Monday, OCTOBER 11, 1948

The Charlotte News

Monday, October 11, 1948

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that in Paris, representatives of Britain, France, and the U.S. said that they were not willing to accept the proposal of the six "neutral" nations of the U.N. Security Council that the Berlin blockade would be lifted during mediation by the Big Four foreign ministers regarding the blockade crisis. The apparent concern was that the move could tacitly approve reinstitution of the blockade in the event negotiations again failed. The Western powers refused to negotiate directly with Russia on the crisis until the blockade was permanently lifted.

Secretary of State Marshall, after briefing the President in Washington on the Paris meeting of the U.N., headed back to Paris. Secretary Marshall denied that he and the President had differences, fueled by the rumor of Saturday that the President had first asked Chief Justice Fred Vinson to go to Moscow to meet with Josef Stalin and then withdrew the plan. The President confirmed the rumor regarding such a plan, saying that he intended the mission to discuss the problem of control of nuclear energy, and that its withdrawal came after discussing with Secretary Marshall the possibility that such a step might be misinterpreted.

Republicans, meanwhile, led by Senator Arthur Vandenberg, criticized the President for the incident as interfering with bipartisan cooperation on foreign policy. Governor Dewey was said to have disapproved also.

Britain, in a 40,000-word white paper, accused Russia of trying to push the Western powers from Berlin with the blockade and of keeping thousands of Germans in concentration camps while attempting to sabotage the economic recovery of Europe. The statement was similar to that of the U.S. issued September 27 but provided greater detail.

The Russians warned again of fighter planes and gunnery practice within the airlift corridors supplying Berlin from the West.

Russian soldiers guarding a roadblock shot at a German truck and a German passenger car attempting to pass from Hamburg through a roadblock. The truck and its contents were confiscated and the passenger car and its occupants escaped.

Also in Berlin, a fast-talking American Army sergeant said that he was able to penetrate a road barricade through use of psychology and a few candy bars, becoming the first American of record to do so. The previous night, he had tried the stunt and been prevented, but was told to come back the following morning, at which time he was allowed to pass.

In Tokyo, 32 Japanese soldiers, including four generals, were accused of war crimes for beheading 33 captured American B-29 crew members. Seventeen of the men were executed in this manner within four hours after Emperor Hirohito broadcast his surrender speech on August 15, 1945. The charges alleged that the men were used for archery target practice, karate or kesagiri, the latter involving a sword ritual, diagonally cutting from a human's left shoulder through the body and exiting the right side of the stomach.

The President, in a letter, told the National Association of Letter Carriers that FBI records demonstrated that the loyalty of 99.7 percent of all Federal workers was not subject to question. The letter and another from Governor Dewey were both read to a convention of the Association. Governor Dewey said that he would maintain the civil service system.

The President campaigned in Cincinnati, saying that Mr. Dewey had been vague on the issues and that he intended to smoke him out. He would deliver a major speech on labor issues this night in Akron, O.

Governor Dewey would also speak on labor this night in Pittsburgh.

The Supreme Court refused review of a lower Federal Court decision out of Greenville, S.C., upholding the right of states to ban slot machines, pinball machines and other such devices, each of which was spelled with a capital "T".

In Statesville, N.C., armed black prisoners rioted at the prison camp the previous night. The Highway Patrol and local deputies restored order. The prisoners held the superintendent of the facility for a half hour and a guard for 90 minutes before releasing both unharmed. The unrest had begun when a guard tried to take a knife from a prisoner after he had used it to try to attack a fellow inmate during dinner. Twelve of the ringleaders were transported to Central Prison in Raleigh.

In Charlotte, 60 men reported for pre-induction examinations for the Army draft, set to begin in November.

In Boston, in the sixth game of the World Series, Cleveland, with a 3 to 2 game advantage, led after six innings 3 to 1.

Cleveland would win the game 4 to 3 and thus complete the inter-tribal scalping and take the Series. Bob Lemon was the winning pitcher and Bill Voiselle had the loss.

