The Charlotte News

Thursday, May 13, 1954

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that at Geneva, French Foreign Minister Georges Bidault told the 19-nation Korean portion of the peace conference this date that Korea must be reunited through U.N.-controlled elections, guaranteed by an all-Korean commission in which both North and South would be represented in proportion to their relative populations. He said that it had been evident that North Korea had committed the initial aggression in June, 1950, having sought no prior recourse to any procedure of conciliation or arbitration, and without warning. It was reported that earlier, the 16 nations which had fought under the U.N. flag in Korea had considered at a private session the question of winding up the phase of the conference dealing with Korea.

In the 16th day of the hearings before the Senate Investigations subcommittee regarding the dispute between the Army and Senator McCarthy, Army general counsel John G. Adams insisted this date that the Army had no desire to halt the investigation by the subcommittee, normally chaired by Senator McCarthy, regarding suspected sabotage and espionage at the secret radar facility at Fort Monmouth in New Jersey. He denied that the Army had ever engaged in trading favors for Private G. David Schine in an effort to stop the investigation or had sought to appease Senator McCarthy for the same purpose. He said that any special consideration for the Private had stemmed from the subcommittee's picturing him as essential to its work, and that any special deference to Senator McCarthy had been only from trying to avoid "open hostility". He admitted that the Army wanted the investigation ended. Ray Jenkins, special counsel for the subcommittee, questioned Mr. Adams regarding the Army's desire to stop the investigation, to which Mr. Adams had replied in the negative when given a choice between a yes or no answer, but went on to explain that the statement regarded the "type of hearings" being conducted at the time. Mr. Adams said it was not an admission or confession that he wanted the investigation terminated by having testified the previous day that he had been concerned over Roy Cohn's bad reaction to being barred from touring the Fort Monmouth facility the prior fall, threatening to open up the investigation further on the facility, Mr. Adams saying that Senator McCarthy had volunteered previously that the subcommittee investigation was about complete and about to be turned over to the Army. Mr. Adams also said that the inference suggested by Mr. Jenkins, regarding whether a November 6 luncheon at the Pentagon, attended by Army Secretary Robert Stevens, Mr. Adams, Senator McCarthy, Mr. Cohn and subcommittee assistant Francis Carr, had been arranged to pursue further the Senator's earlier statement that the hearings might be terminated, was not the case, that other circumstances figured in the arrangement of the luncheon. (There is no transcript of this date's hearing online, as there were also not of the prior three days, to resume the following day.)

A brief excerpt from a colloquy transpiring the previous day between Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Adams, regarding Mr. Cohn's great upset at being barred admission to Fort Monmouth, is included on the page.

Senator Clyde Hoey of North Carolina had died suddenly the previous day at age 76, and his funeral services would be held in Sunset Cemetery in Shelby the following Saturday afternoon following a service in the Central Methodist Church. His body would lie in state at a Washington funeral home during this date, and once it arrived in Shelby, would be taken to the Senator's home on West Marion Street. He had served in the Senate since 1945 after a term of four years as Governor between 1937 and 1941. He was probably best known for having been the chairman of the Senate Investigations subcommittee dealing with the "five percenter" scandal during the Truman Administration. He was the fifth Senator to die during the 83rd Congress and the second from North Carolina, Senator Willis Smith having died the prior June. His death left the Senate with a lineup of 47 Democrats, 47 Republicans and independent Senator Wayne Morse of Oregon, who had pledged to vote with Republicans whenever a tie vote would otherwise occur, giving Vice-President Nixon the ability to break the tie. An aide remarked that the Senator had gone out the way he wanted, having previously said that when he died, he hoped it would be sudden and while he was still active. He had begun life at age 12 in 1890 as a printer's assistant and four years later, purchased a county newspaper, which he proceeded to edit and publish for the ensuing 14 years while he studied law and began his way up in politics, winning election to the State House in 1898 and to the State Senate four years later. He had been appointed an assistant U.S. Attorney in 1913, and served briefly in the U.S. House in 1920, then practiced law for 16 years before becoming Governor and subsequently, Senator.

