Wednesday, August 25, 1954

The Charlotte News

Wednesday, August 25, 1954

FOUR EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that it appeared that the six-Senator special committee set to consider the charges against Senator McCarthy on the censure resolution sponsored by Senator Ralph Flanders of Vermont, which the Senators had boiled down to five principal categories of charges the previous day, would likely call few witnesses when hearings would begin on August 31. Senator Arthur Watkins, chairman of the committee, said that it would reserve the right to expand the number of charges on which it would inquire and the witnesses it would call.

Senator Henry Jackson of Washington proposed this date that the next Congress take time to do "a thorough and resolute" job in revising laws to curb Communists, including the bill signed by the President the previous day stripping the Communist Party of its legal rights as a party, though not making membership in the party a criminal act. Senator Jackson had been among the Democrats who had helped to put forth the measure in the face of Republican opposition, including that of the President, attaching it to another bill which was designed to get rid of Communist-dominated unions, which the Administration had supported. Senator Jackson said that he believed the legislation was open to possible revision at the start of the 84th Congress in January. He said that the Congress had taken on that particular bill hastily and without prior committee hearings, and that by January, the Justice Department would have an opportunity to review it and make comment as to how it fit with existing statutes. He said that he and the other Democrats who had proposed the bill had no intention to hamper the Internal Security Act, under which the Justice Department was attempting to force the registration of Communists. The President said that he was satisfied that the bill would not impair or abrogate any portion of that Act or other criminal statutes under which leaders of the Communist Party in the country were currently being prosecuted, such as the Smith Act. A Communist Party spokesman had said that the measure would be attacked in the courts as unconstitutional and that in the meantime the party would continue to function as a legal party. The section of the bill relating to labor would deprive the Communist-infiltrated unions of legal standing before the NLRB in collective bargaining. The Subversive Activities Control Board would determine which unions were infiltrated, with its findings subject to review by the courts. Organized labor had not commented on that portion of the bill.

In Paris, it appeared unlikely that the National Assembly would ratify the European Defense Community treaty providing for a six-nation unified army, as Premier Pierre Mendes-France had refused to provide Government backing for the treaty, after an extended meeting the previous day with his Cabinet, stating that he would not risk his Government to a vote of confidence on the matter, after the Brussels foreign ministers conference of the six nations had refused the previous week to go along with his proposed amendments to the treaty which he said were necessary for its ratification by the Assembly.

In Rio de Janeiro, riots had erupted after the departure from the airport of the body of deceased President Getulio Vargas, who had committed suicide the previous day after being forced to resign, following a demand for his resignation by 58 Brazilian Air Force and Army generals. One person had been killed and 43 injured after a half million Brazilians had gathered at the downtown airport to provide their last farewells to El Presidente. Three persons had been killed and 30 injured in violence the previous day across the country. A crowd had gathered in front of the Air Ministry, apparently to express hostility at the generals who had forced El Presidente's resignation. In the central area of the city, a riot car had sought to disperse a mob, whereupon the rioters descended on the car and set it afire, injuring at least 20 persons. Windows of the Standard Oil Co. building had been smashed and crowds had gathered at the U.S. Embassy, placed under heavy guard after rioters hurled rocks through its windows. U.S. diplomatic buildings and firms, as well as newspapers which had opposed El Presidente, had become targets. Rioters had burned the office of one such publishing and radio chain in Porto Alegre on the Atlantic Coast and had heavily damaged the U.S. consulate in that city, plus one other. El Presidente, to be buried in southern Brazil, would be denied a blessed grave because of his suicide.

In New York, before a Senate Banking and Currency subcommittee consisting only of Senator Prescott Bush of Connecticut presiding, a New York real estate man testified that a group of Brooklyn cooperative apartments had returned four million dollars to builders who had invested only $15,000, indicating that the windfall had occurred after he and others had made very substantial loans. According to committee counsel, the witness had testified that the Farragut Gardens apartments had cost slightly more than 18 million dollars after the investors had obtained an FHA mortgage of almost 22 million.

