The Charlotte News
Friday, January 4, 1952
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that the Communists had issued seven objections, each of which is listed, to the allied six-point plan for exchange of prisoners in Korea, rejecting a new U.N. appeal for immediate trade of sick and wounded prisoners. Allied negotiators accused Communist China of releasing soldiers of Korean origin from its armies in 1949 and 1950 to form part of the North Korean Communist Army, and also sought an explanation for reports that the Communists were shipping crated warplanes into North Korea. The Communists labeled this latter claim a "ridiculous rumor" and said that there was nothing wrong with the release of Korean soldiers from its armies. The Communists accused the allies of keeping some 500,000 North Koreans behind the U.N. lines through intimidation with the atom bomb.
Both subcommittees, on the prisoner exchange issue and the truce supervision issue, would meet again the following day. It appeared to the allies that a long struggle still lay ahead on the prisoner exchange issue.
In the ground war, allied infantrymen moved through heavy mortar and small arms fire this date to recapture Christmas Hill on the east-central front just before dawn, after Communist troops had attacked and won the hill after dark the previous night. The peak had changed hands repeatedly sends Chinese troops had seized it on Christmas Day. The only other activity along the front were from patrols fighting minor skirmishes. The weather had become milder after a week of extreme cold.
In the air war, clearing skies enabled allied airmen to fly 79 sorties against enemy supply lines and front positions on Thursday.
In Atlantic City, the United Steelworkers Union convention voted to postpone their threatened nationwide strike for 45 days, but warned that they would strike in late February unless the Government settled the dispute in the meantime. The voice vote was practically unanimous. Meanwhile, the Wage Stabilization Board, to which the President had referred the dispute, would make recommendations with the goal of resolving the dispute over the demanded 18.5 cents hourly wage increase and other concessions, which the steel companies claimed would necessitate a rise in steel prices, triggering an inflationary spiral through the economy.
The Government approved higher ceiling prices for Ford passenger cars, but refused to grant the full increase sought by the company, granting a 4.97 percent increase against a 5.39 percent sought rise in prices. Increases were also approved for Mercurys and Lincolns, also short of that requested.
In Paris, the U.S. expressed concern that a new Russian proposal to move the Korean armistice negotiations before the U.N. Security Council might cause a breakdown in the negotiations ongoing in Korea. Also at the U.N. this date, French sources said that they had received unofficial reports that the Chinese Communists had massed some 200,000 troops in full battle gear in areas just north of the French Indo-China border, presenting a threat of invasion at the point when an armistice would be reached in Korea. In his address the previous day to the political committee, Soviet chief delegate Andrei Vishinsky had mentioned Southeast Asia as a possible trouble spot, a reference which some U.N. observers thought was freighted with ominous portent.
Clarence Streit, in the third in a series of articles regarding his impressions gleaned from attendance of the NATO Council meeting in Rome recently and discussions with military and diplomatic leaders in Europe, tells of the economic danger to the Atlantic defense being another major factor which had contributed to the decision to seek European Union. Problems included getting enough arms quickly enough to deter attack without unduly straining the economies of the Atlantic countries and thereby undermining their morale by inflation, high taxes, and reduction of the standard of living, as well as determining how to spread the economic and tax burden equally among all of the allied democracies, then to get this distribution accepted and carried out by each of the sovereign governments.
North Carolina Senator Clyde Hoey stated in Shelby, before representatives of the Methodist Church and the Lutheran Church, that he would vote against the confirmation of General Mark Clark as ambassador to the Vatican, an appointment to be renewed by the President in the current Congressional session after his recess appointment had been withdrawn after sparking controversy among Protestants. Senator Hoey said that he did not deem it essential or necessary to have an ambassador to the Vatican.
Attorney General J. Howard McGrath indicated to reporters that there was no change contemplated in his status, responding to rumors that he might soon leave the Cabinet.
In Washington, a Federal District Judge ordered bench warrants issued for three defendants who failed to appear for arraignment on perjury indictments for allegedly lying under oath to a Senate subcommittee investigating favoritism and influence at the RFC. One of the defendants was E. Merl Young, whose wife Loretta had received a mink coat which another missing defendant, Joseph Rosenbaum, had financed. The third defendant who failed to appear was Mr. Young's brother. In Miami, a deputy U.S. marshal stated that Merl Young had not been served with any process to appear in Washington and Mr. Young's wife indicated that they were unaware of his required appearance this date.
