The Charlotte News

Monday, January 20, 1947

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that Herman Talmadge refused to recognize Lieutenant Governor M. E. Thompson as Acting Governor of Georgia but also stated that he would abide by the decision of the courts in settling the dispute over legal succession of his father, deceased Governor-elect Eugene Talmadge. Mr. Thompson, meanwhile, set up an office in the State Capitol as Acting Governor.

Students from the University of Georgia planned a march on the State Capitol the following day to protest seizure of power by Herman Talmadge.

Both Herman Talmadge and Mr. Thompson had indicated support for a bill introduced in the Legislature to establish a white-only primary election. Mr. Talmadge stated that the same people who had tried to abolish this system and the county-unit voting system in the state were protesting his assumption of power.

The Legislature invited Mr. Talmadge to address it, and did not invite Mr. Thompson.

The State Attorney General stated that he recognized Mr. Thompson as Acting Governor.

News Associate Editor Harry Ashmore, still reporting from Atlanta on the dispute, tells of outgoing Governor Ellis Arnall having achieved a significant political victory in attempting to hold the Governor's office for Mr. Thompson after the Legislature had, outside the State Constitution's prescribed succession, elected Mr. Talmadge on the theory that the general election results had been invalidated by the death in December of Eugene Talmadge before being sworn in as Governor. Governor Arnall had managed to get the Talmadge forces to submit to the courts for final determination of the dispute, a major achievement.

Prior to this episode, Governor Arnall's popularity had reached a low ebb in the state, his friends conceding that he was finished politically for the foreseeable future. The liberalism he had championed, consistent with the New Deal, was disappearing throughout the country. But now, the same friends believed that his political currency was replenished.

In Warsaw, Poland, the Government bloc, as anticipated, won the election held Sunday, taking up to 80 percent of the seats in Parliament. Landslides were rolled up in the cities. The Polish Peasant Party appeared to have the bulk of the remaining twenty percent. The leader of that party, Vice-Premier Stanislaw Mikolajczck, stated that he would seek to have the Supreme Court invalidate the election results based on irregularities and violations of the secret ballot.

Near Athens, Greece, an explosion aboard the 1,800-ton Greek steamer Chimarra had left 431 persons missing and presumed dead in the Gulf of Petalion, twenty miles east of the city. Apparently, the ship had struck a mine left from the war. The Government, discounting early reports of sabotage, reported that 206 persons had survived. All of the children aboard had been killed and 95 percent of the women. The ship had sunk too quickly to deploy more than two lifeboats.

In Miami, a man who owned a pack of pitbulls which had attacked and killed a woman, had been charged with manslaughter and was scheduled to appear for arraignment.

In Los Angeles, a search was underway for an eleven-year old girl who had been forcibly abducted into a car by a young male motorist who had stopped to offer her and her fourteen-year old sister a ride. The two had refused, whereupon the driver forced the younger girl into the car and drove away.

State House and Senate confreres continued to debate the different Senate and House versions of the salary increase for teachers and State employees, the Senate version providing for a 20 percent increase and the House, providing for a 25-30 percent increase, inversely graduated based on current pay.

A local Charlotte bootleg liquor trader, Herman Satinover, had been killed by gunfire in a fracas with two men at 3:45 a.m. Mr. Satinover had gone to the residence of one of the men because he believed that his sister had been insulted by the man. Six people, including a passed-out drunk in the living room, had been initially detained by police for questioning. Mr. Satinover had allegedly hit one of the men in the face before the fatal shot was fired, after one shot had missed. The man who had supposedly issued the insult to the victim's sister stated that he did not know how he had done so. Mr. Satinover had a long criminal history.

Just why this rather routine Charlotte murder case merited such a dominant place on the front page of the day, taking up half the page, including large photographs, is subject to interpretation, responsive perhaps to a new policy of stressing local and state matters over national news under the new management of The News, since Thomas L. Robinson had become publisher on January 9 and former editor J. E. Dowd, general manager. But we shall see whether this trend is temporary or continuing.

On the editorial page, "Who Said No Doctors?" tells of the announcement by the State Hospital at Morganton that five new doctors had been hired, at a time when medical personnel were at their lowest ebb and when State Hospital salaries remained low. There had been only three doctors to care for 3,000 patients in the mental health facility.

The new hirings indicated that the reforms with respect to the hospital, undertaken in response to the January, 1942 series of articles in The News by the late Tom Jimison, had been implemented with efficiency.

The primary draw had been the construction of twenty houses at the hospital for the medical staff.

The piece cites State Representative John Umstead for exceptional service in coordinating the Duke and Bowman Gray medical schools with the State Hospitals.

"Bingo! No More Inflation" tells of the Federal Reserve Board lifting the ban on margin trading on the stock exchanges, allowing trading on 75 percent margin. The move came in response to increasing production and the easing of the threat of inflation because of a decline in employment and the consequent disappearance of the sellers' market.

Emil Schram of the New York Stock Exchange, however, wanted 50 percent margin trading, as in pre-war days.

