(9 of 9)
Well aware that the honor code and its system of justice were causing problems, West Point's Berry set up a special committee in 1974 to see how the two "could be strengthened and improved." Composed of 14 officers and 16 cadets, the committee produced a two-volume report ten months before the present scandal broke. The academy is already instituting recommended procedural reforms aimed at removing the secrecy of the hearings and improving the individual's right to due process. For example, cadets appearing before an honor committee are now allowed to be present while witnesses are being questioned.
In its most significant recommendation, the committee urged that the system be modified so that dismissal would no longer be automatic for any cadet found guilty of an honor violation. The committee urged that cadets be punished according to the seriousness of their offenses; if mitigating circumstances were strong enough, a cadet could be let off with no punishment at all. To be put into effect, the reform authorizing discretionary punishment needed to be approved by two-thirds of the cadets; only 54% voted in favor last spring.
Academy officials anticipate that the discretionary option will be approved when the proposal is next put to a vote, probably this fall.
The fact that little more than half of the corps voted for a flexible system of punishments shows how strongly the status quo is defended by many cadets, and their elders, despite the difficulties. "An officer who sees a fellow officer commit an atrocity has an obligation to report him, even if he's a friend," says Ulmer. "If you won't do that, you have no business at West Point." Over the decades, the code has helped to make West Point what George Patton Jr. called a "holy place," an institution that Maxwell Taylor describes as "something like the church; it is not for everyone, only for those with a true vocation." Agrees Berry: "The code's a statement of ideals that I think is sound. Imperfect human beings don't measure up to ideals. It's a pretty demanding code. But the battlefield is a pretty demanding place."
No one could quarrel with Berry's contention that West Point has to prepare young men to perform honorably and reliably on the battlefield. The problem that he and the U.S. Army confront is how to revise the code, and the system of justice that goes with it, to foster a sense of honor in the cadets—a system that they can uphold with honor themselves