Wednesday, June 9, 1948

The Charlotte News

Wednesday, June 9, 1948

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that Arabs and Israelis had announced their unconditional acceptance of the four-week truce proposed by the U.N., during which time a permanent peace would be sought in Palestine. The Arabs agreed that the truce could begin Friday morning, as proposed by Count Folke Bernadotte, U.N. mediator for the truce.

For the second straight day, Tel Aviv was bombed by Egyptian planes, with losses feared by Israelis to be heavy. During the night, Israeli planes bombed Arab artillery positions near Kfar Biddu and Nebi Samwil, from which artillery barrages had been launched at Jerusalem. Fighting also continued along the road between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

Secretary of State Marshall announced that the U.S. had accepted the proposals of the six-nation London Conference regarding Western Germany. Some members of Congress, however, expressed concern as to whether Congressional approval was necessary. The British Cabinet had approved the measures, but the French National Assembly had not yet approved, though the French Cabinet had given their imprimatur the previous day. The agreement provided for a federal government in Western Germany and internationalization of the Ruhr while remaining part of Germany.

British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin told Commons that he hoped Russia would join the Western powers in agreeing on the future of all of Germany.

In Berlin, Russians and Communists urged Germans to resist the plan as an attempt to take away the Ruhr.

In Prague, it was announced that Premier Klement Gottwald would be the only candidate of the Communist-dominated National Front coalition for the presidency to succeed Eduard Benes, who resigned rather than lend his approval to the Communist-backed constitution, since approved by Mr. Gottwald. The move assured that Mr. Gottwald would be elected by Parliament the following Monday. Antonin Zapotocky, a staunch Communist, was chosen by the National Front to become Premier.

The Senate rejected by voice vote an amendment to the draft bill, sponsored by Senator Richard Russell of Georgia and Senator Burnet Maybank of South Carolina, to allow enlisted white men to serve in separate units from blacks.

Senator Vandenberg called the House cut of foreign aid appropriations a "cynical reversal" of American foreign policy, and launched a fight to restore the funding to assure the success of ERP. Meanwhile, House Appropriations Committee chairman John Taber claimed that letters he had received ran 2 to 1 in favor of the cuts.

In Spokane, Wash., President Truman called the 80th Congress the worst in the history of the republic and urged that the people vote it out in November. He had made a similar statement the previous night in Butte, Montana.

Former Secretary of Agriculture Clinton Anderson won the Democratic primary in New Mexico for the U.S. Senate. Senator Carl Hatch was retiring.

John L. Lewis said that he would not strike after July 1, provided the operators agreed to pay to retired miners $100 per month from the pension fund as previously agreed in May. The prior settlement had been challenged in court as violative of the Taft-Hartley Act.

Dikes along the Fraser and Columbia Rivers continued to be strained after 21 days of rain along a 100-mile stretch from Portland, Ore., to the Pacific. In British Columbia on the Fraser, the danger was greatest at Lulu Island, Veddar Canal, and Pitt Meadows. Thus far, the death toll in the flooding had reached thirty, with 545 missing, including 390 from Vanport, Ore., swept away on May 30.

Near Pichucalco, Mexico, 15 persons were killed when an airliner crashed while making a forced landing at La Perla ranch.

In Newark, N.J., rain forced postponement of the middleweight title boxing match between Rocky Graziano and Tony Zale, scheduled to be held in Ruppert Stadium. The fight would be held the following night.

The blonde nurse-hatcheck girl from New York who placed the ad seeking a husband with $10,000 to support her and her two children, had found her mark after several interviews. She came to Daytona Beach, Fla., to interview the man, a night club proprietor. He gave her some money shortly after her arrival. They went out to dinner twice and she paid the tab both times. The man's first wife, however, said that as far she knew, she was not divorced, as her husband had declined to sign the papers she had obtained in Florida.

In Flagstaff, Ariz., two eagles fought over the carcass of a young goat while perched on the cross-arm of an electrical pole until they were both electrocuted, leaving the town without power throughout the night.

On the editorial page, "Politics in a Moral 'Revival'" tells of Dr. Frank Buchman and his Moral Re-Armament celebrating the tenth anniversary of the organization by holding a world assembly in California, starting with a global broadcast by Dr. Buchman, favoring a tent under which all religions could unite, open to all save Communists.

