Debate at USU commendable

Last December, we chided Utah State University's College Republicans for a cookie sale where ridicule and ill will were used to make a political statement about affirmative action. Last week, USU students turned things around. They held a serious, invigorating debate over the issue.

We gave them a thumb in the eye for being small-minded in their cookie venture. We owe them a big "thumbs up" for being high-minded in this one.

Affirmative action, a program that offers a leg up to people who traditionally have been held down, is filled with hot-button terms like "quota" and "reparation." It takes the Pledge of Allegiance phrase, "liberty and justice for all" and sets the former against the latter. Conversations heat up. Tempers sometimes flare. And someone tends to feel burned.

At USU, however, 700 students hotly debated the issue and were able — in the end — to produce more light than heat. Three professors and three students discussed the issue, then took questions from the audience. Both sides presented forceful arguments.

If justice were truly equal in America, ran one position, affirmative action wouldn't be needed.

The opposing view held that the original intent of affirmative action had been skewed in the past couple of decades to require "equal results," not just "equal opportunity."

For those not associated with university life, seeing the campus being used as a place for political perspective — not just political protest — was a positive way to patch up the traditional "town-gown" rift that often exists in college towns.

In December, we said "turning the issue (affirmative action) into a stick for beating fellow students . . . simply aggravates people and limits room for discussion."

The students of USU and the College Republicans there should be commended for turning the issue into a carrot that led hundreds to an open forum. Students didn't shelve their passions, but they held them in check so their minds could be engaged.

That is what a university does best.

"Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors," wrote Thomas Huxley.

The fact Aggies on both sides of the issue sat down to talk it out speaks well of them and their institution.