The Charlotte News

Tuesday, October 31, 1950

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that two fast-moving American columns, a 24th Division tank column on the western flank, approaching Sinuiju, and the Seventh Division on the east coast, which had landed at Iwon Sunday and driven to Punsan, 40 air miles south of the Manchurian border, had penetrated North Korean defenses at several points Tuesday in a concerted effort to reach the Chinese border. Further up the east coast, South Korean forces advanced 22 miles beyond Songjin and entered Kilchu, leading to Siberia, 62 miles away.

The drive toward Hamhung by two Communist divisions, reportedly comprised primarily of Chinese, had slackened 25 miles short of its objective. Correspondent Stan Swinton reported that an American adviser said that the Chinese appeared to have run out of mortar ammunition and were withdrawing.

In Tokyo, allied headquarters said that while there was evidence that the Chinese Communists were aiding the North Koreans, ten Chinese Communist soldiers having been captured at Unsan, Taechon, Onjong and Taepyong, it had not been established that there was any organized presence. A South Korean commander, however, said that he was convinced that the Communist Chinese soldiers were in the vanguard of the North Korean forces at Unsan.

Correspondent Jack MacBeth was told by an American colonel that, no matter who they were, the soldiers fought differently, engaging only at night, and were "damn good at it". He said that they wore sandals instead of the rubber soles worn by the North Koreans. They were also well-organized and equipped.

There were several pieces of evidence suggesting that the Chinese Communists were involved en masse.

Yates McDaniel reports that officials at the Pentagon were professing no surprise at the appearance of Communist Chinese troops but still said that they expected no large-scale intervention, cited evidence for their belief that the Chinese effort was to protect a North Korean power dam on the Yalu River which supplied electricity to both Manchuria and Korea, and to delay U.N. efforts to end the fighting and rebuild Korea.

The NATO defense secretaries and military chiefs of staff, meeting in Washington to work out the common defense plan for Western Europe, entered an extra session this date, apparently to consider further the issue of rearming West Germany to counteract the East German paramilitary police. Secrecy continued to surround the conference.

A report from San Juan stated that National Guard forces, intent on smashing the last of the resistance by Puerto Rican Nationalists, had driven the rebel forces from their stronghold at Jayuya, using strafing planes and troops. Jayuya was the scene of some of the bloodiest fighting in the rebellion, which Governor Luis Munoz Marin said was aided by the Communists. The National Guard troops also went to Utuado, ten miles to the west, where a force of about 60 to 70 Nationalists were dug in. At Ponce, six Nationalists were arrested and each charged with the murders of two policemen. A captured Nationalist admitted that a full-scale revolt had been planned for the eve of the November 4 vote on the new constitution, opposed by the Nationalists. It was estimated that there were 1,200 to 1,500 persons involved in the rebellion. Casualties on both sides were estimated to include 30 dead and 25 wounded, but might be higher.

At the U.N., the U.S. appealed to the General Assembly to override the effort of Russia to oust Secretary-General Trygve Lie and prevent him from being given a renewed term of three years by vetoing the extension in the Security Council, an act, said U.S. delegate Warren Austin, to punish him for carrying out faithfully his duties to the organization.

According to the Agriculture Department, higher food prices, perhaps the highest ever, topping the 1948 record, were expected in 1951.

Near Manila, 25 armed bandits stole $40,000 in daylight from a payroll car of a passenger train.

In New York, John Boettiger, 50, previously married to Anna Roosevelt, only daughter of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, plunged to his death from the seventh floor of an exclusive hotel. Police said that he had been depressed for several days and was under the care of a male nurse. The previous night he had taken an overdose of sleeping pills and and had been revived by a doctor, who assigned the male nurse. He had asked the nurse to open a window to give him fresh air and then jumped through it in the nurse's presence. He had been a journalist, eventually becoming publisher of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, a Hearst newspaper. The couple had one child and had moved to Phoenix when they were divorced two years earlier. He had remarried in late 1949.

In Charlotte, the body of a 65-year old contractor was recovered from the Catawba River after he had drowned himself. Both of his wrists had been slashed. Three notes explaining his actions, that he was despondent over domestic difficulties, were found in the pocket of his coat left on the bridge from which he had jumped.

At Ayot St. Lawrence, England, writer George Bernard Shaw, 94, was reported much weaker after having made good progress in healing from his broken thigh suffered September 9.