During the war, when Russia had been an ally, the MRA movement had suffered. But since the advent of the East-West conflict, it was again thriving, with adherents in 52 countries and headquarters in many cities around the world, including New York and Los Angeles. It had been endorsed by such luminaries as ERP administrator Paul Hoffman.

The piece finds it disturbing to see the ideological divide entering religion rather than religious forces being mobilized to bring about understanding between East and West. It says that it would feel better if the forces were trained on providing salvation for all, including Communists. Such a movement as MRA could ignite a holy war with Russia, a tendency already over-emphasized in American life.

"A Poor Dodge on Draft" examines the passed proposal of Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., regarding admitting aliens to the armed forces in limited numbers as part of the draft bill, with citizenship available after five years of service. The piece thinks it a departure from the tradition of the American citizen-soldier and suggestive of an easy way to meet foreign defense responsibilities, weakening the concept of patriotic duty by Americans. The recruitment of anti-Communists from Europe would anger the Russians, one of the attractions of the bill, but was, the piece finds, also frivolous as Russian propaganda would exploit the notion of foreign mercenaries fighting for the U.S. to establish American imperialism.

"More Confusion in Divorce" quotes from a recent dissent of Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson regarding the uncertainty of varied divorce laws across the states, making it hazardous for couples to remarry on potential penalty that their prior divorce was not valid. He and Justice Felix Frankfurter had dissented from an opinion providing that Nevada divorce decrees did not allow cessation of alimony payments ordered by New York courts under separation decrees.

The piece opines that one of the worst aspects of the divorce laws was that a spouse had to bring scurrilous charges against the other to end a marriage which was in fact being ended amicably.

While being against Federal intervention in most arenas, the piece favors uniformity in the divorce laws and thinks that the Federal courts ought assume jurisdiction.

That would not be constitutional as marriage and divorce are within the areas reserved to the states under the Tenth Amendment police powers to regulate health, morals, safety, and welfare, with Federal oversight limited, as with all state and local laws, to striking down those statutes and ordinances either overbroad, seeking to outlaw Constitutionally protected conduct, or void for vagueness or which violate rights of individuals under the Constitution.

Based on proposed model codes, the state legislatures have, for the most part, adopted relatively uniform divorce laws, with the exception of laws regarding division of property. Since the mid-eighties, no-fault divorce has been the law in all states save New York, abandoning the old practice of having to assert "mental cruelty" or other such specious grounds for divorce based on boilerplate cooked up in the attorney's offices. New York adopted the concept in 2010.

A piece from the Atlanta Journal, titled "A Bitter Pill for Henry", finds Henry Wallace, inventor of hybrid corn, to have been pirated by the Russians who now claimed the invention. While the Russians had made various industrial and agricultural advances in fact, they had claimed to the Russian people of late to have invented the transformer, the electric lightbulb, electric welding, radio, radar, steam and jet engines.

The piece thinks that Mr. Wallace, having praised Russian agricultural techniques, must have found this latest claim to be a bitter pill to swallow.

Drew Pearson discusses again the effort of Congresswoman Helen Gahagan Douglas to effect a discharge petition to have the Taft-Ellender-Wagner long-term housing bill discharged from the House Banking & Currency Committee, chaired by Jesse Wolcott, to the House floor for a vote. The marching orders to the GOP were firm not to sign the petition. Mr. Pearson relates of a mistake made by Majority Leader Charles Halleck, thinking that Congressman Caleb Boggs of Delaware, a Republican, had signed, ready to call him on the carpet for perfidy, when in fact it turned out to be Hale Boggs of Louisiana, a Democrat.

Because of the troubles with the railroad brotherhoods, the Secret Service had placed a double guard around the President's cross-country train. At one point in 1920, President Wilson was traveling across country by train on a speaking tour during rail strife when his car was deliberately uncoupled by striking switchmen, causing the rest of the train to leave it behind.

The 30 "extemporaneous" speeches for the tour were largely written in advance. The President studied them in between stops and made alterations at times during the speeches. For instance, at Gary, Indiana, urged by Congressman Ray Madden, the President, intending to talk for five minutes, gave a twenty-minute lecture on the do-nothing Congress with regard to the cost of living.

