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Show Editorials Vote No! Somebody is trying to pull a sneaky on the studentbody. Tomorrow's ballot bal-lot includes a referendum vote on the Advisory Cabinet. The action is to I move the Cabinet out of the ASUU Constitution. Actually it is a subtle move to destroy the Cabinet entirely. Qranted, Advisory Cabinet has not ;been very effective this year. The only ircason for this, however, lies with the present Executive Council and more specifically with the Organizations Board. The Cabinet could have work-fed work-fed if the Council would have given it a chance. The prevailing opinion was that it was no good, so the results were ;no good. i Basically the idea of an Advisory "Cabinet is sound. It offers more students stu-dents a voice in student government. The Cabinet should be made up of different dif-ferent student organization heads who would express opinion to the Executive Council. It is an integral part of our present constitution. Without it stuT dents must rely on 1 7 executive Council Coun-cil members to represent them. With it the mass of students can have a voice through their special interest organizations. organiza-tions. The studentbody elections certainly do not give the Executive Council the entire opinion of the students so that, they can speak up on all issues. The Advisory Cabinet is built into the sys-. tern to give the Council an idea of how students react to the issues of the day. The present Council has done a good job of finding a substitute for the Advisory Cabinet. The Executive Studentbody Stu-dentbody Sound-Offs (ESSO) have given vent to many student concerns. Through the meetings of the Executive Council with interested student groups many points of general interest have come up. The best example would be the late opening of the Huddle during finals. The need was presented to the Council during an ESSO. The Council took it to Union Board. Union Board acted to open the facility for those students who were: studying late. Many students took advantage of the late opening. Applause for ESSOs. But a standing committee would give a continuing channel for such communications form students to the Council. The ESSOs are great, they should not be abolished. They do not fill the entire need of Advisory Cabinet, however. The Cabinet leaves the door open for any reaction at any time. It lets students feel that they are more directly direct-ly involved in student government. And more importantly it gives students a standing forum to air their gripes. One of the real worries of the present pres-ent Council and those hoping to eliminate elim-inate the Cabinet is that the Advisory Cabinet has no power. It would indeed in-deed be humorous if an "advisory" body did have, real power. Any power , necessary for such a group to express opinion is the power to express opinion. This certainly is inherent in the present Cabinet if it were allowed to function. The Cabinet is good. No one at present really doubts that. The move is to get the Advisory Cabinet out of the constitution and into the by-laws. Why? Because to move something out of the by-laws doesn't require a major constitutional change. It can be done on the sly by an Executive Council. We doubt that any Council would do this. But why leave the door open? Tha referendum reads, "Should the Advisory Cabinet be removed from the Constitution?" We strongly urge the studentbody to vote NO. Don't leave the door open for a future Executive Council to do away with this much needed student voice. |