The Charlotte News
Tuesday, May 11, 1954
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that that at Geneva, a French spokesman said this date that France was willing to discuss at the peace conference the Communist plan for an Indo-China armistice along with its own plan, but declared strong opposition to major provisions of the Communist proposal presented the previous day. The French spokesman indicated that France had no intention of breaking off the talks in Geneva regarding Indo-China, despite the apparent East-West deadlock. Some observers believed that the new French reaction to the Communist terms represented a softening of its position, but it remained clear that the French were unwilling to accept the main provisions of the Vietminh proposal. A spokesman for the U.S. delegation to the conference, after being informed of the new French statements, said that the U.S. opposition to the Vietminh terms remained unchanged, that its acceptance would represent unconditional surrender to the Communists. The primary Western objections to the proposal were the provisions for Communist-style elections without international supervision, recognition of the Communist-backed regimes of the Indochinese Associated States and lack of military guarantees to back up the proposed armistice. Sources close to the Vietnamese delegation said that the Vietminh terms were also unacceptable to Viet Nam. The French-sponsored Government of Viet Nam was reported to be working on a third peace plan which might differ considerably from that of either the French or the Vietminh. The talks were in recess for the present and might not be resumed until the following Friday.
Also at Geneva, Soviet Foreign Minister V. M. Molotov this date attacked the Western-proposed Asian defense pact as an American scheme to preserve and perpetuate colonialism, that it could not correspond to the interests of peace or enjoy the support of the peoples. He said that he supported the proposal of Communists China's Premier and Foreign Minister Chou En-lai, that the Asian countries should settle their own problems.
Secretary of State Dulles said this date at a press conference in Washington, in advance of a secret report during the afternoon to the House Foreign Affairs Committee regarding his efforts to create a ten-nation "united front" in Southeast Asia, that the U.S. wanted a Southeast Asian alliance which would pledge member nations to fight should they be openly challenged by Communist aggression. He also said that the loss of Indo-China would not necessarily mean the loss of all of Southeast Asia.
From Saigon, it was reported that Vietminh General Vo Nguyen Giap had broadcast over the Vietminh radio this date his agreement to a meeting with French Army representatives on the airfield at Dien Bien Phu to arrange for evacuation of the 1,300 wounded French Union soldiers from the fallen fortress. French commander of the forces in Indo-China, General Henri Navarre, had addressed a message to General Giap, dropped on the seized fortress by a French plane early in the afternoon, and had also made an attempt to contact him via radio, regarding an agreement to allow evacuation of the wounded. Prior to taking the fortress, the Vietminh had refused any truce to allow such evacuation.
In the 14th day of hearings before the Senate Investigations subcommittee regarding the dispute between the Army and Senator McCarthy, Senator Everett Dirksen of Illinois offered a proposal for suspending public hearings following the testimony of Senator McCarthy, but chances of its adoption appeared slim. The Army and Senator Karl Mundt, temporary chairman of the subcommittee, plus all three Democratic members of the subcommittee, opposed it, with Senator Mundt stating that he hoped nevertheless that "this miserable business" would be cut short. A committee vote on the matter was scheduled for the afternoon, and there was a chance that Senator McCarthy might be called to testify immediately after that vote. Just prior to the lunchtime recess, counsel for Secretary of the Army Robert Stevens, presumably Joseph Welch, said that the Secretary was under treatment for a virus infection and suggested that it would be a gracious act to excuse him from further testimony until he recovered. Secretary Stevens, however, declared that he felt fine. Senator McCarthy said that he believed the Secretary should be excused under the circumstances and Senator Mundt told Mr. Stevens he would not be called as a witness during the afternoon. It was not clear who might testify during the afternoon session, whether Army chief counsel John G. Adams or Senator McCarthy. There was no testimony during the morning. (As indicated, there is no transcript available online for this date's hearings, as with the case of the ensuing two days, until Friday's hearings.)