North Carolina Governor Kerr Scott maintained at a news conference his stance that if the State was going to take over maintenance and construction of city streets, then the gasoline tax would probably have to be increased.

He backtracked somewhat from his statement in Charlotte the prior week that he would return to his farm and retire from politics after the end of his gubernatorial term in 1953. He had been mentioned as a possible candidate in 1954 to contest Willis Smith for the Senate. He said that he would return to his farm at the end of the term but would not necessarily rule out further politics.

He would run successfully in 1954 against Senator Alton Lennon, appointed to the Senate seat in 1953 by Governor William B. Umstead at the death of Willis Smith. Senator Scott would serve in the unlucky hot seat until 1958 at his own death.

On the editorial page, "'Rebellion' in Puerto Rico" tells of the Nationalist Party being small in number, notwithstanding newspaper accounts making them seem more important. The current rebellion was thought to be in response to the coming November 4 election on the new constitution.

Puerto Ricans generally held a special affinity for their native island but also valued their ties to the U.S. Governor Luis Munoz Marin steered a course between outright independence and statehood, choosing self-government together with political and economic ties to the U.S.

The Nationalists had been led for years by Pedro Albizo Campos and comprised only a tiny fraction of the population.

The rebellion in Puerto Rico would coincide with the next day's attempted assassination of President Truman at Blair House in Washington by two Puerto Rican Nationalists.

"Eisenhower Fills the Bill" finds General Eisenhower to meet a number of enumerated criteria for becoming supreme commander of NATO. He had not yet been asked to accept the position but had indicated recently his availability and it hopes he would be appointed. He could still remain available, it ventures, for the GOP presidential nomination in 1952.

"Two Ways of Borrowing" bristles at criticism of Charlotte newspapers by an editorial in the Winston-Salem Journal for inconsistency in criticizing Federal deficit spending while favoring local bond issues funded by deficit spending. The editorial distinguishes the two forms of spending on the bases that the local government was spending for long-term capital projects which were to be paid off at a time certain, whereas the Federal Government funded regular spending with borrowed money and simply re-funded the loans out of the budget when they came due.

The latter practice had happened in Charlotte on its 1870 railroad bonds, re-funded twice when they had come due, were now finally being retired, though after costing the taxpayers five times in interest the original $300,000 principal.

It suggests that if the Journal would tend to its own knitting, Winston-Salem might grow to be the bustling city which Charlotte was.

Mama? What did you say your mama does?

A piece from the Shelby Daily Star, titled "Fall Color in Trees", tells of tree expert Frank Kowalk furnishing a statement by Frank Pipal, an Omaha forester, who said that leaves turned even before the first frost, dispelling the commonly held notion that the frost caused the leaves to turn. Mr. Pipal had explained the chemistry behind the changing of the leaves, having to do with the disappearance of chlorophyll and replacement by carotin and anthophyll during the fall, changing the leaves from green to yellow. The reds were caused by sugar, producing anthocyanin. The browns were the result of tannic acid in the leaf sap.

The most variegated color was produced by sunshine, moisture and cool nights, followed by warm days. Drought, cloudiness, and warm nights produced the poorest coloration. Sunshine was necessary to produce the sugar.

After very cool nights and the first frosts, nature caused the leaves to fall.

The Indians had attributed the change in colors to celestial hunters having slain the Great Bear, causing his blood to drip onto the trees, his fat splattering from the great kettle producing the yellows.

Drew Pearson tells of the Indian Ambassador having approached the President immediately after his speech before the U.N General Assembly the prior week and suggested that he go ahead with peace talks then and there, as Foreign Minister Andrei Vishinsky was present. The President, somewhat taken aback at the forwardness, said that he had Secretary of State Acheson present for that purpose. The Indian Ambassador replied, "But there's an old Indian proverb that you can't keep a dog and do your own barking." The President had not appeared to catch the drift, but the State Department had been of two schools of thought, one being to lay out an olive branch and the other favoring only talk of arming, the former having won out.

He next calls attention to the little-realized qualities of some of the Congressional candidates, starting with former Senator Rush Holt of West Virginia, who had been friendly with Nazi agent George Sylvester Viereck prior to Pearl Harbor, wanting to publish through him a book accusing FDR of pushing the U.S. into war with Germany. Herr Viereck eventually was sentenced to a six-year jail sentence on those facts for not registering as an agent of a foreign government.

The NATO defense ministers, gathered in Washington to discuss preparation for the common defense, had not expected all of the press attention accorded them, irritating a British wing commander.

