The Charlotte News
Monday, March 18, 1957
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Manila that Philippines Vice-President Carlos Garcia, 60, had acceded to the Presidency this date following the death in a plane crash of President Ramon Magsaysay, 49. President Garcia was the fourth President of the Republic. He would serve until after the regularly scheduled election would take place the following November. He was a staunch supporter of President Magsaysay's foreign policy and was expected to continue the policy of strengthening relations with the U.S. He told the press that he anticipated no changes in the Cabinet and would continue to fill the role of secretary of foreign affairs which he held as Vice-President. President Magsaysay had been a champion of democracy and bitter foe of Communism. The crash had occurred on a Cebu Island mountainside just after the plane had departed Manila. One passenger, a Philippine newsman, survived the crash, which took the lives of 26 persons, including several top Government officials and educators and several Philippine newsmen and members of the President's staff. The President was returning from delivery of two commencement addresses on Cebu. No cause of the crash had yet been determined but Communist sabotage was not being ruled out. As Defense Secretary, Mr. Magsaysay had wrecked the Communist Huk rebel movement at the early stages of the Republic. Messages of condolences came from abroad to the Government, the President's widow and three children.
In Tel Aviv, it was reported that an Israeli Army spokesman stated that three more plastic land mines had been found near the Gaza border at a location close to where a tractor from an Israeli farm settlement had struck a mine. Footprints from the mines led to the Gaza Strip.
In Miami, Fla., the SS Perama had been taken in tow this date after two large explosions and a fire aboard had caused its crew of 43 to abandon ship in the Gulf of Mexico. The Coast Guard had reported that the vessel had been taken in tow by the SS Esso Bermuda and that the ship's crew had returned to their ship from another ship which had picked them up from two lifeboats, one of which contained 25 men and the other, 18. A Coast Guard plane from St. Petersburg had reported at the scene that visibility was ten miles and that the wind was south at 12 knots. The Perama was described as listing to port and "dead in the water". Reports that the vessel had been sinking had been denied by the Coast Guard. It said that the explosions had occurred five minutes apart and that fire had broken out in the aft section.
In New York, the owner of a Brooklyn auto-wrecking firm and his two pet dogs had been found dead in his fume-filled car the previous day. Police said that the man had been despondent over the death of his wife the previous week.
In Gatlinburg, Tenn., it was reported that three Boy Scouts, who had been missing overnight on a hike in the Great Smoky Mountains, had been found this date by a rescue squad huddled in a shack on the 6,693-foot Mt. Le Conte. The shack was near a lodge which stood atop the peak, one of the highest in the Smokies. The oldest of the three, 13, said that they had reached the lodge about dusk of the previous day after hiking from Newfound Gap, eight miles away. He said that he knew enough from his training to stop hiking at dark, but they could not obtain entry to the lodge because it was locked and so they entered an outhouse where wood was stored. He said they remained fairly warm until around midnight, when the wind had begun to blow and hail had started falling. The other two boys were ages 11 and 12. They were among 21 members of the troop which had set out the previous day on a routine hike along U.S. Highway 441 to Mt. Le Conte, planning a round-trip to Newfound Gap, a total of about 13 miles. Nine of the Scouts had completed the trip and nine others had turned back safely to the Gap. It had taken rescuers nearly three hours to bring the three boys down the precipitous Alum Cave trail to park headquarters, as the youngest boy had been numbed with cold and was carried down the mountainside, while the others walked. The oldest boy said that they were not very scared because they knew that their parents would be looking for them, but that they had not slept very well on the floor.
Incidentally, it is 18.6 miles from Newfound Gap, which rests on the bunion on the big toe of North Carolina, just over the Tennessee border, to Alfred Reagan Tub Mill, Roaring Fork, Tenn., via Courthouse Rock and the Place of a Thousand Drips—or you could travel 18.5 miles in the other direction and land at the Museum of the Cherokee People, established in 1948, all of which somewhat circuitously leads back to "the curse of Tecumseh", to explore more fully the Gap, subsequently sought to be explained, in somewhat overreaching fashion, by White House secretary to the President, Rosemary Woods, actually explained by Bob Haldeman. But all of that may require some Boy Scout training, gleaned at least vicariously from other close relations if not directly, in navigating the woods on a snowy evening.
