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Show Right perspective Making rights real BY BRIAN MASON I believe it was President Wood-row Wood-row Wilson who said, "Your freedom free-dom ends where my 'nose begins." be-gins." The problem of balancing one person's right to act with that of another person's is often an extremely difficult task. This has become increasingly apparent appar-ent as more and more people vigorously and vociferously demand de-mand more rights which they feel they should have but which they have not had in the past. This campus was touched by the problem last spring. Questions Ques-tions raised included : Does the school administration have the authority to prevent "undesirable" "undesir-able" speakers from speaking on campus? Does a certain faction of students have the right to stop other students from attending classes? Do students have the right to effectively stop work in a school administration building by blocking the hallways? Does a group of students have the right to take over the front page of a school newspaper to publish their own viewpoint? Though the First Amendment guarantees a person's freedom of religion, spech, press, assembly, and petition, there has never been a federal law to enforce these rights. The states have for the most part relied on trespass and disorderly conduct statutes to prosecute violations of First Amendment rights. Thus, the 83 students arrested in t h e Park Building last spring were charged with trespassing, not with violating violat-ing the right of personnel in the building to assemble and carry on their work. On June 16, Senator Roman Hruska (R-Nebr.) and Senator Philip Hart (D-Mich.) in the Senate Sen-ate and Rep. William M. MeCul-louch MeCul-louch (R-Ohio) and Rep. Hale Boggs (D-La.) in the House of Representatives, representing both sides of the political spectrum, introduced legislation which will empower the U.S. District Courts "to grant injunctions, upon the request of the Attorney General or private persons, against the threatened or actual interference by any person . . . with the rights of individuals or groups to freedom free-dom of spech, freedom of the press, peaceful assembly, and petition for redress of grievances." Called the "First Amendment Fredoms Act," the bill is designed de-signed to balance rights among groups and individuals. Thus it can be used against police who seize newsmen's cameras or film. It can be used against students who seize buildings and shut down classes. Ie can be used against college administrators who try to bar peaceful, orderly demonstrations demon-strations by students. The proposal for such an act originated with the National Commission Com-mission on the Causes and Prevention Pre-vention of Violence chaired by Dr. Milton Eisenhower. In its report re-port the Commission said: "Despite "De-spite some eloquent and subtle rationalizations for violent methods meth-ods of protest, the record of experience ex-perience is incontroversible. While violent protest is sometimes followed fol-lowed by the concessions sought, it more often produces a degree of counter-violence and public dismay dis-may that may gravely damage the cause for which violence is invoked." In introducing the bill, Sen. Hart said, "It favors no political phil-rsophy phil-rsophy or faction. The act is not designed to prevent those critical of institutions or the viewpoint of other groups from vigorously exercising their First Amendment rights. But they must not infringe in-fringe upon the rights of others." This bill must not be allowed to die as if it were a bill of minor import. In fact, it is one of the most important bills to be intro-ducde intro-ducde since the Civil Rights Acts of 164 and 168. If the bill does not become law, we can revert to either the one extreme of anarchy an-archy and chaos or the other extreme ex-treme of repression and a police state. ..The First Amendment Fredoms Act will give the Attorney Attor-ney General and the Courts the power to dtermine when a person's per-son's rights under the First Amendment are being violated, a power which they must have if that Amendment is not to become be-come just words on a piece of paper. |