As we have noted previously, Senator Hoey is buried in Sunset Cemetery 13 feet from the grave of W. J. Cash, who had died in Mexico City 13 years earlier. Please do not go there with a tape measure to verify our calculation, which was determined by footsteps, and so could be a little inaccurate, by a millimicron or two, the thickness of a sheet of paper, perhaps. It was just an observation, not one on which turns any significant premise about history or the art of politics. We, like you, are entitled to our observations and opinions. As we also pointed out once at the beginning of this project in 1998, Senator Hoey's home backed on the lot belonging to John and Nannie Cash, Cash's parents, a home which they built in 1942 on Sumter Street, the redolent garden of the Cashes during summer months, full of tomatoes and peaches, no doubt wafting into the backyard of the Hoeys, making life the sweeter.

Another story speculates on the person Governor William B. Umstead might appoint to serve in the seat until a special election could be held, that speculation centering on former Governor Gregg Cherry, for whom Governor Umstead had served as campaign manager in the gubernatorial election of 1944 and who had been appointed by Governor Cherry to the Senate seat vacated by the death of Senator Josiah William Bailey in late 1946, with former Governor J. Melville Broughton ultimately winning the 1948 Democratic primary, but then dying early in his term in 1949, succeeded by Frank Porter Graham, then UNC president, appointed by Governor Kerr Scott, eventually defeated in the 1950 runoff primary by Willis Smith. Two lawyers from Winston-Salem, one a Democratic National Committeeman, Carlisle Higgins, and the other a prominent Baptist lay leader and former State legislator, Irving Carlyle, were also thought to be leading candidates for the appointment.

In fact, State Supreme Court Justice Sam J. Ervin, mentioned down the list on an inside page as a potential appointee, would be appointed to the seat, having served previously in the House for a year after his brother Joe, suffering from a physical illness, had committed suicide at Christmas, 1945, midway through his first Congressional term. The rest, as they say, …

The Senate Investigations subcommittee took time out from the hearings this date to pay tribute to Senator Hoey, adopting a resolution praising him. Senator John McClellan had proposed that the subcommittee take an early morning-session recess in honor of the Senator so that Senators could attend memorial services on the Senate floor, a proposal then adopted. The President praised Senator Hoey's long political record, as did Vice-President Nixon, who said that he had followed procedures which were "a model of fairness and which all committees and chairmen might well follow", that he had, as chairman of the Investigations subcommittee, pursued "facts rather than headlines". Prominent state political leaders, including Governor Umstead, former Governors Scott and Cherry, and Senator Alton Lennon, the other current North Carolina Senator, all paid tribute to Senator Hoey.

A time exposure by News photographer Jeep Hunter shows beams of automobile lights crossing one another on the new Independence Boulevard at an intersection. We think it may be cropped to omit Communist motorists proliferating in Charlotte.

On the editorial page, "Clyde R. Hoey—Statesman" indicates that Senator Hoey had been one of the most universally loved and respected men in recent political history, widely known and with many personal friends, able to remember the first names of fellow North Carolinians without prompting. He had visited or spoken in virtually every town and hamlet in the state during his long political career, the only North Carolinian ever to serve in the State House and the State Senate, as Governor, as a member of the U.S. House and then, finally, the U.S. Senate. When he had run for the Senate in 1944, following the withdrawal of incumbent Senator Robert Rice Reynolds to avoid certain defeat, he had been nominated by the largest majority the state had ever given a Senatorial or gubernatorial candidate in a Democratic primary, then had no opposition to re-election in 1950.

He had been on his way to becoming a living legend on the national scene, often sought by photographers, who saw in his dignified, yet debonair fashion the essence of Senatorial tradition, catching the eyes of visitors to the Capitol with his long, white hair, frock-coat and striped pants, winged collars and high-top shoes, which he had worn throughout his life, always with a red carnation in his lapel. He was deeply religious and held to the high standards of integrity and morality in his public life. As former chairman of the Senate Investigations subcommittee, which was now headed by Senator McCarthy, he had exposed the scandal involving "five percenters", persons who sold for a percentage their access to Government, and the war-surplus tankers scandal, while, in the meantime, taking scrupulous care of the rights of witnesses before the subcommittee. As Vice-President Nixon had said, the Senator had searched for facts, not headlines.

