Yeshiva undergraduate men may soon witness emendations to the institution's forty-year-old constitution, a document that students can presently unearth in an appendix to the Guide to the Perplexed. Yeshiva College Student Council President Pinky Shapiro and executive committee chair Moishe Singer structured the Amendments Committee this past summer in hope of remedying the cumbersome constitution that establishes student council precedent. After proving unable to solve the clarity issues in a brief summer, the committee diligently continued working throughout the year and apparently stands just weeks away from reformulating 'the law.'

Two years have elapsed since YC has experienced the formation of an amendments committee, and six years have passed since the last amendment was officially ratified. In spite of time lapse, the executive members of this year's committee, Shlomo Herman, Yehuda Shmidman, Moishe Singer, and Marc Tenenbaum, remain optimistic that the student body will vote wisely to institute the panel's recommendations.

Officially, the process of passing a constitutional amendment consists of four steps. The first, and most elementary step, involves the creation of an amendments committee. Following member selection, an open amendments meeting occurs, affording the student body a chance to pose to the committee questions and suggestions about the constitution. The third step charges the executive student council with approving the changes by a three-fifths vote and then resubmitting the proposal. Only then are the changes presented to students for a school-wide referendum.

"The committee's objective is to preserve and clarify the constitutional tenets," explained committee member Shmidman. "We are going to obliterate the corruptness and loopholes [in the old constitution]."

Composed in the 1960's, the constitution did not include some of the more recent additions to Yeshiva such as the Sy Syms School of Business Student Council, the Stone Beis Medrash Program Student Council, and the Students Organization of Yeshiva. The committee seeks, as one of its primary objectives, to clarify the relationships between the various student councils. Furthermore, members hope to increase the responsibilities of certain Yeshiva clubs and societies. Tenenbaum, a YC senior, explains that the committee chiefly aims to incorporate all student bodies and clubs into a single umbrella student organization in hope of decreasing misunderstanding and increasing cooperation.

The process began with Shapiro and Singer researching constitutions of universities nationwide. After amassing substantial amounts of information, the committee again sought to attain student input. To that end, approximately fifty students attended interest groups devoted solely to constitutional discussions. The committee then presented the pertinent issues to the YCSC, asking for further advice in order to complete its task properly.

At a February 28th session, with approximately forty students in attendance, the committee presented a synopsis of the relevant issues concerning the amendment process and again requested attendee participation. Roughly seventy percent of the attending student body offered counsel to the committee that was annotated and considered while crafting the new constitution.

"We don't want to try to fool anybody," said Tenenbaum. Similarly, Singer emphasized the fact that the committee needs as much student support as possible in order to accomplish its goals.

Originally, the committee had wanted to create five amendments to the constitution, but due to the excessive confusion throughout the document, they decided to make large-scale changes by convening a constitutional convention. The most notable addition is the precise differentiation between the executive student council and YCSC as a whole, an item that, until now, has remained ambiguous.

The present YCSC is cognizant of the problems plaguing the constitution. Shapiro admitted that after reading through the constitution, he located many flaws and empathizes with what he deemed "the amendments committee's monumental efforts."

After many thorough revisions, however, the committee has successfully completed a semi-final draft. Following another open amendments meeting slated for Tuesday, May 8th, anticipated to garner critical student feedback, a final revision will be drafted. By the end of the semester, students will be able to vote on the amendments and decide the fate of the present constitution.

Members of the committee are confident that the student body will vote to approve the new document. "I'm very optimistic," contended Singer, who believes that there is a "better than two-thirds chance" of passing the emendations. He hopes that by putting things in writing, the committee will succeed in clearly delineating the separate powers in the sphere of undergraduate male student leadership.