The Charlotte News
Tuesday, December 9, 1958
TWO EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Moscow that the Soviet Union's top policeman, General Ivan Serov, had been relieved of his job, the announcement indicating that he had been transferred to other duties but providing no hint of what they were. His successor as chairman of the Committee for State Security also was not announced. Most foreign observers in Moscow believed that he might have been given an even more important position, as he had long been a friend and close associate of Premier Nikita Khrushchev. Some Western experts on Soviet affairs, however, believed that he had been demoted because the Izvestia announcement did not give his new post, the customary procedure when a Kremlin official was promoted. The 53-year old Army general had become well known abroad in recent years for being in charge of security arrangements on Premier Khrushchev's trips, and had been widely known earlier for directing the plan to liquidate anti-Communist elements in the Baltic countries in 1940. He had been last seen by Western correspondents at a Kremlin reception on November 10 for the head of the Polish Communist Party, Wladyslaw Gomulka. He was usually friendly and informal in public, chatting freely with foreign diplomats and newsmen at receptions.
Senator Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota this date gave the President a confidential message from Premier Khrushchev dealing with Russian nuclear detonations. The Senator had recently returned from a visit in Moscow.
In Taipei, Formosa, the Chinese Communists fired 3,766 shells this date at Quemoy, it being an odd-numbered day, with even-numbered days having been voluntarily set aside for non-shelling so that the Nationalists on Formosa could resupply the offshore islands. This date's shelling had been relatively heavy.
In Caracas, Venezuela, the ruling junta this date threatened to suspend constitutional rights to curb rioting against the president-elect of the country, obviously another El Presidente in the making.
In Montgomery, Ala., a dramatic conflict between two staunch Southern segregationists had marked the Federal Civil Rights Commission inquiry into complaints of flagrant discrimination against black voters in the state. One of the Southerners was the youthful Governor-elect John Patterson, the State Attorney General, and leader of Alabama defiance of the Commission's fact-finding effort. The other was veteran John S. Battle, the former Governor of Virginia and a Southern member of the six-member Commission. In a statement at the close of the first day of the Commission's first public hearing, Mr. Battle emphasized that no one believed more strongly than he in racial segregation as a way of life in the South, but that Alabama officials were not making a good impression by what looked like an effort to cover up their actions on black voting. He pleaded with them to reconsider and obey Commission subpoenas to deliver their records and cease withholding of testimony lest "our enemies" capitalize on the situation. But Mr. Patterson disagreed and in a bristling statement, rejected the appeal to cooperation, stating: "In fights of this nature there can be no surrender of principle to expediency. The time for retreating has come to an end." The remaining course of the Commission's Alabama investigation hinged largely on what it would do about the resisting officials. There were suggestions that the Commission might ask the Justice Department to cite them for contempt. The Commission had received abundant testimony from black witnesses, some of whom were highly educated faculty members of Tuskegee Institute, that they had been denied the ballot in Macon County for no other reason than their race and color.
In Miami, Fla., it was reported that the Teamsters Union was underwriting a $200,000 loan for striking Eastern Air Lines flight engineers. Henry Breen, secretary-treasurer of the Flight Engineers International Association, had reported in Washington that it had accepted an offer by the Teamsters to put up collateral for the loan from a third-party who was not identified. He said that they were offered considerably more but were only borrowing $200,000 at present. The flight engineers and the International Association of Machinists had struck Eastern on November 24, shutting down the carrier. The mechanics had resumed talks with the airline, but no meetings with the engineers were scheduled. Jimmy Hoffa, president of the Teamsters, said on Monday that the union had offered to lend the engineers $200,000 in their strike "and if necessary we will go farther than that." AFL-CIO officials in Washington indicated that acceptance by the engineers of direct aid from the Teamsters, which had been ousted from the labor organization for corrupt practices, could lead to expulsion of the engineers as well. The AFL-CIO constitution forbade affiliates from dealing with expelled unions. Mr. Hoffa, in a Miami Beach interview, accused the AFL-CIO of lacking courage to back its flight engineers against Eastern. Asked what the Teamsters expected in return for their offer of the loan, he said: "Nothing except a moderate interest on the investment. We aren't trying to take over the flight engineers. We are just supporting trade unionism." Mr. Hoffa was in Miami Beach for a meeting with the Teamsters executive board, indicating that the union expected to spend at least $100,000 on a drive starting June 5 to organize 70,000 Sears-Roebuck mail order and warehouse workers. The Teamsters also had an organizing campaign underway in Puerto Rico and were making surveys in several Latin American countries, according to Mr. Hoffa. He announced that the union planned to invest about 4 million dollars in Florida real estate, including hotels. He gave no details pending action by the executive board. The investments would be made from the 57 million dollar Central-Southeast-Southwest pension fund of the Teamsters, with all except 14 million of that fund having been invested. Again, watch out for those fires at Christmastime. Keep them in the fireplaces.