It indicates that, as with the late Governor, interim Senator and Representative Cameron Morrison of Charlotte, Mr. Hoey had been a Democrat of the old school, who, though differing many times with the national party leadership, remained steadfastly loyal, seeking to iron out differences from within the party. His death, it concludes, removed from the political scene one of the finest men the state had produced, "a man who earned and merited the all-too-rare designation of 'statesman'."

"Mecklenburg's Doctors Lead the Way" indicates that three choices faced the white doctors of the Mecklenburg County Medical Society two days earlier when they had met to determine whether the word "white" should be deleted from its constitution and by-laws, making black doctors eligible for membership. White doctors could have rejected the proposal, tabled it until a study group would make recommendations on the matter, as had the state medical society, on the premise that it would have made convention accommodations difficult, or removed the ban. By a vote of 95 to 33, the latter course was undertaken, the piece finding it logical, honorable and courageous. It was the first county medical society in the state to admit black doctors to its membership, but the legality of the action was in dispute, given the state society's continued exclusion of black doctors. If it was determined by the state society that the Mecklenburg society's action was illegal, then the state society's house of delegates would determine what to do about it. Another view was that it was not illegal for the county society to adopt different by-laws from the state society regarding the issue, as the admission of black doctors was not contrary to the constitution and by-laws of the state medical society.

It posits that whatever the legal results might be, the other results would be salutary to the community, permitting physicians of both races to benefit from professional association with each other and attracting young black doctors to come to Charlotte to practice, improving the medical care in the community. It hopes that the moral leadership provided by the local doctors would transfer to associations of ministers and other professional groups.

"Proposed Amendment of Dubious Merit" indicates that the Constitutional amendment just passed by the Senate to allow for fixing the number of Supreme Court justices at nine and requiring their retirement, along with all other Federal judges, at age 75, as well as other changes, would, if approved by two-thirds of the House and then ratified by the necessary three-fourths of the states, demonstrate the Senate's lack of faith in itself, apparently afraid that a strong President might talk them into "packing" the Supreme Court, as President Roosevelt had attempted unsuccessfully in 1937, in the wake of his landslide victory over Governor Alf Landon. The Roosevelt plan had been to appoint up to six "assistant justices", one each time a sitting Justice turned age 70. It had been in response to the fact that the first term of FDR had seen no deaths or retirements from the Court, and the fact that the Court had invalidated significant portions of the New Deal legislative package, notably, the National Recovery Act and parts of the Agricultural Adjustment Act. The reason for the plan had died away with the retirements and deaths which followed, beginning in September, 1937, ultimately permitting FDR to appoint nine Justices, including the elevation to Chief Justice of Justice Harlan Stone, to eight seats on the Court by 1943.

The piece indicates that the best protection against any unwanted court "packing" would be strong Senators rather than unnecessary changes to the Constitution. It finds the compulsory retirement proposal to be of dubious merit, as the average lifespan in the United States was currently 68.5 years and increasing steadily, such that it was anticipated to become 75 years within 20 years, meaning that people would not only be able to live longer but would be able to work well beyond the age of 75. In addition, with longer life came wisdom and maturity, at least in most people, and judges, above all, needed those qualities. One of the most eminent Justices in the nation's history had been Oliver Wendell Holmes, who had been 90 when he resigned—the piece mistakenly assuming that Justice Holmes had become Chief Justice. Chief Justice John Marshall, who had significantly transformed the Court from a weak sister to the executive and legislative branches into a viable third branch of the Government, had died in 1835, still on the bench at age 79 after 34 years in the position.

It indicates that if Senators believed that Federal judges ought retire at age 75, then they should apply the same standards to Senators, nine of whom at present were 75 or older. There were also a dozen or more members of the House in the same age bracket. It trusts that the House would vote against the proposal and that the Senate would busy itself on matters which were more important.

