THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, April 17, 1995 TAG: 9504170031
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: Betty Gray
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
Outside the state legislative building in Raleigh, there are signs of spring.
Carefully groomed beds and pots of flowers and trees are in bloom with a delicious display of colors and smells to the delight of lobbyists, lawmakers and members of the public as they approach the building.
Inside, there are early signs of another, more dreaded time of the year - the silly season in the General Assembly.
One sign of the start of the silly season is a bill, filed in early April by Rep. John W. ``Bill'' Hurley, a Cumberland County Democrat, that would adopt square dancing as the official ``American folk dance'' of North Carolina, clogging as the official ``folk dance'' and shagging as the official ``beach dance'' of North Carolina.
Another entry - and a perennial favorite among some lawmakers - is a bill filed earlier this month dealing with football.
Every other year about this same time, some befuddled state legislator usually decides it's time to micro-manage the football schedules of the state's three largest state-supported universities - the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University in Raleigh and East Carolina University in Greenville.
And, right on schedule, here it is again - a bill that requires the Carolina and State football teams to play E.C.U. beginning no later than the 1999 season.
This year's Athletic Director-Meddler Award goes to a bipartisan group - Reps. John M. Nichols, a Republican from Craven County, and Alex Warner, a Cumberland County Democrat, sponsors of the bill in the House, and Sens. Ed N. Warren, a Pitt County Democrat, and J. Richard Conder, a Richmond County Democrat.
Not surprisingly, two of the four, Nichols and Conder, received their bachelor's degrees from E.C.U., while Warren and Warner received graduate degrees from the school.
Nichols and Warren are old hands at this great football debate.
As a freshman, Nichols disguised his Carolina-must-play-ECU-football-game-bill under the title: ``An act to provide additional funding for women's athletics without requiring additional appropriations by the General Assembly.''
At the time, Nichols displayed signs of greater things to come - he showed that he had quickly learned the art of obfuscation.
But as a freshman Republican, Nichols was fairly easy to ignore and his bill stood little chance of success. As a sophomore legislator, however, Nichols is a member of the majority party and he's had an easy time promoting his largely conservative agenda.
I think I know the root of the problem.
During the 1960s and 1970s as a teenager in Washington, N.C., just 22 miles from the campus of East Carolina University, I saw the angst many of my neighbors went through when they applied to attend Carolina and State - the ``in'' schools for most of us then.
The feeling among my friends, at that time, was that if weren't accepted at Carolina or State, there was always E.C.U.
In the ensuing 20 to 30 years, E.C.U. has gone on to become a respected university with a medical school that is the pride of eastern North Carolina. Many of the E.C.U. students of the 1960s and 1970s have done well enough in life to reach the top of their professions, make millions of dollars and have the time and ability to become successful politicians.
But these E.C.U. graduates are still trying to make up for their apparent ``failure'' to attend Carolina and State by trying to push those schools around on the playing fields instead of the academic fields of endeavor.
Carolina and State don't want to play their sister school - leaving thousands of frustrated E.C.U. fans at a loss for proving their worth.
I have a few words for all purple-and-gold Pirate-fan-legislators and lawmaker-athletic-director wannabes.
Get a life.
Get some therapy.
E.C.U. has overcome its runner-up reputation of the 1960s and 1970s.
You can, too. by CNB