The Charlotte News

Friday, October 10, 1952

FOUR EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports, via George McArthur, that the Communist Chinese had made it to the top of White Horse Mountain this night and had amassed 16,000 fresh troops within easy striking distance of the hill which guarded the route to Seoul and had been the object of fierce fighting since the prior Monday, when the Communists had launched their strongest offensive since May, 1951. Intelligence officers stated that the enemy could commit two fresh divisions to battle at any time. The South Korean defenders of the hill, though exhausted, had scrambled right back to the top and battled the enemy hand-to-hand during a drenching rain for 30 minutes before surrendering the crest again. A front line officer said it was so dark at the crest that the South Korean troops had to grope their way forward to close upon the enemy. They had a simple rule for night fighting, that if they felt a shaved head, they knew it probably belonged to a Chinese soldier. An officer said that the only sounds from the top of the hill were screams from someone knifed and the moans of the wounded. Because of the darkness, artillery from both sides could not operate. In addition, minor fights were reported from other places along the western front, northwest of Yonchon, and in the east, above the "Punch Bowl".

The U.S. Eighth Army reported that enemy casualties for the first week of October had totaled 4,786 killed, 2,692 wounded and 50 taken prisoner, the heaviest casualty toll since the previous November. The total did not include losses to allied warplanes and artillery or the heavy casualties of the previous three days at White Horse.

In the air war, U.N. fighter-bombers hit behind enemy lines this date against troop concentrations, and 15 B-29's struck four enemy supply centers on Thursday night, three of which within the vicinity of Pyongyang.

In Phoenix, Ariz., General Eisenhower said this date that he would make public before the election a report of his financial status, saying that most of it was a matter of public record anyway. The General did not disclose whether he intended to open his tax returns for public inspection, and some of his aides indicated that the statement did not necessarily include tax returns. The previous Sunday, in an off-the-record discussion with several dozen members of the press, the General had said he did not intend to make a public statement regarding his personal finances, saying that he did not see why he should "dance to the other fellow's tune". The General spoke in Phoenix in a 12,000-seat stadium, to an estimated 10,000 people during the afternoon of this date.

Governor Stevenson spoke in Oklahoma City in the City Auditorium, predicting that Russia might abandon its aggressive policies because American-sponsored collective security in Korea had worked so well, but that the U.S. needed still to guard against trickery by any Soviet attempt to substitute honey for vinegar. He said only time would tell as to the Soviet intentions, and foresaw no likelihood of sudden changes in the world situation, but did see a chance for long-run improvement provided the country steadfastly pursued its present course. He said that that the long-run gain toward peace, however, might be altered should the Republicans win in November and proceed to change foreign policy. He said it was dangerous to talk tough unless the country was prepared to act tough, and that the new Republican policy was to talk tough while simultaneously weakening the country's defenses and alliances, a "sure road to disaster". He said that General Eisenhower's call for a 20 billion dollar budget cut would mean a slash of defense funds and that the Old Guard part of the Republican Party, represented by Senator Taft, which had captured the General, meant to scrap bipartisan foreign policy. He said that the Administration's policies had been "mightily successful" and had rallied and united the free world and checked the spread of Communism. The Governor would speak in New Orleans this night.

The President this date continued his whistle-stop campaign through New York, seeking the state's 45 electoral votes for Governor Stevenson, attacking the Republican record on civil rights. He said in Buffalo the previous night that in "a wave of hysteria", Republicans and some Democrats had tried to win votes by hurling false charges of Communism, charges which could split the country and lead to similar attacks on Catholics, Jews, and other minorities. He said that more pressure could be anticipated in the ensuing four years against the Bill of Rights and that it was part of the President's job to uphold the anti-discrimination sections of the Constitution, a job which he warned should not be turned over to a professional military general.

The President did not comment on a statement made by Governor Dewey via state-wide radio and television Wednesday night that the "white supremacy" slogan on the Alabama ballot, alongside a rooster, convicted Governor Stevenson and his running mate, Senator John Sparkman of Alabama, of the "rankest hypocrisy". Governor Dewey had displayed the rooster emblem and the slogan "white supremacy for the right" to television viewers. He said it was the same emblem of white supremacy displayed by the Klan, a "Jim Crow banner". The story states that the slogan and symbol had been placed on the Alabama ballot around 1901 in reaction to the post-Civil War era when mass black voting had been encouraged by "opportunistic newcomers" and many white voters had been disenfranchised. A photograph on the page shows Governor Dewey displaying an enlarged facsimile of the ballot.

