Page 4-Friday, February 17, 1978-The Michigan Daily Giving SPACE to minorities htc Mitbi3rn Bai g Eighty-Eight Years of Editorial Freedom 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, MI 48109 By Bruce Brumberg Vol. LXXXVIII, No. 115 News Phone: 764-0552 I Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan Oh, those gaping potholes A LONG WINTER of snow, plow- ing and salt has taken the final toll on Ann Arbor's roadways. Almost every street from State to, the smallest lane has a surface which closely resembles that of the moon. Minor filling and patching after the spring thaw will not suffice. Local roads need major repairs - a fact citizens cannot ignore any longer. One ride on the bumpy thoroughfares is proof enough of the need for renovation. While the need for these repairs is obvious, the city's inability to fund them is just as clear. To repair even one mile of a' single street costs nearly $350,000. Multiplied by the city's nearly '400 miles of roadways, the cost becomes almost staggering. Year after' year, however, city voters have failed to pass any millage ,increase which would fund road repairs, leaving the city with no choice 'but to perform patching jobs with the ;little monies it has. At Moonday night's session, Council finally agreed to place a road repair nmillage increase on the November ballot. the April ballot was eliminated because of what was said to be a lack of time to familiarize the public with the issue prior to the election. It seems unfortu- nate that repairs should be further de- layed, but Council sees the time period before the election as crucial. With November still nine bumpy months away, Council has taken ituupon itself to conduct a public education campaign to convince voters of the need to pass the pothold repair millage. This, coupled with uncomfortable drives along local roads for the city's driver throughout the summer should lead to a victory for the millage. As Councilman Louis Senunas (R- Third Ward) said at Monday's meeting, convincing the public to support the ad- ditional millage might be aided by the delay in fixing potholes. "Let the people fall into a few," he said, "then they'll realize" how sorely a major street repair program is needed. In fact, delaying the repair might be a good thing for everyone. If drivers can't speed through the city because of the gaping potholes every ten feet, there will be a lot less aggressive driving, and as a result, fewer acciden- ts. Affirmative action programs, established to insure the ad- mission of previously excluded minority students to professional . schools, have been met by emotional, legal and political reactions. Now, in the landmark case of Bakke vs. The Regents of the University of California, the U.S. Supreme Court must decide if the affirmative action 'policies of special preference and ad- missions quotas for minority ap- plicants are constitutional. The Bakke type of special ad- missions program is problematic for two reasons: First, it assumes minorities need a segregated evaluation process in order to gain entrance to professional schools; and second, it assumes that the sole measures of merit are reflected in standardized test scores and college grade point averages. The issue has been fur- ther derailed by "either/or" ex- tremism: either you favor a preferential quota system giving minorities a "break", or you do not. If you do, then you are again- st individual merit and the main- tenance of academic standards; however, if you do not, you are a racist. But whether a radically preferential admissions policy is the only way to -enable more minority students to practice medicine or law is debatable. Consider Temple University School of Law in Philadelphia, which has what appears to be a balanced and successful ap- proach to professional school admissions. Temple's special admissions program, in the wor- ds of the dean, Peter J. Liacouras, "seeks out and carefully, individually and affir- matively selects those applicants - minority and majority group members - who have an out- standing performance record and an exceptional aptitude for the study and the practice of law, not necessarily reflected by their LSAT scores." The Temple Law School's Special Admissions and Curriculum Experiment (SPACE) program insures that applicants with the best in- dividual merit and the highest aptitude for the practice of law and community leadership will be seriously considered for ad- mission. The program is not college GPA of- 3.80 or above; students with exceptional and continuous economic deprivation; those with excep- tional and continuous leadership ability demonstrated in substan- tial college or community ac- tivities; and applicants with exceptional physical disability. Admission is competitive within the six SPACE categories, so that being in one of them does not insure admissions. To be accepted by this discretionary route, the SPACE Committee must find evidence that the applicant's LSAT scores The Temple program is affirmative action at its democratic best - a students have been admitted through the SPACE program. In a student body of 1115, women constitute 36 per cent, not the two per cent of 12 years ago. Minority students still comprise less than ten per cent, with blacks making up eight per cent of the total enrollment. But ten years ago they comprised one per cent. Advocates of racially preferen- tial admissions systems argue that any program which avoids being color-conscious will promote hypocrisy and en- courage a university to accom- plish indirectly what it may not do directly. But as Carl Cohen, professor of philosophy at Michigan, observes: "The racial count that results may not bd the same as that produced when racial preference is used, but perhaps it ought not be. Even if the count were the same, the in- dividuals would be different, and that makes