College Republicans President Stephen
MacGudwin wrote a letter to the editor in the Daily on Friday,
informing the campus community his group “in no way endorses
or encourages support of the Michigan Civil Rights
Initiative.” Claiming that the Daily had no justification for
recognizing his organization as an MCRI supporters in an editorial
that ran in Thursday’s Daily, he recommended that the Daily
staff “take five minutes to contact student organizations in
the future, before writing factually incorrect editorials against
them.”
- Mira Levitan
After reviewing the editorial in question, the Daily stands by
its precedent. The message being promoted by the College
Republicans through its website seems to conflict strongly with the
assertion that the local chapter of the College Republicans does
not support the MCRI.
On the organization’s website, under the heading
“Connerly and the MCRI, the latest battle has begun,”
there is a picture of Ward Connerly, and alongside it an asterisked
recommendation to come to its office and sign the MCRI petition. On
Feb. 12, the College Republicans sponsored a members-only event
with Jennifer Gratz as the guest speaker. Gratz, the plaintiff in
one of the University’s cases challenging the use of race in
its admissions policies, is also the executive director of the
MCRI. At this event, she spoke of her support for the ballot
initiative, encouraging other supporters to sign it.
If it is not the intention of College Republicans to support the
MCRI, then it would serve them well to make the necessary changes
to its website and discontinue the practice of using its office as
a forum to gather support for the petition. Otherwise, it is
impossible to reconcile the assertion that College Republicans does
not support the initiative with the materials presented on its
website.