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Justice is served
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Also by Badger Herald Editorial Board:
- The Invisible Man Award: Wyndham Manning (May 7, 2009)
- The People's Choice Award: Jacqueline Hitchon et. al (May 7, 2009)
- The Lifetime Achievement Award: ASM (May 7, 2009)
- Honest representation (May 5, 2009)
- Junger for ASM Chair (May 5, 2009)
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It's been several weeks since the Student Labor Action Coalition's living-wage referendum passed during the Associated Students of Madison's fall election. After much debate over the legality of this action, we applaud the Student Judiciary for seeing the unconstitutionality of this referendum and holding that it never should have been placed on the ballot.
SLAC's referendum would have prohibited the Student Services Finance Committee from hearing or reviewing the budget proposals of university services — such as University of Wisconsin Recreational Sports, University Health Services and the student unions — that do not provide all of their employees with "living wages."
We believe the Student Judiciary took the right position in stating that the referendum effectively violated the Supreme Court's decision in Southworth, which determined the constitutionality of UW's segregated-fee system. The referendum violated the principle of viewpoint neutrality by changing the bylaws of ASM that referred to the distribution of segregated fees.
If the Student Judiciary had not decided in its unanimous decision that SLAC's referendum was unconstitutional, student participation would have been absent in the segregated-fee distribution process. Rather, SLAC's political statement would have prevented students from reviewing the budgets of organizations receiving non-allocable fees that did not provide all of their employees with a wage of slightly more than $10. As a result, Chancellor Wiley would have been given complete discretion to determine the budgets of these organizations. Students would not have been able to participate in the shared-governance process.
Finally, after several weeks in limbo, students' ability to participate in the segregated fee distribution process has been restored. It's nice to see that SLAC's antics have been put to rest.
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Oh, pish posh. This campus overwhelmingly supports a living wage for workers - and we'll get there, one way or another.