The President, speaking informally to an audience of about 1,000 persons at a ceremony marking completion of a frieze in the Capitol rotunda, said that he hoped the future would bring "increasing security for all America and all the world." The frieze portrayed more than 400 years of American history, rimming the inner base of the dome. The President said that an additional panel might deal with the nation's future, would not regard "the shattering effect of a hydrogen bomb or an atom bomb", but rather the country's role in leading the world "to a more secure and peaceful existence."
The Senate, according to a report, might vote this date on a Constitutional amendment designed to fix the size of the Supreme Court at nine members, to compel retirement of all justices and other Federal judges at age 75, except those serving for a specific number of years, to prevent Congress from withdrawing the authority of the Supreme Court to consider Constitutional questions within its appellate jurisdiction, and to bar any justice from resigning to run for the presidency until after five years following resignation or retirement from the bench. Supporters of the proposed amendment were optimistic that it would be passed and sent to the House, a two-thirds vote of those present being required in each chamber for it to be sent to the states for ratification by three-fourths of them. Senator John Butler of Maryland, author of the proposal, said the previous day that he believed the President favored it. The amendment, of course, never passed, and the number of justices of the Supreme Court remain fixed only by law, not by the Constitution, and all Federal judges serve for their lifetimes or until they voluntarily retire or are removed by impeachment.
In Washington, the Board of Immigration Appeals heard arguments this date regarding why singer Dick Haymes should not be deported to his native Argentina. A spokesman for the five-member Board said that the decision would likely be made by the end of the month. If adverse, Mr. Haymes could appeal into the Federal courts. The Justice Department had ordered him deported on March 23 on the ground that he re-entered the country illegally the previous June 7 after flying to Hawaii to visit Rita Hayworth, currently his wife, but not at the time.
In Allentown, Md., police said the previous day that two teenage boys and a man had admitted setting fire to a vacant one-story house to prevent a black family from occupying it, and all three were charged with arson.
In the Dallas area, FBI agents ended a $200,000 extortion scheme against 20 Dallas Jewish families the previous night by arresting a mud-spattered man as he picked up a package which supposedly contained the extortion money. The agents arrested him as he scrambled down a railroad embankment at nearby Garland to retrieve the package. He fired one shot at close range but missed. The extortion letter had been addressed to "you Jews", demanding the $200,000, stating further: "How many you Jews be dead before you pay. Acid-dynamite-fire-guns will make you pay." The arrest followed two weeks of such threats, contained in notes, letters, telephone calls and classified ads in the Dallas Morning News. The arrested man faced at least 20 counts of extortion and a possible charge of attempted murder of a Federal officer. His attorney should plead his obvious stupidity as a defense.
In La Crosse, Wisc., a 15-year old girl had vanished six months earlier from a babysitting job and all of the high school boys in the town were being provided polygraph tests to determine whether they knew anything about her disappearance. The local district attorney did not expect to turn up the abductor of the girl, who was taken from the home of a family friend while the child for whom she was babysitting slept unharmed in another room. He did hope, at least, to turn up leads in the disappearance. The lie detector tests had gone on for four days thus far without any clues being revealed. About 20 to 30 boys were being processed per day and there were more than 2,000 boys within the city's three high schools. The polygraph examiner said it was the largest such test in the history of crime detection. The polygrapher had four years of experience in the Army's Criminal Investigation Division in the Far East and had been hired the previous month to head the new City-County Crime Laboratory. He hoped that the tests, having revived public interest in the disappearance, would lead to a tip. Why not ask the girls, too? Seems rather strangely limited. "Round up all the usual suspects..." Stupidity strikes every five minutes.
In Oklahoma City, a pediatrician addressed 500 Oklahoma doctors at the State Medical Association convention, informing them that low-grade temperatures could be produced by many things other than a virus, that a child might have trouble getting along with his teacher or playmates and the resulting emotional upset could raise the temperature, a phenomenon which psychiatrists called "school fever". He said that even chewing gum could make the temperature rise above the norm of 98.6, that a perfectly normal child might have a temperature in the range of 100 or 101 just from exercise. He urged that a child should not be made reliant on the thermometer to tell when danger was at hand, that it was normal for temperature to vary, with an elevation in the afternoon for weeks or months on end being normal because of exercise.
