The Charlotte News
Tuesday, January 30, 1951
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that the allied offensive, in its sixth day, was slowed to a crawl in Korea by the enemy resistance this date, as it had apparently hit the main enemy force along the frozen western front. Allied units advanced only a few hundred yards and advanced units were suffering their worst casualties of the offensive, still far below the losses, however, inflicted on the enemy. Hundreds of enemy supply vehicles were observed moving southward toward the western battle line.
A Navy task forced shelled the eastern port town of Kansong, 25 miles north of the 38th parallel, throughout the day. A South Korean division drove into Kangnung on the east coast, 20 miles south of the parallel.
At the U.N., the U.S.-sponsored resolution to name Communist China an aggressor was expected to pass this date, twelve weeks after General MacArthur had first reported the presence of Chinese troops in Korea. Russia and Poland intended to speak against the resolution, continuing to claim that the U.S. was the aggressor. India warned that its passage would end all hope of a negotiated ceasefire with China and might ignite a third world war. Forty-three nations of the 60-nation political committee had indicated their support of the resolution.
Correspondent John Scali reports that Premier Rene Pleven of France told the National Press Club in Washington this date that France was building its military strength steadily to do its part in NATO to resist Communist aggression. France would have twenty regular divisions in Europe by the end of 1953, he said, with 100,000 more men under arms than at the outbreak of World War II. The French Premier had just finished meeting a second time with the President during his visit to the U.S., which he said had as its aim strengthening ties between France and the U.S. and letting the U.S. know that France was not just a "fair weather friend". He praised the selection of General Eisenhower as supreme commander of NATO.
Former Undersecretary of the Army Tracy Voorhees told the Senate Defense Preparedness subcommittee, chaired by Senator Lyndon Johnson, that he believed it would be necessary to draft both young married men and 18-year olds to meet the manpower quotas for the military.
Price administrator Mike DiSalle proposed a "margin of profit" basis for imposing price controls within the blanket order issued the prior Friday to freeze prices and wages. Under the proposal, price levels would be based on cost plus a fixed margin of profit. Wage freeze exemptions remained under study by the wage stabilization board.
Railway switchmen reported as sick on at least six railroads in the Chicago and Detroit areas this date, hampering movement of vital freight. The railroads were being run by the Army since the Government seizure of the railroads to avert a strike threatened in December, following a Federal court order for the switchmen to return to work and then an order to show cause re contempt to union officials when the men did not immediately return to work, with that walkout, described by union officials as an unauthorized "wildcat strike", ending December 16.
In Raleigh, legislation was introduced in the State Senate to have the State Highway Commission become partially responsible, along with localities, for building and maintaining all city streets of the state, heretofore an exclusively local responsibility. The measure did not follow the recommendation of the special study commission that the whole responsibility be borne by the State.
Tom Fesperman of The News, in
the second of his series of reports on life in an Army training camp,
again reports from Fort Jackson, S.C., telling of several of the
personalities involved in the training process at the camp, such as
the stern taskmaster sergeant who had a booming voice as a sergeant
in the movies
Severe weather hit most of the nation with bitter cold gripping the central portion, as warmer temperatures were recorded near the Arctic Circle than in many places in the Midwest, where at least one reading of 45 below zero was registered at Lone Rock, Wis., with the most severe temperatures being in Wisconsin and Minnesota. Snow fell in Houston as temperatures of 25 degrees were recorded, with below-freezing temperatures all the way to the Rio Grande Valley, threatening citrus fruit and vegetables. Icy highways and freezing rain beset many areas, with several deaths attributed to the weather. Only in the extreme Southeast and the Far West was milder weather prevalent.
How were the tomatoes doing?
On the editorial page, "Standard for 'The Gardens'" discusses the proposed three million dollar coliseum-auditorium complex for Charlotte, apparently originally to have been called "Queen Charlotte Gardens", and how it was to be administered, whether by a special autonomous, apolitical committee, by the Park & Recreation Commission, or by the City Council with assistance from a special advisory committee. It does not propose to argue the relative merits of each suggested method but says that it does not agree that the complex had to be self-supporting, that the community interests were paramount to the balance sheet, and so non-commercial and commercial events, as trade shows, at the proposed facility should be properly balanced.
It urges the Charlotte legislative delegation, which would decide the issue of supervision, to stick to principles of sound management and select the authority which could best demonstrate, by its personnel, adherence to those principles, while being mindful of the pitfalls of local politics.
Where are the "Gardens"? We've never seen those. They must have paved them over with the sea of parking lots stretching from the Coliseum-Auditorium to the Trade Mart long ago. They may have a tree or two in a box out there in front somewhere, but the gardens have never been evident in our recollection, spanning back nearly to the time of the opening of the Coliseum and Auditorium in 1955.
Gardens? Who needs gardens? People want to park, not look at empty flower beds when they come out to a basketball game or hockey match in the middle of winter. Put in some more parking spaces where you have those gardens drawn in. We'll change it to "Queen Charlotte Gardens of Macadam". Besides, the paving companies need the work.
"Services vs. Dollars" finds that while it was in general agreement with the 1951 General Assembly on holding the line on spending, it believes that the line should be fixed in such a way to allow for continued expansion of essential services, as education and institutional services, by raising additional revenue if necessary and not to fix the line in terms of absolute dollars and cents. It recommends South Carolina as example, where Governor James Byrnes had proposed a sales tax measure to raise 30 million dollars annually to be used to build educational facilities.