In Evanston, Ill., a floor fight appeared possible regarding the election of six presidents of the World Council of Churches this date, after delegates had requested that a layman be included among the slate of candidates, with the possible solution being proposed that one layman's name would be added to the list and that the delegates would then choose the six winners from among the seven names.

In Phoenixville, Pa., a wedding would take place the following Saturday between an Army sergeant and his Japanese fianceé at the Valley Forge Army Hospital. The bride to be would have to appear shortly before immigration authorities in Washington to determine how long she would be permitted to remain in the country, as she was currently under a $500 bond pending an appeal of a decision by authorities in Hawaii that she had no right to enter the U.S. on a six-month visitor's visa because she had specific intent to marry. The prospective groom said that depending on the decision, he would either send her back to Japan so that she could then enter lawfully as his wife and thus become an American citizen or to his home in Louisville. He was confined to the hospital for about the next ten months because he had contracted tuberculosis while serving in Korea, and she was currently living at the hospital guest house. Everyone at the hospital intended to attend their wedding.

In London, at Madame Tussaud's wax museum, Prime Minister Churchill received a new suit of clothes. His likeness had been first installed in 1928 and had since been melted down five times and recast to keep up with his physical changes during the interim.

Also in London, it was reported that the Long Buckby town council had initiated a campaign to censor tombstones, but had relented after the matter had received widespread publicity via a reporter who communicated the dismay of the widow over the censorship of her couplet: "Someday God will tell us why/ He broke our hearts and let him die." The town council and its chairman had determined initially that a more dignified verse should be selected, but the local reporter's interview with the widow was picked up by the London Daily Express, which said that as absurd as the incident was, it should not be laughed off as it represented "a symptom of a dangerous disease that keeps breaking out all over the world. It is the disease of censorship, the hankering to suppress the facts."

In Ripley, Tenn., a judge dismissed a case of theft of three watermelons from a farmer's patch against three boys the previous day, after asking everyone in the courtroom to raise their hand if they had never stolen a watermelon when they were young, the sheriff, three highway patrolmen, court employees and spectators all keeping their hands in their pockets.

On the editorial page, "Brazilian Respect for Law May Prevail" indicates that the reduction of the coffee crop and exports from Brazil had created economic trouble and political unrest which had led to the forced resignation of El Presidente Getulio Vargas, following demands by 58 Brazilian Army and Air Force generals, resulting shortly thereafter in his suicide the previous day, after he had said on Sunday that he would not resign and would only leave office dead.

Much of the public knew little about the country other than that it produced a large amount of coffee. It was larger in physical size than the continental U.S. and its borders were contiguous with every other South American country except Chile and Ecuador, having a population of 40 million. In addition to its coffee problems, it had a huge agricultural surplus, which had been bought by the Bank of Brazil to assist producers, paying prices higher than the prevailing international market rates on several commodities, the Bank having been unwilling to sell at a great loss. Excessive buying abroad had created commercial indebtedness, and inflation had caused the cost of living to skyrocket, rising 15 percent during the first half of 1953. Internationally known Brazilian statesman, Oswaldo Aranha, had taken over the Finance Ministry the previous year and had straightened out some of the mess. But dissatisfaction with the Vargas regime had continued, reaching its climax when an attempt earlier in the month had taken place on the life of a crusading anti-Vargas newspaper editor and it was revealed that El Presidente's bodyguards had been involved, the incident resulting in the death of a popular Air Force officer, for which three men had been arrested, as pictured on the front page.

It indicates that it was too early to speculate on what might come of the events in Brazil, but the Vice-President, Joao Cafe Filho, who had assumed the Presidency in the wake of the suicide, was reputed to be a man of tact and sense, though relatively unknown. Brazil had also been a sturdy, internationally-minded ally to the U.S. and did not go casually from one revolution to the next as did some South American countries, as Brazilians had deep respect for the law and constitutional processes, suggests that the attitude might help Brazilians resolve their present difficulties.

"A Final Whack for an Old Proposal" tells of Senate Majority Leader William Knowland's gloomy prophecy of veto of the bill which had passed the Congress, providing for a five percent wage increase for 1.5 million Federal employees, coming true after the postal rate increase which Senator Knowland had said was necessary to preserve the wage increase, had failed to pass.