In 2021, after more than fifty years of politicization of the Supreme Court, since 1968, all of which has favored Republican appointees, and with 11 of the 12 regular Federal Circuit Courts of Appeals now being larger than the Supreme Court, there having been four Democratic appointments to the Supreme Court in that interim in which there have been 20 years of Democratic Administrations, not to mention the contested election of 2000 and the questionable election of 2016, compared to 15 Republican appointees, plus the elevation by President Reagan of Justice William Rehnquist to Chief in 1986, it appears time to amend the number of justices on the Supreme Court. As we have pointed out previously, the last time a Democratic appointment of a Chief Justice succeeded was Fred Vinson, by President Truman in 1946, the appointment by President Johnson of Justice Abe Fortas to become Chief to replace retiring Earl Warren in 1968 having been filibustered to death by Senator Strom Thurmond and other such atavistic Senators still living in the Nineteenth Century. In the case of the Ninth Circuit, it is three times larger than the Supreme Court. There has been no change in the size of the Supreme Court in more than 150 years, since the Judiciary Act of 1869 fixed the size at nine at a time when the population of the country was 38.5 million, less than one-eighth of the 2020 population, 331 million, and when the caseload of the Supreme Court was 21 cases heard in 1869, compared to the caseload of late of about 75 decisions per year, markedly down from earlier years, 138 in 1970, 152 in 1980, 125 in 1990, 87 in 2000, 86 in 2010. While, ideally, aside from the few cases with original jurisdiction Constitutionally in the Court, Supreme Court cases are limited to those where disputes from the states or Federal Circuits impact large numbers of citizens, can it be said, with more than a hint of a dissembling wink, that 75 cases in a year before the highest court in the land can properly represent 330 million people, leaving the Circuit Courts and state supreme courts, and their often conflicting opinions, to divide the country along state and regional lines, with lack of uniformity of decision being more the rule than unformity of decision? Is it any wonder that the people of this country appear about half crazy, or at least hopelessly confused as to how their government works, much of the time?

The Rehnquist Court's move toward states' rights since 1986 winds up over time damaging the country, quite visibly on a daily basis, by dividing it along lines dependent on where the citizen lives, especially glaring in a mass society where the individual, especially one without substantial financial or educational means, is likely to fall through the cracks in the floor, quite contrary to the vision of the Founders when they adopted the Constituition for the United States, abolishing the Articles of Confederation, which was essentially a compact for common defense among the 13 original colonies.

It is time to reconsider the size of the Supreme Court and its ability to handle the cases which properly belong there out of the various Circuit Courts and state supreme courts. While increasing the number of justices to thirteen would still appear quite inadequate to the task, it is an improvement on nine. Then, perhaps, in another 150 years, the Congress might decide, in its infinite collective wisdom, to increase the number to 17—provided, of course, that Mitch McConnell, or his functional equivalent, is no longer a Republican leader by then.

A piece from the Wall Street Journal, titled "The International Id", indicates that a suggestion had been made recently before the American Psychiatric Association that one thing wrong with the world was that there were not enough couches in the proper places, such as at Geneva. The president of the Association had said that the same principles applied to treatment of psychotic persons as to neurotic nations.

The piece supposes that countries, as people, suffered from complexes and that the international id was something to be taken into account, as a country's ego could often get into trouble if it was unchecked, and a highly developed libido, in the sense of the doctrine of Karl Jung rather Sigmund Freud, would only make the trouble worse, as history was full of accounts where some nations had to make others lie down quietly and listen. Some nations were reluctant, leading to problems with trade, while others suffered from fear compulsions resulting in inferiority complexes, which in turn made them brash and bold. Others had the feeling that they were always being spied on, quite likely a correct conclusion. And still others were given to dreams of glory and some to fits of indecision.

It posits that it was not surprising that nations were that way, as people were that way and countries were only collections of people and the complexes which made them up. But it was not clear why some of them chose the creations of cartoonist Charles Addams and his family of strange characters to run their affairs, a matter which the psychiatrists might be able to discern.