In Washington, a Federal grand jury this date indicted Bernard Goldfine, Boston industrialist and close friend of former White House chief of staff Sherman Adams, on a charge of contempt of Congress. The 18-count indictment was based on Mr. Goldfine's refusal to answer 22 questions put to him by a House Legislative Oversight subcommittee, which the previous summer had investigated his relationship with Mr. Adams, based on alleged quid pro quo gifts to the latter by the former in exchange for intervention with Government agencies on Mr. Goldfine's behalf, though Mr. Adams had denied that there was anything behind the gifts other than longstanding friendship. The questions which Mr. Goldfine had refused to answer were mainly regarding his financial dealings with a Boston company which he controlled. The House had voted the contempt citation by 379 to 8 on August 13. The law provided for a maximum of a year in jail and a fine of $1,000 for each count of contempt, if convicted. It was learned that the indictment had been voted by the grand jury the previous day while Mr. Goldfine's attorneys were skirmishing in Federal District Court in Boston regarding financial records which the millionaire industrialist had been ordered to provide to the Internal Revenue Service as part of an income tax investigation. Tax officials said that the records produced were not complete, but spokesmen for Mr. Goldfine claimed that he had insufficient time to get the papers together. He was scheduled to be arraigned on December 12.
The Boston Globe said this date that Mr. Adams would obtain about $100,000 for a book on the Eisenhower Administration under a contract with Harper Brothers and Life Magazine, a contract which he would reportedly sign within the ensuing few days.
Ann Sawyer of The News reports that there was strong sentiment developing in the Mecklenburg County Commission this date to seek a solution to the problem of the hundreds of City schoolchildren who were too poor to afford lunch but were not covered by the private school lunch program, which lacked sufficient funding to provide for more than about half of the children needing the free lunches. Commissioner Ernest Brown said this date that he would ask the Commission to study the problem and that it would probably receive full backing. He said that he wanted an investigation done to determine the number of children who were going hungry because their parents could not afford the lunches and then to determine the cost of providing lunches to all of those deserving. He said that he would be in favor of the Commission footing the bill if there was any way they could afford it. Six years earlier, Mr. Brown had attempted to obtain help for needy hungry schoolchildren and said that he was just as interested in the problem at present as he had been earlier. Other commissioners had also expressed interest in the problem. Commissioner Herbert Garrison said that that if any money would be found anywhere in the world, he would be delighted to do it as he hated to see anyone hungry, especially children. He said he would be willing to help in any way he could for the hungry kids. Commissioner John McEwen said that he believed they had some surplus funding accumulating and that if they investigated and found that it was absolutely necessary, they might find a little bit of money. Commissioner Craig Lawing said that if it was their responsibility, he would like to do something about it, and if it was not, he wanted to find out whose responsibility it was, as it was a "pitiful situation" and people did not realize how many people did not have anything to eat. The Commission chairman, Sid McAden, said that he believed it all right to look into the problem, but warned that it would "cost thousands and thousands of dollars." At present, there was no governmental appropriation as such within the welfare budget. Welfare superintendent Wallace Kuralt said that some provisions for lunches could be made in computing budgets for needy families, but in the case of Aid to Dependent Children grants, only 75 percent of a child's minimum living requirements were met.
In Oswego, N.Y., it was reported that police patrol cars had delivered milk and that a snowplow had assisted in delivery of a maternity case in the community, as it dug out from the worst snowstorm in its history. A task force of snowplows recruited throughout the upstate area had sought to push through mountainous drifts to reestablish lines of transportation and supply. The two-day storm, which had ended the previous night, had left behind more than 40 inches of new snow and brought to 5 feet the total accumulation left in a series of storms which had begun at Thanksgiving. The Weather Bureau forecast up to seven additional inches for the Oswego area this date. The mayor of the town reported swift progress in recovery with the aid of equipment from nearby areas, and State police reported that most of the main routes were open and that many secondary highways had been restored to service, though only for one-way traffic in some sections. Schools and factories remained closed. Police set up an emergency service to deliver milk, and plows escorted fuel trucks on emergency deliveries to homes without oil and coal. A plow churned a path the previous day for an ambulance which had taken a woman to Oswego Hospital, where she awaited the birth of her child. Eight persons had been driven from a two-family home the previous night when the roof had collapsed under the weight of the snow, the families having gone to homes of relatives and friends. Bitter cold had spread into Midwestern sections as snow diminished in most areas west of the Mississippi Valley. The snow, however, continued in the Northeast. The lowest temperatures of the season had been reported in many parts of the snow belt from the Rockies to deep into the mid-Mississippi Valley and the Missouri Valley. Below zero temperatures were common throughout Montana and the Dakotas and were reported as far south as central sections of Illinois and Indiana, into southern Iowa. One of the coldest spots had been International Falls, Minn., on the Canadian border, reporting 28 below zero, a slight improvement over the previous day's low of 32 below. In South Dakota, it was 15 below at Philip and 14 below at Huron. In Minneapolis-St. Paul, temperatures were recorded of 10 below, and northward, at Duluth, it was even colder. Chicago had its coldest day since the prior February, recording six below. Six inches of snow covered areas of Chicago and its suburbs and readings of 11 below were reported in some suburbs. The storm had dumped amounts ranging from more than a foot to 3 inches across the Rockies and Midwest, and had reached New England during the night, with snow flurries having continued in the Great Lakes region and the northern Ohio Valley. The southern boundary of the snow belt was the Ohio River, southern Pennsylvania and the metropolitan New York area. More than two inches had fallen early in the night in New England. We hope Santa is greasing his sleigh rails, or he may not make it this Christmas. Watch out for him because the sleigh bells will be muffled and the lanterns to light his way will be obscured by white-outs, and if you're driving a tractor-trailer, you could run over him.
Why is not the Naked City
Because we have fallen behind, there will be no further comments on the front page or editorial page of this date, as the notes will be sporadic until we catch up.
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