
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, April 12, 1990                   TAG: 9004120653
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B6   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: DANIEL HOWES HIGHER EDUCATION WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

JUNE 4 HEARING MAY GIVE VMI HINT OF COURT RULING

Virginia Military Institute may get some indication June 4 of whether it will be forced to admit women, when its attorneys meet with U.S. District Judge Jackson Kiser for a hearing and pretrial conference.

But it is not likely the judge will rule that day on the constitutionality of the 150-year-old school's admissions policy, a Washington and Lee University law professor said Wednesday.

"In a case that's complicated at all, a [federal] judge might take it under advisement and rule in a couple of weeks, or even months," said Alan Ides, who teaches federal jurisdiction at the Lexington college.

The schedule set Wednesday includes an April 30 deadline for briefs opposing three motions already filed in U.S. District Court in Roanoke and a May 14 deadline for any replies to those briefs.

The Justice Department filed a sex-discrimination lawsuit against the all-male school on March 1, saying its admissions policy violated the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

A month earlier, state Attorney General Mary Sue Terry and attorneys for the private VMI Foundation Inc. contended that the federal government did not have the authority to sue VMI, and they asked the court to declare the 1,300-cadet school's admissions policy constitutional and legal.

The Justice Department, before filing its discrimination suit, asked the court to dismiss those motions. Kiser is to consider them in June.

The judge also will review requests by Gov. Douglas Wilder, the state Council of Higher Education and its director, Gordon Davies, to be dismissed as defendants.

Defendants listed in the suit are Wilder; the state; VMI, its board and superintendent; and the state council, its members and officers.

Wilder's office, contending that responsibility for VMI policies rests with its board, said he should be dismissed from the case because the governor has played no role "in establishing or maintaining VMI's allegedly discriminatory admissions policies."

Under state law, the General Assembly controls VMI, and the board of visitors and superintendent operate the school.

The state attorney general's office also asked that the Council of Higher Education and Davies be dismissed from the case.

by CNB