The Charlotte News
Friday, September 5, 1958
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Taipei, Formosa, that the Chinese Nationalists had said this date that the Communist blockade of Quemoy Island was tightening and that they soon might need help to keep their supply lines open. The chief Nationalist military spokesman, Rear Admiral Liu Hoh-lu, had refused to tell newsmen whether U.S. warships might be asked to escort supply convoys to the islands just off the Communist Chinese mainland. There had been persistent rumors that ships of the U.S. 7th Fleet would soon start escort duty. Dispatch of U.S. vessels to guard Quemoy-bound convoys would send the ships across Communist China's new 12-mile sea limit, and the Chinese Communist Government had stated that it would regard such action as an invasion of its territory. Admiral Liu's remarks had followed the reported U.S. decision the previous day to help defend Quemoy and Matsu against any Communist invasion, possibly by bombing Communist bases on the mainland. The Chinese Nationalist Foreign Ministry, which had rejected Communist China's new sea border, this date called for the U.S. to make a clear-cut statement on whether it would help the Nationalists defend Quemoy and Matsu. The President's official warning to the Communists the previous day said only that U.S. forces would help fight for the offshore islands if he felt that they were vital to the defense of Formosa. Britain said that it fully shared U.S. concern regarding any attempt to impose territorial changes by force in the Far East. In Moscow, the Communist Party newspaper, Pravda, warned that the Communists would retaliate throughout the Far East if the China coast were attacked. The importance of the Quemoy Islands to the Nationalists was underlined by Admiral Liu's disclosure that they had 100,000 troops there, far higher than previously believed. Despite the present lull after two weeks of consistent Communist shelling of the offshore islands, the Admiral said that Quemoy was threatened with a sea and artillery blockade by the Communists.
In Tokyo, it was reported that Japan's opposition Socialist Party had demanded this date that the Government deny the U.S. use of bases in Japan in the event of a shooting war with Communist China regarding the offshore islands.
In London, the British Admiralty reported this date that personnel from two Icelandic gunboats had tried to board two British trawlers in Iceland's forbidden fishing grounds this date.
In Nicosia, Cyprus, new violence had erupted between Greek Cypriot rebels and British troops early this date, but no casualties had been reported.
Teamsters lawyer George Fitzgerald told newsmen this date that he could explain fully his role in a million dollar union welfare fund loan which was being investigated by the Senate Select Committee investigating misconduct of unions and management. He expressed resentment that the hearings had been adjourned until the following Tuesday before he had an opportunity to reply as a witness to testimony mentioning him. The Committee had heard testimony the previous day regarding a 1955-56 loan to a Detroit real estate promotion firm which allegedly had repaid none of the principal and not all of the interest due. The loan had been made from the Michigan Conference of Teamsters welfare fund. A staff accountant testified that the Winchester Village Land Development Co. had paid Mr. Fitzgerald and others a $35,000 fee for telling the firm where it could obtain the loan. Mr. Fitzgerald, a former Democratic national committeeman from Michigan, told newsmen that the payment had been made for legal services and not as a fee for finding the loan. The accountant, Walter Henson, testified that money from the loan had been used improperly for various purposes. He estimated that the union welfare fund would wind up losing nearly $650,000 of the loan principal and that it had received only $104,000 of the $279,000 due in interest. Mr. Fitzgerald contended, however, that the company had other assets and said that the money would be recovered in full. The firm had been organized by Abe Green and Jack Winshall of Detroit, who developed property near Flint. But Mr. Henson had testified that nearly $21,000 of the money had gone for purchase of 19 cows and a bull. He also said that the firm used a phony billing system to sell a piece of the mortgaged property for $10,000 and buy it back a few months later for $50,000.
A group of about 50 white students apparently had succeeded this date in preventing black students from entering the high school at Van Buren, Ark., but had failed in their boast that hundreds of other white students would join them in their boycott, which had started the previous day. One striker had said the previous night, "You'll see very few white kids in there tomorrow." The strikers had fashioned a cardboard sign and attached it to a telephone pole, which read: "Chicken whites go to school with jigs." A few girls had joined the striking group, but a huge majority of the high school's students had attended classes as usual.
