The Charlotte News

Tuesday, April 22, 1952

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that an allied spokesman told Communist negotiators in the Korean truce talks this date that their attitude clearly indicated that they had not come to the conference to negotiate an armistice. This statement came in response to a North Korean negotiator indicating that the U.N. negotiators should give up their "illusions" about banning Communist airfield maintenance and repair during an armistice. The session on truce supervision lasted 16 minutes. No problems were solved.

In the other staff officers meeting, regarding exchange of prisoners and the issue of voluntary repatriation, possible solutions were still being explored during a one hour and 40 minute session. The allies presented to the Communists a list of six new prisoner camps in South Korea, in addition to the camps on Koje Island, where bloody riots had occurred in recent months. A U.N. spokesman said that some of the prisoners at Koje had been transferred elsewhere, relieving the crowded condition of 130,000 prisoners and 30,000 civilians formerly being housed there.

Both groups would meet again the following day.

U.S. Eighth Army officers were puzzled by a report of about 200 white-clad Chinese Communist cavalrymen on the central front this date, moving toward Kumsong until they were ripped to pieces by allied artillery. A staff officer said that intelligence officers were studying the details of the report. He said that the probability of snow in the mountains in the area might explain why the enemy troops had on white uniforms. Such cavalrymen had last been reported shortly after the entry to the war of Communist China in November, 1950.

U.S. Navy headquarters in Tokyo stated that five U.S. ships had been sunk by mines and 46 U.S. and 11 British warships damaged during the Korean War.

Congressman Robert Hale of Maine introduced this date a resolution seeking the impeachment of the President for seizing the steel mills, plus a companion resolution to declare the sense of the House that the President had violated the Constitution and that the steel mills should be returned to their private owners. The resolution of impeachment was referred, per the usual course, to the Rules Committee, where no further action was expected, at least immediately. Congressman John McCormack of Massachusetts, the Democratic Majority Leader, defended the President, and Republican Congressman Fred Crawford of Michigan suggested that the courts be allowed to determine the legality of the seizure. Meanwhile, the Senate resumed its debate on a Republican-sponsored measure to forbid spending of Government money to carry out the seizure. Late the previous day, the Senate passed, by a vote of 44 to 31, an amendment proposed by Senator Homer Ferguson of Michigan forbidding use of any of the money in a 960-million dollar appropriation bill in carrying out the order of seizure. None of that money, however, was necessary to enforce the seizure, and Senator Styles Bridges, the Republican floor leader, stated that it was only a gesture of Senate disapproval. Eleven Democrats had joined 33 Republicans in the vote, and two Republicans, Senators Wayne Morse and William Langer, sided with the 29 Democrats in opposing it. Senator William Knowland of California announced that he would press for a vote during the afternoon on a companion amendment which, he said, would make it impossible for the President to enforce the seizure.

In New York and Pennsylvania, primaries took place this date, with 96 Republican and 94 Democratic delegate spots to be chosen in New York, though there was no presidential preference race. Governor Dewey appeared to have the entire Republican delegation pretty well assured for General Eisenhower, but Senator Taft was predicting that he would obtain 20 of the delegates. In Pennsylvania, only General Eisenhower and former Governor Harold Stassen were on the ballot, as both Democrats and Republicans each picked 60 delegates, with ten at-large delegates in each party already having been chosen. Senator Taft had withdrawn from the Pennsylvania primary because the delegates were not bound by the results of the popularity contest. It was believed, nevertheless, that a substantial write-in vote would occur for the Senator. Supporters of General Eisenhower, including some Democrats, also believed that a write-in vote would take place for him as well among Democrats. Pennsylvania permitted cross-party voting in the primaries. There were no named Democratic presidential candidates on the ballot in Pennsylvania.

New rain, some of it heavy, added to fears along the Missouri River of additional flooding, as major dikes continued to hold at critical spots and experts continued to predict that Kansas City would be safe. Missouri Governor Forrest Smith proclaimed a flood emergency and sought emergency funding from the President. A weatherman at LaCrosse, Wisconsin, said that the flooding on the upper Mississippi River had subsided and that "the worst of it is over now."