The President would complete his cross-country, 15-day whistle-stop tour the following day in New York City, giving two speeches, one regarding civil rights, during the afternoon in Harlem, at Dorrance Brooks Square, and the other at 10:00 p.m., at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, in honor of Columbus Day.

In Cleveland the previous day, a few minutes after the President had answered cries from a crowd to "give 'em hell, Harry!" a deputy U.S. marshal gave the President a court summons, making him a defendant in a lawsuit filed in Cleveland on September 3 by a lawyer, challenging the legality of the Korean War on grounds that the President had failed to obtain Congressional approval for it. The plaintiff was seeking an injunction, ordering the President to withdraw all troops from Korea and to stop troops from engaging in any similar fighting without a valid declaration of war by Congress. It also asked the Federal Court to reprimand the President "publicly and sternly" for having "usurped powers never delegated to him." The local U.S. Attorney said that a citizen did not have standing to sue the President on such an issue and that the District Court had no jurisdiction over the matter.

Samuel Lubell, who had been traveling around the country tapping grassroots reaction to the presidential campaign, tells of repeatedly hearing comments, such as one by a Jewish lawyer in Philadelphia, who lived in a near-suburban development of neat homes averaging $14,000 in value, that he had been set to vote for General Eisenhower until the General indicated that he was supporting Senator McCarthy's re-election and then also met with Senator Taft, causing him to decide to stick with the Democrats, despite his belief that they had been in power too long. Mr. Lubell had heard the same from Jewish voters he had interviewed in New York City. General Eisenhower had hoped to make inroads in the Jewish vote, of considerable importance in New York, California, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Ohio. Because of the General's leadership in the Allied crusade in Europe which had smashed Nazism, he was well-liked in Jewish communities and had done well in Jewish wards during the primaries the previous spring. That previous affinity toward him had not entirely dissipated but the likelihood of a dramatic shift in the Jewish vote appeared to have dwindled because of the General's peace with the isolationist wing of the Republican Party and his endorsement of Senators McCarthy and William Jenner. Other voters as well had expressed this same sort of reservation about the General.

Another Gallup poll appears, showing that the Democrats were gaining in the race, with the preference for the two parties now separated by only four percentage points, as the Republicans had lost two full points since the previous survey reported on October 1. General Eisenhower, however, continued to run substantially ahead of his party. Of the respondents polled, 45 percent said that if the election were held at present, they would prefer the Republicans, while 38 percent preferred the Democrats, with 17 percent undecided. But when those who were leaning toward either the Republicans or Democrats were included in the total, 49 percent favored the Republicans and 45 percent, the Democrats, with 6 percent undecided. When the question was posed only regarding the presidential candidates, 50 percent favored General Eisenhower and 38 percent, Governor Stevenson, with 12 percent undecided. (The final percentage would be 55 to 44 in favor of the General.) The respondents had been interviewed through October 4 and those who said they would not vote in November excluded.

In Kassel, Germany, a former leader of the SS, who told the court that he was still a Nazi and anti-Jewish, was sentenced to life imprisonment this date for the murder in Silesia in 1934 of a Jewish doctor, Dr. Lindemann, a lung specialist. The defendant, Herbert Bischof, fainted when sentence was pronounced.

In Boston, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this date unanimously set aside the conviction of Denis Delaney, the former IRB collector who had been given a two-year sentence and fined $10,500 for accepting bribes and falsifying tax liens. The Court held that the defendant's due process right to a fair trial before an unprejudiced jury had been denied by the unfavorable pretrial publicity.

In Fort Lauderdale, Fla., two armed robbers tied up three employees of the People's Industrial Bank this date and escaped with $9,000 they had stuffed in a brown shopping bag. They had entered the bank 45 minutes before it opened, slipping through an unlocked rear door. They then walked up to two tellers and told them to keep quiet and they would not be hurt. The two then walked in a leisurely manner out the back door, across a parking lot and disappeared.

Columnist Earl Wilson and his wife would be guests of the Carolinas' Carrousel on Thanksgiving Day, November 27, in Charlotte. Grady Cole, chairman of the celebrity committee for the Carrousel, said that a full schedule of activities would be planned for Mr. Wilson and his family, but the details had not yet been completed. Mr. Wilson had been the honored guest of the Southern States Fair in Charlotte in 1950 and had also visited Fort Bragg at that same time.