In Raleigh, Governor Luther Hodges said this date that he wished that the state Democratic chairman, John Larkins, had "spoken out more frankly" when the Governor was faced with critical comments from county Democratic chairmen. One county chairman had told the Governor at a meeting on Saturday that he thought state and county chairmen should be consulted on persons being appointed to State positions. Other chairmen had applauded the statement. The Governor said that he was not being critical of Mr. Larkins but felt that he could have told the county leaders that the Governor had consulted with him countless times on appointees. The Governor was asked whether he was satisfied with Mr. Larkins as state chairman, and he replied that he believed he was a very good man and had experience. Later he pointed out, in response to a question, that he did not select Mr. Larkins for the post, but had inherited him and that he had agreed that Mr. Larkins should remain.
Charles Kuralt of The News reports that the County Commission this date had asked school officials to study a merger of the City and County school systems. After ten minutes of fast talk on the matter, the Commission, the entire school board and State Representative Frank Snepp agreed that consolidation was imminent. The Commission agreed unanimously to submit the matter to the voters in the spring.
Ann Sawyer of The News indicates that with several elections only a little more than a month away, the need for a County elections board chairman had been raised by the County Commission chairman this date, asking Mr. Snepp what could be done to speed the appointment of a successor to W. Cleve Davis, who had died on February 19. Mr. Snepp said that he understood that state Democratic chairman John Larkins had requested the county Democratic chairman to make recommendations.
Torrential rains and winds of hurricane force had hit the Texas Gulf Coast the previous day and at least one person had drowned when heavy rains flooded streets and highways. A tornado had injured several persons, with scattered damage having been caused in the Galveston area. More than ten inches of rain had fallen at Texas City, where every street had been flooded for a time with knee-deep water, forcing several families from their homes in low-lying sections. Winds of up to 80 mph had cut off telephone and electrical service in several towns in Galveston County. The rains had begun tapering off along the coast early this date. When is somebody going to get a grip on the weather? We must have order in the country.
In Galveston, the death of a small
mongrel dog, key figure in a gunfight which had resulted in the
firing of five dogcatchers, had continued this date to stir
controversy. Blackie had been found floating in a bayou on Saturday
near where its young master and another boy had holed up with a rifle
and held off police and dogcatchers for an hour the previous
Wednesday. The two 14-year old boys said that the shooting had
occurred after a dogcatcher had sought to shoot Blackie. The
dogcatcher said that he fired to scare the dog after it had bitten
him. No one was hurt in the exchange. A City commissioner had
revealed the previous day that five temporary dogcatchers had been
fired and that a drive to rid the city of stray dogs had been called
off. Blackie had been placed in the pound for a 14-day observation.
The boys were suspended from school. But irate citizens had rallied
to their side after the story had been published. The mother of one
of the boys said that when she asked to see Blackie on Friday, she
had been offered any other animal in the pound, indicating that her
son was hysterical after finding Blackie's body, saying that the dog
had been mutilated by what appeared to have been a shotgun blast.
Earlier, all except the head dogcatcher had been disarmed as a result
of the incident. There remained a mystery as to how Blackie had met
death. The City commissioner said that it was highly possible that
the dog had been killed in anger, but he did not think that was the
case. The mayor, however, thought otherwise, saying that he did not
see why they had killed the "little fellow's dog." He
said that he was going to see that it did not happen again. A meeting
this date was arranged between the boys' parents and school officials
to discuss their school suspension. Blackie was a good dog. They
shouldn't oughtta gone and kilt it. The question though is who
In London, it was reported that a woman who had won the price of a new nose on a television show had said this date that she had decided to keep her old nose and give the money to charity. She had jested that she got chilblains on her nose in winter and that she scalded it when she took a hot drink. The previous week, she had appeared on "State Your Case", during which viewers decided which of three hard-luck stories ought be awarded a prize which was the equivalent of $280. The viewers looked at the woman's giant nose, heard her tell of her yearning to have it bobbed, and voted her the winner in a mail-in poll. Meanwhile, her eight-year old daughter had changed her mother's mind, saying that she liked her the way she was, crying bitterly against having her nose cut off. Her husband agreed with their daughter and so the money would be distributed to four charities in the woman's hometown. Her husband said that they were all pleased that she had changed her mind as they had gotten "sort of used to her nose over the years."