So, kids, if you want to play hooky so's you can watch the hearings on the tv, be sure and go out and run five miles and then return home, claiming to be so terribly exhausted that you could not possibly go to school the next day, as you feel feverish, terribly feverish. Please, ma, hand over that thermometer quick. Things are getting dim.
On the editorial page, "Free World Unity, Admission of All Countries, Are the UN's Needs" indicates that the tenth anniversary would occur for the U.N. in 1955 and, per the Charter, the General Assembly would have on the agenda the question of convening a conference at which the Charter would be reviewed and perhaps amended. Secretary of State Dulles had emphasized the desirability of ample public discussion prior to that conference, and many Senators had expressed a similar view. To that end, a Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee was holding public hearings on revision of the Charter, the subcommittee being chaired by Senator Alexander Wiley of Wisconsin. The subcommittee would meet in Greensboro the following Saturday, as part of its itinerant mission across the country to inform the public.
It finds it most fitting that the subcommittee had chosen to have a meeting in North Carolina, as the state had produced outstanding students of foreign affairs, including Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals Chief Judge John J. Parker, the late Charles W. Tillett of Charlotte, who had attended the Charter conference in San Francisco in spring, 1945 and reported back to The News regarding his impressions, and Frank Porter Graham, former UNC president and former Senator, who had been instrumental in resolving the Indonesian crisis and had attempted, without success, to resolve the dispute between India and Pakistan, after appointment to those roles by the U.N. The United World Federalist organization had begun at the Asheville conference of 1947, and was probably stronger in North Carolina than in any other state. In addition, Senator Guy Gillette had proposed in Charlotte, before the Atlantic Union Committee, the formation of an assembly of legislators from countries around the Atlantic, prompting great interest by the press of the state in the various proposals.
The piece suggests that it was unrealistic to expect U.N. members to agree to any major revision of the Charter, as the Eastern interests would not agree to any changes which might injure themselves, and the Western interests would do likewise. But the likelihood of failure, it suggests, should not rule out the attempt. It regards the necessity of revision of the Charter, however, to be doubtful, as in its present state, the Charter had permitted remarkable growth and adaptability, while its failures could not be attributed to its structure. No organization, no matter how perfectly structured, could reconcile widely divergent views between obdurate opponents.
It posits that there were two ways in which the goals of the U.N. could be advanced without revising the Charter, by permitting the U.N. to reflect what the world was instead of what it ought to be, and by uniting the free world members of the organization so that they could more effectively advance freedom and combat totalitarianism.
It finds that Secretary of State Dulles had stated the case well in his book, War or Peace, published in 1950, in which he stated that he had come to believe that the U.N. would best serve the cause of peace if the General Assembly were representative of what the world actually was, without attempting to appraise closely which nations were good and which bad. The fact that some member nations had governments which were not representative of the people did not mean that they did not govern and have a power which ought not be represented in any organization which purported "to mirror world reality". He had said that if the Communist Government in China proved its ability to govern China without serious domestic resistance, then it should be admitted to the U.N.
But since writing that book, the Secretary had changed his mind, now ruling out consideration of admission to the U.N. of Communist China or its diplomatic recognition by the U.S. That view deprived the opportunity, at least, to see what the Communists might exchange for such admission and recognition. By refusing to consider a package deal whereby pro-Western countries would be admitted along with pro-Eastern countries, the U.S. was limiting the worldwide nature of the organization, whose present membership did not include Germany, Italy, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Finland, Hungary, Rumania and Bulgaria in Europe, and Japan, Indo-China or Korea, in addition to Communist China in Asia. It indicates that even if Communist China eventually were seated in place of Nationalist China on the Security Council, providing it unilateral veto among the Big Five members, it would not add anything, as Russia already possessed a unilateral veto, along with France, the U.S., and Britain.