With Congress out of session, there was no possibility that the veto could be overridden.

It finds the President's veto message providing his rationale to be open to serious question, having based it on the addition of 112 million dollars to the cost of the Post Office Department by not approving the postal rate increases, which was leaving the Post Office with a deficit of 400 million dollars per year, a total of four billion since 1945, and would add more than 200 million to Civil Service pay without providing revenue to offset it.

It finds that the principle on which the President had based his veto to have had a false ring about it, that wages of Government employees should not be linked to the ability of their particular department to support itself, that if it were the case, the IRS would have the best paid employees in the Government and the Alcohol Tax Unit would have the worst paid employees.

It concludes that the President was upset because Congress had ignored his request for increased postal rates, and whether Federal workers deserved a pay increase had not seemed to count. It indicates that it was not justifying the old habit of Congress of voting expenditures without providing offsetting revenue, but finds that the additional revenue need not come from the same agency which received salary appropriations.

"Box Score" indicates that the President's box score of legislative accomplishment stood at 54 hits and 10 strikeouts, an .844 average, bringing to mind the box score of the "self-appointed commie-chaser" Senator McCarthy. He had claimed to have found many Communists in the Government, and using his modest "57 card-carrying Communist" whom he claimed to have been in the State Department in February, 1950 when he began his Communist-hunting routine, the charges recently filed against one of the 57 had caused it to appear for awhile that he might be able to chalk up a .075 batting average. But the charge had been dismissed, leaving him with a five-year record of .000. It suggests a new name for the "slugger", "Triple 0 Joe".

"It Began with the Red, Red Rose" indicates that in Moscow, a Soviet horticulturalist had boasted of developing a rose which changed from white to pink to yellow to brown to red within the course of seven days.

The Western world was fighting back, as a mink farm operator in Iowa had announced that he had succeeded in breeding minks in 12 different colors. A woman from Highland Falls, N.Y., said that she raised canaries in the shades of cinnamon, apricot and mahogany. A man in Ascot, England, claimed to have bred the first true blue Pekingese dog in history, replete with blue eyes and named Blue Rhapsody.

It suggests that it was Moscow's move, and having claimed invention of the radar, butterflies, jukeboxes, "bezebol", seedless grapefruit, democracy, Hamlet and the wheel, it is certain they would come up with a chartreuse sunset, a shocking-pink caterpillar or a black orchid before the end of the week.

A piece from the Chicago Daily Tribune, titled "What Little Girls Like", indicates learning from the writer's wife that there was more rope-skipping than she could remember having observed in many summers, and that something new had been added, a medium tempo in between slowsies and fasties. She was aware of that fact from having overheard a couple of fourth grade girls discussing the matter. For some reason, for which she could not account, the game of jacks had lost its appeal with girls in favor of skipping rope.

It indicates that the girl who could pick up five jacks at once learned manual dexterity, but caused the onlooker to say to himself, "what prodigies will she not achieve when her talents are fully developed?"

Drew Pearson, being on vacation, has his column this date written by Mrs. Babe Ruth, widow of the "king of swat", indicating that she had been with the Babe recently when she went to Washington for the Babe Ruth League World Series, comprised of teams of young boys 13 to 15 from every part of the country, who visited the sights of Washington when they were not playing baseball. Wherever she had gone, she felt the presence of her late husband looking over her shoulder and listening, as he had enjoyed children. She tells of his past, having grown up an orphan, having received the guidance and understanding of the brothers of St. Mary's Industrial School in Baltimore, keeping him out of trouble, teaching him moral values and providing him religious training, encouraging him to play ball in his free time. By the time he was 19, he was ready to enter professional baseball. He had often gone back to St. Mary's, but the kids he had left behind were no longer there.

She was happy to have his name perpetuated by the League, sponsored by the Coca-Cola Co.

She tells of a miracle story related by the Babe, which had occurred in Tampa, Fla., when the Yankees were playing an exhibition game during the afternoon and were jogging to their bus behind the right field stands, near where a car was parked with a hunched-over child and an adult sitting in the front seat, the Babe having glanced at the child, waved and yelled to him, then thought no more of it. The greeting had a remarkable effect on the boy and he had stood up and called something in return. Sportswriter Fred Lieb had noticed that the boy's father was shedding tears, exclaiming that it was the first time that his boy had stood up in two years. She suggests it as indicative of the Babe having had an inspiring impact on young people.

