The Charlotte News

Friday, January 14, 1949

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that in China, the Communists officially announced through Chairman Mao Tse-Tung an eight-point plan for surrender of the Nationalist Government of Chiang Kai-Shek. Mao rejected Chiang's New Year's proposals for peace and, among the terms, insisted that all treaties with the U.S. be abrogated, which included, according to the State Department, only friendship and commerce treaties of the previous year, along with the treaty formed in 1943 which abolished extra-territorial privileges of Americans in China, plus American aid programs. The eight points otherwise included: trial of all war criminals, including Chiang and Madame Chiang; cancellation of the constitution; elimination of reactionaries from Government and the Army; confiscation of "bureaucratic" capital; land reforms; cancellation of all treaties with "imperialist" nations; return to the standard calendar; and formation of a state council to include all Chinese elements, except reactionaries. The Communists also announced that Communist forces had entered Tientsin in an all-out assault on that city.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee unanimously recommended confirmation of Dean Acheson as Secretary of State. It was expected that the Senate would follow with quick confirmation the following week. In executive session during the morning, Mr. Acheson told the Committee that Communism was "economically fatal to a free society and to human rights and fundamental freedoms." It appeared that some GOP opposition to Mr. Acheson, which had surfaced in 1946 when he was named Undersecretary of State, had melted away.

The State Department issued a report which stated that the Soviet policy of "obstruction", severely hampering the activities of the U.N., made necessary the North Atlantic Treaty with France, Britain, the Benelux countries and Canada—to become NATO in the spring. It said that if world recovery was to progress, a sense of security had to be restored.

In Munich, six more German war criminals were hanged at Landsberg Prison. Four had been involved in the killing of unarmed American servicemen during the war and two in the killing of inmates at Buchenwald and Flossenburg concentration camps. General Lucius Clay had reaffirmed the death sentences of five who had been recommended for clemency by a special commission. One scheduled to die this date was provided a reprieve. Ninety-seven German war criminals had thus far been put to death at Landsberg since the previous October 15. This date's executions were the first since December 3.

Eleanor Roosevelt, as the U.S. representative on the U.N. Human Rights Commission, had appealed several times to the Russians to release G. I. war brides from Russia and had been ignored except for a curt acknowledgment. She had asked how the Soviets could reconcile the refusal with their insistence on a U.N. requirement guaranteeing freedom of movement as a human right. She said that the Soviet representative had replied that it was a "regulation like any other regulation".

The Justice Department filed suit to break up A.T. & T. from Western Electric on the ground that the combination violated anti-trust laws, providing a monopoly on the telephone business in the country. It sought not only divestiture of Western Electric but also division of same into three different companies and to make numerous telephone patents generally available on a royalty basis. Western Electric and A. T. & T. had been conjoined for 65 years. The companies contended that the combination resulted in cheaper service to consumers.

That may have been true. Now, you are lucky to get a string and tin can for less than around $5,000 per year, and that does not usually even work half the time. The one monopoly which did work...

The U.S. Jaycees announced their list of outstanding young men of 1948, which is provided. It included Representative George Smathers of Florida, subsequently a Senator, and Lou Boudreau, player-manager of the Cleveland Indians, World Series champions. It also included Elvis and the head of Toni. The selection committee included General Eisenhower and Harold Stassen, both now college presidents.

Near Fayetteville, N.C., three Air Force fliers died when a C-82 "Flying Boxcar" crashed at Fort Bragg. Thirty-six had parachuted to safety and one survived the crash. The crash occurred near a hunting preserve for a group of New York men, formerly the estate of Percy Rockefeller.

In Durham, two teenage boys pleaded guilty to felonious assault in the beating of a 42-year old man and one to an additional charge of petty theft for stealing 50 cents and a package of cigarettes from the man. One was given a four to six year prison sentence and the other, four to seven years, the additional year being for the larceny. The plea was entered after a surprise witness testified at trial to seeing the assault take place. He said that one of the defendants struck a lighted cigarette lighter to the victim's ear and that he appeared helpless because of drunkenness or beatings. The victim was still undergoing treatment for his injuries.

They shoulda done took the juice for taking the man's cigarettes like 'at. You can beat the guy up, take his last cent, but it's just common human decency then to leave a feller his cigarettes.