It indicates that the Communists were united both within the U.N. and without it, while the democracies were not. While it was axiomatic that in democracies it was more difficult to reach a consensus than in a totalitarian state or autocracy, the world had not yet made a supreme effort to unite the allies. NATO had been a proper vehicle for that effort, but it was now being bypassed and forgotten. Almost a third of the Senators had once supported the Atlantic Union resolution, which would have provided for a citizens' convention from Atlantic countries to explore the possibilities of Atlantic federation, but the resolution gathered dust as members of Congress waited on the Administration, which, in turn, claimed it was waiting for the Europeans to approve the European Defense Community. Even if EDC were approved, which it regards as doubtful, the more important goal of trans-Atlantic solidarity would still be a long way off.
U.N. Charter revision, it concludes, was relatively unimportant when compared to true internationalization of the U.N., and most important, the uniting of the free world by realistic and workable regional associations.
"The City's Stake in Recreation Survey" indicates that the following morning, city and county residents would call on the City Council to renew their plea for a City contribution to a countywide recreation survey, seeking that the Council provide $5,000 in addition to the $5,000 appropriated by the County Commissioners and the $2,000 from the United Community Services for the purpose. It concludes, after providing a few basic facts, that the City had an equal, if not greater, interest to Mecklenburg County in having an adequate survey made by competent experts and that an investment of $5,000 at present would save many times that amount in years to come, ensuring a more orderly and efficient expansion of the public recreation system.
"Father's Report" indicates that news reports of the previous few weeks had emphasized just how troubled were the times, the reason Mother's Day had been a pleasant diversion. News had come of a new niece in Kansas and the writer's wife was surprised at the young father's calm, also stating that he had imparted that the baby girl was not red as most babies were, looked mature as if two or three days old, was 21 inches long, the longest baby born all day, and that he could not ever remember wanting a boy.
It concludes that it had at least momentarily distracted from Private Schine, the fall of Dien Bien Phu, V. M. Molotov at Geneva and the slump of the Charlotte Hornets baseball team.
Drew Pearson indicates that the DNC had met in secrecy the previous week to debate the question of whether its chairman, Stephen Mitchell, was right or wrong in having sought to get James Roosevelt to step out of his California race for a Congressional seat because of his public marital difficulties. No one was admitted to the secret meeting unless a proper member of the DNC or a proxy thereof. Averell Harriman had arrived at the meeting as a proxy, with plenty of Democratic credentials to his credit, appearing for a New York Tammany politician. But then a few minutes later, another distinguished Democrat from New York, Angela Paresi, arrived, claiming to hold a proxy for the same politician, the dispute having been resolved by giving Mrs. Paresi the proxy for a DNC committeewoman from Brooklyn instead, until that committeewoman arrived, prompting Mr. Harriman to step aside.
After the meeting got underway, there was a semi-filibuster over filling the seat of a Texas national committeeman, who had been terminated because he had favored General Eisenhower in the 1952 campaign, the matter left to be decided by the Texas Democratic convention the following September.
Then came the debate on the question of the treatment by the chairman of Mr. Roosevelt, in which it became clear that the majority of the committee members present favored the position of Mr. Roosevelt rather than Mr. Mitchell, despite a resolution supporting Mr. Mitchell in the matter having passed unanimously.
Mr. Pearson notes that Mr. Mitchell had grown in stature and popularity with most Democratic leaders, but nevertheless was insisting that he would retire after the midterm elections in the fall, probably to run for Congress or mayor of Chicago.
Senator McCarthy had gotten himself into something of a jam regarding his possession of the secret FBI report on Fort Monmouth, having demanded the prosecution of other people for being in possession of secret information. Senator John McClellan of Arkansas was now suggesting that perhaps Senator McCarthy should be prosecuted. On January 22, 1951, Senator McCarthy had made a speech in the Senate demanding that the Justice Department prosecute Mr. Pearson for printing what Senator McCarthy had described as classified material regarding General MacArthur's faulty intelligence prior to the advance to the Yalu River in November, 1950, during the early part of the Korean War. Mr. Pearson's column on the subject had cited facts showing that General MacArthur had no idea that such a large number of Communist Chinese troops were on the other side of the Yalu when he ordered the U.N. troops into the area. When the Justice Department declined to prosecute Mr. Pearson for relating the information, Senator McCarthy had complained bitterly. Again on March 22 and 24, 1954, the Senator had cross-examined Attorney General Herbert Brownell in a Senate Investigations subcommittee hearing regarding why he did not "prosecute Pearson" on two other alleged grounds, one having been alleged possession of production figures obtained from the Munitions Board and the other, an alleged but actually imaginary incident in which Senator McCarthy claimed that a Justice Department official named "Murray" supposedly gave Mr. Pearson a secret file on an espionage case. The Senator conceded that in neither case had Mr. Pearson published the secret information, a correct statement. As a result of the Senator's demands, Mr. Brownell sent the FBI to talk to Mr. Pearson about the charge of the Senator regarding "Murray", something which had never taken place.
