Cheuse said she and the other sponsors do not understand Lewis' objections.

"Our first step is to question his decision. Hetook issue with the title, not the bill," Cheusesaid.

"He didn't respond to us. We made two differentattempts to talk to him. He didn't arrange ameeting. He didn't speak with us," she said.

In an effort to understand Lewis' refusal tosign a bill that does not initiate radicalchanges, Stewart said a larger debate lies behindthe attempts at diploma reform.

"The subtext of this discussion, even if notthe intent of [Cheuse and Anna M. Baldwin'00, thebill's co-sponsors], is the issue of what thefuture of Radcliffe is going to be," Stewart said.

Lewis may not be willing to renegotiate theentire agreement between Harvard and Radcliffe forsuch a small change, she added.

The bill could still have a future but is notlikely to succeed, according to Stewart.

"What could happen [is that] the sponsors ofthe bill could decide to put it on the agenda of astudent-faculty committee," Stewart said. "WithoutDean Lewis's support it would probably not do wellin the College [because he sits on many of thecommittees on whose consensus the decisionrests]."

Cheuse said she does not plan to drop the issuebecause it affects many students at Harvard, butshe said she is uncertain about her next step.

"A lot of students were interested in thisissue, so we want to make sure people understandthe decision," she said. "We want to find out howother students want to proceed."

She added, "We may have to pursue other avenuesthat are not the traditional ones."

But, in an e-mail message to The Crimson, Lewisquestioned the amount of support behind the bill.

"The bill came out of the U.C. on a very splitvote, without the support of the students whooriginally proposed it," he wrote.

Eric M. Nelson '99, chair of the StudentAffairs Committee of the council, said Lewisnotified him of the decision the week beforespring break. Lewis also sent Stewart an e-mailmessage, reiterating the same information