In Winston-Salem, speaking to the North Carolina Dairy Products Association, Governor Kerr Scott said that it was time for the state to stop dodging the question of race and that he was going to see to it that minorities had a fair opportunity and training to fit into industrial and agricultural growth in the state. He suggested that one of the reasons that the textile industry was leaving New England might be that the Boston slave traders of old were having their sins visited on their descendants, in accordance with Biblical injunctions regarding "the sins of the fathers".

He also spoke out in favor of increased rural electrification and telephone service, criticized the power interests and telephone companies for delaying it. He said that he would apply pressure to get them to comply.

On the editorial page, "Progress within Our Means" comments on the Advisory Budget Commission recommendations to the Legislature on spending, including not allowing any more for the rural highway construction program, recommended by Governor Scott, than that normally taken in by the highway fund, not eliminating the sales tax on restaurant meals, not surrendering of a portion of license revenue to cities and counties, and not establishing a $2,400 minimum salary for teachers with Class A certificates. All had been recommended by the Governor. The Commission simply found that there was not enough revenue to pay for these programs or changes in revenue distribution.

It did recommend a 39 million dollar increase in school spending, including increase of average teacher salaries by about $500 per year. It also recommended an increase in old age assistance and aid to dependent children. It recommended 50 million dollars worth of new building projects plus 22 million to complete those under construction, and seven million for hospitals, the latter quadrupled by Federal matching funds and local funds.

It was likely that the Legislature would accept the recommendations without major change.

"Penalty of Birth" comments on the report of the State Education Commission, pending before the General Assembly, recommending an emergency fund for replacing and improving dilapidated school facilities in the state, especially in the poorer counties, as further elucidated by Tom Fesperman on the page. The black schools suffered far more than the white schools generally. The Advisory Budget Commission had recommended against the State becoming involved, however, in the building of school infrastructure, the province historically of the counties, and so it was unlikely that the situation would change, but remained a live issue.

It concludes that there would be no real equality of educational opportunity in the state until a child was no longer penalized for either being from a poor county or black.

"1949 March of Dimes" urges giving to the program even though there had been objection the previous year in the way the National Foundation conducted its drive, with too many promotional gimmicks to suit the public. The Foundation had responded that with an outlay necessary of 17 million dollars to pay for care of 27,600 children and adults stricken with polio in 1948 nationwide, there was need to raise funds to continue the post-epidemic treatment and replenish exhausted resources. The piece says that every polio victim in Mecklenburg County the previous year had received unstinting treatment, regardless of color, background or resources, and so finds the program worthy.

Tom Fesperman of The News tells of the General Assembly considering a bill to establish a 50 million dollar emergency fund for the counties to build schools and other facilities. The need for the bill came from the realization from the report of the State Education Commission that the state had many aging school buildings, 400 white and a thousand black schools, which should be torn down and replaced or in other instances undergo major alterations, especially in the poorer counties of the state. The percentages were far worse for black schools than white. The deficits included sagging floors, poor bathrooms, dim lights, leaky roofs, poor heat, and overcrowded facilities.

The reason for the problems had come from the fact that the counties were left to foot the bill for capital outlays, improvements and construction of buildings and purchase of equipment, while the State paid for operation.

Wilkes County, for instance, could not keep pace with Forsyth, Guilford, and Mecklenburg.

The Commission recommended a 150 million dollar State program over ten years to build new school structures, including 100 million during the ensuing six years for the most urgently needed buildings. A minority group on the Commission thought all was hunky-dory.

Drew Pearson tells of Senator William Langer looking into the high cost of Navy Wave uniforms, as the Waves were required to pay for their own from a meager $264 allowance, while Navy enlisted men had their uniforms paid by the service. The Wave uniforms, at the behest of Mrs. James Forrestal, had been designed by Mainbocher, who supplied gowns for the Duchess of Windsor and other women of Park Avenue. Mrs. Forrestal had been fashion editor for Vogue while Mainbocher had been its editor. His business had suffered during the war and so he designed the uniforms, gratis, in 1942. The Navy insisted that the uniforms were cheap given that his designer dresses sold for $600 and more. But, Mr. Pearson points out, that was little consolation to a Navy Wave with $264 to spend on a uniform.

