The Charlotte News
Wednesday, January 18, 1950
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that Secretary of State Acheson expressed at a press conference the hope that a third force in China, neither Nationalist nor Communist, would be able to spring from among the people and wrest control of the Government from the Communists. He said that the Communist treatment of Americans in China made it obvious that the new Government did not seek American recognition and that the seizure of American property at the Peiping Consulate on Saturday showed that American diplomatic officials were not being permitted to perform their duties in China. He also said that even if the U.S. developed a hydrogen bomb, it would stand by its asserted policy regarding atomic control. And he knew of no planned atomic development in Russia which would alter that policy.
NLRB general counsel Robert Denham said that he was going to court this date to seek a court injunction to restore the coal miners to a five-day work week. He had filed a complaint charging John L. Lewis and the UMW with unfair labor practices for calling the three-day work week on December 1 to place pressure on the coal companies to acquiesce to his demanded increases in wages and contributions to the pension and welfare fund. Mr. Denham said that he would not first seek a temporary restraining order pending issuance of an injunction.
Pressure was growing among Republicans in Congress for the President to invoke Taft-Hartley and seek an injunction. The President had taken the position that Taft-Hartley applied only to strikes and could not be invoked in any event without a national emergency which had not yet accrued. Senator Homer Ferguson contended that 20 million tons less coal was above ground than on March 23, 1948 when the President had declared an emergency under Taft-Hartley and that the ICC had declared an emergency when it restricted coal-burning locomotive operations in December.
The House had agreed to hold a vote Friday on whether to approve the proposed rules change by the Rules Committee to rescind the 1949 rule which allowed for a vote on the House floor at the request of any committee chairman after a bill had been pending in the Rules Committee for as long as three weeks. Under the old rule, a discharge petition, requiring a majority vote of the House, was necessary to effect discharge of a bill stuck in committee. The primary aim of the proposed rule change, approved in the Rules Committee by a coalition of Southern Democrats and Republicans, was to block a vote on the President's Fair Deal legislation, especially the Fair Employment Practices Committee bill, presently pending before the Rules Committee.
The President had recently told a civil rights group that he had been assured by Vice-President Barkley and Senate Majority Leader Scott Lucas that a vote would be had on the FEPC bill, anti-lynching and anti-poll tax legislation if it took all summer to do so. He said that he was doing everything possible to defeat the proposed rule change. But there was no indication from Congressional leaders that they would keep Congress in session all summer during an election year. The Senate was anticipating action by March on the FEPC bill and the House was about to take action on it.
The Senate Investigating subcommittee chaired by Senator Clyde Hoey issued a unanimous report based on its hearings of the previous summer regarding the "five percenter" matter, criticizing Maj. General Harry Vaughan, Presidential military aide, for accepting freezers as gifts and for allowing access to White House influence by John Maragon, now under indictment for perjury before the subcommittee for denying that he received money for his influence exerted on behalf of clients in obtaining Government contracts. The report added that it was not intending to criticize the long-standing tradition of allowing the President and his family to receive gifts of esteem. One of the freezers was given by General Vaughan to First Lady Bess Truman. The report was also critical of Mr. Maragon.
In New York, in the retrial of Alger Hiss for perjury, summations were slated to begin the following day and the case was expected to go to the jury late Friday. The case was adjourned for the day to allow attorneys to prepare their final arguments.
In Detroit, the UAW rejected a $100 per month pension offer by Chrysler and provided the firm a seven-day strike notice.
The Army ordered heavy equipment to the area of New Madrid, Missouri, in danger of breached levees, with the intention to pull the plugs in the levees at designated points so that the waters would flow into the floodway to lower the pressure on other earthen walls along the Mississippi's course, as at Cairo, Illinois.
In Boston, the FBI joined the search for a gang of bandits who the previous night had robbed a Brinks facility of 1.5 million dollars, a million of it in cash, one of the largest robberies in the nation's history. The robbers donned masks and, in twenty minutes, penetrated six locked doors to reach a vault, taking five cashiers and guards by surprise. They left behind a million dollars in cash because their hands were full. The police had chased a Cadillac sedan with stolen plates, headed for Providence, R.I., thought to be the getaway car, but lost it.
Must have been an inside
In Charlotte, a representative of the Institute of Government in Chapel Hill told the City Council and Board of County Commissioners that consolidation of the governments would produce great improvement in personnel practices, but that reorganization of some departments would be necessitated by the move to achieve the desired results. The presentation was another in the series of nine reports being presented by the Institute after its study of consolidation at the behest of the City and County.
