The Charlotte News

Friday, December 5, 1958

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Berlin that an East German official disclosed this date that East German Communist police had taken into custody a U.S. Army pilot whose plane made a forced landing in East German territory. The man for the job of gaining his release is evident, auf die Art einer unmöglichen Mission. Leider weiß er nicht, dass sein Reporterfreund die Schwester von Dr. Richard Kimble ist und daher bald von dem unnachgiebigen Polizeileutnant verfolgt wird, der von seiner Ergreifung besessen ist, sodass nur dieser Detektiv ihn aus der Falle befreien und zurück zum Strip bringen kann.

In Geneva, it was reported from the conference to discuss and formulate a system for eliminating surprise attacks that the West this date proposed an international control system to maintain a permanent check on the ground forces of all nations.

In San Luis Potosi, Mexico, it was reported that reinforced federal troops patrolled the state capital this date as a paralyzed political strike entered its third day. Strikers headed by the Civic Union were demanding the resignation of Governor Manuel Alvarez of the San Luis Potosi State, or his ouster by federal authorities.

In Washington, it was announced this date by Secretary of Health, Education & Welfare Arthur Flemming that a Federal grant of $45,510 would be made to help rebuild Clinton High School in Clinton, Tenn., which had been dynamited on October 5. The school had been the scene of limited integration in the fall of 1956 and also the object of scorn drummed up primarily by John Kasper of Baltimore. Mr. Kasper had earlier in the year been released from jail after serving a year for contempt of a Federal court order not to interfere with integration at the school.

In Dayton, O., it was reported that Charles Kettering, automotive genius and former General Motors research head, had left an estate conservatively valued at a little more than 200 million dollars.

Julian Scheer of The News reports from Zebulon, N.C., that former President and Mrs. Truman, visiting with their in-laws, had come to town the previous day as the high school band played an off-key version of the "Missouri Waltz" and 5,000 people cheered, pushing Santa Claus to the backseat. It was the first visit to Zebulon by the Trumans, and son-in-law Clifton Daniel was able to take the speaker's stand and say some nice things about his mother-in-law, Bess. He told his hometown crowd: "I think I have the nicest father-in-law in the world, who happens to be married to the nicest mother-in-law. Any man who can stand up in public and say something nice about his mother-in-law must have a pretty special one." His remarks had brought cheers from the crowd, who had lined the streets for more than an hour awaiting the visit of the Trumans. They had arrived in Raleigh by train late in the afternoon and the first words to greet them when they stepped from a private rail car were, "Hooray for Harry." The former President, flashing his famous smile, gave the crowd of several hundred a big wave and said, "It's certainly a great pleasure to be in this great state of my son-in-law's." He said that he had visited the state before and that its hospitality was unsurpassed by any other state. Governor Luther Hodges and his wife said a few words of greetings and turned over the Governor's limousine to the Trumans for the trip to Zebulon, 20 miles away. Daughter Margaret remained in New York with her young son. A motorcade swept the Trumans and town officials to the town and as the former President stepped out of the limousine and mounted the speaker's platform, the band had played the "Missouri Waltz". By then, it was already dark and his white hair was bathed in Christmas lights, as he stood just 20 feet from the drugstore operated by his hosts, the E. C. Daniels. Initially, he said: "Somebody ought to be running for office. They won't often get a crowd like this I'm sure." Someone in the crowd yelled, "Why don't you run again?" He then told the crowd, "Never before has a more cordial welcome been bestowed upon this retired farmer from Missouri who used to be President of the United States." (Contrast his response to what Trump would have said in response to a crowd suggesting that he run again—even though, in the case of Mr. Truman, because he was in office when the 22nd Amendment was ratified, he could have run for another term, though having served more than two years of the completed term of FDR, followed by a full term, which, under the Amendment, would otherwise disqualify a person.)

In Los Angeles, a painting contractor had shot and killed a union official the previous day, saying, "I wanted him to jump into a swimming pool to humiliate himself and he refused." The 36-year old man was booked on suspicion of murder after the 64-year old business agent for local 35 of the painters district council had been gunned down in front of startled workers. The assailant was a contractor on a painting job in progress at a swimming pool company office. He told sheriff's deputies that he had become angered at the man on Wednesday when the union official pulled a union painter off the job because the assailant had hired non-union workers. He said that he had then brought a gun to work, knowing that the official would return, that when he showed up, he said to himself, "I'm gonna make that guy walk over to the swimming pool," wanting him to jump in to humiliate himself. He said that he had told the man to walk, and that when he refused, he shot him in the stomach, that even after he shot him the first time, he still wanted to make him walk to the pool and jump in. The man had turned and run, and the contractor then shot him in the back and leg, at which point the man fell down. According to witnesses, the contractor stooped over the victim, turned his head over and shot him again at close range behind the left ear. The contractor then went to his office, laid the gun on his secretary's desk and told her to call the police. It is quite probable that he was not altogether well.