It suggests that if the diplomats were to allow psychiatric examination, it would not be necessary to try to cure all of the varied complexes in all of the nations, that the ones on which to place attention were those countries suffering from claustrophobia, forcing them in their minds to branch out, that if the psychiatrist could do something about that complex, the international id might be straightened out.

Drew Pearson indicates that the average person who observed perspiring Senator Karl Mundt, temporary chairman of the Senate Investigations subcommittee during the Army-McCarthy hearings, probably did not realize some of the private problems he faced. His wife was an ardent supporter of Senator McCarthy, and was a member of a small group, which included Senator McCarthy's wife and the niece of the McCormicks of the isolationist Chicago Tribune, who had helped to plan the moves of the Senator and provided him moral encouragement. Senator Mundt was not that close to the group, but Senator McCarthy had tipped Senator Mundt off to a good stock deal in Texas about a year earlier involving the Texas oilman Clint Murchison, a friend of Senator McCarthy, and Senator Mundt, as a result, the had bought more than 200 shares. Senator Mundt also, however, had reason to be friendly to the Army, as its chief counsel, John G. Adams, was also a South Dakota Republican, the state in which Senator Mundt had to run for re-election the following November. Mr. Adams, before joining the Defense Department, had also been an official of the state Young Republicans, working for Senator Chan Gurney of South Dakota. He was a much smarter witness than had been Secretary Stevens, one of the witnesses whom Senators McCarthy and Everett Dirksen wanted to keep from testifying.

Those who had watched the battle between the late Senator Robert Taft and General Eisenhower at the 1952 Republican convention recalled that its principal moment of bitterness had been a diatribe delivered by Senator Dirksen against Governor Thomas Dewey of New York, leader of the Eisenhower forces. Seldom in a political convention had political tempers been so frayed and so much vitriol poured from the lips of any one orator, with Senator Dirksen having done his best to defeat General Eisenhower. With that failure, salt had been poured into the Senator's wounds when General Eisenhower understandably refused to accept him as a vice-presidential running mate. The memories of the public and President Eisenhower, however, were short, as Senator Dirksen now rated as one of the top advisers to the White House, some even placing him higher than Vice-President Nixon, partly because the latter had fallen from favor after making a speech in April before the association of editors indicating that the U.S., in the event France would withdraw from Indo-China, might have to send in ground troops, and partly because Senator Dirksen had been taking a soft approach to heal wounds in the squabble with Senator McCarthy. Senator Dirksen had been strongly supportive of Governor Dewey's candidacy for the presidency in 1948 and had helped to obtain his nomination, but had called him the "most cold-blooded, ruthless and selfish political boss in the country" at the convention in 1952. The Senator had opposed the isolationist stance of Col. Bertie McCormick of the Chicago Tribune in 1948, but, himself, had been backed by Col. McCormick in 1952. Now, he was one of the close advisers to the President. But, no matter which side of the political spectrum Senator Dirksen had been on, he had been consistently the friend of Senator McCarthy.

A prior assistant to Senator Dirksen, currently being paid by the Republican elections committee for the re-election of Republican Senators, a purely partisan organization whose members had no FBI clearance or right to attend closed Congressional hearings as representatives of Senators, had nevertheless been attending some of the secret hearings the previous fall and winter on Fort Monmouth before the Senate Investigations subcommittee, chaired by Senator McCarthy, including one in which Brig. General Ralph Zwicker had been heckled by Senator McCarthy for not blocking the promotion and eventual honorable discharge of the Army Reserve dentist accused by Senator McCarthy of being a "Fifth Amendment Communist" for having taken the Fifth Amendment in response to questioning by the subcommittee regarding his subversive activities in the past. Mr. Pearson concludes that it was the type of cooperation which Senator Dirksen had given his friend, Senator McCarthy. He observes that the presence of a private public-relations man substituting for a Senator and given the privilege of cross-examining witnesses, including General Zwicker, undoubtedly had invalidated that hearing, were it to be challenged in the courts. But it showed the type of closed-shop which Senator McCarthy had operated during the Fort Monmouth hearings and the closeness of Senator Dirksen to Senator McCarthy.