Also in Charlotte, the City and County agreed to order a survey which was expected to double property valuations to raise revenue for needed future projects.
On the editorial page, "The China Question" posits that Red China would continue to be an issue even if it took over Formosa. It was to be hoped, for the sake of the Chinese people, that the Communist Government could bring order to the land, where the Nationalists had failed. But it doubts that it would take place, as Russia was not capable, with its own internal problems, to provide the necessary assistance to the Communists for the effort, that for its vast expanse and huge population, no country was capable of doing so. The problem of Red China, it concludes, was just beginning.
"Syndicated Crime" praises the effort of Senator Estes Kefauver of Tennessee for his resolution before the Senate Judiciary Committee to investigate the impact of gambling rackets on local, state and Federal governments. The Senator had found that there was no law which could be used effectively to get at the syndicate and wanted the investigation to determine whether interstate commerce was being substantially impacted by the operation and menacing in the meantime municipal government operations, and to determine whether Federal assistance was necessary, with recommended legislation accordingly. It was important, concludes the piece, to find an effective weapon against this corrosive enterprise.
"Effective Community Force" praises the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce for being quietly active in civic improvement during the prior year.
"Education Dream" finds the Truman program for Federally-financed college education through merit scholarships to be misplaced for the fact that first, the public primary and secondary schools needed to be brought up to standard before a guaranteed college education program should be implemented. And even then, it posits, the program should be undertaken at the local level rather than by the Federal Government.
A piece from the Greensboro Daily News, titled "What Middle Class Wants", discusses the President's proposal for a middle-income housing program not being desired by the middle class, as they wanted to make their own way and not be reliant on Government largess. The program would provide Government-guaranteed, long-term, low-interest loans but had been denounced as "pure socialism".
While the newspaper had supported low-income housing assistance for the fact that many of those in need of housing after the war were veterans, that need had been met for the most part and the need for middle-income housing was not so pressing, with cheap, plentiful credit available.
It concludes that when the middle class would become dependent on the Government for support, the democracy would be shaken to its foundations.
A piece from U.S. News & World Report suggests that the President's optimistic appraisal of the state of the economy was not shared by all Americans as a fourth of the nation's families earned less than $2,000 per year, less than half the average income of $4,000. And of those, about 40 percent earned less than a thousand dollars. The status suggested that the country had a long way to go to reach the general prosperity level predicted by the President for 1955, that of $5,000 per year, and $12,000 per year by the year 2000 seemed unattainable.
It goes on to analyze some of the root causes for the underclass, concludes that it was primarily lack of education which adversely impacted earning power.
Boy, it would have been something to be able to earn $12,000 in 2000. Bet you wish you had voted for Republicans all along so you, too, could be wealthy.
But, now, there is a revolutionary panacea for all your economic woes. Get your degree from Trump University right away and you will discover the sure and easy route to becoming a billionaire overnight. And, if you act now, as a special bonus, learn how to build a fence to keep out all of the unwanted elements, affording thereby complete security against all untoward activity, and then charge the cost of the enterprise to a foreign government, if not Mexico, then Russia as a penalty for interfering with our electoral processes, enabling the Man to be "elected" by dint of small majorities in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. A free picture with the cardboard cutout of the Man, himself, is included in the $36,000 tuition. Results are guaranteed, or you can sue the lying bastard, indict him and put him in jail where he belongs.
A piece from the Christian Science Monitor examines the policy toward China and posits that it was good that Secretary of State Acheson, not Senator Robert Taft, was in charge of American Far East policy. Senator Taft believed that a little military aid could save the Nationalists from the Communists. But the economic aid which had been given to the Chiang regime had been misused, instead lining the pockets of the Nationalist leaders. Moreover, Senator Taft's charge that the policy had been guided by leftists who wished to be rid of Chiang in favor of the Communists, was unconvincing.
Mr. Acheson had displayed a grasp of the basic problems in the Far East which suggested a hope of a more effective Far East policy. He made a persuasive argument in urging the Chinese to pay more attention to Russian imperialism in Manchuria and Mongolia. He was likely not as complacent as he appeared regarding Communist control of China, urging that what happened there was largely dependent on the Chinese people. The U.S. policy would place reliance on self-determination, as the tendency toward nationalism in China and the Far East would be inimical to Russian Communism.
