The shoot-out at the Crazy-U corral is about to begin.
On one side of the fence stand Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff and his state Legislature deputies. On the other stand U president Bernie “the kid” Machen and his band of academic desperados. The battle is shaping up over the U’s ban on concealed weapons on campus.
Machen appeared before the Legislature’s Administrative Rules Review Committee on Monday in defense of the policy. According to a legal ruling recently issued by Shurtleff, the policy violates the state’s 1995 concealed weapons carrying law. The law allows properly licensed gun owners to carry their weapons in public. It also prohibits any state agency from formulating gun policy without specific legislative approval.
In a front-page article in the Salt Lake Tribune on Sunday, Machen argued that allowing weapons on campus would destroy academic freedom. “The presence of firearms on campus would undermine this free-flowing exchange of ideas,” he said.
Machen is right. At a good university, faculty and students engage in argument and discussion, trusting that no kind of force (administrative, academic, or violent) will be used to advance ideas. The notion that students need a weapon capable of administering death at any moment just to feel safe is paranoid and poorly grounded. It sets the whole campus on edge and undermines the university’s educational mission.
U students must keep in mind, however, that this gunfight is more about the fight than the guns. The 1995 law that placed firearm regulation under legislative control is a blatant power grab. The law attempts to override traditional administrative oversight and symbolizes a larger struggle between the U and conservatives who resent its commitment to academic freedom.
Traditionally, government functions on the basis of separation of powers. The legislature drafts and forms the law and the executive enforces it. This system allows the governor and his appointed officials to administer the law flexibly and efficiently.
Conservatives in the state Legislature, however, are intent on using the concealed weapons law to put the heavy on local administrative control. Legislators first passed the law in 1995 in response to a Salt Lake City ordinance requiring a waiting period for gun purchases. After the city won a court battle over its ordinance, the legislature cracked down and centralized firearm regulations.
Conservatives used the law again just recently to handcuff Gov. Leavitt and force him to give in to pro-gun demands. As a result of a ruling issued by Shurtleff, the State Department of Human Resources (under the governor’s direction) changed its regulations prohibiting state employees from bringing their guns to work.
With Salt Lake City and the governor safely placed in a cage, gun advocates are now gleefully discussing the prospect of taming an even larger beast, the University of Utah.
The antagonism between U administrators and conservative Republican state legislators is well-known and well-publicized. Many conservatives resent all of the so-called “liberal” thought coming out of the U. They see it as a bastion of anti conservatism. How else to explain the U’s poor funding? Though in many states the flagship universities (such as Berkeley, Wisconsin and Virginia) are well-funded and widely respected, conservative bias in favor of smaller, less “liberal” state colleges and Brigham Young University prevents the U from getting more government help.
The gun issue now offers conservatives a perfect chance to take revenge. It’s highly polar and hotly debated and has President Machen in a bind.
Conservatives are pulling out all the stops. For example, The Salt Lake Tribune quoted Charles Hardy, a spokesman for Gun Owners of Utah. He advocated “punishing” the U by passing “a 20 percent [budget] cut?until they pull their head out.” Similarly, state legislators are lining up in opposition to President Machen, threatening to force their will down his administrative throat.
The conservatives’ victory may be less sweet, however, when LDS church-owned BYU becomes subject to the same uniform regulations. If the state wins a lawsuit against the U, the church would also be forced to alter its policy at BYU. Imagine church President Gordon B. Hinckley then speaking out against repealing the gun ban. LDS conservatives who’ve made their political career chanting “Guns, God and Country” would have to rethink their position if God no longer likes guns.
Though conservatives paint this most recent battle between President Machen and the state Legislature as a gun rights question, it’s actually about power. A victory on this issue will allow legislative oversight to creep further into the U, having potentially dire consequences for academic freedom. Legislators who control gun policy now may take control of decisions concerning hiring, academic departments and budget allocation in the future.
U students, faculty and staff, therefore, must rally in support of President Machen. When Sheriff Shurtleff and his posse come riding up, we need to have our political six shooters ready.
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