Counsel to the Council

When the Student Council tentatively voted last week to abolish the Senior Class Day Committee, it behaved much like the quack doctor who decided to cut off his patient's toe because of a sore toe. Recognizing the evil in the election procedure for the Permanent Class and Class Day Committees is meritable, but the Council should make a more thorough examination of the problem before its final decision tonight.

The Council realizes that the present system encourages many candidates for the honor of the Permanent Committee, while few are willing to try for the scant prestige and harder work of the Class Day Committee, elected a few weeks later. We have advocated combining the two elections. The twelve highest vote-getters, the well-known seniors, would make up the Permanent Committee, which contacts class members for projects in later years. The next two men would be on the Class Day Committee. And in order to insure the coordination needed in planning the Senior Week, the last eight representatives on the ten-man Class Day Committee would be the remaining top man from each House. In contrast, the Council would have the Permanent group take over the duties of both committees, with its bottom eight members elected on a preferential basis from the separate Houses.

While both proposals solve the prestige problem of the Permanent Class Committee, the Council's slapdash elimination of the group only aggravates the situation with new difficulties. The Council's assumption that the Permanent Council has nothing to do in the spring and could plan Senior Week is not entirely correct, since it must approve a constitution and make a number of appointments. Dissolving the Class Day Committee automatically cuts out a number of seniors willing to work for the class.

The most serious objection to the Council's plan is the requirement that each House must have a member on the Permanent Committee. Whereas House representation is justified on the Class Day Committee for cooperation purposes, the Permanent Committee needs popular men for its organizing programs. By pushing its magical formula of having every House represented into the Permanent Class Committee elections, the Council may unfairly eliminate good men merely because they run second in their own House.