2008 Woodie Awards
Punishing the candidates who ran a clean campaign
Issue date: 4/24/08
To put it simply, I'm disappointed by recent developments that have taken place in the student council elections on account of decisions by the appeals committee and by Student Council.
First of all, the decision made by the Appeals Committee to disqualify all candidates running for executive Council positions was rash and overly aggressive. I think the Appeals Committee wrongly chose to ignore the decision made by the Committee on Student Elections (CSE), which only voted to disqualify five of the nine candidates. The CSE was created for a reason Â- to run and monitor elections as a disinterested bodyÂÂ - and I think that we should leave more discretion up to them to perform their function. They are the ones setting rules and have been following the election process with the utmost scrutiny. It doesn't make sense that their decision can be so easily overturned by three people on the Appeals board, who only met for one afternoon (and one of whom sits as the president of Council).
It was also a poor decision to push back the executive elections. From a principled point of view, I don't think it's appropriate to hold new elections two weeks later that disregard all campaign violations that were made in the first. The fact is that those violations (such as mass e-mails asking for fraternity brothers to vote for a candidate) will still have influence on this new election, giving the candidates who violated campaign policy an unfair advantage in this upcoming election. Those candidates who ran a clean campaign are at a disadvantage for following the rules. Still the Appeals Committee is clearly bent on redoing the executive elections. To compensate for the disadvantaged candidates the Appeals Committee should institute vote penalties in the upcoming elections to reprimand the candidates who failed to play fair.
Furthermore, the decisions of the Appeals Committee forced the CSE to postpone the timing of class elections without asking for the opinion of or input from anyone involved in the class elections. It appears as if the class elections were shoved off to the side for no good reason. If we want to talk about increasing voter turnout on campus, it is not a wise tactic to tell the student body for a month that elections will be on a certain day and then suddenly postpone them the day before the set date.
First of all, the decision made by the Appeals Committee to disqualify all candidates running for executive Council positions was rash and overly aggressive. I think the Appeals Committee wrongly chose to ignore the decision made by the Committee on Student Elections (CSE), which only voted to disqualify five of the nine candidates. The CSE was created for a reason Â- to run and monitor elections as a disinterested bodyÂÂ - and I think that we should leave more discretion up to them to perform their function. They are the ones setting rules and have been following the election process with the utmost scrutiny. It doesn't make sense that their decision can be so easily overturned by three people on the Appeals board, who only met for one afternoon (and one of whom sits as the president of Council).
It was also a poor decision to push back the executive elections. From a principled point of view, I don't think it's appropriate to hold new elections two weeks later that disregard all campaign violations that were made in the first. The fact is that those violations (such as mass e-mails asking for fraternity brothers to vote for a candidate) will still have influence on this new election, giving the candidates who violated campaign policy an unfair advantage in this upcoming election. Those candidates who ran a clean campaign are at a disadvantage for following the rules. Still the Appeals Committee is clearly bent on redoing the executive elections. To compensate for the disadvantaged candidates the Appeals Committee should institute vote penalties in the upcoming elections to reprimand the candidates who failed to play fair.
Furthermore, the decisions of the Appeals Committee forced the CSE to postpone the timing of class elections without asking for the opinion of or input from anyone involved in the class elections. It appears as if the class elections were shoved off to the side for no good reason. If we want to talk about increasing voter turnout on campus, it is not a wise tactic to tell the student body for a month that elections will be on a certain day and then suddenly postpone them the day before the set date.
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