The previous day's game marked an historic event in Major League Baseball as Satchel Paige, 42 years old, became the first black pitcher in a World Series game, pitching for two outs in the 7th inning, disastrous for the Indians, allowing the last six Braves' runs and requiring two relievers, the second of whom was Mr. Paige, to complete the inning. Mr. Paige was charged, however, with a balk because of his unusual hesitation pitch, which had been banned earlier in the year by the American League. He gave up one run on a sacrifice fly and one hit. The winning pitcher for Boston had been Warren Spahn and the loss was charged to Bob Feller, who gave up seven of the Braves' eleven runs through a third of the seventh inning, which had started with the game tied at five runs apiece.

On the editorial page, "Military Aid for Europe" remarks on the signs in recent months that the Republicans and the Midwest were no longer the exponents of isolationism in the country. South Dakota Senator Chan Gurney, for instance, had advocated supplementing ERP with military aid to Western Europe, including Fascist Spain. A former isolationist, he had learned the lesson of World War II and its preceding years, when isolationists in the Congress prevented preparation for warfare.

The nations of Western Europe understood the lessons of Munich well and would be better prepared for another war, provided they were given the wherewithal to do so. The piece suggests that the U.S. might as well line up with the five Western European Union nations as it would be providing money, materiel and men to them anyway if a war with Russia were to come.

"A Confining Platform" tells of Governor Strom Thurmond finding it difficult to continue to stimulate interest along his campaign trail in the same old lines about states' rights, an issue with limited national appeal. Thus, he had recently resorted to claiming that the Democrats had been taken over by "foreign schemers and the pinks and subversives".

The charge made no sense as the far left had splintered from the Democrats and formed the Progressive Party.

Governor Thurmond was convincing few outside the "lunatic fringe" when he veered so far from the facts. Mr. Thurmond appeared far afield from being a reactionary personality himself, as his term as Governor had evidenced genuine concern for the welfare of the people. So it was unfortunate that his "ding-donging publicity" for states' rights was attracting increasingly race haters to his camp, persons who could do much harm to the South.

"Fish and Factories" tells of the people who liked to fish along the Ocmulgee River in Georgia being upset with the pulp mill builders for polluting their streams.

For much of its history, the agrarian South did not need to worry about such things as polluted streams. But with industrial development, such unwanted collateral aspects of modernity had intruded.

The director of the Georgia Agricultural and Industrial Development Board was sympathetic to the fishermen but also did not want to scare away industrial development, especially regarding an industry as paper, which employed 130,000 and transacted a billion dollars worth of business.

The piece, however, suggests that manufacturing facilities ought install filtering systems to alleviate the discharge of waste. There was need for continuance of a pattern, already established, of cooperative development between manufacturing and the rural countryside in which it was located. The intelligently managed corporation would provide for fish as well as factories and always remain alert to the aesthetic needs of the surrounding population.

It may not be pure coincidence, incidentally, that a piece on Governor Thurmond and his States' Rights party appears on the last day of the World Series, juxtaposed to an editorial on fishing and the pollution of streams—that is, the Fielding and Strom connection.

A piece from the Charleston (S.C.) News & Courier, titled "Set Free the Colleges", urges that South Carolina do as Duke, funded largely by profits from investments in hydro-electric plants making it a free university. It recommends sale of the Santee-Cooper and that part of Clarks Hill which the State owned and use of the proceeds to fund state colleges and universities, rendering tuition free.

Drew Pearson tells of President Truman and his advisers trying to take the Berlin crisis from the diplomats and put the matter directly before Stalin on the basis that the world could not have peace unless the people of Russia were allowed to befriend the people of other nations. The Russian Premier would be reminded of the good will extant during and at the end of the war. The hope would be to convince him to lift the iron curtain.

The Defense Establishment was preparing to ask Congress to provide about five billion dollars in military aid for the Western European Union countries for one year. That would be on top of the five billion for the Marshall Plan and the 12 billion for defense.