In Jackson, Mich., 179 mutineering prisoners staged a bloody battle in their cell block this date after a dispute over what should be done with 11 Southern Michigan Prison guards they were holding as hostages. Two of the prisoners were stabbed and beaten badly, and their bloodied bodies tossed out of the cell block by other convicts. One convict had died in the melee and two million dollars worth of damage had been done to the prison after three days of rioting. The prisoners had stated that they would spare the lives of the 11 guards in exchange for a guarantee that they would not be punished for their part in the riot.

At Rahway, N.J., the five-day mutiny by prisoners at the Rahway State Prison had resulted in awarding them their chief demand, a probe of the State Parole Board. They continued, however, to hold out on the issue of immunity from disciplinary action as a result of the incident. The refusal to grant that demand had caused a new disturbance in a wing not previously involved in the outbreak. That disturbance quieted after 45 minutes when guards threatened the use of teargas. Food and water had been shut off from the rioting prisoners, but a prison official said that it was possible they had filled containers with water prior to the outbreak. A prison official said that a small amount of teargas had been used the previous night on the 231 mutineers who had taken over a dormitory wing and were holding eight guards as hostage. Prior to that time, guards had been reluctant to use teargas because of the hostages.

The Air Force disclosed that a second pilot had been convicted in a court-martial for refusing to fly, this officer stationed at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Miss., found guilty of malingering and sentenced to dismissal under dishonorable conditions, forfeiture of all pay and allowances, plus three months imprisonment. The base commander, however, had remitted the prison sentence and the case remained subject to final disposition.

In Santa Monica, California, movie producer Walter Wanger was convicted this date of assault with a deadly weapon for shooting his wife's agent in the groin, and was sentenced to four months in jail.

In London, Scotland Yard said that thieves had stolen from a U.S. military store at Hampton in London's outskirts 30 cases of chickens, 2,750 pounds of smoked hams, 540 pounds of frankfurters, 1,140 pounds of pork sausage and a number of rolls of beef.

The second in a series of six articles on nerves, by Dr. W. C. Alvarez, advises that a person should observe the strains which caused nerves to "act up" and then avoid those strains and hoard one's energy. He advises never to be ashamed of one's nerves, that shame should only occur from trying to control them. Some patients hated to be called nervous and even became angry at the suggestion. He advises that the pain was real and very trying, that a stomach-ache resulting from fear was just as real as one from a gastric ulcer. But, nevertheless, there was nothing physically causing the pain, that it was from the brain becoming tired and distressed, sending a pain signal of soreness or fatigue to some part of the body in response. So, he advises, if an examining physician said that a person was suffering from "nervous distress", the patient should not become indignant, that it was nothing about which to be ashamed or the doctor's fault that there was nothing, per se, physically wrong with the person.

Incidentally, Dr. Alvarez was the father of Luis Alvarez, the noted physicist who won a Nobel Prize in 1968 for his contributions to particle physics, and, in 1967 and 1969, put forward a theory of "jet recoil mechanism", which explained the backward physical motion of President Kennedy, after being shot in the head in Dallas on November 22, 1963, as consistent with a shot fired from the rear, that the President's backward motion was in reaction to the forward momentum of the jet of brain, skull and bullet fragmentation matter forced by the bullet from the right frontal wound in his head.

Abstruse theoretical physics (and unattached melons) aside, however, real world experience, with direction of bullet travel known, appears to the contrary, as one would expect under Newton's Second Law.

At Yucca Flats, Nev., one of the most spectacular atomic bombs ever detonated was felt by observers ten miles away. It was probably the largest bomb ever detonated within the continental U.S. and its smoke had blotted out 1,500 troops situated within four miles of ground zero. It had been dropped by an Air Force plane flying at 30,000 feet and was visible 75 miles away in Las Vegas, where it was also felt seven minutes after the blast. The reporter, Bill Becker, states that the concussion twisted his neck a minute after the flash and that the fireball had lasted between four and ten seconds. The heat from the blast had singed the faces of observers at News Nob. Some of the troops, stationed in 4.5 foot deep foxholes, had some of their necks twisted as well by the shock. Observers who had also witnessed the Bikini Atoll explosions in 1946 were uncertain as to whether this bomb was bigger. Twenty-two minutes after the explosion, the mushroom cloud had spread perhaps at 40,000 feet and was blowing away from observers to the southeast, while the dust column was twisted in the same direction, posing apparently no danger to civilians invited to observe the first such open show in the country.