She urges that the scare headlines regarding juvenile delinquency be buried as they only multiplied the problems, and that the good which children did be stressed, hopes they would remain on the ball field where they would not get into trouble. She posits that the more playing fields there were, the fewer delinquents there would be.

Marquis Childs, in Marrakech, Morocco, tells of Hadj Thami El Glaoui, 80, the Pasha of Marrakech, being one of the last feudal overlords who had survived into present times. He believed in his own authority, regardless of whether he was a puppet of the French, as some observers indicated, or whether he was a power to whom the French rulers had to defer. He said that the people of Morocco were loyal to him and to the present Sultan, Ben Arafa, whom he had helped to enthrone after his enemy, the former Sultan, Ben Youssef, had been deposed. He had told Mr. Childs in an interview that to supplant the present Sultan, as Moroccan independence leaders were demanding, would result in civil war.

When General Walter Bedell Smith had met El Glaoui during World War II, he said that he displayed greater natural qualities of leadership and authority than any man he had ever met, and Mr. Childs understands that assessment. He had made it virtually impossible for the French to consider seriously changing Sultans by publishing a letter after a talk with resident General Francis Lacoste, the letter indicating that he was satisfied with assurances given him that no change would be made. But the independence leaders in exile, who had been reported conferring with the French in Madrid and Geneva, insisted that a precondition for any negotiation had to be to bring the former Sultan from exile in Madagascar to France for the initial conferences.

El Glaoui criticized the French for failing since World War II to take strong measures, essential to maintaining order and peace in Morocco, saying that Moroccans did not want independence, realizing that they were dependent on the French, that it was only a few troublemakers and Communists in the cities who were responsible for the violence, and that if the French did not show the requisite strength, he would look to friends in America or Great Britain. It was said that he could summon 10,000 to 20,000 armed horsemen to his side and ride against the cities.

Morocco presented a conundrum for the French, a country where they could not leave and where, it sometimes appeared, they could not stay. Casablanca, with a population of a million, rivaled Marseilles as the second city in the French Union, and the cities generally had restless populations who were wholly or partially unemployed, living in shantytowns, susceptible to agitators and fanatics. While life in the back country was harsh, the old way of life was preserved and suspicion of the uprooted urban population was deep.

One of El Glaoui's chief objections to the former Sultan was his failure to live up to the tenets of the Moslem religion.

Mr. Childs finds the country an amalgam of the Fifth or Sixth Century and the present, with the large public square in Marrakech teeming with life, scarcely changed in 1,500 years, while at night, by the light of flares, storytellers recited old stories, sometimes accompanied by two-stringed lutes. A vendor of medicines peddled such things as powdered ram's horn as an aphrodisiac, a hangover from times prior to Christ.

He observes that the real dilemma was how to reconcile the old and new and integrate the uprooted masses in the city with the simple peasants of the back country, problems for which no one held simple solutions.

Doris Fleeson indicates that if Democrats were picking a sleeper at present in the midterm elections, they would name Richard Neuberger, challenging Senator Guy Cordon of Oregon, where no Democrat had been elected to the Senate since 1914. The current excitement in the Oregon campaign concerned Senator Margaret Chase Smith of Maine, as it had been announced that she would visit Oregon to campaign for Senator Cordon, prompting a comparison by the Neuberger campaign between the latter's conservative voting record and the liberal record of Senator Smith. For her part, she said that she had no plans to campaign outside Maine, though adding that she liked Senator Cordon very much. He was one of the few senior Republicans who had gone out of his way to make her tasks easier as they served on the Appropriations Committee together. It was thus likely that if Senator Cordon requested that Senator Smith campaign for him, she would do so once the Maine elections were over in September.