Senator Langer wanted the Navy to supply the uniforms, now that the Waves were being made a regular part of the service.

The Senator was also examining Mrs. Forrestal's jewelry enterprise, which had encountered some shady dealings.

The GOP Senate conference included Senator Irving Ives urging that the Senators back a rules change to break up filibusters, which they had promised had they won the majority. Most of the time was spent resolving seniority issues for committee membership.

James Marlow examines the decision of Congress, or, more specifically, the Democrats, whether to seek repeal of Taft-Hartley along with a replacement form of the old Wagner Act plus amendments thereto or to repeal the Act and reenact the Wagner Act separately and then pass amendments. Labor favored two separate legislative packages as it would be easy to effect repeal and replacement with the Wagner Act in one action, but would take many weeks of debate to add amendments. If done at once, then labor would still have to operate under Taft-Hartley for that extra time. With the Wagner Act back in place, labor then could devote its energies to opposing amendments.

The Republicans were certain to seek to place amendments in the original package. Some Democrats also favored this approach. Republicans wanted to retain the Communist loyalty oath provision for union officers. Both parties had indicated a desire to retain the ban on secondary boycotts and jurisdictional strikes.

Joseph Alsop, in Paris, tells of the contest in French politics being the centrists of the Socialist, Radical, and MRP parties against the rightist followers of General De Gaulle. The Communist upheaval in fomenting labor strikes, especially the recently resolved crippling coal strike, had forced many of the French to support General De Gaulle, regarded as a strong man.

Within the centrist movement, there were major disputes between the Socialists and the Radicals on Government planning. With a few exceptions, such as Foreign Minister Robert Schuman and President Vincent Auriol, the center lacked strong men. Such caused the survival of the center to be precarious, albeit for the time preserved from becoming dead wood by the presence of ERP and the fact that M. Auriol was a political master hand, playing leader of the herd on a cattle range, chasing away the wolves from both the Left and the Right whenever they came too close to the herd.

A stipulation attached to ERP aid was that the French had to put away an equal amount in francs to that provided by ERP, the so-called "counterpart fund", which it could not touch unless the Government was following "non-inflationary" fiscal policies, to counter the tendency in France to avoid taxation and dismissal of surplus bureaucrats until economic disaster loomed. Now, the Government asked the ERP administrator in France for money from the counterpart fund to avoid the looming disaster. The administrator then instructed the Government that he could not release the funds until the cause of the disaster had been eliminated.

Such was the situation the previous month when Prime Minister Queuille offered his important fiscal and budgetary reform program, utilizing the need for release of money from the counterpart fund as a stimulus for voting for the package, resulting in the package passing and the budget balanced.

But the result was that the American ERP administrator was placed at the center of a maelstrom of politics and economics in the country, causing resentment regarding "American interference".

The Gaullists meanwhile demanded that all release of counterpart funds be ceased so that the final crisis in France would occur and force national elections, in which they were confident of prevailing.

Samuel Grafton, no longer carried by The News, discusses the British sending a fleet of ships into the Trans-Jordan port of Aquaba on the Red Sea on the claim that it was to serve their part in the mutual defense pact with Egypt, which, Mr. Grafton points out, the Egyptians had renounced. The basis for the action had been the shooting down by Israel of five RAF planes a week earlier over the border region between Egypt and Israel during an acknowledged surveillance mission by the British.

Presently, the British, not the Arabs or Israelis, therefore were threatening the best chance thus far for peace in the Middle East, just as the mutually agreed ceasefire between the Egyptians and Israelis had begun to allow for the nascent mediation conference under the auspices of the U.N. on the Island of Rhodes. Even the Manchester Guardian had editorialized that Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin was "making fools" of the British and in danger of doing worse with this action.

If the action had to do with Middle Eastern oil, then the world had to deduce that it was entering a new age of imperialism based on fear, a country facing a long, slow recovery from the war, desperately seeking resources elsewhere. If so, it was akin to the Dutch attack on Indonesia and the French aggression in Indo-China. Of all forms of aggression, Mr. Grafton posits, this type was the most dangerous as it could not succeed. The world organization would put down such efforts quickly, but in the process it could render the Western world helpless, the Western Alliance dead aborning by the fact of one of its member nations embarking "upon a military adventure among those peoples whom we once used to call 'natives.'"

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