Most of the speeches were being rewritten by adviser Clark Clifford and press secretary Charles G. Ross from drafts prepared by brain trusters in Washington.

Former Ohio Governor Frank Lausche, running again for Governor, and former Senator Sam Jackson of Indiana, also running again for his old seat, both spoke for the President along the tour in their respective states. Neither had done so for FDR in 1944.

Just before the President left Washington, he procured and placed four old-fashioned rocking chairs on the new White House balcony, locating them behind a shady elm tree where they could not be seen from the street.

Secretary of Defense James Forrestal had not accomplished a prime objective behind unification of the military, avoidance of duplication and cost savings. Mr. Pearson provides an example of radio tubes being purchased in 1942 in a quantity sufficient to last ten years, then again the following week because of the need by the Army to stock different types. Eventually, the Signal Corps discovered duplication and was able to eliminate 30 percent of the stock.

Marquis Childs discusses the frustrations with Congress being endured by ERP administrator Paul Hoffman, head of Studebaker. He had to state to the House Appropriations Committee, chaired by John Taber, his intentions on spending every bit of the money being appropriated, forcing him to make commitments before the many variables and vicissitudes of the program could be properly ascertained. It was a role to which he was not accustomed in business and the motorcar operations were quite simple by comparison.

Now, suddenly, after two months on the job, he was informed that the entire budget would be slashed by a quarter, with the appropriation made by the House based on fifteen months when that sought by the Administration was based on twelve months, despite that lesser budget being deemed to render the recovery program impossible of efficient and proper implementation.

Thus, it was useless to have brought in an industrialist to manage ERP if that with which he had to contend was such recalcitrance by Congress. But it was still up to the Senate and the leadership of Senator Vandenberg to determine the wisdom of the House cuts and it was to be hoped that they would restore the budget and give back a measure of independence to Mr. Hoffman to enable his efficient administration.

Stewart Alsop, in London, discusses the failure in the U.N. Security Council of approval of the Soviet-proposed sanctions to be imposed against the Arab states, causing British officials to breathe easier. For the sanctions would have immediately led to a political upheaval in Iraq where, without Western imports, the already low standard of living would have dropped through the floor.

A loan of Russian gold to Iraq was to have taken place as the sanctions became effective, undoubtedly on condition that Soviet control of Iraq would take place. The sanctions also applied to Pakistan which was in nearly as abject straits as Iraq, which would cause the Pakistanis to have turn to Iran for aid, Iran being the likely next Soviet takeover target. The Western position in the whole Middle East, in the British view, therefore would have come under threat from Russian dominance.

The British assessment, while perhaps having been exaggerated, was ignored initially by Washington, suggestive of the lack of recognition of the seriousness of the situation with respect to Palestine's key position and the effort by the Soviets to use it to drive a wedge between the U.S. and Britain, with Russia gaining power as a result in the Middle East.

Loss of the Middle East to the British would be disastrous and extension of Soviet power into the region would be equally disastrous for the U.S. Such a situation required that American policy be formulated in that light.

With the Bevin policy now shelved in Britain and the new Cabinet policy being formulated to have the Arab portions of Palestine controlled by King Abdullah, with the sanction of loss of subsidies to Trans-Jordan if Israeli territory determined by the U.N. partition plan were violated, and Israel recognized within those partition limits, a new Anglo-American settlement was possible.

A letter from an unnamed foreign correspondent to his father in North Carolina tells of the reaction of Europeans to American foreign policy, finding Secretary of State Marshall and President Truman generally on the right track but worried of President Truman's tendency to "shoot off his mouth" about things of which he knew little. He thinks Senator Vandenberg the best of the presidential candidates. President Truman, he asserts, could not be elected. He nevertheless thinks his instincts were good and he approves of his "slap at the South", though politically "injudicious". He likes General Eisenhower better than anyone else, though he was convinced that the General intended to stay out of the election. It would take a miracle to get him in and the age of miracles, he concludes, was no more.

A letter from the Charlotte Constable supplements a report in the newspaper that he had been indicted for false pretenses by receiving $35 from a man in Nashville, Tenn., stating that a week later in Recorder's Court, the matter was dismissed and found without probable cause. He wants the record corrected in advance of the June 26 primary runoff for re-election as Constable.

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