The Daily Tar Heel
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The Daily Tar Heel

All bone, no meat

Student Body President Matt Calabria was right to veto a negative campaigning bill that would be little help to campaigns or officials.

Members of Student Congress have dedicated themselves to revising parts of the Student Code and to removing some of its most unclear, ambiguous language.

But good execution is even more important than good intention. And in terms of its legislation regarding negative campaigning, Congress has misfired.

Student Body President Matt Calabria quite validly used his veto, a power of the office that hadn't been employed in more than a year, to return the bill to Congress. The legislation was supposed to give the Board of Elections power to penalize campaigns for negative words and actions - but it doesn't actually do so. Congress has produced a vague definition and a stern disapproval rather than a clear course of action.

The vetoed legislation leaves all parties in a lurch. The BOE would have no sure mandate for what to enforce and how to enforce it. Meanwhile, campaigns would have to grapple with internal and external conflicts about speech and tactics that might or might not be "unsubstantiated, subjective and defamatory."

The bill doesn't provide clear definitions of subjective and defamatory remarks for the BOE to consider, and it doesn't elaborate enough about what campaigns should deem inappropriate. There are degrees of defamation and shades of subjectivity.

Congress members must define the legislation's terms to a greater extent and must clarify what they consider to be inappropriate campaign speech. Congress should say what it means and not force candidates to look up words in the dictionary.

It should go further than a hazy definition and should afford the board punitive powers.

For the student body's president to say that the bill in its current form would create a chill effect on candidates' speech is telling. Now it's time for Congress to produce something that candidates and the BOE alike can easily understand and use.

There's no question that Congress has been working hard to fix the Code and to clean up campus elections. But members need to figure out what they must do to make their body's final work as effective and complete as possible - before it goes to the student body president's desk.

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