"A printed invitation to a political fundraiser that solicited a $125 donation for Democrat Meredith Richards' Congressional campaign recently was mass-mailed through the University's free, intra-departmental postal service -- in a possible effort to cut campaign costs.

This constitutes an abuse of University resources by an outside party, internal mail officials said.

Richards is challenging the Republican incumbent Virgil H. Goode for Virginia's 5th District seat in Congress.

"In the seven years that I have been at the University, this is the first time I've received anything like this" through the messenger mail system, said Astronomy Prof. Steven R. Majewski, who reported that every mailbox in his department received an invitation.

Correspondence sent through messenger mail "has to be an internal, University correspondence," Mail Services Manager Jack Parker said. "This is for a political fundraiser, and it should have gone through the regular, U.S. Mail."

The invitation, a copy of which was obtained by The Cavalier Daily, claims to have been extended by the University Democrats and David Carley, a former Democratic National Committee member who will be hosting the fundraiser at his Farmington residence today.

According to Carley, he was never in contact with the University Democrats in planning the event.

Carley said he was approached initially by Paul Saunier, a former University administrator whom Carley described as a long-time "fixture in the Virginia Democratic Party."

At the conclusion of a breakfast meeting arranged by Saunier between Carley and Meredith Richards, Carley said he decided to support Richards' campaign by hosting a fundraiser for University faculty.

According to Carley, the Richards' campaign then informed him that University Senior Vice President William W. Harmon "would be doing things with the campaign at the University."

Harmon said the Richards campaign, not the University Democrats, came to him with the idea.

"I was approached by the Richards campaign, and they indicated that Carley was interested in hosting a reception," Harmon said. "In terms of contacting faculty, it appears that [the University Democrats] would be the logical vehicle on Grounds for supporting the campaign."

Although the student political organization was listed as a co-host of the fundraiser on the invitation, University Democrats President Ian Amelkin confirmed that Harmon produced the 600 faculty names for the mailing list and authored the invitation.

At a University Democrats meeting that Richards attended on Wednesday night, she opened her talk by thanking the group for their sponsorship of the fundraising event.

"I think it is great you helped hand [the fundraiser invitations] out to faculty mailboxes," she said. "It was a great no-cost, low cost way to handle it."

It is unclear if she knew of the use of University's messenger mail.

Richards' campaign communication manager Dave Sagarin, when asked who had initiated the on-Grounds campaign, said the University Democrats had, though he denied having any detailed knowledge of the planning process. According to Sagarin, the campaign's fundraising coordinator would be unavailable for comment yesterday and today.

According to policies of University Mail Services, messenger mail "is mail sent out by U.Va. departments for delivery to addresses within the University System."

Regardless of the legality of the correspondence, Majewski said he believed it was an abuse of the system.

"Anybody could find some campus student organization, slap their name on the letter and use the messenger service," Majewski said." (Paul Quinlan, The Cavalier Daily, September 27, 2002)

Editor's Note: Is this materially different from the use of University e-mail in the 2000 Charlottesville City Council campaign for political purposes? See Letter from Erin Garvey and The Art of Accepting Defeat.

What do you think of the use of e-mail or the use of the messenger service at the University of Virginia as a way of encouraging political support and/or participation? An abuse of the system, best use of the system or a mistake?

Please send your thoughts to george@loper.org where the most representative comments will be placed on my web site with full attribution.