''Benner v. Oswald'', 592

F.2d The ''Federal Reporter'' () is a case law reporter in the United States that is published by West Publishing and a part of the National Reporter System. It begins with cases decided in 1880; pre-1880 cases were later retroactively compiled by W ...

174 (

3d Cir. The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit (in case citations, 3d Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts for the following districts: * District of Delaware * District of New Jersey * Easte ...

1974), was a case about the voting rights of undergraduate students at a public American university.

Facts

The board of trustees for the Pennsylvania State University was selected through a process involving several groups aside from the state executive branch (the

governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

) and the university. The groups included a society of the

alumni Alumni (singular: alumnus (masculine) or alumna (feminine)) are former students of a school, college, or university who have either attended or graduated in some fashion from the institution. The feminine plural alumnae is sometimes used for grou ...

of the university and local agricultural and industrial societies of

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. A group of undergraduate students at the university sued desiring to be involved in the selection process for some of those seats currently selected through the society elections.

Issue

The question presented by this case was whether the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the

U.S. Constitution The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, in 1789. Originally comprising seven articles, it delineates the nation ...

requires that undergraduate students be allowed to participate in the election of the

Penn State Board of Trustees The Penn State Board of Trustees is the 38-member governing body for The Pennsylvania State University. Its members include the university's president, the Governor of the Commonwealth, and the state Secretaries of Agriculture, Conservation and Na ...

—thereby allowing them to have a voice in the board's makeup.

Holding

The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the court held, did not require the undergraduate students be allowed to participate in the selection of the board of trustees. The court ruled that the selection process for the board does "serve important governmental objective" and is "substantially related to the achievement of those objectives". The court decided the election of members of the board of trustees was not equivalent to general elections and the issues addressed in '' Kramer v. Union School District'' and ''Hadley v. Junior College District of Kansas City'' were not germane. The court also reviewed whether the selection process was reasonable, and decided that it was, as the university sprang from "a

land grant college A land-grant university (also called land-grant college or land-grant institution) is an institution of higher education in the United States designated by a state to receive the benefits of the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890. Signed by Abraha ...

committed to the teaching of

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people t ...

and the mechanic arts."

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Benner V. Oswald United States equal protection case law 1974 in United States case law 1974 in education United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit cases Pennsylvania State University University governance Student rights case law in the United States