all the difference." The Temple program is affir- mative action at its democratic best-a program that pursues in- tegration without granting special privileges to some groups at the expense of others. This program exhibits a proper balan- cing of the various competing in- terests consistent with the main- tenance of high admission stan- dards, as well as providing in- dividuals from all groups in society with an equal opportunity to enter a profession on the basis of individual merit. Those are qualities any University can en- vy. program that pursues i without granting special ntegration privileges to some groups at the expense of others. racially exclusive or quota- based. It accounts for ap- proximately one-fourth of the students in each entering class. It goes beyond the applicant's statistical credentials, which are the basis for admission for the remaining three-quarters of each entering class. Applicants who consider their backgrounds exceptional may request a review by the SPACE committee. Reviewers consider six categories of applicants: black, Hispanic, American In- dian, Asian, or any other group under-represented in the legal profession; non-minority groups with admissions criteria equivalent to the first category; do not adequately measure his potential in law school and the legal profession. Following a comprehensive review, the SPACE Committee then recom- mends for admission those can- didates who it feels present the best objective qualifications among all six categories. Perhaps the most important feature of the Temple program is a student body that includes men and women from every racial, ethnic, religious, and aconomic class. The program is open to all applicants. No racial or ethnic group is considered deserving of exclusive preferential treatment. The proof is that approximately twice as many whites as minority An Albert earlier Wheeler suggestion1 to place thej by Mayor millage on Blruce Blrit tit berg fre(fItie i otribiaor I)rtilv 's EditorialI page. to the The President's initiative LETTERS TO THE DAILY Distortion on Middle East arms ,PRESIDENT CARTER does have a taste for drama, it turns out. Getting tired of watching the coal k strike drag on and efforts to end the dis- pute fail, the President took a powerful itiative and called union and industry egotiators together for a rare White k p£qrf erenc . w ien it looke as uT the coal opera- ,s~ere going spurn the meeting, arter threatened to denounce them to the nation - certainly a formidable challenge to any company's public re- lations. Negotiators for both sides saw the President's leverage and hurried to the Oval Office. e« That series of events - and the fact that Carter called 12 governors to a Washington yesterday to discuss the energy problems resulting from the coal strike - is evidence that the Presi- 4 dent may finally be grasping the 9 dimensions of his office. It's a good t sign. a Carter could, if the strike continues, choose to invoke provisions of the Taft- Hartley Act, which would force miners ,back to work for what is called a "cool- ing off period." But he would do best not to use those provisions. The Taft- '4 c a, ti .4 1. 'C7 aI,7 a + a 4t a } 4 T Hartley Act has never really worked before; striking workers usually stay on the picket lines, and often the back- to-work order incites violence. The new round of coal talks may not prove fruitful right away, and the nation could start feeling the pinch of a coal, shortage, but at least we won't have to say that our President stood by and did absolutely nothing about it. Now, there's an improvement. CORRECTION: In yesterday's article, "The 'U's unknown links tb apartheid," by Thomas Detwyler, the ac- companying diagram shows Continental Oil Cor- poration doing business in South Africa, when in fact, it is Continental Illinois Corporation (banking) which has business interests there. Continental Oil should not have been underlined. Also, Edward E. Carlson is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of UAL, Inc., not United Air- lines. The airline company, on the board of which Carlson also sits, is a subsidiary of UAL, Inc. The 1975 sales shown are those of UAL, Inc. The Daily regrets the errors. To The Daily: As is common in much of the American press today, the Daily's editorial of February 9 ("The Mideast Arms Picture") makes several false assumptions that distort the realities of the Middle East situation. it is impor- tant that these assumptions are pointed outineorder to better un- derstand the problems that prevent peace in the Middle East today. Firstly, the editorial claims that "Israel has maintained a stubborn negotiating posture" and has not negotiated "fairly with the Egyptians." On the con- trary, Israel always desired direct negotiations with Egypt and other neighboring Arab states that would lead to peace and security. At present, Prime MinisteryMenachem Begin stresses that "everything is negotiable," a far cry from a "stubborn posture." In audition,. ne has drawn up plans for Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank, and return of the Sinai territory to Egypt. These plans include obvious con- cessions and are 'positive steps towards successful negotiations. The editorial's second false assumption is that an American A clipping for Israel's wings By Richard Gross 5 f A( H4OME UJrr~o t1'f, TEL AVIV, Israel - Israel's condemnation of the U.S. pro- posal to sell warplanes to Egypt and Saudi Arabia came as no sur- prise, but the furor over the num- ber of aircraft has clouded the real issue: the change in Ameri- can policy. Never before has the United States offered such sophisticated offensive weapons to the Arabs, particularly Egypt. A previous proposal to sell defensive Hawk missiles to Jordan had so many strings attached that King Hus- sein dropped the idea. Israel is unwilling to accept