Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 28, 1995 TAG: 9501310032
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
That was then; this is now. This week, it was the other side's turn to be hoist with the petard of an argument made by many of those who consider themselves champions of women's rights.
There may be more petards to come.
By a 2-1 decision Thursday, a panel of the 4th Circuit upheld U.S. District Judge Jackson Kiser's approval of the plan whereby VMI won't have to go coed. Instead, the court agreed, the Virginia Women's Institute for Leadership at Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, to open this fall, can count as the state's women-only alternative to men-only VMI.
Under the plan, each in-state student at the Mary Baldwin institute will benefit from a $7,308 state subsidy equal to what the commonwealth spends per student at VMI. In addition, the private VMI Foundation is supplying a $5.5 million endowment to the new program.
In its first crack at the case, which was brought by the U.S. Justice Department, the appeals court had said the status quo could not continue. VMI can't have it both ways, the court had ruled: If a single-sex education is as valuable as VMI was arguing, then Virginia could not constitutionally provide the opportunity only for men and not also for women.
Some women's-rights advocates stood on the side of Justice in calling for a coeducational VMI. Others almost from the first - including leaders of a number of private women's colleges, among them Mary Baldwin - sided with VMI. Though VMI's status as a state institution has been central to the dispute, they feared a ruling against the men-only policy at the VMI might eventually lead to legal difficulties with their women-only policies.
Thus, the case underlined the existence of two trends in feminist thinking that aren't always easy to reconcile. There is opposition to the paternalistic notion that women need special protecting. But the value of, say, women's colleges, is often argued on the grounds that women thrive when separated from the worldlier setting of coeducation.
The VMI-Mary Baldwin plan upheld this week reflects the second line of thinking. Not only does it allow the perpetuation of segregation by sex, but it does so by approving a program for women at Mary Baldwin that will be less regimented (and perhaps better for it) than the program for men at VMI.
The tension between the anti-paternalism and pro-protection views is apt to persist even if this particular case is settled.
Which hasn't happened yet. The Justice Department may decide to appeal the latest ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Even if no such appeal is made, the case is still alive: The appeals panel returned it to the District Court for oversight of the plan's implementation. In his dissent, Judge J. Dickson Phillips said the plan won't work. If he's right, more litigation could be in store.
The VMI case has raised - but not answered - other questions, too.
Mary Baldwin is a private, nominally sectarian institution. Does the plan not only blur the private-public distinction but also raise the possibility of a church-state difficulty?
At $7,308 per undergraduate, Virginia's subsidy for both VMI and the Mary Baldwin institute is considerably higher than average for the state. Is it only a matter of time before budget-cutters get around to them?
Women are taking their place in the business, professional, academic and military arenas in ways unimaginable a generation ago. In pursuing a plan that groups students not by talent or interest but by gender, has Virginia bought into an anachronism?
by CNB