In Prineville, Ore., a former convict had brushed aside pleas to surrender and killed himself this date after a ten-hour siege that had begun when he briefly held six persons hostage. The 27-year old man had shot himself in the head as police crunched across the frozen lawn minutes after midnight to pump teargas into his small, white frame home. Only moments earlier, a psychologist, who had gone into the house unarmed in an attempt to persuade the man to surrender, walked out and said: "Well, boys, I think it's all over." At that point, 14 policemen were running toward the house when they heard a noise which hardly sounded like a shot. One officer peeked through a window and saw the body of the man on the living room couch. He had muffled the shot with rags. It was the only shot fired in the siege, which had begun when state police went to the house to serve a warrant on the man, released from state prison on October 31. He had stepped from the bedroom at that point with a .30-.30-caliber rifle and the State policeman was held captive for 30 minutes, along with the man's former wife and their four children, whose ages ranged between five years and 11 months. A State Police sergeant persuaded the man to let his captives go, unharmed. Police then talked to him over the phone and at one point he had sobbed: "I'm going to end it all." Then he said he would wait until the psychologist and counselor from the state prison arrived to talk with him. The psychologist talked to him for over an hour, but the man refused to give up his rifle. The psychologist was reluctant to discuss what he had said, but eventually indicated: "I tried everything I knew of. Nothing worked. For a minute I thought… I told him this isn't the Christian thing to do, to kill yourself. What would it do to your family?" He also told him that it would be more manly to give himself up than to commit suicide. But he had apparently decided during the talk that the only thing he could do was for him to remove himself entirely, that his major concern had been for his wife and children and their welfare. His wife had divorced him while he was in prison and said after the shooting, "I did everything I thought was right." The man was a Marine Corps veteran of the Korean War.

In Florence, Ariz., a prison warden led 25 lawmen storming through barricades at the Arizona State Prison on Thursday night and rescued two guards held by the rebellious inmates. Despite warnings from the 46 insurgent prisoners that they would kill their hostages if attacked, the warden decided to call their bluff and had won his gamble. An inmate convicted of statutory rape was shot in the back during the assault and he was reported in poor condition but was expected to live. About 300 National Guardsmen, deputies, police officers, guards and civilian volunteers had ringed the prison walls with rifles and automatic weapons to guard against new outbreaks, and the riot was quelled by 11:00 p.m. The two freed guards had been held for nearly an hour and both later expressed fear that the prisoners would have killed them with their homemade knives after the warden announced that he would not bow to their demands to take over the prison. One said that the inmates had told him to tell the lawmen not to come any closer or they would kill him, but he had said nothing. The warden, meanwhile, armed with a .45-caliber automatic pistol, shouted to the barricaded inmates: "If you bastards even so much as scratch my men, I'll kill all of you."

John Kilgo of The News reports that the case against one of two bail bondsmen, charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice in City Recorder's Court, had a mistrial declared in Superior Court this date after the jury consisting of 11 men and one woman announced that they were hopelessly deadlocked and could not reach any verdict. The solicitor said that he would either try the case again the following week or at the January term of court.

Ann Sawyer of The News reports that hunger was no stranger to hundreds of city schoolchildren, as they went to school without breakfast and often had little or no lunch, more often than not going to bed with only partially filled stomachs. In the City schools each day, 250 free lunches were served at an annual cost of $10,000, but the free meals did little more than take the edge off the hunger of the children in question. It would take $70,000 more each year to provide lunches for them. The director of the Attendance Department for the City schools said that 250 children ate free lunches at present and 250 other children already had been certified as needy and would qualify for free meals if the money were available. Five hundred more low-income children who presently went home to little or no lunch, brought a sandwich, or went without lunch. A thousand more children received Aid to Dependent Children grants, checks calculated to meet only 75 percent of the minimum living requirements, but they did not have any money for lunch. Estimating that it cost $40 per year to provide a hot lunch for a child, it would cost $70,000 more to meet the demands of the hungry schoolchildren. The 250 free lunches presently provided came from the City lunchroom program, a self-supporting non-profit organization. Its director said that the free lunches actually were paid for by parents of children who bought their lunches daily. The number of children varied with the school and the need was greater among black students than among white students. Children in 29 of the city's 49 schools the previous year received free lunches, ranging from 1 to 34 students. Although about one-third of the population was black, about half the free meals went to black students. At the end of the previous school year, 155 white and 157 black children were receiving free lunches. During the year, 243 white and 175 black children were on the list. A child might receive free lunch, depending on his home financial situation. Sickness in the family sometimes would mean that a child would have to receive free lunches for a few weeks or a month. Seasonal employment, with the worst months being in the winter, also changed the list. After a parent applied through the school for free lunches, a social investigation was conducted by the director of the program and her staff of three white and three black social workers. It was a policy of the staff not to provide free lunches for more than two children in any one family, in an attempt to stretch the inadequate funding as far as possible. A conference was held, usually with the mother, to determine which children would receive free lunches. In the case of the other schoolchildren in the family, the staff worked with the mother to teach her to prepare low-cost, nutritious packed lunches. The Health Education Division of the City schools and the Nutrition Division of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Health Department joined forces to prepare a list of all packed lunch suggestions. For sandwich fillings, they suggested such things as dry beans, mashed with chopped raw vegetables, or peanut butter mixed with applesauce, prunes, raisins or bananas. (No wonder many of them would prefer to go hungry. What is this, prison?) While the lunch program could not provide lunches for all of the hungry children, it did attempt to supply milk to them all. The emphasis was placed in the elementary grades for several reasons, as children were younger and did not understand about being hungry. Also, the only hot lunch available was a standard plate which cost a quarter. In junior and senior high school, children had more choice of food and if they received 10 or 15 cents, they could buy a bowl of soup or a sandwich. But in the elementary grades, there was only one plate lunch. Stage a riot and throw that crap on the floor. Demand filet mignon, with Napoleons for dessert.

