With the graduation Wednesday of the Class of 1994, the U.S. Navy and the Naval Academy hope to end the saga involving honor code violations that has enveloped the academy and the Class of 1994 for the last 18 months.

Top Navy officials are undertaking steps to prevent future honor code violations, but the resolution does not start in Annapolis -- it starts with the top ranks of the Navy.

When the inspector general states that the senior officers in charge did not want to "get to the bottom" of the scandal that involved students cheating on an electrical engineering exam, that demonstrates a breakdown at the top, not the bottom.

When academy committees suggest that the problem with the honor code is the failure of midshipmen to understand and hold to it, they are analyzing the symptoms and not the disease.

When midshipmen, impressionable young men and women eager to learn the ways of the Navy, see senior officers passively investigate honor violations and sexual harassment charges, see honor violations treated as disciplinary problems, see indecisiveness in the face of issues of principle, they cannot help but be disillusioned.

These same senior officers and officials are the very people who have stressed honor and integrity to the Brigade of Midshipmen, yet when faced with obvious honor code violations the senior ranks did not meet the standards they espoused.

It is not the Class of 1994 that let the Navy and the Naval Academy down -- it is the Navy that has let the Class of 1994 down.

Altogether, 134 members of the class were investigated, and 81 eventually admitted to cheating after advance copies of an electrical engineering exam were taken and distributed on campus. However, only 24 were expelled. Another 64 Midshipmen received lesser punishment for cheating or other violations; the rest were exonerated.

This class joins the Navy and Marine Corps with more than 50 fellow graduates that have admitted they violated the honor code not only by cheating on an examination, but by lying about their involvement. How did they avoid expulsion? Because the ++ Navy reviewed their entire records at the academy and deemed that, on balance, their individual records outweighed their violation of the code.

This sliding scale of justice is appropriate for a disciplinary violation, but is clearly inappropriate for an honor code violation. Honor is not a situational ethics problem; it is a virtue: Midshipmen do not lie, cheat, or steal.

All the remedies proposed to date are directed at the Brigade of Midshipmen. Of all the groups involved, the brigade was and is the most dedicated, the most diligent and the most committed to rooting out and expelling those within its ranks that violated the honor code.

The evidence is incontrovertible: At every juncture of the various investigations, when superior officers attempted to declare the cheating issue concluded, the midshipmen refused to accept those findings. It was the demands of the midshipmen that virtually required further investigations, and it is the midshipmen who wanted all those guilty of cheating expelled.

One officer at the academy said that if it were left to the midshipmen, those that violated the honor code would be shot at dawn. It is clear that the Brigade of Midshipmen did not want gradations of punishment; they wanted and expected the code to be upheld.

That is not to say that those midshipmen who violated the honor code or the officers and officials who were responsible for the investigations and punishments are bad or venal. There is no doubt that every official believed he was acting in the best interest of the Navy and the Naval Academy.

Unfortunately, they have adopted collectively the doctrine of moral relativism in enforcing the honor code. This belief, widely practiced today by leaders in law, politics and business, requires the relaxation of moral sensibilities and the substitution of the perspective of the alleged wrongdoer: The incident must be viewed from the wrongdoer's perspective, taking into account the pressures they were under and how they saw the situation.

In replacing the strict moral code of the honor code with relativism, the leaders in the Navy failed their responsibility to the academy, the Navy and the code itself.

The honor code is based upon fair and, at times, even harsh enforcement. The introduction of the "total" midshipman concept determining the extent of the punishment for violating the code distorts the moral foundation of the entire concept. It seemingly allows a midshipman with a "better" record to commit an offense and be spared the expulsion that a midshipman with a lesser record would suffer.

The Navy is effectively saying there are degrees of honor. It would be troublesome if one officer or official were responsible for this sea change in the standards of the honor code, but the adoption of the standard of moral relativism by officers and officials at the highest ranks is clearly a distressing and troubling signal to the Navy and, ultimately, the country.

Why are these breaches of the honor code so serious? Is it because the traditions of the service academies run so deep and are such a storied part of the academies' histories?

The major reason honor is so important to the Naval Academy, to the Navy and Marine Corps, and to all American military services is that graduates of Annapolis, West Point and the Air Force Academy are charged with the greatest and most awesome responsibility a country can confer: leading the nation's young men and women into that most dangerous of endeavors -- armed combat with enemy forces.

It is not surprising that midshipmen, when interviewed about what officers they respect, almost uniformly named Marines. The Marine Corps has made adherence to its core beliefs and values the center of its training and operations, with academic achievement an important factor, but not the overriding factor for success.

Members of sister services have made jokes (occasionally at some personal risk) about the intelligence of the members of the corps, but no one jokes about any Marine's honor or dedication. "Semper Fidelis" is a living doctrine. The Navy must return to those precepts, and that leadership must come from the top.

Honor code violations, in the fleet and the corps, have ramifications far beyond the individual: They can lead and have led to the endangerment and loss of lives. Military command demands absolute integrity -- the false reporting of a position, of the checking of weapons or of a pre-flight check causes danger to the unit. Cheating on training exercises diminishes the entire command.

With leadership comes responsibility for the welfare and safety of all those entrusted to the leader's command, and the disintegration of a leader's integrity is not only a disintegration of the individual's own core values, but it risks the integrity of the entire command. Military leaders, if given a choice between honor and academic excellence in their officers, would choose -- no, demand -- honor.

Why then do midshipmen cheat if honor is paramount? Unfortunately, grades at the Naval Academy have become a defining value of a midshipman, or so many of them believe. The need to excel academically has placed tremendous pressure on students, not only at the Naval Academy, but at every college. A report published last year in The Sun stated that more than 70 percent of the student body at an Ivy League college cheated. (It is interesting to note that neither the public, the administration, nor the student body protested or demanded changes to end this practice.)

Academic credentials are important, but the true measure of an officer is integrity; without that, officers cannot lead those under their command effectively. This must be taken into account at the Naval Academy.

The Navy and the Naval Academy have proud and demanding traditions to uphold. The good news from the entire episode is that the Brigade of Midshipmen upheld the highest traditions of the Naval Academy and the honor code. The brigade, in uncoordinated yet consistent efforts, attempted in every way possible to force a full and thorough investigation and to expel those members of the brigade that violated the code.

The tragedy is that senior officers and officials in the Navy did not share the brigade's commitment to the honor code, and, until they do, the Navy will continue to be plagued with problems. "The Laws of the Navy," contained in a plebe's "Reef Points," or training manual, states: "When principal is involved, be deaf to expediency." The Navy must return to its tradition of honor and principle.

W. Minor Carter, an Annapolis lawyer, graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1962. He served in the Navy from 1962 to 1970, including three years at the Naval Academy.