Senator Cordon was typical of the type of Senator people had associated with Republicanism prior to the time of Senator McCarthy. He was a small-town lawyer who had gotten places through hard work and patient attention to detail, not well-known on the social circuit but had achieved high places on both the Appropriations and Interior and Insular Affairs Committees, two committees quite important to Oregonians. Yet, Republicans admitted that he was in trouble in the coming election, explaining that he had not campaigned but had stayed in Washington so much that younger Oregonians did not know him. He had also debated whether to run again, which had slowed his campaign. Republicans were confident that he would win in the end, as during his long tenure in office, he had done something for virtually all of the influential people of every town in the state. One Republican had said that Senator Wayne Morse obtained the publicity, but Senator Cordon got things done for the people, even under the Democrats.

Mr. Neuberger was stressing the public power issue, but Republicans discounted it across the Northwest and would pull out all the stops to help re-elect him.

She indicates that in Wyoming, Republicans would make a valiant attempt to take the seat left by the suicide of Democratic Senator Lester Hunt the prior June, with the Republican Governor having appointed an interim Senator who was a Republican.

A letter writer from Kannapolis indicates that there were some 30,500 public school teachers in the state, not including vocational or distributive education, music, Bible instruction and other special instructors paid in part by local, Federal or state funds. There were approximately 250 home agents and assistants in the state. But the Governor selected a State home demonstration agent for his committee studying desegregation of the public schools and passed over the 30,000 teachers, in addition to parents of students. He suggests to the Governor that the teachers and parents had been let down.

A letter writer from Mount Gilead indicates that he had been appointed rural letter carrier on September 1, 1914 and had served in that capacity until the end of October, 1953, retiring at the age of 70. At the beginning of June 1953, the postmaster had provided notice that there would be an examination held on August 8 at Greensboro to fill his vacancy, five months before the vacancy opened. He had never heard of such a thing occurring through all the prior Administrations under which he had served. His substitute, a Democrat, had served 18 years satisfactorily in that position but the Administration did not intend to allow a Democrat to serve a day and so had called the examination before the vacancy opened. The applicants who were expected to make the grade had not, but a young man with a good reputation, who happened to be a Democrat, scored 88, plus the 5 percent for having been in military service, but, nevertheless, had not received the appointment. Normally the bonded substitute would serve until the regular carrier was appointed, but not in his case. A carrier from another township had been appointed as the substitute temporary carrier, a variation from the normal practice. He indicates that his letter was not meant to be malicious but rather to call attention to the way the matter was handled, indicates that some of his good friends were Republicans and he respected their views. He had seen a blueprint for discontinuing the office out of which he had worked and he indicates that might occur unless they made the temporary appointment stick.

A letter writer from Rockingham points out that the "How's Your IQ?" column appearing in the newspaper on August 18 had presented a sentence in need of correction: "I sure wish one of my sisters were coming." The corrected sentence had read: "I certainly wish one of my sisters was coming." She indicates that in addition to the change, the verb should have remained "were" in the corrected version, the past subjunctive form, and that the past indicative form, "was", appeared to her wrong. She quotes from two textbooks on English grammar to back her up. She signs her name, "Mary Idol Breeze".

The editors note that they were referring the problem to the editors of the IQ column for solution.

Neither one of them wore correct. It should of went: "I sure in tarnation wished one of mine sisters wore coming." And the "wore" comes from the plural sisters. If only one, it would of went she was coming.

And shouldn't her middle name be "Idle"?

A letter writer from Lincolnton comments on a previous letter regarding the so-called "gutlessness" of the President and the Republicans in the Senate for failing to chastise Senator McCarthy, this writer finding that the prior writer had overlooked the "gutless Democratic" Senators who had also evaded the issue, suggesting that the prior writer's memory was rather short because in 1950, when the Democrats had control of the Senate, they did not have the guts to act against Senator McCarthy. He suggests that many of the charges presently being brought against Senator McCarthy had been completely known and reviewed by other committees controlled by the Democrats when they were in the majority, and yet they lacked the guts to take action. He also indicates that it would be silly to suggest that the President should censure Senator McCarthy, as he had no power to do so. And the President and the prior writer had no business trying to tell the people of Wisconsin how to vote. He suggests that the prior writer instead take up his pen in support of the millions of blacks in the South who needed a champion for their rights, which were being denied.

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