H -°, L 7° | Tomorrow: 
H 17°, L 4°An anti-war panel discussion scheduled to be held at Memorial Union tonight was displaced due to security costs, communication breakdowns and sponsorship withdrawals.
Spokesperson for the Campus Antiwar Network and Badger Herald Opinion writer Steve Horn distributed a press release Sunday morning announcing that the event, which was at different points set to be sponsored by CAN, Madison International Socialist Organization, the University of Wisconsin Havens Center, Middle East Interest Group and the Wisconsin Union Directorate’s Society and Politics Committee, would no longer be held in the Union.
Horn said in the release the reason for the cancellation of the event was the Union demanding they pay for four security guards for controversial anti-war panelist Cindy Sheehan.
Horn said in an interview the reservation was made two weeks in advance of the event and he was not told about the security until Friday, at which point they said he would not be able to hire security in time.
“I couldn’t believe that over a weekend they couldn’t get in touch with anyone that works on security,” Horn said.
Horn asked friends and organizations to talk to the Union about this issue Friday. A friend, former Herald Editorial Page Editor Eric Schmidt, acting as a neutral party, e-mailed Union Building and Events Manager Roger Vogts, saying the cancellation of the event may be a violation of the first amendment under a supreme court decision which said free speech cannot be financially burdened.
However, spokesperson for the Union Marc Kennedy said it was actually not the security fee that canceled the reservation. He said the reservation, which was initially made by spokesperson for ISO Rob Lewis, was never a valid reservation to begin with.
Because the group being asked to speak — a Chicago based organization called Free and Equal — is outside UW, they need a department to sponsor the event, not just a group of student organizations. He said though there was some talk of the event being sponsored by Havens Center, in the end it withdrew its sponsorship.
Kennedy also said many attempts were made to contact the student organizations hosting the event last week, but the Union was unable to reach anybody until Friday, when ISO withdrew their sponsorship because they did not want to be involved with the outside group. He said if they had gotten in touch earlier, the event might have gone on as planned.
Lewis would not comment on the details of the planning, but he did say there needed to be better communication and collaboration on both sides.
Horn later stated ISO did withdraw their sponsorship, adding that is when Havens Center was brought in to sponsor. He said they withdrew Saturday when they became aware of the security cost.
Sheehan said she did not hear about the cancellation of the reservation at the Union until she was driving to Madison Sunday afternoon. She said as far as she knew, the cancellation was due to the security fee and she was not sure why a panel featuring her should have to pay it.
“I’m not exactly sure how to react yet,” she said. “The only thing I’ve ever done is advocate for peace in a very peaceful way.”
Free and Equal Founder and Chair Christina Tobin — who also heard the fee was the reason for the cancellation — said she was outraged. She said she thinks the security fee was charged to the group because she and Sheehan have a liberal outlook.
She added no matter where the event takes place, it will happen. Horn said it was likely to be on the steps of the union.
Schmidt also noted without full permission, Horn lifted a paragraph in his release word for word from an e-mail previously sent from Schmidt to Vogts. Although Schmidt did not give permission for the phrasing to be borrowed, Horn said he had permission to use the information in the e-mail.
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If the Union has standard procedural rules for when security is required and who has to pay for it and applies these rules to all organizations, then the decision to cancel is not in violation of the first amendment, provided that the rule is not applied differently dependent on the viewpoint of the organization.
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Conservative groups commonly have to pay security fees to bring in speakers to the UW. Additionally, the Havens Center is a left-wing joke. There is no way that a comparable right-wing center would be allowed to exist on campus.
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This is just the Anti-war group being sour because they couldn’t handle the standard requirements that the Union gives to all groups who reserve rooms. Now the group is using some low blows (rights violations) to see if they can get extreme liberals in an uproar at the Union.
It’s just plain ridiculous.
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So this is where we are—-the corporate funded stupid white men of the ‘tea party’ have managed to bring a MAINSTREAM peace movement to their level of ‘outsider’—-IF U OF WIS AT MADISON IS TO REMAIN A CREDIBLE UNIVERSITY THIS EVENT MUST BE ALLOWED TO CONTINUE IN ITS ROOM.
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If the Haven’s Center pulled its sponsorship of the event, according to regent board policies, a non-UW entity/event/organization may not use the Union. The security issue is a non-issue so long as there is no departmental sponsorship.
The Haven’s Center brought Noam Chomsky to speak, for free, at the Orpheum. Chomsky is not a joke.
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Very glad this event is happening and that the various misunderstandings were cleared up. I see that the situation was significantly more complicated than I thought when I wrote that initial email to Roger, who is an all-around decent human being working at an all-around decent campus union that I was proud to be a part of during my time at UW.
Yet there are still constitutional questions that remain (as there are in so many things), and I hope those are not muted simply because this event came back to order so smoothly.