THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, March 30, 1995 TAG: 9503300418
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE LENGTH: Short : 42 lines
About 200 University of Virginia students protested the Republican Party's ``Contract With America'' Wednesday at a rally outside the Rotunda.
But far fewer heeded the call of student organizers to walk out of classes and march through the campus.
``The Contract With America is a contract with the nation's corporate elite, with the rich,'' Jody Calemine, a 20-year-old student from Culpeper, told the rally. ``For the rest of America, the contract is a declaration of war!''
Other speakers decried the contract as an attack on the poor, minorities, women, the environment and democracy.
Among the contract's stated goals are to place stricter limits on welfare recipients, letting states control spending for government entitlements such as subsidized school lunches and passing a capital gains tax cut.
The rally was organized by the Coalition Against the Contract With America and was supposed to begin with a mass walkout from classes at 1:30 p.m.
About 50 students began marching from Gilmer Hall toward the Rotunda, and a couple dozen joined the placard-waving group.
But the protesters ran head-on into a much larger procession of students getting out of classes about 2 p.m. and heading for buses and dormitories and other classes. Few joined the march.
One student shook his head and laughed as the marchers went by.
``I'm a Republican,'' said Andreas Xenos, a 22-year-old senior from Fairfax. ``We put up with a liberal view for so long and it's finally changed. I think it's funny this is going on.''
The number at the rally grew to about 200. U.Va. has an enrollment of more than 17,500. by CNB