On the editorial page, "Mr. Houghton's Stunning Distinction" finds that Americans always expected politics to stop at the water's edge, that no matter how much mudslinging might occur in election campaigns, candidates would always represent the nation to the world with the best possible ambassadors and ministers, chosen regardless of race, creed, color or political debts owing.
But it finds the expectation false, as actually politics in the country took "to the water like a jet-propelled duck." It cites Amory Houghton, the new U.S. Ambassador to France, as example. He had been a successful industrialist who was actively interested in government, had contributed generously to the RNC and had spent his own money to relieve the U.S. taxpayers of the burden of running its Embassy in France. But he had an obvious and tremendous flaw in that he did not speak French.
It suggests that every other American in that Embassy, from the chauffeur to the first assistant, not only likely spoke French but understood the language, and with good reason, because the business of diplomacy was to understand and be understood. Every fledgling diplomat was required to learn the language and customs of the foreign land in which he wanted to serve, with the requirement waived only on the ambassadorial level, where it was most needed.
Mr. Houghton had been chosen primarily because he was a deserving Republican and was willing to pay the bills of the Embassy.
The British paid their Ambassador to the U.S. more than $75,000 per year for living expenses, while the U.S. provided but $12,000 for similar expenses for its Ambassador to England. That resulted in the primary criterion for selecting U.S. diplomats being their wealth and consequent willingness to purchase the job. Meanwhile, career diplomats who understood the language and the arts of diplomacy, comforted themselves with the old saw, "He also serves who only stands and waits." They understood that the reason they were passed over for ambassadorships was no insult to their carefully won proficiencies, it being the case that they were simply not rich enough to pay the American people for the job.
Senator Mike Mansfield of Montana had suggested to Congress that the U.S. pay for the upkeep of its embassies and staff them with thoroughly trained diplomats. It suggests that someday it might happen, that in the meantime, everyone had to pray that Mr. Houghton never got separated from his interpreter, as diplomats did have to talk to each other.
"Ballots & Bullets Don't Necessarily Mix" indicates that it was not because it feared that Elvis Presley might be elected governor of the state, as the job did not pay enough, and even if North Carolinians might purchase for their Governor an airplane, pink Cadillacs were a little too tony for their taste. Instead, the reason it opposed extension of the vote to 18-year olds in North Carolina was based solely on the argument made for giving them the vote, that if they were old enough to fight, they were old enough to vote.
It finds that sentiment to be too much like saying "if they're old enough to talk, they're old enough to be lecturers on aerodynamics or space satellites." It cannot fathom the logic or relationship between a man's ability to kill another and his ability to discriminate wisely between candidates for public office, and does not think voting ought be characterized as a prize to be offered to a group which might be called upon to fulfill a democratic duty.
It indicates that politicians who generally proposed extensions of the franchise to persons younger than 21 hoped thereby to reap a direct and immediate profit from attraction of the new voters.
It concludes that it was passively opposed to the whole idea.
"Threatening Flivvers Need No Sympathy" indicates that the taint of a felony conviction would not soon apply to highway drag racers, after the State House Roads Committee had determined that a felony charge was too harsh even if such racers prearranged their dangerous sport. Thus, it remained less criminal to threaten lives with souped-up automobiles than with knives or pistols.
It suggests that despite the fact that it believed that the Committee had erred, it also finds its concern and sympathy for the future of errant youth to be genuine and admirable.
But there was no need for sympathy for inanimate things, such as automobiles, as it did not hurt the feelings of a flivver to replace its tires or reline its brakes. Yet, the General Assembly had made no progress toward enactment of a new vehicle inspection law. Motor Vehicles commissioner Ed Scheidt had reportedly been unable to find a legislator willing even to introduce the bill.
