Six students representing the Keep Coke campaign introduced a resolution to the Vassar Student Association (VSA) Council on Sunday, Nov. 16.
The resolution, which the Council tabled until next week after a period of discussion, called for the overturn of the Nov. 2 resolution recommending that the College ban the sale of Coca-Cola products on campus.
The Keep Coke campaign also presented the Council with 300 signatures from students, faculty and staff who support keeping Coca-Cola sales on campus. Their resolution calls for an open forum discussion and for the Council to rescind its vote on the Kick Coke resolution until they obtain a campus-wide referendum seeking an end to the sale of Coca-Cola products.
The Keep Coke resolution notes that Terrace Apartments President Riane Harper '09 was quoted in an 10.29.08 Miscellany News article as having said of the Kick Coke resolution, "It's not an opinion issue, it's an ethical issue. It's a moral issue." The Keep Coke resolution states that the VSA Council has no authority to make moral decisions for the student body, and accuses the members of the Council of having "overstepped their boundaries and abused their position" in voting in favor of the Kick Coke resolution.
The issue of student government making moral choices for the student body was also addressed at the VSA Council's first discussion of the Kick Coke resolution on Oct. 26.
"I'd just like to say that one of the concerns I have, although I agree with this ethical situation—and I do feel that it is ethically right to get rid of Coca-Cola—[is that] I still feel uncomfortable forcing my ethical opinions onto my constituents," said Cushing House President Mathew Leonard '11 at the Oct. 26 meeting.
The Kick Coke resolution was subsequently tabled until Nov. 2, when Council members presented information that they had gathered after e-mailing their constituents and asking for student opinions.
The Council found that over 70 percent of respondents were in favor of kicking Coke, though they acknowledged that the number was probably inflated because many students responding to several different representatives. The Council subsequently delivered a divided vote in favor of passing the original resolution.
The issue of making decisions based on ethics versus making them based on student opinion was again discussed during the course of the Nov. 2 debate. Some Council members maintained that ethical issues trump student opinion, while others members disagreed.
At the Nov. 16 discussion of the Keep Coke resolution, Leonard noted that the Council had sent the Committee on College Life (CCL) all of the data that they had gathered during the previous week, both for and against kicking Coke. "What we sent to CCL was not a unanimous ‘kick Coke,'" he said.
Many Council members echoed that sentiment and stated that they felt as if they had voted in accordance with student opinion, as indicated by the responses to the e-mails they sent out.
"You reached out and you wanted to get opinions on that, but I still don't think that takes away from this proclamation of it being a moral issue," argued Keep Coke member Erica Seigneur '09.
But the strong language of the resolution bothered many Council members. "Our role is to ‘issue official endorsements and position statements of the VSA'. I caution you against asking us to pass something that tells us we've overstepped our boundaries," said Vice President for Student Life Nate Silver '10, referencing Section 3, Article C of the VSA Constitution.
Silver also wondered why so few students had attended the meeting to support the resolution compared with the number who had come to Council the previous week in support of Kick Coke.
Other Council members found the resolution offensive. "I find this resolution extremely ill-intentioned; I think that the language embedded in it is accusatory against the VSA and not against the decision we made," said Class of 2009 President Luis Hoyos.
"You are extremely incorrect in saying that I acted in my own opinion, and I find that very offensive," Hoyos later added.
Members of Keep Coke told the Council that they had not meant for the language of the resolution to be offensive, and that they only wished to have the Council reconsider the matter.
Seigneur pointed out that the 300 signatures gathered by the Keep Coke campaign constituted more than the 12 percent of the student body. Fifteen percent is required to call for a referendum vote to challenge an amendment to the VSA Constitution.
"That's enough students to challenge an amendment to the Constitution—surely that should be enough students to challenge a resolution," said Seigneur.
Josselyn House President Zachary Wasser '11 stated that he felt that the Keep Coke campaign was too late in its actions and that they should have spoken up when the original resolution was being discussed. Yet he also commended the Keep Coke students for taking a stand.
"I respect you guys for voicing your opinion," said Wasser. "It's not easy on this campus a lot of times when there are a lot of people going one direction, or at least the vocal group going that direction, and you guys stand up and say, ‘We feel this way.'"
The Keep Coke campaign's resolution will be discussed again at the next VSA Council meeting on Sunday, Nov. 23.
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