Page Eght
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Wednesday, August 21, 1974
Township center of controversy
(Continued from Page 1i
correctly reported, members of
the Pierce campaign and many
Whiteford residents remain un-
convinced.
"The county clerk is the on-
ly guy who understands what
happened," Pierce aide Rob-
ert Dwyer said. "We've talked
with him and we still don't know
what is going on."
EVEN if that error was cor-
rected, Briskey claims other
problems could still render the
election illegal.
Among the strongest accusa-
tions made by Briskey are that
absentee voters were sent sam-
ple ballots already marked for
certain candidates. He also
stated absentee voters were
afraid to return their ballots.
In the letter, Briskey does
not further explain the allega-
tions or how he learned of them.
HE ALSO contends that one
voting machine did not work
correctly and that the machines
were improperly handled after
the polls closed during the time
when the votes were being tal-
lied.
Local election officials - par-
ticularly Ernest LaPointe who
was responsible for setting up
the machines - said there were
no problems other than the
election night mix-up in report-
ing results.
LaPointe took full blame for
that error and attributed it to
"just plain carelessness."
IF Briskey can substantiate
his allegations, he could file a
lawsuit asking that the election
be overturned in Whiteford and
a new one held.
Members of the Pierce cam-
paign have talked with Briskey
and another township candidate
who feels the election was not
properly handled. Pierce has a
staff of Ann Arbor lawyers look-
ing into what legal options are
available to him in the White-
ford incident.
At this time the congressional
candidate has taken no formal
legal action, pending the out-
come of an official election can-
vass being carried out by state
officials. Such a vote check is
a standard procedure after all
elections.
However, Pierce undoubtedly
will ask for a recount in the
close congressional race.
BRISKEY and another defeat-
ed township candidate have al-
ready requested a recount of
the Whiteford Township results.
Underlying much of the offic-
ial talk in Whiteford is the sus-
picion - often not verbalized-
that the election itself was rig-
ged.
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FRI.: Bogart in TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT
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None of the local candidates
or Pierce has actually said the
election has been intentionally
subverted, but many of citizens
grumble about fraud and local
"Watergates."
THESE rumors have not
been confirmed and even those
persons recounting them doubt
if they could ever be legally
proven. "I can't put my finger
on any one thing, but the whole
election smells," said one town-
ship resident active in politics.
"We're not completely satis-
fied," Dwyer said. "We don't
want a tainted election." How-
ever he stresses that the Pierce
campaign does not suspect any
intentional fraud took place.
But behind that official word,
some of the aides just -shake
their heads when they look at
the vote totals in the congres-
sional primary. Although fairly
sure no one tried to directly in-
fluence the Reuther-Pierce out-
come, they wonder about the
township contests.
WHAT first raised the eye-
brows around the Pierce office
was the unusually high num-
Deserters sco
imin~ted amnel
STOCKHOLM, Sweden (A)-A
spokesman for the estimated 350
American miiltary deserters in
Sweden r e j e c t e d yesterday
President Ford's statement sug-
gesting conditional amnesty to
deserters.
"We want universal and un-
conditional amnesty for resis-
ters, deserters and those veter-
ans who have been given dis-
honorable discharge," said Mike
Powers, 24, of New York.
He said 900,000 Americans fall
into those categories, not the
50,000 Ford mentioned in a
speech Monday.
"But of course we are pleased
that the amnesty question was
brought up at all," said Powers,
who fled here in 1968 and now
teaches English.
He said Ford's statement was
"an attempt to make public
opinion forget the Watergate
scandal and the continuing Viet-
nam war," and "we are not in-
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her of votes polled by Thee
Williams in the congressional
primary.
In Whiteford he gamed some
60 votes - 16 per cent of all'
those cast - while across the
entire district the retired engi-
neer received only three per
cent, finishing a distant last in
the five-way battle.
Williams did not campaign
in the Whiteford area and ac-
cording to Pierce workers had
never heard of the township
when asked about it shortly af-
ter the election.
THE other four congressional
candidates, including Pierce,
had done some minimal work in
the region, although that section
of the district is generally con-
ceded to be Reuther territory.
Consequently, the Pierce aides
are at a loss to explain how
their candidate trailed Williams
in the township by a margin of
more than three to one.
And as Pierce himself said
in a meeting with his workers
last week: "I'd hate to lose this
thing on an error - where we
didn't even know what hap-
pened."
rn F ord's
iosty offer
terested in forgetting either
one."
More than 700 deserters came
to Sweden during the seven
years since the first four ar-
rived here from the U.S. Carrier
"Intrepid" in 1967.
The Swedish S o c i a 1 Demo-
cratic government had been a
harsh critic of American in-
volvement in Indochina and it
is believed that the refuge given
to deserters influenced the
American decision to down-
grade diplomatic relations at
one stage. Normal relations
were restored earlier this year.
The deserters were granted
residence permits on the
grounds that they risked being
sent to a scene of war.
Some Americans here have
said that if amnesty were grant-
ed, not more than 50 percent
would leave Sweden.
In Canada, where many draft
evaders fled, reaction also was
cool to the Ford speech. "Many
people want to go back very
badly, including myself, but we
don't want to go back under
conditions like this," said Gerry
Condon, managing editor of war
resister's m a g a z i n e, Amex-
Canada.
Condon said the President had
taken "a very tough stand .. .
it's just asking for another
pound of flesh from people who
resisted a war they felt was
illegal and immoral." He esti-
mated 25,000 Vietnam exiles are
in Canada.
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