Mr. Pearson concludes that the main point was that the Senator claimed that it was illegal for the Justice Department and the Munitions Board and other Government sources to reveal allegedly classified information, but he now claimed that an Army officer had given him similar information and that he had a right to publish it with impunity.
Joseph & Stewart Alsop indicate that a month earlier the U.S. Air Force and Navy had proposed a plan which almost assuredly would have saved Dien Bien Phu from falling to the Vietminh. Aircraft carriers—as already reported by Drew Pearson—, had been standing by in the Gulf of Tonkin and within easy flying range, and planes from Navy carriers and longer-range planes from the U.S. Air Force bases on Okinawa were to join in dropping tactical atomic bombs on the Vietminh besieging the fortress. At the time, the area held by the French Union defenders was large enough so that the danger to the defenders would have been slight. A small number of tactical nuclear bombs would have destroyed the Communist artillery, key to the battle, and decimated the Vietminh ground forces. The odds would have been changed in the battle overnight from the Vietminh outnumbering the French by four to one to even or better in favor of the French. At the time the plan had been proposed, the enemy forces were closely concentrated along the periphery of the fortress and were not deeply dug in as subsequently, essentially poised as sitting ducks for the new strategic atomic weapons.
There had been formidable objections to the plan, however, with Army chief of staff, General Matthew Ridgway, arguing that the plan might not succeed.
The allies also objected. The French did not want intervention, on the basis that it might trigger entry to the war directly by the Communist Chinese, and unwanted intervention would disturb the Western alliance. Use of tactical nuclear weapons would have created a loud backlash in Britain. Thus the proposed attack was scrapped, and the time passed when it could have been undertaken after the periphery surrounding the fortress was reduced significantly by the Vietminh. Eventually, the belief that the fortress could not be saved was one of the chief obstacles thereafter to any attempt to relieve the defenders.
The Alsops posit that such past conduct of foreign policy portended a like trend for the future, as it was now inevitable that Indo-China would be lost to the Communists, and, without U.S. intervention, so would eventually fall the remainder of Southeast Asia. Yet, the chance of forming a line of resistance to Communist imperialism in Asia was not rated highly by the Pentagon. The Pentagon did not want the U.S. to "get stuck in the flypaper", as the current cant phrase had it at the Pentagon, describing another Korea-type fight. The Alsops suggest that a tactical atomic airstrike would not have "stuck the country in the flypaper", as neither would have a series of conventional airstrikes, provided they had worked. But Pentagon opinion was consistent and solid that joining a local war in Indo-China would be the height of folly, as it would require at a minimum cutting off supplies to the Vietminh from Communist China. That could be effected probably by a coastal blockade of mainland China and destruction of China's vulnerable supply lines leading into Indo-China, but that would also spread the war, inevitably involving Communist China, and because of the Chinese alliance with the Soviets, also potentially Russia.
The Joint Chiefs and most of the U.S. civilian leadership had been united on the desirability of saving Indo-China from the Communists, provided it could be done without "getting stuck in the flypaper". That knowledge probably greatly increased British and other allied reluctance to join in "united action", as sought by Secretary of State Dulles in recent weeks. The Alsops indicate that the U.S. allies, as proved by Korea, preferred "flypaper wars", the reasons for which they could hardly be blamed.