changes in American policy that do not coincide with its own inter- ests, as limited as those interests may be. ,It thus is more con- cerned with the policy shift than fighters to Egypt, according to the sources, is a desire to keep President Anwar Sadat from returning to the Soviet fold. He expelled the Soviets from Egypt in 1972 but he now is repor- tedly in need of space parts for his Soviet-built MIGs. The F-5Es are no challenge for most of Israel's aircraft and even in Sadat's own words are con- sidered by military analysts to be "10th-rate" warplanes. Of more concern to Israel is the proposal to sell 60 McDonnell- Douglas F-15s to Saudi Arabia. They could, in the Israeli view, wind up in Egyptian skies in time of war with Israel. And they are the best planes in the West, even without all the ultrasophisticated avionics. sale of weapons to Egypt would be "insignificant.' Any weapons' sale to Egypt would set a precedent and would be a "significant" change in American arms policy in the Middle East. This precedent could easily lead to future arms sales to Egypt and to an escalated arms race in the Mid- dle East. The Daily feels that the United States should use arms sales to apply pressure to Israel. However, this is again falsely assuming that Israel has been the intransigent, party. President Carter wisely believes that the United States' role in the Middle East negotiations should be that of mediator, not arbitrator. Such an arms sale with the purpose of pressuring Israel would distin- ctly change this position. The United States should not be using scare tactics, as the Daily ad- vocates. This would be detrimen- tal to peace efforts. -Debbie Salinger Jeffrey Colman mixed up text To The Daily: Due to a printing error, the text of our Wednesday guest editorial, "Apartheid is not a debatable is- sue," does not follow the copy the Coalition Against Apartheid sub- mitted to the Daily. Although the overall meaning of the piece was not changed, we would like to correct two points: First, we did not attribute remarks concerning Mobil,, Texaco, Ford, GM and IBM both to Ted Lockwood of the Washington Office on Africa and to Tim Smith of the National Council of Churches, but to Smith alone. Second, the error obliterated what Lockwood said summariz- ing the recent Clark Report on South African investments put out by the U.S. Senate. Sen. Clark's report, Lockwood noted, concluded that U.S. cor- porate performance in South Africa is "abysmal" in terms of bringing about meaningful change. The Daily picked tr Atis point in excerpting our r tial for highlighting purpos . ut the information was lost in t..ext. The point is important because of widespread corporate claims that U.S. firms somehow work from within apartheid to change it. The Clark committee only verified what the U.N., the World Council of Churches and the OAU have been saying for 15 years; onl , _4.. -r.n ala (T4' v- called on the Regents to cut all financial ties to firms operating in South Africa. As Prexy Nesbitt of the American Committee on Africa summed it up atthe forum, the UM must now decide, "Which side are you on?" - Andy Feeney, Secretary Washtenaw County Coalition Against Apartheid ban radioactive waste To The Daily: Readers who are concerned about radioactive wastes should know that the Michigan legisla- ture is considering banning dis- posal of the wastes. Although the federal government considers Michigan to be an excellent can- didate for the "hot dump," local residents, the governor, and the attorney general are opposed. The ban legislation has already passed the Senate and is now being considered by the House Public Health Committee, which will make a final decision next week (the week of Feb. 20.) Let- ters urging a total ban on the burial of radioactive wastes in the state should be sent to the House Public Health Committee, c/o Rep. Raymond Hood, State Capitol, Lansing. Readers wishing to have extra impact could also send letters to the following members of the com- mittee: Rep. Connie Binsfeld; Rep. Wilbur Brotherton; Rep. George Cushingberry, Jr.; and Rep. Jackie Vaughn III. A few letters now could prevent risking the health of Michigan residents for many generations to come. - Steve Freedkin Energy Project Director the solution To The Daily: George Mendenhall, a Univer- sity of Michigan teacher, has studied and researched past civilizations to ascertain the reason and cause of their down- fall. He has found that there are designs of growth in all principles (laws) of action (conduct) of people. Laws have a design of growth built into them just the same as all seeds have an ab- solute, positive growth, and all acts (deeds) of people have an absolute, positive growth result. The design of growth from seeds cannot be altered (changed) by any person on ear- th. This is not true of .acts of people. A wrong act or principle used that is creating an un- ri :ci mh a a inn ,- ifr nr..in . " --~'' 2 " ! COMMENTA R Y it is with the aircraft themselves, diplomatic sources say. The Israelis, the sources said, refuse to consider any other American objectives in the Mid- dle East other than keeping Israel militarily strong and eco- nomically viable. "Israel has conditioned itself to think only in unitary terms, not regionally," one source said. "The Israelis are predictably upset," another said. "Egypt is no -longer in the non-lethal cate- gory of weapons supply, and Prime Minister Menachem Begin has accepted an invitation to go to Washington in March and apparently hopes he can convince President Carter to change his mind about a policy shift that means giving to the Arabs what the United States thus far has given only to Israel. The outcome most certainly will affect the future course of peace negotiations between Egypt and Israel, which now are stalled and awaiting a new U.S. effort to reactivate them.