"A Matter of Judgment—II", after a bit of a long-winded introduction on the business of editorial writing, follows up the earlier editorial, "A Matter of Judgment", in which it had suggested that newspapers, operating under the pressure of time constraints and the need to make the news attractive to readers, occasionally produced salacious headlines and even stories which were misleading or false. The same was true of the radio and fledgling television.
But, upon greater reflection, it feels the need to amend the earlier piece to add that in a free society, where freedom of the press was valued, the newspaper business had to be permitted, within the limits imposed by defamation laws, to provide the customers that which they wanted as long as it was not harmful, that conflict being news, the reverse of the adage "no news is a good news", newspapers needed conflict to sell their wares to the public.
That sounds like a sell-out, rendering the first piece a complete nullity.
Drew Pearson discusses the need of the Soviet Union for oil to wage war and that its only way to obtain enough oil for more than a two or three-month campaign was by taking over Iran, which it was seeking to do by peaceful means through economic enticements. Were it to gain control of Iran, not only would it then have a ready supply of oil, it would have access to the Indian Ocean via the Persian Gulf and could then take over India, Saudi Arabia and the Near East generally.
The failure of the Congress to approve a 25-million dollar loan sought by Iran had resulted in Iran leaning toward the Soviets instead of the U.S. The loan approved by the Export-Import Bank had so many strings attached that the Iranian Parliament would likely veto it. U.S. Ambassador to Iran Henry Grady had been urging Congress to approve the loan but was getting nowhere. Meanwhile, Iran had cut off the Voice of America and given free play to the Voice of Moscow, and had negotiated a trade treaty with the Soviets, giving favorable treatment to Iranian products.
Price administrator Mike DiSalle had told Congress that providing only partial price controls would not work well as it would only anger the country as controls were incrementally implemented, akin to bobbing the tail of a cat an inch at a time, that full control from the start was the better method, cutting off the whole tail at the start.
What about the retail in those black cats with nine lives?
Senator Zales Ecton of Montana, during a visit by farmers of his state, had asked them to stop bothering him in his Senate office so that he could spend his time getting the work of the people done. The farmers, hearing it, turned around and quietly departed.
A Marine colonel had donated his $500 bonus provided by the State of Pennsylvania to Pfc. Robert L. Smith, who had longs both arms and legs in Korea.
The President was going to appoint a commission to investigate why Americans were not voting, as in 1900, the turnout had been 74 percent while it had been but 43 percent in 1950.
Senator Russell Long of Louisiana was investigating complaints that the large automobile companies were hoarding steel under fictitious names while the little companies could not obtain enough steel to stay in business.
Joseph & Stewart Alsop tell of the recent trip to Korea by Army chief of staff General J. Lawton Collins and Air Force chief of staff Hoyt Vandenberg having proved the turning point between the former three months of defeatism and new optimism evident in the Pentagon. Their reports to Congress, based on a new estimate of the military outlook in the war, had stimulated encouragement also on Capitol Hill.
The odds remained the same, with three American corps plus one South Korean corps still facing six Chinese armies and one North Korean army, a total complement of about 290,000 Chinese plus 150,000 North Korean troops.
But the new ground commander, General Matthew Ridgway, had succeeded two weeks earlier in establishing a good defensive line, with the South Korean corps holding the extreme western sector and the three American corps defending the more open country below Seoul, in the central and eastern sectors. Patrols had held the enemy at least a day and a half from the U.N. front, preventing massed enemy troops from reaching allied lines by night, as they had done in the past. Even if the line could not be held as anticipated, there were good positions to which to fall back.
Meanwhile, the enemy supply lines stretched 250 miles to the Yalu River in wintertime, in poor country which had no more food stocks available as it had already been fought over twice in the prior seven months. The large enemy force therefore could actually prove a disadvantage in terms of consumption of supplies.
It was still not a certain situation for the allies but for the first time, there were optimistic assessments being made, producing a much better atmosphere, with an end to the fighting at least imaginable, if not imminent.
Marquis Childs discusses India, celebrating its fifth year of independence from Britain, fearful of another world war, the motivating factor behind Prime Minister Nehru's criticism of the U.S. and the attempt to bring about a ceasefire with Communist China, appearing to most Americans as appeasement.
India was suffering from famine, with food rations cut by 25 percent, from 12 ounces of food grains per day to nine, with dieticians estimating that 24 was necessary for proper strength. On the black market, rice and wheat had risen from 100 to 200 percent above the legal price, causing bitter resentment among the Indian population. Unless the U.S. provided aid in the form of surplus wheat, at a cost of about 200 million dollars, as sought by Nehru, there would be mass starvation in India within six months.
Meanwhile, Communism was on the other side offering food and land, promising an end to usury and graft. America was perceived by the Indian people as having unlimited wealth. With those factors at work, mass famine deaths in the streets of Bombay and Calcutta would cause the people to be susceptible to the lure of Communism.
It was to be hoped that Congress might respond with the sought aid, to preserve the good will of India down the road, but, Mr. Childs suggests, that kind of legislative maturity was unlikely to be exhibited.
Robert C. Ruark discusses the draft and the need to regularize the process and make it equitable. He cites the absurdity of professional athletes being exempt from the draft when, he asserts, anyone able to play professional sports was at least capable of handling KP duty. As long as men were dying in the service of their country, he believes, there should be no exemptions from the draft for professions but pure equality in the induction process.
Framed Edition
Links-Date — Links-Subj.