It urges the legislators to talk about the issue of dangerously defective vehicles, with the idea being so logical that mere confrontation of it might overwhelm their suspicions, while, it finds, the Assembly was staying busy with far less important matters.
"Renaissances Have To Be Shared" tells of Blackwell Robinson having written in 1956: "A genuine honest-to-goodness renaissance is taking place in North Carolina. A renaissance that is clearly perceptible in many cultural fields of endeavor—art, music, drama, literature, history and handicrafts."
It finds that the assessment of North Carolina culture had lost some of its luster recently when Elizabeth Hughey, the State librarian, and Dr. Roy McKnight of Charlotte, the board chairman of the library, had made a plea for funds from the Legislature. It was revealed, for instance, that North Carolinians now outnumbered their public library books by about a million.
In indicates that it was not that North Carolinians did not or would not read, as each book had been read an average of four times in 1956. It suggests that if, indeed, the state was in the midst of a cultural renaissance, its fruits deserved to be more widely enjoyed, and that a good way to begin was to provide better public libraries better public support.
A piece from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, titled "Licenses as Good Clean Fun", tells of the state of New Hampshire having recently authorized "personalized" license tags, with the results so far, according to the Associated Press, being pure whimsy, with such examples reported as an explosives manufacturer having sought "TNT", a Republican having asked for "IKE", and other requests having been for "WAC" and even "AWOL".
It finds it quite predictable, and predicts further that it would be troublesome. California had devised a triple-letter, triple-number system for its license tags the previous year, and a musician had sought "A-440", which was the international pitch for tuning instruments. A man from Atherton had received, without asking for it, a license beginning "DEM", when the man was a Republican.
It suggests that it would be simpler and safer for the states to avoid personalization and favors in auto licensing, and instead try standardization. But thus far, the only standard on which all 48 states had agreed involved size of plates. After 54 years in which the auto license tags had come in all shapes, a standard 6 x 12-inch plate was to be adopted in the current year by October 1.
It concludes that if states' rights regarding license tags could be set aside, which still appeared doubtful, the date would really be Der Tag.
As we have commented before, the one we recall most vividly came to our attention one afternoon while playing wide-eyed tourist for about 15 minutes on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, circa 1980, when we got behind a white Rolls-Royce, or similar luxury vehicle, with the tag, "WHATAZOO"
Drew Pearson tells of Congressman Clare Hoffman of Michigan having started three years earlier a probe of Teamsters Union vice-president Jimmy Hoffa, arrested during the previous week for allegedly trying to bribe an attorney for the Senate Select Committee investigating racketeering and organized crime influence on the Teamsters, but having had his investigation stopped by Postmaster General Arthur Summerfield. Mr. Hoffman, a Republican, along with Congressman Wint Smith of Kansas, also a Republican, and Phil Landrum of Georgia, a Democrat, had been serving as a subcommittee investigating the Teamsters, when suddenly word had come from the White House, via Republican House leader Charles Halleck of Indiana, to call off the probe. Mr. Hoffman had been so irked that he had given a speech on the House floor, complaining that the subcommittee on labor racketeering and welfare funds "had but barely entered upon its investigation when, apparently for political reasons, it was liquidated." Congressman Smith had also complained to the press about the halting of the probe, saying that it had been terminated because of "pressure" exerted "from so high that I can't even discuss it." (It might be noted that the pattern would repeat in the fall of 1972 vis-à-vis the House Banking and Currency Committee chaired by Congressman Wright Patman of Texas, investigating the money trail from the arrested Watergate burglars, which was quickly squelched by the White House, via Republican House minority leader Gerald Ford, only to be followed, based on the initial findings by the Patman Committee and the reporting on the subject by the Washington Post, in the spring of 1973 by the impaneling of the Senate Select Committee chaired by Senator Sam J. Ervin, a member of the present Senate Select Committee investigating Teamster corruption in 1957. Longevity of service and memory are valuable assets in a democracy for preserving it. Such is a basic precept which ought be stressed repeatedly to the morons on the right today who want to reinvent the wheel every election cycle and send a new crop of unqualified brainchildren to the House from their districts where the majority of voters are obviously divorced from reality, wishing to impose their particular wills—, through loudmouthed, inarticulate charlatans practiced only in the Great Baltimore Bathtub Hoax and other like frauds, meant originally in jest or otherwise, perpetrated on those too gullible not to fall for it, not sufficiently versed in algebraic functions and basic symbolic logic, such that they adopt an unfounded assumption as fact and then build their entire world view on that unfounded assumption, unable to detect the missing link in the study for want of adequate education regarding the whole—, on the rest of the country despite it being clear that their views are, and always have been since the Founding, limited to a fringe minority at best. The demagogic weakness of these brainchildren is that they desire, insofar as they understand anything different themselves, to exploit their constituents' lack of understanding of the Founding principles, rather than educating and leading them to the water without regard to the political consequences for doing so.)
