[1139] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
Re: wow
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Christopher Beland)
Wed Mar 13 17:54:15 2002
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Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 14:32:56 -0800
From: Christopher Beland <beland@MIT.EDU>
To: MIT-Talk@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: <uv68z8wgpnh.fsf@suspiria.ai.mit.edu>
> Me, I ran for UA VP, and I was an ASA officer for two years.
I remember reading about that UA race. Flashback to *The Tech*, 29
Jan 1993...
---
Theft of ballot Box by Protest Group Forces Delay in UA Election Results
By Reuven M. Lerner
Undergraduate Association elections were disrupted on March 11 when a
group of students calling itself the Student's Revolutionary
Government stole a ballot box from the Lobby 7 polling station.
The unprecedented theft, which completely surprised UA officers and
the election commission, forced a special election for students whose
ballots were stolen and delayed the announcement of election results
for nearly one month.
Four of the five students accused of having taken part in the theft
were eventually ordered to do community service and pay a $60 fine by
the Office of the Dean for Undergraduate Education and Student
Affairs. Charges against the fifth, Jeremy H. Brown '94, were
dismissed after it became clear that he had not participated in the
theft.
[...]
Students involved in the SRG described their action as one of
liberation from a government that did not care about student needs.
"The SRG feels that the UA is ineffectual," said the group's
self-proclaimed ideological leader, identified by a number of sources
as Peter S. Yesley '92, in an anonymous telephone interview one day
after the theft. The caller said, "It was [the group's] right to
incorporate a new government."
The so-called revolutionary group announced itself in a two-page
"manifesto" distributed in dormitories and Institute buildings early
the morning after the theft. The document said that "whenever any form
of government becomes apathetic ... it is the right of students to
alter or abolish it, and to institute new government."
The caller described the theft as the first stage in a revolution
against the UA, but refused to discuss future plans. "It would be nice
if I could tell you all the plans of the government. But then it
wouldn't be the Student's Revolutionary Government; it would be my
government. That's not fair. That's not democratic."
When asked what services he felt a democratic student government
should provide, the caller indicated that Student's social lives would
be greatly improved if student government were truly effective.
[...]
At its April 15 meeting, the UA Council voted unanimously to ask the
Dean's Office to conduct hearings for five of the students thought to
have been involved with the theft. In a resolution, the council
reserved "the right to recommend to the ODUESA any appropriate
sanctions" to be levied against the five students implicated in the
theft-- Brown, Ross A. Lippert '93, Valerie J. Ohm '93, Ralph
A. Santos '92, and Yesley.
---
For the complete story, including eyewitness accounts of the thefts, and
to find out what happened to the ballots and the ballot box, see:
http://www-tech.mit.edu/V112/N67/ballots.00n.html
Beland
Self-Appointed Historian
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