Tom Fesperman of The News tells of the atomic bomb blast having been televised live nationally for the first time. But after the explosion and resulting mushroom cloud, the picture exhibited diagonal patterns and blotches which had nothing to do with the atomic weapons, but rather resulted from the periodically interrupted transmission of the picture across the country. The problem occurred because there were no television stations within hundreds of miles of Yucca Flats to relay the picture. Even with the disturbances, one could see the blast and the effects of the shock wave, which arrived 30 seconds later at the television equipment ten miles away, causing a loud roar. Then came the mushroom cloud and then the flat top of an ice cap which formed above the mushroom, after which the steadiest picture of all showed a "pure white flower-shaped cloud" many thousands of feet in the air, with a gray blanket spreading across the desert below. Everyone who observed it at the television station believed it historic, including the cooking expert set to follow with a local afternoon show, though too busy preparing for her own program by baking a cake in the studio to be fully attentive to the bomb. The event had been broadcast locally on WBTV, channel 3 on your dial.

On page 2-A, the first chapter of a new serialized novel begins, Miss Millions by Rob Eden, the story of a working girl suddenly thrust into the lap of luxury.

The Comic Dictionary entry for the date indicates that "grammar" was defined as "the science that learns us how to speak correct."

On the editorial page, "'Evacuation & Unity' the Egyptian Cry", another by-lined piece by News editor Pete McKnight from Cairo, as part of his Middle East tour with the American Christian Palestine Committee study group, tells of the group, despite having come to study the problems of Arab refugees following the Arab-Israeli war, having encountered the British-Egyptian impasse regarding the Suez Canal and the Sudan.

Every Arab leader with whom Mr. McKnight had talked agreed that Britain had to evacuate the Canal Zone and that Egypt had to have full control of the Sudan, the source of the Nile, upon which Egypt depended for its life. The two issues were joined together under the slogan "evacuation and unity". The result had been riots the previous January 26, punctuated by bombs set all over Cairo, in vengeance for the death of some Egyptian troops in the Canal Zone. In consequence, there had been imposition of martial law and complete censorship of the mail and press, a curfew and house arrest of opposition political leaders. The Government thereby had been able to distract the people from the illiteracy, poverty, landlordism and political inequality which stood in contrast to the lush villas and luxury apartments of the ruling elite.

Egypt was charged with political dynamite which could be ignited by the upcoming May elections. Presently, the nation was ruled by a Cabinet appointed by King Farouk, after the Wafdist Government had been disbanded shortly after the riots. It was not a strong government and the Wafdists appeared to have an overwhelming majority as the election neared. If the Wafdists were returned to power, they would increase their anti-British campaign, and some believed that King Farouk would not take that chance but rather would call off the elections and continue rule under martial law, likely to cause unrest. Another potential source of ignition might be an incident between British and Egyptian troops or produced by the youthful firebrands at Fuad University, who appeared to have inspired the January 26 riots.

Should new trouble occur, the U.S. would have a stake, as it was the general American policy to follow the British lead in the area, causing resentment among the more nationalistic Egyptian leaders, placing the U.S. on the side of despised colonialism. The reason for this policy was to preserve the Anglo-American alliance worldwide.

"The Cops Come Through" praises the city police and fire departments for the quick solution of the mystery of the series of three church arson cases the previous week, leading to the apprehension of a teenage bobby-soxer who had set the blazes in a fit of pique. It provides special praise to Fire Chief Donald Charles and detectives Neal Forney and Charlie Moyle, who had laid the groundwork for the girl's arrest. Mr. Charles had suggested that because of the number of false alarms turned in during the previous several weeks, it might be the work of a juvenile delinquent and one girl in particular, with whom he was familiar and who lived a short distance from the location of three of the alarms. Detective Forney then talked to the girl, who admitted setting the three fires at two different churches.

You better get a search warrant because she probably has that little boy's shoes in her bedroom.

"Rejoin Us Mortals, Mr. Truman" tells of the President having been acting and talking "mighty big lately", regarding the steel seizure and his determining whether the steelworkers would be entitled to an increase in pay while the Government was running the steel mills, suggesting that it was all a part of his inherent executive power. He had also stated that the floods in the Midwest could have been avoided if the governors had not dragged their feet and implemented the Pick-Sloan plan for flood control. He had also warned Congress that he would call special sessions repeatedly through New Year's Day if necessary, should they continue to try to cut the defense budget, compromising national security.