Mr. Pearson indicates that his column had revealed on April 13, 1954, that high Republicans in Michigan, led by Postmaster General Summerfield, had made a deal with the Teamsters to support Senator Homer Ferguson of Michigan for re-election, in return for which, the investigation of Mr. Hoffa and the Teamsters would be dropped. At the time in 1954, Senator Ferguson faced a tough re-election battle with the late former Senator Blair Moody, the latter having died in the middle of the primary campaign, with Pat McNamara, a long time member of the Detroit City Council and a strong AFL leader, having been nominated by the Democrats as the replacement nominee. In the end, to the surprise of everyone, Mr. McNamara had won the election over Senator Ferguson.
At the time the probe of the Teamsters had ended, it was just beginning to strike pay dirt. It had been looking into alleged Teamster pressure on jukebox employers to make union payoffs to Teamster locals, as well as pressure on automatic car wash employers to make like payoffs, in addition to investigating property acquired by the wife of Mr. Hoffa and the wife of another Teamsters chief, after Mr. Hoffa and the other chief had settled a strike in Flint, Mich.
Mr. Pearson next provides highlights from a recent off-the-record speech at the Gridiron Club by Adlai Stevenson, in which he said: "I feel like the famous cow on a winter morning who looked at the farmer and said, 'Thanks for that warm hand.' I wish it had been as warm and friendly last November… I hesitated to come back four months after the election to rake up among the embers of my funeral pyre, a bonfire which most of you publishers fanned so vigorously and a funeral at which so few of you mourned… I have great sympathy for the men who occupy the presidency, especially the present recumbent. Think of the embarrassment when even Time, the Republican house organ, reveals that his bird dogs failed to flush a single covey of quail… As Jefferson said, the office of the President can be a 'splendid misery.' I feel deeply for the unhappy man in sweater and cleats who approaches a tee and finds a sign reading '440 yards par 4'... Even after an heroic 225-yard drive you still have to struggle to replace the turf in some far-off place—like London or Suez… I would recommend miltown on the rocks. It might diminish the pain of recent scenes… Mrs. Charles E. Wilson ranks as the first female Ike-onoclast... Do not let me ever discourage you from ever running for president. It is a wonderful way to meet a lot of people you wouldn't meet otherwise—at any price. It is a fine exercise for the hands, feet, stomach and vocal cords. I'm told that it is not too hard on the head if you use good judgment. You don't even have to read or write. Someone will do it for you."
Marquis Childs tells of a case, U.S. v. Watkins, pending before the Supreme Court, regarding a labor organizer presently employed by the UAW, John Watkins, who had refused to testify in 1954 before HUAC regarding persons whom he had known while he had been a member of the Communist Party between 1942 and 1947, who had since left the movement, while testifying freely about his own association and naming those members whom he believed were still members of the party. Mr. Watkins had been cited for contempt, tried and sentenced to a year in jail, was now contending before the Supreme Court that Congressional committees which went beyond their legislative objective in asking questions of a witness had usurped the rights of both the executive and judicial branches, and that when a citation for contempt had issued, the Congress had become virtually the prosecutor, the judge and the jury.
Thus far, the Supreme Court had avoided passing on the broad powers which Congressional committees had exercised since the end of World War II. Mr. Childs indicates that if the Court took up the issue, the case could become one of the most significant before the Court in a long time.