Off England, a British rescue tug was able to get a man aboard the American freighter, Flying Enterprise, this date, ending the week-long lone vigil of Captain Kurt Carlsen, seeking to save the vessel and its valuable cargo. But fog and rising winds had, for the nonce, forced a halt to attempts to tow the freighter 300 miles to England. The ship, laden with water taken on during the earlier hurricane, continued to wallow in heavy seas and the previous day continued to list to 60 degrees, but remained buoyant and riding "satisfactorily". Captain Carlsen had previously only had a single book aboard, The Law of the Seamen, until reading matter was brought aboard for him from the British tug. It was estimated that it would take at least three days to tow the stricken ship to port. All of the crewmen had previously been evacuated.
Icy weather conditions continued to prevail in some sections of the nation, as the Rocky Mountain region began to emerge from the effects of a five-day siege of snow and sub-zero temperatures. In southwestern Colorado, snowdrifts had reached 80 feet in some places. Rescue crews had fought through drifts to free 14 persons stuck in shelter houses on Wolf Creek Pass.
As pictured, a young girl in Houston had killed an 1,100-lb. steer with a .22-caliber rifle and barbecued it, after which she was believed to be the first girl ever charged with rustling cattle.
She appears awfully slight of build to have consumed an 1,100-pound steer. Must be fake news.
In Gaffney, S.C., a probate judge had on file applications for marriage licenses from four different women for a single soldier, and the soldier, who had also filed four applications, said he would decide which one to marry later. The judge indicated that the law did not require that he marry the first woman he brought into the office.
It looks to be a 1951 Pontiac up 'ere stuck in the snow in Seattle. Hope the chain man gets 'er free so's ye don't have to pay no expensive tow bill. That's a hell of a thing, 'ere.
On the editorial page, "The New Internal Revenue Plan" finds that the President's proposed reorganization of the IRB made good sense. The proposal would streamline the theretofore unmanageable array of field offices at the local level, replacing them with 25 district offices under district commissioners, who would be given some of the authority presently centralized in Washington. The Bureau had been weakened by inefficiency and incompetence, and, sometimes, dishonest officials, who had been political appointees. The President proposed to remedy that problem by placing all of the IRB jobs, except that of commissioner, under Civil Service. He also intended to set up a separate and independent inspection service to maintain a regular tab on the Bureau's operations.
The President would submit his proposal under the Reorganization Act, which meant that it would become law unless either chamber of Congress rejected it within 60 days of its submission. It suggests that the reaction of Congress would be worth watching, as the Congress was not without blame in exercising improper influence on the Justice and Treasury Departments in tax cases.
"A Report on Going Forward" remarks on Governor Kerr Scott's annual report, appearing to accentuate the positive, emphasizing the achievements of his first three years in office instead of only those of 1951. The Governor did not have a candidate as yet to push his "Go Forward" program into the future, to oppose William B. Umstead, the most formidable announced candidate for the 1952 gubernatorial race, in which Governor Scott could not succeed himself.
There were problems for his program in the future, such as the modernization of dilapidated primary roads, drafting and enforcing an adequate highway safety code, attracting more industry in the face of what appeared to be high corporate taxes, and improving the educational resources of the state. The achievements of his term were substantial, including building and improving roads, construction of new schools, rural utilities, state institutions, hospitals, ports, mental institutions, and tourist facilities. Some of the growth would have occurred anyway, but much of it was the result of the Governor's tenacious, hardheaded insistence on realization of his goals, for which he had risked his own political neck several times based on his belief that he was doing the right thing.
Despite all the improvements and substantial spending to effectuate them, the state had a surplus of cash on hand, as expenditures had been offset by the huge defense effort and foreign aid programs impacting the state positively, increasing the revenue base.
The newspaper confesses that it had opposed many of his projects, but his program had gone forward in spite of many obstacles and appeared to have clear sailing through the balance of his term.
Mr. Umstead would become the next Governor, and Governor Scott would run successfully in 1954 against interim Senator Alton Lennon, successor to deceased Senator Willis Smith, who would die in mid-1953.
"The Diplomatic Litvinoff" finds that, with the death during the week of Maxim Litvinoff, one of the last symbols of amicable Soviet-U.S. Relations had passed. He had won fame and respect as a plain-spoken diplomat at the League of Nations, and as Soviet Ambassador to the U.S. during World War II, had enabled Russia to obtain lend-lease material. In 1939, while negotiating a Franco-British alliance with Russia, he was abruptly replaced by V. M. Molotov, shortly before the mutual non-aggression pact between Stalin and Hitler was consummated just before the German invasion of Poland. In 1943, he had been recalled from Washington after the Québec Conference, apparently because he had not extracted an Anglo-American pledge to initiate a second front in Europe or because Russia wanted to emphasize its displeasure over the failure to obtain that pledge.