On the editorial page, "Will You Be Left Out Nov. 4?" tells of the following three Saturdays being available to register to vote for residents of Mecklenburg County, and that the failure to register might wind up determining local, Congressional and national races.

Currently, it indicates, 46,320 persons were registered in Charlotte, while there were over 80,000 persons over 21 years of age eligible to vote. It provides a table of countries and their respective percentages of participation in their most recent elections, headed by Italy with 92 percent in 1948, with six countries in Europe having substantially greater percentages of participation than the U.S. in 1948, with 52 percent of eligible voters casting ballots, and 41 percent in the 1950 mid-term election. It points out that Japan and Korea also had greater percentages of participation than did the U.S.

In comparison to other states, North Carolina ranked 39th, with only 30 percent of eligible voters participating in the 1948 election.

It urges, therefore, registering and then voting on November 4.

"You Don't Go Forward by Backing Up" indicates that the previous two City Councils had been wishy-washy on the matter of curb parking in the city, had sat and twiddled their thumbs while the volume of traffic grew ever greater and the flow of traffic grew correspondingly slower. Movement of traffic in the growing city was one of its most difficult problems facing City Government and, it ventures, one which could not be solved by a series of expedient gestures which reflected only the Council's lack of courage to stand firmly for the principle of scientific traffic engineering.

"Job Classification Makes Sense" indicates that a City Councilman had presented to the Council the merits of job classification for municipal employees, and though not convincing his fellow members of its benefits, had probably sold the taxpayers who read the details of the argument in the local newspapers. Classification would define each job and give department heads a guide in hiring workers, establishing fair and equal pay scales for all jobs, minimizing grievances over salary, build morale, and provide other benefits. The Council as a whole appeared to believe that it would be too much bother, but the piece offers that lethargy was no excuse for inactivity, and suggests that the voters might feel the same way when they cast their ballots in November for the new Council.

"Fight Fire with Precautions" indicates that during the previous year, five percent of the country's forests had been destroyed by fire, equivalent to enough lumber to build 86,000 five-room houses, enough for the building needs of a city twice the population of Charlotte. It could also have supplied 3.5 million tons of newsprint, enough to supply all the newspapers for a year. In addition, 12,000 persons died and 24,000 were injured each year in fires. On average, the daily fire loss in the country included 34 persons, 849 homes, 74 stores, 88 factories, nine churches, eight schools and four hospitals.

It indicates that it was Fire Prevention Week and so recommends pondering ways in which to make a contribution to stop such fires, reminding that careless use of electrical appliances, tobacco, matches and flammable liquids, along with faulty chimneys and flues and defective heating devices represented typical causes of house fires.

The citizens of Boston, Atlanta, and Texas City could remember terrible fires of the previous decade. In 1871, the great Chicago fire destroyed over 17,000 buildings, and the Wisconsin forest fire had killed 1,152 persons.

The Fire Department and the Jaycees were emphasizing fire prevention, and it regards it a good time to reflect on the need for a new fire station in Charlotte, which was subject to approval in the upcoming bond election in December.

A piece from the Philadelphia Bulletin, titled "Why Britain Exports Cars", tells of Americans who had bought new automobiles during the previous few years since the war having a good yardstick by which to measure what England was doing to pay its own way. The previous year, Britain had built 476,000 passenger cars, but exported 375,000 of them, had built some 259,000 trucks and buses, while exporting about 139,000, a trend which had transpired since the war. Britons wanted cars no less than did Americans and many had the cash to purchase them, but the British Government, regardless of whether Labor or Conservative, would not allow the citizens to have them because of the necessity of exporting them to continue to eat. A whole list of manufactured goods were forbade to Britons, such as the best of English cloth and clothes, its finest cutlery, and its best shoes and dishes, nearly all of which were earmarked for export.

It indicates that when workers in Detroit had discovered that five percent of U.S. cars were being exported right after the war, when consumers were hungry for automobiles after manufacture had ceased in February, 1942 for the duration, they had struck.

Drew Pearson, en route through the West, again looks at Senator Nixon's secret expense fund, this time to determine whether the Senator had used influence with the Government on behalf of the 76 millionaire contributors to the fund, something which he had denied in his September 23 speech regarding the fund.

A few days later, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch had disclosed that Dana Smith, the tax lawyer who had established the $18,000 fund for the Senator, had used the Senator's influence through his administrative assistants to try to obtain a $500,000 tax refund from the Government. It was illegal for any member of Congress to intervene in a case against the Government for pay. Other members of Congress had gone to jail for accepting money for intervention in cases against the Government.