Federal District Court judges in Virginia had ruled against school integration for the moment in cases in Norfolk and Alexandria the previous day. The Norfolk judge, however, had made it plain that his ruling was subject to change after the Supreme Court would decide on the pending matter regarding the delay of 2 1/2 years of integration in Little Rock, granted by a District Court judge in Arkansas but reversed by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, due for oral argument before the High Court on September 11. The judge in Norfolk upheld the School Board's action in rejecting eight applications from black students for admission to a white school. The School Board said that even if admitted to the school, those eight students would be transferred to a new black school to be built in time for enrollment, and the judge had agreed with the Board that it would involve too many transfers for the best interests of the applicants. The judge in Alexandria had authorized Arlington County to open its schools the following Monday on a segregated basis, but he emphasized that his order did not nullify the right of 30 black pupils to transfer to white schools later if he found that they were entitled to such transfers.
Schools in the Arkansas cities of Fayetteville, Bentonville, Charleston and Hoxie had proceeded with integration without incident.
In Montgomery, Ala., the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., faced a hearing in City court this date on a charge of loitering, on which he had been arrested earlier in the week.
In Winston-Salem, N.C., two crudely constructed crosses had been burned on the lawn of R. J. Reynolds High School the previous night. Earlier in the day, the school had admitted a female black student for her second year of attendance. Police chief Jim Waller said that the half-burned crosses apparently had been the work of pranksters, whom he linked with a football pep rally and bonfire held about 200 to 300 yards away. That's funny, we have never heard of a rival of that school, either near or far, which had reference to crosses in its team nickname. Perhaps, fans of the Black Demons thought they were playing Holy Cross or some school with a similar name. Perhaps, realizing their own nickname, they were only being self-effacing. Or, perhaps, it was some of that outside riffraff.
Donald MacDonald and Ann Sawyer of The News report that Judge Basil Boyd and four other Charlotte City Recorder's Court defendants who had been indicted by a grand jury the previous day, including the former clerk of the court, Allen White, a police officer, and three professional bondsmen, had posted $1,000 bonds during the morning pending trial which would begin on September 29. They were all charged in conjunction with irregularities in the court, which had been investigated by the grand jury for several months.
Investigation by two News reporters, Ms. Sawyer and John Kilgo, had reportedly figured largely in the grand jury's indictment against Judge Boyd. The charges against him were under the general rubric, "willful neglect of official duty", and several of the points made by the grand jury in its findings had been based on testimony before it by the two reporters. Mr. Kilgo had previously interrupted a conference in court between the judge, four local bondsmen, an attorney and other court officials, and the newspaper had later disclosed that the judge had been in the process of sharply reducing bonds posted by the bondsmen, which had been ordered forfeited. The grand jury presentment had said, "Although this action was not finalized, its proposed handling was against public interest." The grand jury also said that the judge "failed to keep informed of the detailed operations of the court and that he made no provisions to check up on cases not disposed of, although absence of entries in his docket book should have made this condition apparent." A story by Mr. Kilgo in the newspaper shortly after the investigation had begun had pointed out that blank spaces in the judge's docket book should have indicated something had been amiss in the handling of certain cases. The presentment said that the judge had given preferred treatment to defendants represented by counsel and cited the summary of a case study made by Ms. Sawyer which it had subpoenaed during its investigation. It also said that the judge had admitted changing sentences as much as 2 to 3 weeks after the original sentences and had further testified that he did not know and had not made official inquiry as to what constituted a term of court. A series of stories by Ms. Sawyer and Mr. Kilgo had disclosed the judge's practice of sharply reducing sentences in many cases after the original judgment. The law forbade the changing of sentences after the term of court in which the case had initially been heard and determined.
In the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City, N.J., Miss Mississippi, Mary Ann Mobley, had been among the talent competition winners, as pictured, the previous night, with the third round to take place this night and the final competition to occur the following night.
On the editorial page, "British Riots: Racism or Joblessness?" finds that what Adlai Stevenson had once called "the revolution of rising expectation" among the people of Africa and Asia was now confronting a revolution of rising discrimination among whites. In South Africa, Nationalist Apartheid forces, who would enforce total separation of the races under any circumstances, had installed a new Premier, Henrik Verwoerd, who was a more militant racist than the late Premier Hans Stridjoem. From Little Rock to Richmond, "massive resistance" had come into vogue. That which few had expected was that in Nottingham and London, England, where people traditionally were fair to each other and obeyed the law, iron bars, knives and riots would be added to the racial counter-revolution. The Greensboro Daily News had suggested that "London is not too far from Little Rock."
It hopes that the judgment was premature and that those perceiving resemblance between the racial troubles might be mistaken in interpreting headlines of London, Capetown and Little Rock as if they were all of a piece. It suggests that there was an element of uniqueness in every place where racial tension raised its head. "The correlate of South African white supremacy has been a defiant inhumanity. Only in flashes of barbarity have we in the South seen this."