The piece finds it a "bragging, cocksure attitude", disrespectful of the opinions of others. It suggests that the humble man who had come to the Presidency in April, 1945 had been less likely to throw caution to the wind and was therefore a safer man. It finds that since he had announced on March 29 his decision not to run again, the burden of office had been lifted from his shoulders, and, it suggests, ought to settle there once again to provide him grounding.

A piece from the Raleigh News & Observer, titled "Beyond Secession", tells of the followers of Governor James Byrnes of South Carolina having a right as individuals or as a group to vote for any candidate or party they desired in the 1952 elections, and had a right to bolt from the Democratic Party. But, it finds, the Governor had reiterated a "strange doctrine" when he had suggested that he and his followers had a right to be regarded as members of the national Democratic Party for purposes of picking the nominee, despite giving advance notice that they would not be bound by the party's decision. The piece finds it a step beyond the assertion of the right of secession by South Carolina in 1861. Governor Byrnes was essentially proclaiming that the South had a right to be both in and out of the Democratic Party at the same time.

It indicates that anyone who wanted the Republicans or another party to win in November should not be able to determine the Democratic nominee or the party's platform at the convention.

Lathan Mims, Associated Press staff writer, presents the first in a series of Associated Press articles on the move of the New England textile industry to the South. He writes from Charlotte, indicating that the South had captured the lion's share of the nation's cotton, hosiery and synthetic textile industry and was preparing to receive more transplants from New England. The revolution had begun in 1927, at which point the South had become the nation's leader in cotton textile production. Presently, it had slightly more than 80 percent of the nation's spindles, the measure of textile industry production, whereas it had 5.3 percent in 1880. The South had once fed much of the yarn to New England, where it was woven into unfinished cloth. But now there was a trend toward integration in the industry, such that there were scores of finishing plants in the South, primarily in the Carolinas, the center of the Southern textile industry.

Southern industrialists and state planners indicated that the woolen and worsted mills would soon follow the parade of other textile mills southward. In 1947, the South's woolen industry was comprised of only 43 plants with about 12,000 employees, but was already growing rapidly. The region stood in the forefront of the synthetic yarn field and therefore could look to a time when it would produce fabrics blended from woolen synthetics instead of all wool.

The worldwide textile economic slump had not greatly impacted the South but had resulted in a slump in prices and earnings rather than in production. Only a couple of marginal small cotton mills had been forced to close. There was some increase in textile unemployment in the Carolinas, but it was not widespread, with only 17,000 unemployed among North Carolina's 240,000 textile workers in early April and 5,000 among the 125,000 workers in South Carolina. Some large mills, such as Burlington, Cone and the J. P. Stevens group, had shut down their plants for a week-long Easter holiday, reflecting the slow business conditions.

But there was a growing feeling of optimism among Southern producers that the worst of the recession was over, as merchandisers' inventories got lower. The South expected to be at the forefront when orders for better business began anew.

There is another term paper topic for you, which you can title: "The South's Turn to Rayon and Orlon, (Or How It Stopped Worrying about the Bomb)".

Drew Pearson, in Paris, indicates that if General Eisenhower were to become President, the time might come when American publishers and newsmen who presently berated President Truman would look back on present press relations wistfully, with some nostalgia. The General's press relations were going to be a lot different from the present system, under which a journalist could throw out any question under the sun to the President and have him respond. Quoting verbatim from White House press conferences also would likely become a thing of the past. The General's press relations were cordial but conducted according to his rules, which did not permit questions.

It appeared that when the General would return to the U.S. sometime after June 1, there would be very few press conferences and detailed questions would not be encouraged. It appeared to be a revival of the old system of press relations under former President Hoover, who required questions to be submitted 24 hours in advance.

French Communists had adopted a policy of slashing tires on any American car which appeared the property of anyone too prosperous when found parked on an isolated street. It was not so much an anti-American strategy as to cause Americans to be anti-French. He cautions American tourists visiting France during the summer of this problem and the benefit to the Soviets should it induce anti-French feeling. He adds that it was why Senator Pat McCarran of Nevada, while appearing to track down Communists domestically, was actually providing solace to the Communists by curtailing U.S. propaganda abroad.