On the editorial page, Walter Lippmann finds that each day made it more likely that the Soviet move in Berlin was the opening gambit in an extensive diplomatic operation dealing with the whole German question. Although the long note from Moscow, which had been sent the previous week, made specific proposals about the status of West Berlin, its general tenor in the text around the proposals that the West withdraw their forces and establish a "free city" suggested that the Soviet Government looked upon West Berlin as an instrument for raising the whole question of Germany. He suggests that there could hardly be any illusion in Moscow that the Western powers would refuse to evacuate West Berlin and leave it surrounded by the Red Army, with its communications under the control of the East German government. The proposals about Berlin were a talking point, not a serious offer.

He drew those conclusions because Premier Nikita Khrushchev had already said in his press conference that they would allow six months during which Russia would refrain from implementing the system while negotiations proceeded. If promising negotiations were not underway, precautions had already been taken to see that nothing portentous would occur if authority was transferred to the East German government.

Secretary of State Dulles had said that the U.S. might let East German officials stamp the documents because they would regard those German officials as mere agents of the Soviet Government. The Communist boss of East Germany, Walter Ulbricht, had replied that he did not care what Mr. Dulles called the officials, provided that they stamped the documents. Thus, he concludes that there was no immediate crisis and that it was only the beginning of a long game in which the distance runners would do better than the sprinters.

He finds it not probable that regarding the whole German question there would be any serious negotiations for the ensuing two years. For a serious negotiation would be one in which at the end of the line the Soviet Army would agree to withdraw from Central and Eastern Europe and retreat back to within its own frontiers. It was reasonably certain that the Soviet Government had not convinced itself that it could withdraw its Army without running a grave risk of an anti-Soviet and an anti-Russian revolt among the satellites. Yet at the same time, there was good reason to believe that the Soviet Government lived in dread of another Hungarian-type revolt, which had taken place in November, 1956, and realized that there was a great risk in the continuing military occupation of Eastern Europe.

On the Western side, a serious negotiation was not likely to begin soon because policy was made by West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and Secretary Dulles. Their terms called for the liquidation of the East German state and the extension of the frontier of NATO to the Polish border. That was literally a demand for the unconditional surrender of the Soviet Union, and was not, therefore, a negotiating position. He finds it reasonable to assume that the Soviet operation in Berlin was addressed to the German successors to Chancellor Adenauer and to the American successors to Secretary Dulles. That was why the gambit in Berlin was only the beginning of a long game. Unless all signs failed, Chancellor Adenauer's successors in West Germany, though anti-Communist, as he was, would move away from his absolute position to one in which negotiations with East Germany and with the Soviet Union could occur. If and when that change occurred in Germany, the American successors of Secretary Dulles would have to change the U.S. position as well.

Given the long view, he deems it perhaps the greatest risk being run at present that the U.S. would become alienated from the Germans who would succeed Chancellor Adenauer. The risk was greater than Americans realized. For U.S. official policy, and the authoritative voices which were raised in the U.S. on the German question, were, it appeared to him, curiously out of date, "curiously unaware of what the rising political generation is like."

"Before we make any more resounding pronouncements about the German problem, we would do well to explore the situation in Germany with a fresh eye and an open mind, and to ask ourselves whether it is still true what was true when Truman and Acheson, Eisenhower and Dulles formed our established German policy."