The Silent Sam settlement snafu

The conflicts over the Silent Sam settlement are all over the place, and this posting will have to be updated later on, but it is worth remembering a couple fundamental governance points about this issue.

First: while the Legislature and the BoG have lawful authority here, in this case both the cause of these difficulties and their resolution entail unlawful (and arguably unconstitutional) acts of failure on the part of the BoG. I will be brief.

        The initial failing is that the Board did not sue the legislature for remedy when the monuments legislation (NCGS 100) was enacted. The purpose of the enacting legislation for the University and the authority of the Board (NCGS 116) is to enable the realization of the 

education provisions of the NC Constitution (NC Constitution Article IX) and by legal precedent the equal protection provisions of the US Constitution (14th Amendment). By failing to remove the confederate monument the BoG followed NCGS 100 and did not protect the University as a a public good that conforms with both federal and state equal protection and equal opportunity requirements. That is: the BoG should have sued the legislature for relief from the monuments legislation so that the BoG could fulfill its constitutional duties. 

            Similarly, in its settlement with the Sons of Confederate Veterans regarding the disposition of the Confederate Monument, the BoG again violated its lawful duty to protect the integrity of NC public higher education as a public good that conforms with both federal and state equal protection and equal opportunity requirements. That is: by supporting the SCV and the preservation of Silent Sam, it tacitly endorses opposition to constitutional provisions for equal protection and opportunity. 

The second issue is that irrespective of the BoG's lawful authority, this settlement still entails a violation of several SACSCOC accreditation governance standards: 

            SACSCOC standard 4.3 requires "the institution to clearly outline the active control of these functions by other entities and how the multiple levels of governance relate to the governing board’s responsibilities pertaining to institutional mission, financial operations, and/or institutional policies." The prerogative authority (or authorities) that control the disposition of the Confederate Monument are not clearly enumerated, and the BoG's assertion of its lawful authority is then in violation of accreditation governance standards. 

            SACSCOC standard 4.2.b requires that "the administration and implementation of the general direction set by the board are carried out by the administration and faculty in order to prevent the board from undercutting the authority of the president and other members of the administration and faculty, thereby creating an unhealthy and unworkable governance structure." The BoG has not established any policy regarding the disposition of University property, and by its actions it has undercut the shared governance prerogatives of both system and campus administrators, and the UNCCH faculty.   

            Finally, SACSCOC standard 4.2.f requires that "the board protects and preserves the institution’s independence from outside pressures." Given the points above, and the extant evidence of the BoG's handling of the Silent Sam controversy, the BoG's failure on this requirement should be easy to enumerate. 

So: broken laws and broken accreditation requirements would be my focus. The advantage of these emphases is that there are clear and practicable remedies for the failures. Moral indignation might feel good, but shared governance means having workable plans to fix and prevent these kinds of problems.