He recounts of a French friend who had told him that he had listened to a Moscow radio broadcast in which an individual was presented who claimed to have "escaped" from New York and that for recreation on Sundays, they had gone to lynchings, mostly of blacks, but also including some Jews and other people. He claimed that about ten people were lynched every Sunday, to the point that finally he had gotten sick of it and so had to return to Russia

Mr. Pearson indicates that in France alone, the Kremlin spent 125 million dollars annually on propaganda, more than the U.S. spent for the entire world, thanks to the cuts imposed by Senator McCarran on the Voice of America.

Soviet propaganda was so effective that many Frenchmen believed that the U.S. was actually engaging in germ warfare in Korea, and, he notes, the Korean War generally was greatly misunderstood in France. Two cleaning women had responded to a question posed by a French official working at NATO as to who they thought had started the Korean War, by stating that they did not know but that Americans had dropped "plenty of disease bugs on them", of which they had seen pictures. Mr. Pearson adds that the U.S. had many friends in France, especially among the intelligent classes, but, that, nevertheless, Communist propaganda had its effect.

Joseph & Stewart Alsop tell of the Democratic Party, after a week following the apparent withdrawal from the race by Governor Adlai Stevenson, having recovered to form an intelligible pattern, a dominant figure in which would likely be the President, despite his now being a lameduck. The President viewed the possibility of Senator Estes Kefauver becoming the Democratic nominee as a disaster, and in the event that the Republicans would select Senator Taft as the nominee, with Senator Kefauver the only apparent viable candidate for the Democrats, the President would be left with the choice of either taking back his withdrawal from the race or orchestrating an effort to draft Governor Stevenson at the convention. If, however, the GOP were to select General Eisenhower as the nominee, the President would likely figure that Senator Kefauver could not beat him anyway and so would leave things alone.

The President had been angered by Governor Stevenson's withdrawal after the President had endorsed him in January. But if the alternative candidate acceptable to the President, Averell Harriman, proved not to be a popular choice, the President would have little viable option but to seek the draft of Governor Stevenson or run, himself.

As to Ambassador Harriman, he had difficulty translating his warmth evidenced in interpersonal meetings into public speeches. He tended to over-prepare for his major speeches, such that they lost their fire by the time of delivery. His speech to a gathering, primarily of diplomats and high government dignitaries, at the celebration of the first anniversary of NATO recently, had drawn a great deal of approbation, but that was lost to the general public. At the recent dinner given in his honor the previous Saturday, his speech was overshadowed by that of Governor Stevenson, who had just stated that he would not accept the nomination.

Robert C. Ruark, in New Orleans, finds that the modern way of raising children tended to produce "adult-children" who had not enjoyed a proper childhood, and who then grew up to be "child-adults". He recalls a "clear-cut period of childhood, in which the youngsters were allowed to play unhampered, like puppies, before some pretty stern parental discipline took over." The child of his youth had not been "jaded from saturation in adult knowledge" or "harassed constantly by theory in the inept hands of parents". Babies were not treated as adults.

He understood that there was a percentage of youth who got into trouble out of boredom and from psychic insecurity, and that possibly the biggest domestic story of the previous year had been the narcotic addiction among the very young. He finds it hard to believe that a healthy child from a good background would wind up taking shots for kicks, but the evidence indicated it was prevalent.

A letter writer comments on the proposed new tax rate for the county, that though it was ostensibly reduced, was actually higher because of increased valuations. He indicates that people understood that taxes had to be somewhat higher and that it was better to talk about it honestly.

A letter writer from Forest City comments on the April 10 editorial regarding Justice William O. Douglas's suggestion of a "Point Five" program to encourage "peasant revolutions" in underdeveloped countries receiving Point Four aid, as the means to combat the threat of Communism. He suggests that the letters "M" and "U" in Communism were significant, as the Christian and democratic efforts under Missions Unlimited were opposed to Communism. He encourages people to make up their minds as to which "M. U." they would follow, as there would be no neutrals or spectators, and high wages and big profits would become useless and senseless in America. He predicts that Soviet Communism would destroy America and Western civilization unless "somebody and something changes our thinking, attitudes and conduct…"

Framed Edition
[Return to Links
Page by Subject] [Return to Links-Page by Date] [Return to News<i><i><i>—</i></i></i>Framed Edition]
Links-Date Links-Subj.