Joseph & Stewart Alsop indicate that in the ensuing days, weeks and months, there would be plenty of bad news regarding the attempt to arrange "a new Munich" in Indo-China, such that, for the sake of contrast, a look at the hopeful side was in order.

The leaders of the Administration and almost all other Republicans were in "darkest gloom" from the prospects of the looming crisis in Indo-China and the Army-McCarthy hearings at home. Nevertheless, important and healthy changes of direction were resulting from both of the crises. The Administration had, as a result, gotten on top of the ordinary business of government, presenting to Congress an admirable moderate-conservative program, representing progress from the disorder in 1953 after taking over from the Democrats. But in the prior January, and for some time since, the Administration resembled the general who would organize his front wisely but leave his flanks unguarded, with the ordinary business of government in hand but the critical business not so at all, as no protection was being provided against the increasing arrogance of the neo-Fascism at home, in the form of McCarthyism, and the increasing power of Communist imperialism abroad, resulting in the Administration and the country paying a heavy price.

The Army-McCarthy hearings had to endure because the Administration hoped that "Joe would be good", until it had been too late to prevent a major crisis. In the same way, it had hoped that Indo-China would save itself, until now, it had been recognized that it would take a miracle, involving U.S. troops, if it could occur at all.

While that was the dark side, the hopeful side was the way in which the Administration had reacted when learning the truth that every new administration had to learn, that they never could "luck through" the hard problems. It was reasonable, however, to believe that the Eisenhower Administration had met that test, as the danger in Indo-China had finally been realized, at which point the President, Secretary of State Dulles and the leaders at the Pentagon had acted with vigor and courage, the quality of Secretary Dulles's offer of "united action" to allies having been underrated because it had not been accepted. The guts of the Administration proved by its willingness to send U.S. air support and relief of the fallen fortress at Dien Bien Phu had not been widely noted because it had been halted by British objections, the belief that it might lead to a world war with Communist China. Those acts presaged more vigor and courage in the risky time ahead.

The pattern at home had been the same, after the President and his team had realized the real danger of McCarthyism and Senator McCarthy, then responding with vigor and courage. Secretary of the Army Stevens perhaps did not appear as the most brilliant man on television and may have made many mistakes, but had gone into the hearings to defend a great principle, despite all the "political pussy footers who would like to appease McCarthy at home as well as the Kremlin abroad". The White House had made a clean break with Senator McCarthy.

By every indication, it appeared that the two crises would be the last episodes in the story of how the Administration learned by doing, and the political analysts who were concerned about the damage being done by them would likely be proven wrong in the long run. The President had finally realized that vigor and courage, as opposed to lucking through things, was the better policy in the long run, a rule he had long ago realized in his military leadership.

Marquis Childs, in Geneva, indicates that the unyielding attitude of the Chinese and Russian delegations at the peace conference regarding Korea was having its inevitable effect, with the Western powers having begun to close ranks as the hope of a decent compromise on unity in Korea faded. Had the Communist position been less adamant and transparent, the U.S. position might have continued to be difficult.

In perhaps the most notable speech of the conference thus far, Canada's Secretary of State for External Affairs, Lester Pearson, had pointed out the difference which most sharply set apart the Communist and non-Communist worlds, that if the U.S. did not respect the rights and interests of others, Canada would not at present be an independent power but merely a satellite of its neighbor, and its representatives would not be able to speak their own minds and stand up for their own views at conferences of the nations, even while disagreeing with some aspects of U.S. policy. By making those statements, he reaffirmed the essential role of the U.N., answering China's Premier and Foreign Minister Chou En-lai, who had sought to identify the U.N. with an "aggressive bloc". He had meant to imply that if Communist China were to become a member of the organization, it would cease to have that characteristic, and China had made a bid to Canada for recognition of its Communist regime, that if Canada were to make the first move in that direction, China would immediately respond by sending an ambassador to Ottawa. Canada had been seriously considering extending recognition, but the Canadian Government now believed that it had to be held up as long as the Communist attitude was openly hostile even to consideration of fair and reasonable solutions for the trouble spots in Asia, which could lead to another world war.