The Secretary's position that the predominating interest of the U.S. was the welfare of the people of the Far East, rather than anti-Communism per se, was sound. While he had not outlined a complete Far East policy, it was a start in the right direction. For completing the matter, he would need the assistance of moderate Republicans, as Senators Arthur Vandenberg and Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.
Drew Pearson tells of General MacArthur having had a lot to do with the flap over Formosan policy by Republicans. He had convinced Senators William Knowland of California and Homer Ferguson of Michigan, during their visit to Japan, that Formosa was vital to security in the Pacific against Communist encroachment. He told them that if Formosa fell to the Communists, the cold war would be lost, that India would fall within two years and the American position in Japan would be indefensible, as Russia had 40,000 troops in the fortified islands to the north.
He said further that while there had been corruption among the Nationalists, it was not the fault of Chiang Kai-Shek, that he had been sold down the river at Yalta and Potsdam.
The General then overrode the State Department's refusal to provide an airplane for the Senators to visit Formosa, and gave them air transport.
Mr. Pearson notes that Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson, also supportive of intervention in Formosa, was peeved at General MacArthur for not telling Assistant Secretary of the Army Tracy Voorhees the information he provided to the Senators, as Mr. Voorhees was sent to Tokyo the previous December to be filled in by General MacArthur on the situation in China. He further notes that Admiral Arthur Radford had also told the members of Congress who stopped in Honolulu that Pacific Fleet units should cover Formosa.
The judge who had initially presided over the pretrial proceedings in the case of Congressman J. Parnell Thomas on charges of defrauding the Government by receiving salary kickbacks from bogus staff, had been rocked in the cradle by the secretary of Congressman Thomas, also under indictment in the scheme. Yet, he gave liberal postponements of the trial to the Congressman based on his claimed health issues for over a year, causing the secretary in the meantime to lose her civil service position and render her no longer able to find employment. Eventually, the case was transferred to another judge who ordered Congressman Thomas to trial, where he eventually changed his plea to no contest and the case against the secretary was dismissed.
The firm which had contracted to
paint the Capitol dome in Washington was under investigation by the
FBI and J. Edgar Hoover for allegedly not living up to its contract by spray painting the
dome rather than hand-painting it. The firm said that it had worked
with the Capitol architect, who supported the company's contention that
the particular contours of the dome required spray painting in the
various crevices, as hand painting would not reach those areas. The
firm had underbid the nearest competitor by $16,000 and so the
taxpayers had received a good deal on the job. The firm claimed that
the reason for the lower price was its special aluminum scaffolding
which could be moved about quickly in the Rotunda, permitting the painting to proceed quickly as the man on the flying trapeze
It was a spray job.
Whether any rabbits were painted secretly in the crevices of the dome remains classified.
Marquis Childs tells of the Republican Party searching for its identity as it entered the mid-term elections, trying to construct a statement of principles. Actions, however, would speak louder than words. It applied with special force to two primary contests in which incumbent independent Republicans would be running, Senators Charles Tobey of New Hampshire and Wayne Morse of Oregon. Both feared that the Old Guard Republicans were trying to defeat them.
Senator Tobey had angered powerful railroad interests by demanding investigation of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. Senator Morse had been one of fifteen Senators who voted for confirmation of Leland Olds for another term on the Federal Power Commission, angering the private utilities and lumber interests in Oregon. But at the same time, he had opposed the proposed Columbia Valley Authority project, similar to TVA, causing suspicion among liberals. And the labor-liberal interests in Oregon were breathing life into a moribund Democratic Party.
So independent Republicans suffered two-fold, from Old Guard Republicans and from liberal-labor interests.
Senators Morse and Tobey followed in a long tradition of such Republicans, as former Senators Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin, William Borah of Idaho, and George Norris of Nebraska. If such men were purged from the party, he ventures, the GOP would be even poorer than it was at present.
Robert C. Ruark, in Melbourne, tells
of the terrible problem of rabbits
Mr. Ruark saw in the outback square miles of land denuded of crops which should have been lush in vegetation, where millions of rabbits had played havoc. They roamed the land with the fierceness of carnivores.
Great effort was expended in trying to rid the land of the rabbits. Teams of hunters prowled the land at night, shooting as many as 5,000 rabbits per night. Packs of dogs ran all night catching rabbits. The hawk and fox were not regarded as the traditional inimical predators by farmers, as they preyed on rabbits.
Nearly all methods
The best laid plans
Framed Edition
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