The Ivy Council unanimously passed a resolution supporting the use of race in college admissions policies at their spring conference held this weekend at the University. The council, whose members come from all Ivy League schools except Harvard University, voted 28-0 yesterday morning in support of the statement.
Princeton was the only school that held a referendum to gauge student support for affirmative action, an issue at the heart of two lawsuits heard by the Supreme Court last Tuesday. The suits allege that the University of Michigan's race-conscious admissions policies deny white applicants their equal protection rights.
About 65 percent of Princeton students supported the pro-affirmative action resolution put to a referendum.
"From the individual resolutions brought by the member schools, the Ivy Council drafted a joint resolution by combining the opinions of all the individual schools," said Bryan Hiscox '04, the University's head delegate.
The draft was then given to the 50 individual participants in the conference. Four students from each of the schools voted on the final resolution, following debates about the statement's scope and wording.
"The priority was that the statement be representative of all student bodies," said USG Treasurer and voting council member Kyle Detwiler '05.
USG president Pettus Randall '04 presented the results of the referendum yesterday morning to the council and stressed that student voices should be taken into account on political issues.
"I encouraged the Ivy Council to take action and to take every effort to publicize how students of the Ivy League feel," he said in a phone interview.
"Often a criticism of student governments is that they let issues die after a vote is taken," Randall said. "We can't let this issue die."
The Ivy Council's decision to pass a resolution sparked debate on campus as to whether the USG should make political decisions on behalf of the student body.
The University was the only member school that abstained from voting on the Ivy Council's fall resolution that denounced the "Drug-Aid" provision in the Higher Education Act.
"In terms of achieving an accurate perception, I personally think that it is the best way," Hiscox said, in response to whether student referenda would be held for future Ivy Council resolutions.
During the biannual weekend conference, the delegates also discussed other issues affecting campus life, including university finances and perceptions of student governments.
After the conference, Detwiler said he would like to formalize the process of selecting Ivy Council delegates from the University.
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