A letter writer from Marshville comments on a May 7 editorial regarding General Washington, suggesting that he needed no such honor as the Senators from Pennsylvania presently proposed, to promote him posthumously to the rank of General of the Armies, so that he would be the first in rank among generals, along with General Pershing, rather than 42nd. The writer points out that he had been the first President and the first commander in chief of the armed forces, a rank provided him by the Constitution, and required no act of Congress to make him equal or senior to any other general. He finds the proposal to be a demotion.

A letter writer says that she had obtained a transcript of the testimony of the Army Reserve dentist before the McCarthy subcommittee, along with that of Brig. General Ralph Zwicker, as well as all pertinent data otherwise on the matter, and read them in full, having read or heard almost all of that testimony by switching from one station to another during broadcasts, comments that she had been shocked by the newspaper's slanting of the news on the subject, especially at the headlines which had been misleading at times, approaching dishonesty. She finds it no wonder that the ignorant who depended upon the headlines and one or two follow-up lines in the stories for their ideas formed such "asinine opinions". She finds that the newspaper was always "out on a limb with the Alsops". The newspaper was certain that Senator McCarthy wanted to be President or a dictator, suggests that they follow columnists David Lawrence or George Sokolsky, obtaining thereby on occasion "the American viewpoint". She believes that if they continued to follow Drew Pearson and the Alsops, they were liable to become Communists. She thinks that the newspaper's recent editorial suggestion that the best way to treat Senator McCarthy was to laugh at him, might also be the best way to treat the newspaper, imparts that her family had a big laugh the first day of the hearings when they had seen on the front page pictures of the representative group of people interviewed by the newspaper, with one thinking that the man in question was General MacArthur. But from those interviews, the newspaper had concluded that residents of Charlotte were against Senator McCarthy.

Moscow would like you to have a free apartment.

A letter from a medical doctor says he cannot help but be fearfully distressed that there was not a more uncompromising rebuke of Senator McCarthy by the newspaper, that while the newspaper had repeatedly warned of his potential danger, the great mass of Christians who might silence him were not to be found. He finds that Senator McCarthy's authority derived from Thus Spake Zarathustra by Nietzsche or the latter's more recently published work, The Antichrist. "A megalomaniac, prophet of a megalomaniac; a missionary of hate, who is teaching that compassion is a weakness, universal sympathy outmoded, that the noble man must be capable of cruelty. If necessary for his cause, cunning, ruthlessness, dishonesty and sophism become virtues." He wonders what people thought the Senator would do if Christ were alive, espousing the doctrine of loving one's enemies. He quotes Buddha: "If a fool be associated with a wise man even all his life, he will perceive the truth as little as a spoon perceive the taste of soup," suggesting that nothing could be done to change Senator McCarthy, whom he suggests be treated as an outcast.

A letter writer says that she had been reading Bernard DeVoto's interesting book, The Year of Decision—1846, and found that history was repeating itself in a number of ways. In that year, President James Polk had as his Secretary of State future President James Buchanan, regarded by Mr. DeVoto as being very shrewd but with no backbone. At the time, the country had been trying to obtain Oregon without offending the British, and Texas and California without offending Mexico. President Polk had realized that vacillation and compromise would never achieve those ends and ordered Secretary Buchanan to inform England that the U.S. wanted all of Oregon, whether England liked it or not, advice which Secretary Buchanan followed, finding England compliant. She thinks that if Secretary of State Dulles and most of the other Administration leaders, including the President, had used those methods with Russia, so many diplomatic blunders might have been avoided. She indicates that she had always been and remained a strong supporter of President Eisenhower but that he was being hamstrung by certain members of his own party and might not be able, therefore, to show his true worth as President. She recommends that he pattern his actions after President Polk.

But in 1846, the country was protected by two oceans and there were no weapons capable of destroying major cities at one blow, across those oceans. Diplomatic methods must obviously adjust to the changed times.

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