The fall of Dien Bien Phu was being equated in Washington with the surrender of the Rhineland to the Nazis in 1936, the first act of aggression by Hitler, which went unchecked by the League of Nations. High officials who were honest were suggesting that the Geneva peace conference regarding Indo-China was the equivalent of Munich in 1938. But the timetable was foreshortened when compared to the Thirties, if U.S. estimates were correct. Sooner than later, another act of aggression, similar to Hitler's blitzkrieg into Poland on September 1, 1939, might occur. Thus another question of whether to use strategic atomic weapons might soon arise.
James Marlow indicates that after 13 days of testimony before the Senate Investigations subcommittee, Secretary of the Army Stevens was still sitting upright, just as dignified as a "man on a high-handled bicycle". He pedaled along, trying to avoid the holes into which Senator McCarthy sought to lead him, answering yes or no or that he could not remember, or getting a little indignant. When they collided, it appeared as a bicycle hitting a truck. Both the Senator and the Secretary had been equally humorless and there had been few attempts to subject the Senator to humor or ridicule.
The Secretary had sought to be funny the previous day at the Senator's expense, but the Senator had ridden right over him. The Senator was looking back eight or nine years prior to Mr. Stevens becoming Secretary, to try to show that there had been a lot of Communists in the Army, citing Earl Browder, previous head of the American Communist Party. The Senator claimed that Mr. Browder once testified that in 1944 and 1945, there had been 13,000 Communists in uniform, to which Secretary Stevens had posed a sarcastic question, "Does this mean I'm a Communist, Senator?" The Senator turned away with contempt, saying: "That's awfully funny, isn't it, Mr. Secretary? I doubt very much they would accept you as a member." Mr. Marlow suggests that Secretary Stevens would probably not try that approach again, but since the Secretary was not a comical man, it was still not shown how the Senator might handle himself when a real wit would collide with him.
It had been thought that Boston lawyer Joseph Welch, special counsel for the Army during the hearings, might needle the Senator into exasperation. Mr. Welch had delighted television viewers with his light touches, but had not yet had a thorough chance to work on Senator McCarthy. On the brief occasion when the Senator had testified regarding how confidential FBI information on the question of espionage at Fort Monmouth in New Jersey had come into his possession, he had, shortly after taking his oath, told the subcommittee that he would not reveal the name of the Army officer who had provided him the information, to which Mr. Welch sought to remind the Senator through questioning that he had taken an oath to tell "the whole truth", asking the stenographer to read back the oath, at which point Senator Mundt, on the prompting of subcommittee special counsel Ray Jenkins, cut off the questioning as improperly argumentative. For the remainder of the cross-examination by Mr. Welch of the Senator, the latter showed more contempt for Mr. Welch than anyone at the hearing thus far.
Neither Mr. Marlow nor Eric Sevareid in the following piece make mention of the highlight of the hearings thus far, insofar as humor, at least of the Peter Pan variety, regarding Mr. Welch's comment on April 30 to James Juliana, an investigator for the subcommittee, who testified to receipt from Private Schine of the original print of the controversial photograph of the Private with Secretary Stevens and two others and having directed, himself, that the photo then be cropped to include only the Private and the Secretary, because he believed that was the focus of the subcommittee's investigation, testifying at one point, in answer to Mr. Welch's question as to whether he knew the uncropped photo was that which had hung on the wall in Mr. Schine's New York office, that he did not know of its source, prompting Mr. Welch to ask him whether he thought it came from "pixies", to which Senator McCarthy made ejaculatory interruption, asking for a definition of "pixie", suggesting that Mr. Welch was an expert on the subject, Mr. Welch responding that he understood that it was a "close relative of a fairy"—probably having gotten the clue from attending the 1953 Walt Disney movie recently, "as easy as ABC" in Neverland, with a grandchild or other juvenile guest.
In any event, Mr. Welch having objected on April 29 at one point to examination by Mr. Jenkins of Secretary Stevens as if he were testifying in a murder trial, Senator McCarthy had better stay tuned
Eric Sevareid, from a CBS radio broadcast of April 29, indicates that if there was any sense of political humor left in the country, which he doubts, there would probably be a new musical comedy titled "Rise and Schine", "in which a basso profundo in the wings will repeatedly sing the theme song called, 'Point of Order' (not to be confused with the novel entitled Point of No Return)." He suggests that with or without music, a rerun of the current Washington soap opera would be a distinct service to the public, provided it gave a clear outline of the plot and identified the part each of the characters was playing, relating that the viewers in his neighborhood, whether for or against Senator McCarthy, could not tell anymore at the conclusion of the day who were the good guys and who, the bad guys.