The Russians wanted to bankrupt the country. So, the Administration was trying to veer away from the diplomatic route as an answer and seek instead to penetrate the iron curtain to establish mutual amity between Russians and Americans.

The Friendship Train, sent to Italy and France the previous November, had shown American friendship for these countries of Western Europe, but the people had not been able to demonstrate the same kind of feeling toward Russians. The Government, except via the Voice of America, also had been unable to bridge the gap. It was hoped therefore that the President's initiative might prove successful. It would not hurt, Mr. Pearson ventures, to try.

The Air Inspector General had revealed to the military brass that many prisoners convicted of crimes having to do with their time in service during the war, desertion or violation of discipline, remained in prison and that regulations regarding treatment of them were not being followed, that many had suffered permanent physical impairment from solitary confinement. The Air Inspector General urged that such prisoners, on a bread and water diet, had to be given one full meal every three days and that medical authorities examine them daily.

Marquis Childs tells of the positioning for Secretary of State under President Dewey, the most likely candidate being John Foster Dulles. But opposition to him had formed from both the left and the right. To the left, he represented Fascist conspiracies and wartime cartels, developed through his law firm Sullivan & Cromwell. The critics believed that he was trying to put the old cartels back together again.

The right viewed him as a creature of the Federal Council of Churches, absorbed in a peace effort, too weak to vie with Russia.

An alternative candidate for State was Senator Styles Bridges of New Hampshire, who had leaked the story that Mr. Dulles was responsible for Alger Hiss becoming president of the Carnegie Foundation, on whose board Mr. Dulles sat.

Military leaders in Berlin also appeared suspicious of Mr. Dulles, who had been quoted in an off-the-record conversation as opposing General Lucius Clay's policy in Germany.

But Mr. Dewey still wanted his old friend in the position, as Mr. Dulles was his primary consultant on foreign policy during the campaign, as in 1944. Senator Arthur Vandenberg admired Mr. Dulles and had persistently negated attempts by Mr. Vandenberg's supporters to promote him for the position of Secretary of State, as he viewed his continuing role to be assuring bipartisan foreign policy in the Senate.

So, concludes Mr. Childs, the likely play in January would be Dewey to Dulles to Vandenberg.

But football season will be over by then and so, we predict, the attempt at the old reverse will go awry and wind up with an incomplete pass in the first instance on third and goal, the ball then to be turned over to Truman after a blocked field goal attempt and a long late scoring touchdown in the other direction to pull the fat from the fire or the fate from fata morgana, as it were.

Joseph Alsop tells of Marshal Tito having invited to lunch an old acquaintance, a leftist member of the British Parliament, Konni Zilliacus. Mr. Zilliacus found Tito willing to discuss openly his troubles with the Soviets since his June declaration of independence from the Kremlin and denunciation thereafter by the Cominform. He said that the Soviets had sought to humble him but had not succeeded. While he admired the Soviet system, he believed that the relationship with Yugoslavia had to remain as between two independent sovereign states. He believed that the other satellite countries should be grateful to him for standing up to the Kremlin and not critical. He had been deeply wounded by the Cominform denunciation. But his own people remained solidly behind him.

An economic boycott by the Soviet Union would impede, but not destroy, the ability of Yugoslavia to recover.

He would remain within the Communist sphere but also would be willing to court Western nations. He even complained of the Soviet policy of setting one nation against another, calling it narrow chauvinism and a too strong adherence to nationalism.

He remained tense about the situation with the Soviets and knew that the breach could not easily be repaired.

He complained repeatedly of the inefficiency and inexperience with his own regime, hinted, though not saying so expressly, that Western help in the recovery effort would be welcome.

Albert Coates, director of the North Carolina Institute of Government in Chapel Hill, again provides a synopsis of the pros and cons anent a proposed amendment to the State Constitution, set to appear on the November 2 ballot. This one proposed to increase the total State and County tax which could be levied on property from 15 cents per hundred dollars of valuation to 25 cents. He explains that the lower valuation had left counties strapped for money when needs were expanding.

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