He had been without an official position for six years, but remained in semi-official favor, a rarity in Russia, where displaced diplomats had a way of disappearing from view. He was provided a long obituary by Pravda and was accorded a funeral with a procession of high official mourners, led by Andrei Gromyko.
"Belt or Suspenders?" finds that there was a new twist to the old game, "Button,
button, who's got the button?" deriving from the fact that each
pair of G.I. pants had six buttons but no suspenders
It suggests that the waste was the result of military uniform holdovers from wars of an earlier era. Roman soldiers had once sported goatees until a group of northern barbarians dragged them around by the goatees, prompting an order to shave. Similarly, it posits, perhaps a saboteur had once sneaked into an enemy camp at night and hobbled the troops by snipping their suspenders. Whatever the cause and whatever the result, the important thing was for the pants to stay up, no matter the device employed for the purpose.
Nix, lads
One thing you have to say about him:
whatever else he may have done, he did not ever forget
Drew Pearson tells of the Senate Elections Committee seriously considering major action regarding possible violations of the Corrupt Practices Act by both Democrats and Republicans in the 1950 Ohio Senate campaign, wherein Senator Taft had been re-elected over his Democratic opponent, Joe Ferguson. Senator Taft's campaign manager had, according to the testimony, disregarded the law, as had a major contributor to Mr. Ferguson's campaign, the latter circumventing the campaign contributions limit by making a $35,000 contribution to the committee of John L. Lewis. Both men were engaged in big business and so had plenty of available legal advice, leading Senators to believe they had no excuse for the violations. Senator Taft's campaign manager had failed to maintain a record of contributions which he deposited in his private bank box and thus could not account for $100,000 of the $300,000 which had passed through his hands during the campaign. He provides some of the Senate colloquy, and notes that this same individual was again collecting large sums for the Senator's presidential campaign, prompting questions as to whether or not he had revised his bookkeeping methods.
The Congressional Quarterly finds that the disagreements on policy between the President and Senator Taft during the previous twelve years had exceeded their agreements by 2 to 1, explains the details. Of 67 key issues which came to record votes in the Senate during that period, they disagreed on 44, agreed on 22, and on one, in 1943, then-Senator Truman's view on Federal aid to education had not been recorded. Senator Taft had shaped or shared the position of the majority of Senate Republicans on 59 of the 67 issues, while the President so shaped or shared the Democratic majority view on 53 of the issues. The two disagreed on ten of fourteen foreign policy issues, on all six economic controls issues, on four of six labor issues, the same on defense and farm legislation, on five of six economy and spending issues, had never agreed on the five monopoly, states' rights and security issues, agreed on one of six housing and education issues, two of the six civil rights issues, and three of the six key tax issues.
On 17 issues of "far-reaching importance", the two disagreed on nine and were in partial agreement on 1951 tax hikes and fair employment practices, but did not agree on the extent of each. Their agreement on six such issues included the administration of the Marshall Plan, Federal aid to education, a comprehensive Federal housing program, expanded Social Security coverage, a proposal for the extension of the Defense Production Act, and on revision of cloture rules for the Senate.
It goes on in further detail of their agreements and disagreements, all of which, of course, would become merely academic, as neither would wind up their respective party's nominee in 1952, the President electing not to run again.
A letter writer says that his New Year's resolution was to try to be good and kind, and love the selfish and sarcastic. He favors being friends and loving one another, as God had loved mankind.
A letter writer seeks to explain the long-term impotence of the Republican Party in the South as a function of ostracism by national Republican leaders, the fact that Northern and Western Republican candidates for the presidency would come into the South every four years offering jobs for delegates, and that there had not been a Republican leader of the South appointed either to the Cabinet, as an ambassador or to the Supreme Court in 75 years. He concludes that the Republican Party would not achieve power in the South until it discarded the "effete committee and convention system, which is the happy hunting ground for tricksters and job seekers, by which it has been controlled during the long years of its defeat and impotence, and place control of the party where it belongs—in the hands of the long-suffering loyal voters of the Party."
This year, you will get a trickster on the national stage, who later, after employing his Southern strategy, will bring into the Government happy hunters and those who fancied themselves effete snobs and nattering nabobs of negativism, at least vis-à-vis the Constitution and laws of the United States.
A letter writer wishes the newspaper a happy New Year and says she eagerly awaited its arrival each afternoon.
Eleventh
Framed Edition
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