The Navy League, the civilian arm of the Navy, was stirring the feud again with the Air Force, wanted to implement a three-point plan, to reinstate Navy Day, abolished in favor of Armed Forces Day, to place the Marine Corps commandant on the Joint Chiefs, and to take tactical air support away from the Air Force and return it to the Army. The president of the League urged a propaganda campaign in the newspapers in furtherance of these goals.

He notes that Congressman Carl Vinson of Georgia, a friend of the Navy, had called for hearings on the latter point before the House Armed Services Committee, which he chaired.

Stewart Alsop, in St. Louis, observes the Missouri political landscape, as he had just done in Ohio and Indiana, finds it similar, with a Republican incumbent, Forrest Donnell, running for re-election to the Senate against a Democratic challenger, Tom Hennings, who ostensibly embraced the Fair Deal while also backing away from some of its major programs, the Brannan farm plan and the compulsory health insurance plan. The Republican incumbent saw doom around every corner, warned constantly of the menace of Communism. But his record was spotty in terms of actual support for measures designed to deal with the Communist menace.

Both men suffered from a certain infidelity from their respective parties. The local St. Louis bigwigs of the GOP had written off Senator Donnell, openly instructing their party faithful how to split tickets to vote for Mr. Hennings in the Senate race while voting for Republican candidates for local office. But Senator Donnell had never been strong in St. Louis, as his strength came from the rural areas, where he had campaigned with vigor. He told audiences that the Truman Administration was responsible for Korea, Communism, confusion, corruption, and the rising cost of living. His folksy style included, in addition to the alliterative "c's" critique, remembering every rustican's name as well that of their cows, had a reputation for strict honesty.

Mr. Hennings also had a problem with the Democratic Party, with two party leaders having gone to Washington recently seeking money and an endorsement from the President, but failing in their mission. Mr. Hennings had defeated the Truman-backed candidate in the primary, and the President disliked Mr. Hennings personally.

Mr. Hennings had, however, backed the President's veto of the McCarran anti-subversive bill and had not backed down after it passed over the veto. His primary opponent had been backed by the remnants of the old Pendergast machine, and Mr. Hennings was receiving effective support from labor, giving him a slight edge in the campaign.

But just as in Ohio and Indiana, no one knew whether the gloomy Republican incumbent would pull out a victory over his cheery Democratic rival.

Robert C. Ruark, in Chicago, supports the President's speech to the U.N. challenging Russia to agree to a "fool-proof" plan for peace by having international inspections to police mutual disarmament. But, he cautions, no plan was proof against fools, selfishness or greed, or any of the other ingredients of aggression.

In reality, man had always pushed toward aggression, as with Hitler, Mussolini, and Tojo. He questions how world disarmament could be effectively policed, as there was no way to frisk the world. Even Jesus had been unable to make peace work by sheer selfless sacrifice. It was difficult to talk peace to thugs, as the Russians of the Kremlin.

He doubts the global morality program would work any better than the current effort of the Kefauver committee to make organized crime appear naughty.

A letter writer from Pittsboro criticizes Governor Kerr Scott for having his conference on public power in Charlotte, thinks TVA was a fraud on the public.

A letter writer thinks that labor delivering its vote to particular candidates and interests was repugnant to Americans, that unions should stick to the task of raising wages and improving working conditions. The CIO PAC, he asserts, was an aggressive, well-financed political organization and part of the New Deal wing of the Democratic Party.

Well, here's ye a suggestion: get your boy there from Mon-roe to get ye up some money from all 'round the country to defeat them lib'rals long 'bout 19 and 78 and 80, and call it "The National Con-gressional Cluuuub"—a Klub with a Big Tent, where all morons will be welcome.

A letter from Santa Barbara, California, from the president of Friends of the Birds, Inc., finds that while cats were photogenic, always omitted from their resumes was the fact of their predatory instinct for birds. The myth perpetuated as rationale for this unreined freedom was that cats killed mice and rats in a sufficient degree to make up for the concomitant incidental loss of birds.

It had been said that cats were the pets of poor children who could not afford a license, but, she asserts, more poor children had pet dogs, for which a license was required, than had pet cats.

She therefore urges the licensing of cats, to control their predatory nature, the Hyde side of their Dr. Jekyl—with a hidden ell, as in "feine".

To everything, there is a season, dear... Nothing better than a little crunchy bird for breakfast after a night spent roaming the darkened streets and dank alleyways of the degenerate, decadent humans ...

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