He lists some of the persons who had been contributors to the fund, who had received breaks from the Government. Charles E. Ducommun, a Los Angeles steel dealer, had received a 50 percent tax amortization write-off on a new $265,655 warehouse, it being unknown whether the benefit had occurred through Senator Nixon's help, as such matters were maintained in confidence by the Defense Production Administration and were sometimes not even recorded.

Earle Jorgensen & Co. received a 75 percent tax write-off on forging equipment on September 20, 1951, another 60 percent write-off on $227,236 on July 18, and a third 50 percent write-off on $343,500 on February 4, 1952, and again it was not known whether the Senator's office helped obtain those write-offs.

The Clayton Manufacturing Co. received a 90 percent tax write-off on dynamometers costing $38,106 in March, 1951, and an 80 percent write-off on $171,330 on steam cleaners in July, 1951, again it not being known whether Senator Nixon's office helped, with the owner of the company and his son having been donors to the fund.

K. T. Norris, an ammunition manufacturer, received a 75 percent tax write-off on $199,650 in September, 1951. The Norris Company had defense contracts totaling 54 million dollars with the Army and Navy and leased one plant from the Government at Riverbank, California, while also operating plants of its own, manufacturing 57-mm shells, 75's, 90's, 105's and 155's. Mr. Pearson indicates that he had been unable to ascertain from the Defense Department whether Senator Nixon had helped obtain any of those contracts.

Herbert Hoover, Jr., had an important contract with the Government to explore for oil in northern Alaska, and was president of the United Geophysical Co., which had signed the Alaskan contract with the Navy and was a wholly-owned subsidiary of Union Oil, of which Mr. Hoover was a director and in which held 30,249 shares of stock valued at 1.2 million dollars.

W. Herbert Allen was vice-president of the Title Insurance & Trust Co., which underwrote the oil leases of the big companies operating in the tidelands oil area, and if the oil leases were voided, his company would be stuck having to pay out about 49 million dollars on the underwritten leases. As Mr. Pearson had already shown, Senator Nixon regularly voted for giving control of the tidelands oil areas to the states as well as for other legislation favored by the oil industry. (As the column had pointed out on September 24, Norman Chandler, publisher of the Los Angeles Times and Mirror and also a contributor to the fund, was the principal stockholder in the company.)

In the wake of General Eisenhower's whistle-stop campaign tour, his staff had left behind a blueprint for winning the independent and Democratic vote. Local Republican leaders were provided a confidential, 33-page manual for organizing Eisenhower-Nixon clubs. The manual urged the local Republicans to "choose a man of civic prominence" to chair each club, designed to swing independent and Democratic voters to the Eisenhower column. It recommended therefore getting a chairman who was somewhat outside politics and not considered a dyed-in-the-wool Republican. It also recommended setting up a special bank account for the local organization and having its treasurer pay all bills of the organization when duly approved. It pointed out that there was no Federal law limiting the amount of an individual contribution to such clubs, as long as it was only for state or local organization and not controlled by the national organization. It warned that the clubs did have to comply with state laws, however, and recommended that each club ask an attorney to volunteer legal advice in that regard.

—Yeah, Bob, on that thing you mentioned, you know, the people you know.

—Yeah, I was wondering if maybe they might, you know, with Pearson.

—Oh, right, Bob, no journalists as it would draw too much investigation by others.

—Yeah, oh right, they all flock together, that's right.

—Just thinking out loud, Bob. That's why you're here, to give good advice.

—Same to you, Bob. Say hello to the wife...

Marquis Childs, in Madison, Wisc., discusses Senator Joseph McCarthy's Democratic opponent in the upcoming election, Thomas Fairchild. Mr. Fairchild came from a distinguished political family within the state, his father being Chief Justice of the State Supreme Court and one of his other relatives having been one of the early Governors. Mr. Fairchild had lost to Senator Alexander Wiley in an earlier election when he was State Attorney General. While the 2 to 1 primary victory by Senator McCarthy did not suggest a good chance for Mr. Fairchild, who was waging a campaign of sober and earnest talk, without the enthusiasm, money or publicity attendant the McCarthy campaign, there was still some chance that he could win.

