERE Meo,
a tribal people who are perhaps
the most colorful minority in Asia.
They dress in black, with swathes
of pink and turquoise silk. Rich
handmade sliver clanks around
their necks. Their age old homes
are on the high mountain tops of
central and northern Laos, where
in the cold misty climate they
sought refuge from the outside
world.
They grew vegetables, raised
pigs, and cultivated their main
crop,.opium, which they traded for
the few necessities of life. Today,
it has all gone. The opium fields
are destroyed, the silver sells as
souvenirs in the tourist shops of
the capital cities.
For all its 122,000 new residents,
Ban Xon is a depressing experi-
ence, but for the Meo it is the ul-
timate culture shock. The proud,
once - independent people crowd
around marked clearings to collect
the monthly food drops. While they
wait they are entertained by an
aerial show of helicopters and
light aircraft that take off and land
at the small airstrip nearby.
FINALLY THE RATIONS arrive
in 40 kilo bags that float out of the
skv.Again big brother h nnt for-.

80 per cent of the cases were ma-
laria or dysentery, caused by the
onset of the monsoon rains. The
hill tribes have developed no im-
munity to lowland diseases. But
again they are lucky. They do have
a few doctors to call on, although
the strange medjciines and meth-
ods frighten them..
NOT ALL REFUGEES have
been relocated in such central
areas, and throughout much of
Laos thousands have moved to
places more or less of their own
choosing. The land is unfamiliar,
but at least they are free to live
as they please. However, there is
one problem. It takes time for the
soil to be cultivated and crops to
grow, so in the meantime they too
must look to someone else's gen-
erosity,

So it was with a group from the
Leo Theung tribe, waiting. by the
banks of the Mekong River as we
arrived in a longboat heavily laden
with sacks of rice and tinned
goods. Unlike the Meo, they were
in for a few culinary surprises. In-
cluded in our load were packets of
Carnation Instant Breakfast (va-
nilla), Betty Crocker snack-size
rice dessert, chocolate pudding and
baby food. It was explained to me
at the USAID warehouse that they
were gifts from various charities in
America' and probably manufac-
turers surplus.
THE VILLAGERS were too de-
lighted with the array of colorful
packets to ask what happened to
the missing bags of rice. Out of
200, four were gone after travelling

a kilometer from the warehouse
to the wharf. They were deliber-
ately broken by the laborers who
know that damaged supplies were
left behind. Though only small
scale. corruption compared to the
usual in such operations, it is sad
that even those who have nothing
still have something to lose.
Robin Osborne, an Austra-;
Tian journalist, writes for The
Australian Daily, the Bangkok
Post and other Asian papers.
He t r a v e l s extensively in
Southeast Asia. Copyright -
The Pacific News Service,
1973.

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