It finds that in Britain, the source of trouble appeared to be economic, with immigrants to England from other, poor countries of the British Commonwealth, West Africa, the West Indies, Pakistan and India, turning from poverty, malnutrition and joblessness at home to seek relief in a presently prosperous Britain. There were no restrictions on immigration between countries of the Commonwealth. But now, the effects of the U.S. recession was having its impact on British prosperity, with the number of jobs declining. In Nottingham, coal miners and West Indians had been involved in a fracas, both groups perhaps conscious of their competition for jobs. In London, teenage "Teddy boys" had smashed up black-owned businesses. "There it is. It is very plain that simple economics and juvenile delinquency, not a white supremacy feeling, are largely to blame."
It finds that basic prosperity would not solve all racial conflicts, as they also existed in the human heart, but insecurity, fights over scarce jobs, were enemies of racial amity, breeding strife.
"For us and for Britain, high unemployment should be the prime target of those who would guard against riot, brutality and lawlessness."
Drew Pearson indicates that General Eisenhower, in Paris in the spring of 1952, had told him: "It is inconceivable that we should ever let American boys get bogged down on the mainland of China. It's a swamp with no bottom." But as President, he had now gotten himself in a position where either American boys would get bogged down on the mainland of China or American troops, plus the Chinese Nationalist allies, would have to retreat from a series of islands along the Chinese mainland coast with great loss of face and weakening of links with Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Thailand and other Far Eastern allies.
He finds that the way the President had gotten himself into that predicament dated to a time prior to his Presidency, when the Republican Party had made Formosa a great political issue. Formosa had broken up the bipartisan foreign policy which had for the most part maintained Republicans and Democrats united during and after World War II. He suggests that the probable reason for that choice of issues by the Republicans was that campaign contributions had shown up in the name of the nephew of Chiang Kai-shek, living in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles during the campaign of Congressman Richard Nixon for the Senate in 1950, when witnesses had seen him hand over a large roll of cash to help Mr. Nixon defeat Congresswoman Helen Gahagan Douglas. Senator Joseph McCarthy had also been affiliated with the China lobby, which he never denied while he had been alive, and the friendship between Senator Styles Bridges of New Hampshire and both Dr. T.V. Soong and Dr. H. H. Kung, brothers-in-law of Chiang and among the wealthiest men in the world, had directed the operation of the China lobby. They had lured lobbyists, retained lawyers, offered beautiful gifts to newspapermen to send home stories to the American people communicating the idea that Chiang could retake the Chinese mainland, provided sufficient U.S. money were funneled to Formosa.
It had been a myth which the American people had believed for a long time, and in repeated speeches on the Senate floor, certain Senators who knew better had helped to keep it alive. The potent and generous influence of that lobby had been one of the main reasons why the Republicans had found themselves pushed into picking Formosa as the issue on which to break the bipartisan foreign policy, and why President Eisenhower now found himself, against his own better judgment, pushed into the embarrassing predicament along the Chinese coast.
He indicates that another reason was the persuasive, dynamic personality of General Douglas MacArthur, then commander in Tokyo, who told visiting delegations of American Senators that American troops had to take over Formosa and hold it in the name of its former conqueror, Japan. The General had even gone so far as to put a special plane at the disposal of Republican Senators Homer Ferguson of Michigan and Alexander Smith of New Jersey so that they could fly to Formosa after the State Department had refused air transportation for them. The General's recommendations, plus the agitation of the China lobby, plus the fact that an attorney for Drs. Soong and Kung, Louis Johnson, had become Secretary of Defense under President Truman, had caused many high-level conferences inside the latter Administration during which Secretary of State Dean Acheson argued that Chiang could not retake the Chinese mainland and that American troops should not be risked on Formosa. Secretary Acheson had argued that it might even be necessary to have American naval forces around Formosa to protect Chiang from Chinese Communist attack. General Omar Bradley, then-chairman of the Joint Chiefs, had backed up the Secretary, and President Truman adopted that policy.
In the presidential campaign of 1952, the matter had become one of the chief political targets of Republican orators. Following the election, President-elect Eisenhower had flown to Korea and en route, his plane had stopped to refuel on Iwo Jima. During that hour, General Eisenhower stretched his legs and walked with Admiral Arthur Radford, an hour which completely reversed the policy of the U.S. in the Orient and placed the new President in exactly the opposite position to what his judgment as a military man had previously dictated. He had been so impressed with the conference that he then made Admiral Radford chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
As we have fallen behind, there will be no further notes regarding the front page and editorial page this date, as the notes will be sporadic until we catch up.
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