Some 200,000 Democrats had turned out for the Democratic primary in a state which normally voted Republican at the state level, though having cast its votes for President Truman in the national election in 1948. In addition, 215,000 votes had been polled for the Republican challenger, Leonard Schmitt, who was opposing Senator McCarthy in the general election, thus providing some 415,000 votes against the 515,000 polled for Senator McCarthy in the primary. Additionally, it was likely, based on historical trends, that more Democrats would turn out in the general election than Republicans, thus providing an opportunity to make up the remaining 100,000 votes.

Senator McCarthy had received help from the outside, with visits by Arthur Bliss Lane, the former U.S. ambassador to Poland, and Robert Vogeler, the businessman who had been imprisoned in Hungary for alleged espionage, before the State Department had successfully negotiated his release. But Mr. Fairchild had also received outside help from Secretary of Agriculture Charles Brannan, who was delivering a half-dozen speeches per day analyzing Senator McCarthy's record, showing that he had voted 83 percent of the time against the Rural Electrification Administration. His tour of the state was designed to shore up Democratic support in Wisconsin in the presidential election, in the hope of expanding the 57,000-vote margin of victory which the President had received in 1948.

But the Republicans were confident that Senator McCarthy would easily win re-election and could carry along General Eisenhower to win the state as well.

Robert C. Ruark does not like the way the baseball writers and pundits had treated the World Series. He says that John Mize, at age 40, had a great Series, but the sportswriters had been somewhat condescending, suggesting things, such as life may not be over at 40. He says that he did not want anything subtracted from baseball, that it should stay in its state of bad taste and incompetence, "unparalleled as an art form". Specifically, he decries the fact that the commissioner, Ford Frick, had acquiesced to the television people by forbidding players in the Series from arguing with umpires or stepping out of the batter's box or off the mound in an attempt to rattle the opposition, or using language inappropriate for television viewers. Mr. Ruark remarks that baseball had been around for a long time before television and would probably outlast it, and sees no reason to start changing the sport to accommodate it. He concludes that he was a baseball purist, having once been a sportswriter.

A letter writer tells of having driven a good distance in 1928 to hear an address by Cameron Morrison, which he had enjoyed, as had apparently others who had heard it at the time. He had spoken briefly on states' rights and of his leadership during the Red Shirt days at the turn of the century, indicating that he would lead such a cause again if necessary. He finds that the former Governor and Senator had varied from that promise by supporting President Truman, Governor Stevenson, Secretary of State Acheson, and Senators Hubert Humphrey and Herbert Lehman, turning his back on the people who were "living up to the Constitution" which, the writer says, was for all and not just a few. The writer cannot understand how Mr. Morrison could now support the Stevenson-Sparkman ticket, knowing that if the Governor were elected, President Truman would be "his boss". He indicates that he had been a Democrat all of his life, but when former Minnesota Governor Harold Stassen had switched his delegates to General Eisenhower at the July Republican convention, he had joined the Republican ranks.

Hey, you ought listen to Governor Dewey anent the rooster ballot in Alabama, and maybe you can begin to feel more at home with ol' Steve and Sparky, a couple of down-home boys.

A letter writer finds that all Americans should concur in the sentiments expressed by a minister in his letter on the front page of September 30, an entry in the contest regarding why it was important to register and vote, that voting was a "solemn privilege, a civic duty, a religious obligation." This writer asks whether people stood at attention when a band played the "Star Spangled Banner", whether they thrilled with emotional pride when singing "My Country 'Tis of Thee" or "God Bless America" and saw the flag unfurled. He points out that only about half of the eligible voters in the country voted in the 1948 presidential election and that each person had the responsibility of voting. He urges the citizenry to inform itself about the candidates and issues, and then vote.

A letter writer responds to another letter writer, who had written regarding the distinction between socialism and Communism, that the two were quite different and that socialism had worked in Britain and across several European countries the previous writer had visited. This writer says that everyone knew that socialism had failed in England. She says that Senator Taft's statement that the two parties differed on the issue of "liberty vs. socialism" was true, regardless of who said it. She indicates that her father's income 15 or 20 years earlier had bought more than her husband's equivalent income did presently. She finds, therefore, that the Democrats were making poor people poorer. She asserts that Governor Stevenson was a poet, not a leader, and that more was necessary than a well-turned phrase to get the country out of "this mess". She says that if Governor Stevenson were to win, she would move to Russia, as four years hence, there would be little difference. She regards a "liberal" as only a short step away from a "pink", "and from there on the color deepens." She urges Democrats to "stay American" and not to "become pink ones or yellow ones either."

What about purple?

There is no edition for Saturday, October 11, 1952, on the microfilm, and so we shall see you Monday.

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