Solicitor General J. Lee Rankin had argued for the Government in the case that HUAC, in its questioning of Mr. Watkins, had been contemplating legislation, citing a law subsequently passed, denying the services of the NLRB to Communist-infiltrated unions. Government prosecutors had contended that neither the First Amendment guaranteeing the right of free speech, assembly and religion, nor any other amendment, except the Fifth Amendment, could be used to justify a refusal to provide information.
The most famous of the so-called "conscience cases" along these lines had involved playwright Arthur Miller, husband of Marilyn Monroe, also having refused the prior June to name persons whom he had seen attending Communist meetings at which he was present previously, during the latter 1930's, on the ground that it would harm persons who had long since given up any connection with Communism. Mr. Miller had been cited for contempt, indicted and was facing trial on May 13, likely to be postponed pending the outcome of the Watkins case.
Mr. Childs posits that if the Supreme Court were to find in the case that Congressional committees did not have their claimed broad powers, the case against Mr. Miller might be dismissed. His questioning had come up in the context of investigation of the State Department issuing passports to people with former Communist connections, Mr. Miller having been denied a passport until the previous year when he had obtained one to accompany Ms. Monroe to England where she was making a film.
Senator James Eastland of Mississippi, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, had repeatedly attacked the Supreme Court for its decision in Brown v. Board of Education, having used strong language calling, in effect, for defiance of the decision. Mr. Childs suggests that it was not hard to imagine the reaction of Senator Eastland or Congressman Francis Walter, chairman of HUAC, and others should the Court rule that Congressional committees had overstepped their bounds in such cases.
He notes that while the battle between Congress and the judicial branch had been ongoing almost since the founding, the Court had not hesitated, either in the distant or recent past, to make itself unpopular, "and in the logic of events it can be expected to do so again."
A letter writer from Valdese responds to a letter writer of March 13, who had suggested that teacher complaints regarding insufficient pay had to be viewed within the context of other jobs and professions, suggesting that the teachers' situation was not as bad as they claimed. This writer indicates that low pay of teachers was a prime factor in the teacher shortage in the state and he wishes to cite some facts to the previous writer. He indicates that a beginning teacher with a Class "A" certificate was presently paid $270 per month for nine months, $2,430 each year, averaging out to $202.50 spread over 12 months. Before a teacher could be certified for that salary, the teacher had to spend four expensive years in college. The maximum present salary under that classification, after 11 years, was $380 per month for nine months, or $3,420 per year. A teacher with a graduate degree earned a maximum, after 12 years, of $423 per month for nine months, or $3,807 per year. He finds that the previous writer had compared teachers to such people as secretaries, sales ladies, nurses, receptionists, used-car salesmen, bookkeepers and furnishings salesmen, when, excluding nurses, who also needed a raise in their average pay, most of those people had little or no investment in specialized training beyond the first or second year of college. A study conducted of graduates of the Burke County high schools in the class of 1950, based on unsigned questionnaires of respondents, had found that the average salary for those who had dropped out and never finished high school had been, by 1955, $2,780 per year, whereas those who had finished four years of college and had become teachers were earning $2,430. Other male graduates of high school who had gone to four years of college were averaging $3,511 outside the teaching profession. The writer suggests that the previous writer should have a look at all of the Cadillacs he had observed in the teachers' parking lots, that another close look would reveal that many more teachers in the state drove cars in the low-price or middle range, not "Caddys", that those few who might drive more expensive cars were doing so on a leased basis or driving models ready for the junk heap. He concludes that teacher salaries were out of line with their training all right, but in an inversely proportional relationship.
A letter writer from Lincolnton, J. P. Long, says that he had a previous contact with J. R. Dean through the letters column of the newspaper relative to dogs, that Mr. Dean had said that a dog was man's best friend, and now someone else had written a letter saying that a dog was man's best friend. Mr. Long asks the more recent writer whether he had a mother and believed in Christ, that if he did, he wonders how he could say that a dog was man's best friend. He adds that he enjoyed reading the editorials and the letters and believed that the newspaper was the best in the state.
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