Trustees, not Congress, will decide Chief's future

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A U.S. House subcommittee will hold a field hearing in Champaign next week on a proposal to limit the powers of the NCAA, but no one should expect much to come from the proposal. Congress has a lot more vital matters on its agenda than the "Protection of University Governance Act of 2006." Additionally, the man who might have been able to move this legislation, House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Oswego, has lost his position and his nonpareil influence.

HR 5289, sponsored by Rep. Tim Johnson, R-Urbana, aims to prohibit the NCAA from penalizing a college or university by reasons of the name, symbol, emblem or mascot of its athletic teams. Further, it allows an institution to sue for damages and legal fees.

But the bill, introduced last May, has attracted only 12 co-sponsors (nine of them from Illinois, seemingly a courtesy to the sponsor or to Hastert) and has been assigned to the House Education Committee's Subcommittee on 21st Century Competitiveness, which seems to be an odd fit.

Nonetheless, this will be another opportunity for supporters and opponents of the University of Illinois' Chief Illiniwek to review arguments that have been made and remade for the last 20 or so years.

But the real responsibility for continuing, modifying or ending the 80-year-old Chief Illiniwek tradition at the University of Illinois ultimately lies with the UI's board of trustees, the man who appoints those trustees (Gov. Rod Blagojevich) and the Illinois Senate that confirms them. And that's where the real action will take place in 2007 when the terms of three trustees, all of whom have supported Chief Illiniwek, expire.

This editorial first appeared in The News-Gazette, Champaign, and was distributed by The Associated Press.