A newcomer to their group of viewers gave the regular spectators a rough time with his questions, such as whether Senator McCarthy and Secretary Stevens were both Republicans, and when told that they were, asking why they were fighting one another, in answer to which the regulars said that the two were probably also human beings. He also wondered why Senators Henry Jackson, John McClellan and Stuart Symington, all being Democrats, appeared to be defending the Republican Secretary, while the Republican members of the subcommittee did not appear to be interested in defending him. Their answer was that Washington was "full of wheels within wheels, sometimes big wheels within small wheels". He also wondered what was so funny about Private Schine being in front of a bunch of generals, as it was usually the case in war, to which they answered that while it was, in this war, the men in the rear were not exactly supporting the private at the front. And on the questions and answers went…
Another of his questions was whether Private Schine was a Communist, to which the others expressed surprise, the newcomer explaining that the lawyers and Senators had been talking about the Army coddling the private, when, according to Senator McCarthy, it was the Communists whom the Army coddled. They answered that Private Schine was not being coddled at the moment, but rather roasted.
The newcomer also wondered who, with all of the generals and secretaries tied up in the hearings, was minding the store, to which the regulars answered that it was pretty hard for anyone to wait on the customers when a couple of small boys were throwing bricks through the plate-glass window.
Eventually, the newcomer to the group said that they were confusing him more than the hearing, and they responded that if it were true, they would immediately put a bullet through their heads or run for the Senate, whereupon the conversation ended, which also was where the hearing had ended for the afternoon.
Mr. Sevareid, incidentally, is excused from omitting mention of the pixies as that had not yet arisen in the hearings by April 29 when he delivered the broadcast.
A letter writer indicates that it was heartening to know that the Mecklenburg County Medical Society was seeking a way to extend its membership to include the entire medical profession of the county, including black doctors, that cooperation between black and white physicians was essential if the community were to achieve the goal of adequate medical care.
A letter from the rector of the Church of the Holy Comforter in Charlotte commends the newspaper for its May 6 editorial on denial of membership of black doctors to the State Medical Society, expresses the hope, along with the editorial, that the Mecklenburg Medical Society would admit black doctors to its membership. He indicates that at his church, there were no separate theological schools, that they had a meeting of delegates of the church, whether local, diocessional, or national, meeting on a non-segregated basis, a practice so generally accepted that it rarely occurred to anyone that it should be otherwise. They just thought of it as a meeting of the church, and he believes the medical societies ought to do likewise.
A letter writer from Florence, S.C., indicates that the doctors were right in not mixing the races in the State Medical Society, that the only reservation he had was that the reason given, because of difficulties with convention accommodations, appeared evasive of the actual reason, which appears to him to have been their objections to a racially mixed association. He suggests that all such groups and individuals in the country would sooner or later have to face whether they would "stand for a mongrelization of the races for our coming generations." He wants to know what Jesus would do, seeking to answer his query by finding that the Old Testament enjoined separation of the races, and that Jesus stressed that he had not come to do away with the old law, but rather to fulfill it. "The American people are, in the long run, simply not going to have mixing, that is, mongrelization, of the races. Thank you."
What do you think they do at those conventions? You must be accustomed to the Klan conventions, where everyone engages with everyone else in acquiring Biblical knowledge of one another, including those of blood relation.
A letter from the president of the Charlotte branch of the American Association of University Women expresses appreciation to the newspaper for its excellent publicity during the year for the group, especially true regarding publication of the Adult Education Survey, in conjunction with the Social Planning Council, the annual spring flower show and the recent statewide AAUW convention held in Charlotte.
Make sure that there is no brainwashing going on at the flower show.
Framed Edition
Links-Date — Links-Subj.