Western Front - 1983 April 19

              Western's sailing resort
on Lake Whatcom/p. 9
Rufus Jones School takes no-nonsense i l l
Vol. 75, No. 23 Western Washington University, Bellingham, Wash. Tuesday, April 19,1983
Sasway: Decision to kill must be yours
By JEFF KRAMER
The first American draff resis-ter
to be indicted since the Viet­nam
War criticized the U.S.
government for its selective
enforcement of the draft registra­tion
law and vowed he will never
comply with it under any cir­cumstances,
during a Saturday
morning meeting at the Campus
Christian Ministry.
Ben Sasway, who grabbed
national headlines for his public
refusal to register for the draft in
1980, told an intimate gathering
that only vocal resisters in con­servative
areas of the country
were prosecuted while those
who simply didn't conscript were
left alone.
Sasway, a San Diego native on
leave from his political science
and philosophy studies at Hum­boldt
State University, spent 40
days in prison last October after a
federal judge ruled him a "flight
risk" and a danger to the
community.
Sentenced to 30 months in a
federal work camp, Sasway was
released pending the outcome of
an appeal. He now is lecturing full
time to raise money for legal
expenses.
One of IS individuals to be
prosecuted for not registering,
the articulate 22-year-old spent
much of Saturday morning level­ing
criticism at American defense
priorities and foreign policy.
"What all this defense prepara­tion
is really for is to enforce our
will throughout the world," Sas­way
declared."... under this pol­icy,
I'm going to be killing people
for bananas, possibly. And in my
perception, that's not what it
means to be a human being."
Sasway contended that the dif­ference
betwen registration and
an actual draft was insignificant.
"When they say there isn't a draft,
they expect us to believe it while
they're printing up draft forms,"
he said. "And they say there's no
war, but I want to know what's
going on in El Salvador right
now."
Sasway also argued that com­pulsory
registration conflicts
with democracy.
"The act (of registering) gives an
important moral, ethical state­ment.
You're admitting the
government has a right to make a
decision for you. The decision of
whether or not to kill people has
to be one of the most important
decisions you'll ever make."
Later he added, "If you take
personal responsibility for your
life, similarly to the way I did, you
can go to jail..and that's kind of
scary."
During his trial, Sasway said he
was not allowed to explain his
reasons for violating the law. Pre­siding
Judge Gordon Thompson,
Jr. only allowed the jury to
determine if Sasway had regis­tered
or not, a legal point Sasway
takes issue with.
"It seems to me that a jury
should be able to determine
whether or not I'm a criminal and
whether or not I should be
thrown in jail," he said.
Ironically, Sasway, who has no
desire to return to prison, thinks
doing so could help his cause.
"Right now, a lot of people are
thinking the draft issue has gone
away," he said. "(But) if draft resis­ters
end up in jail, I think it's
going to put on political pressure
that could mean the end of draft
registration." Sasway said he
found it humorous that the
government spent $20,000 to get
him in jail and $60 a day keeping
him there in an effort to get him to
change his mind.
Photo by James Woods
Ben Sasway accused the U.S. government of selective enforcement of
the draft registration law and vowed he will never comply with it under
any circumstances. Sasway was in Bellingham to raise money for legal
expenses.
During an intermission Satur­day,
Sasway said he will never
register.
"I think if there's a legitimate
need, people will come to the
defense of their country. The
question is: What are we defend­ing?
We're not defending Puget
Sound."
During his two-hour appear­ance,
Sasway charged officials
with wrapping American foreign
policy in a "cloak of secrecy."
"The whole point of having a
bunch of spies running around is
contrary to having a free, open,
above-the-board country," he
said, referring to the CIA.
He called for a "tighter public
grip on the military." "I am per­fectly
willing to let people across-the-
board make those kinds of
(defense) decisions as long as
they have the right information,"
he said.
Sasway also said the general
aims of a foreign policy are easy to
understand even if the technicali­ties
are not. "I don't think you
have to know how the plutonium
works in a missile to understand
our foreign policy," he said.
Sasway called for the con­tinued
growth of non-violent
means of conflict resolution, like
those perpetuated by Martin
Luther King and Gandhi. He
lauded the nuclear freeze move­ment
as an important but limited
first step.
"The nuclear freeze is impor­tant,
but it doesn't make us all
that more safe. It's a band-aid
when we really need a face lift or
plastic surgery."
He observed that people can be
"just as dead with conventional
weapons."
Active in the peace movement
since high school, Sasway said he
chose the path of public resist­ance
"not so much to keep myself
out of it (a war), but to keep ev­erybody
out of it.
"What I've tried to do is delib­erately
throw a wrench in the
cogs," he said. Sasway denied any
role as a leader of the resistance
movement however, saying he
merely has tried to bring up the
issue for public debate so people
can make up their minds.
"If I am any kind of a leader, it is
by example," he said.
Swift pushes strong U.S. /China
ties, slams Latin America policy
By PAM HELBERG
Dismal US-Chinese relations,
severely lacking Chinese tech­nology
and a "not very prudent
policy" by this country toward
Latin America were the chief top­ics
covered by Rep. Al Swift (D-
2nd District) in a Bellingham
appearance Saturday.
Swift spoke to nearly 100 peo­ple
at a League of Women Voters
luncheon held in his honor at the
Bellingham YWCA.
He avoided discussing the fed­eral
government's stance on
higher education, admitting that
his knowledge on the subject is
"abysmally" lacking. He spent the
greater part of the two-hour con­ference
talking about issues sur­rounding
his recent 10-day tour
of China. : : : . ' ' '
Swift skimmed over the recent
US decision to grant a Chinese
tennis star political asylum and
outlined three "enormously emo­tional"
reasons for the context ef
US-Chinese relations: the US's
ambiguous policy toward reuni­fication
with Taiwan, our exploi­tive
use of China's status in the
world marketplace, and using
China as a play-off against the
Soviet Union.
Swift called current relations
more strained now than ever
since normal relations were rein­stated
in the Nixon era.
He advocated a return to nor­mal
relations, noting that the
Pacific states and, more impor­tantly,
the Pacific Northwest has a
tremendous stake in the future
development of Chinese
technology: .
The Pacific Northwest logging
industry has a specific stake in
good relations, Swift said. Refined
lumber currently is exported
because the Chinese have no
mills to refine raw logs. Improved
technology could change that,
resulting in higher exports, Swift
said.
The Chinese are in the process
of setting up meetings with
representatives from Georgia-
Pacific, Weyerhauser and ITT to
discuss future direct trade
possibilities.
"China is vibrating with poten­tial,"
Swift said. "But they've only
developed to 5 percent of their
hydroelectric capacity."
Swift blamed poor US involve-
• See NW FUTURE/page 2
Prof bargaining
bill passes House
By ELAYNE ANDERSON
A bill enabling university professors to vote whether they want
collective bargaining passed the House Friday, but is waiting con­currence
between the House and Senate on amendments.
Milt Krieger, president of the local American Federation of
Teachers, said amendments have postponed Senate Bill 3042 from
reaching Gov. John Spellman's hands, but that he expects the bill to
leave the Legislature this week
One of the changes the bill has undergone while in the House is
removing graduate students and medical residents from inclusion
in collective bargaining.
If the bill is passed into law, faculty would vote whether they wish
to bargain collectively. If they vote in favor of collective bargaining, a
second vote would decide which organization or union would
represent them.
Les Blackwell, president of the American Association of Univer­sity
Professors, said the issue of collective bargaining is not only
salaries, but working conditions, such as equipment and the
number of students in a class.
The main opposition to the biil has been from the Council of
• See PRESIDENTS/page 2