The climate suggested that the post-war boom was finally starting, with prices going down and production going up. The availability again of trading on margin would likely perk up the sluggish stock market.

Yet, it cautions, the country should not forget that similar conditions prevailed in 1929, just ahead of the Crash.

"Not Unification at All" comments that the President's proposed merger plan for the armed forces was really not a true merger at all, rather only providing autonomy to the Air Forces. The Navy had won the argument for continuing as essentially a separate branch. There would be a staff of a hundred men, equally divided between the three branches, and that appeared to be too unwieldy to expect much coordination. Nor had there been much talk recently regarding economy in relation to merger.

It would be up to Congress to smooth out the rough spots in the President's plan.

A piece from the Washington Post, titled "Pensions for Congressmen", favors the grant of liberal pensions to Congressmen, eligible at age 62 after six years of service. They would serve to deter reliance on political connections to earn a living while members served beyond their useful tenure, and would encourage early retirement.

Drew Pearson tells of some of the biggest black marketeers and war contractors getting away with income tax evasion, as 300 cases of criminal tax evasion and another 1,200 income tax fraud cases awaited prosecution by the Justice Department. The backlog allowed the aforementioned groups to continue to evade taxes.

Former Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau had sought in 1945 to obtain more appropriations for investigating tax cases, and Congress provided same to hire more agents. Secretary Fred Vinson, his successor in mid-1945, since appointed as Chief Justice, had pushed the investigations equally hard. But the backlog had then arisen in prosecutions.

Attorney General Tom Clark, responsible for the prosecutions, had not sought extra money from Congress for the purpose.

Assistant Attorney General Lamar Caudle of North Carolina, in charge of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, had been speaking recently before the N. Y. Mirror youth forum and issued a special invitation to the audience to take up any issues of juvenile delinquency with the Attorney General. The audience responded with laughter, apparently not wishing to get too close to the Justice Department.

He next relates that many good people would not accept Government jobs because of the confirmation process. Former Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins had been nominated as a Civil Service Commissioner, and, despite being eminently qualified, had been blocked by the Republicans, led by Senator Robert Taft.

Mr. Pearson next states that former Secretary of State Byrnes had been offered numerous private sector jobs with high salaries, but would take a five-month hiatus and, if a Supreme Court vacancy opened the following June, would be reappointed to the bench, which he had left after one term in 1942 to become Economic Stabilizer and then War Mobilizer for the war effort. Mr. Byrnes, however, would never again serve on the Court.

Marquis Childs continues his look at the need for infusion of funding to education and the consequent bills before Congress to achieve that end. A moderate bill was being sponsored by Senators Robert Taft of Ohio, Lister Hill of Alabama, and Elbert Thomas of Utah, providing for 250 million dollars of Federal aid to the states per year, to be distributed only to the 33 states which were unable to afford an expenditure of $40 per pupil per year, apportioned based on need under that standard. North Carolina, for instance, would receive 21.7 million dollars under that bill, slightly less than Texas. Georgia would receive 17.5 million. California and other such states which could meet the $40 per pupil standard would not receive funds.

A liberal bill, sponsored by Senators James Murray of Montana, Claude Pepper of Florida, and probably Wayne Morse of Oregon, would afford two billion dollars per year of Federal funding, apportioned by population and slated to go to both parochial and public schools. The Taft bill only applied to public schools.

Senator Taft would likely only provide tepid support for the bill, and, without his active support, it would likely not pass. The liberal bill had little chance at all of passage. Thus, in all likelihood, there would be no Federal aid to education, so badly needed.

The National Education Association favored the Taft bill while the CIO American Federation of Teachers union favored the Murray bill, further complicating the effort in Congress.

Harold Ickes discusses Senatorial temperament, focusing on the type of Senator who said one thing in the campaign and did another after obtaining office. He included in the category Senators Edward Moore of Oklahoma, William Knowland of California, and Pat McCarran of Nevada. They had jointly introduced a bill to give rights to the tidelands oil to the states.

But Senators were officers of the United States, not ambassadors of their individual states, thus were vested with the interest of the entire nation. So, Senator Knowland, whose state would benefit by millions of dollars of royalties collected annually on the tidelands oil leases, should view the matter in terms of the interest of all the nation's citizens. Senator McCarran was from a state without a coast or oil interests.

The whole fight had been mischaracterized by California State Attorney General Robert Kenny, but Mr. Kenny, at least, was an officer of his state, not the United States, and thus could be excused for promoting the interests of California. Senator Knowland could not.

A letter writer, after providing a glimpse into the progress of man, from patriarchal societies to democracy, extols the value of education in a democracy, reducing the need for police, courts and jails. He advocates therefore more stress on quality education in the state.

A letter writer favors conservation and revitalization of barren lands to support agriculture, to enable dreams to come true.

A letter writer thanks the newspaper on behalf of the WCTU for having sent an "efficient reporter" to their luncheon, a woman who had provided a nice report of the meeting and the speaker.

She didn't insult anyone's sister.

Herblock.........

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