The Charlotte News
Monday, June 20, 1955
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from San Francisco that the President was reportedly prepared to open the U.N. session marking the tenth anniversary of the founding of the organization, planning an important policy declaration, according to informed sources. The Big Four foreign ministers were preparing to meet this night to plan for the Big Four summit meeting in Geneva, beginning July 18. Some diplomats believed that the President's speech would have special significance with regard to those forthcoming talks. Diplomatic sources had suggested that the Russians likely would press for a declaration of some sort during the tenth anniversary meeting, that Soviet Foreign Minister V. M. Molotov believed that the meeting should not end without the U.N. taking a stand, perhaps in the form of a resolution for peace. Yet, according to rules previously adopted, the celebration was supposed to hear speeches only on the U.N. record and make no decisions of any kind. The President would depart this night after his speech. Diplomatic sources said that the Big Four foreign ministers meeting was only intended to resolve the agenda for the summit talks and determine other procedural arrangements connected with the Geneva meeting. Meanwhile, Mr. Molotov was making rounds, having seen two of Russia's satellite foreign ministers the previous day.
In Wiener Neustadt, Austria, Austrian war prisoners and civilian internees released by the Soviet Union told of having observed American, British and French prisoners in Russian camps, that the Russian camps also held several thousand Germans. A group of 184 Austrians had arrived in the city this date, the war prisoners having been released from Sverdovsk, while the civilians had been held near Irkutsk. They said that while at Camp Alexandrovsk in Siberia, they had met an American from New York, who had been beaten to such an extent that he appeared mentally unbalanced, that the American had told them that he had been serving with U.S. forces in Germany and had been arrested by the Czechs after inadvertently crossing the German-Czech border in 1949, that the Czechs had handed him to the Soviet occupation forces in Austria and that he had been sentenced to 25 years in jail. They said that another American had died in the Ukral Camp in 1952, after he had been arrested in Rumania at the end of the war. They also provided anecdotes regarding other American prisoners they had encountered at the various camps.
In the Senate this date, supporters of the President's defense program faced battle against the efforts of some Democrats to expand air power further and prevent a cutback in ground forces. The defense money bill, appropriating nearly 32 million dollars, might reach a vote this night, expected to pass. Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri, former Air Force Secretary during the Truman Administration, was spearheading what appeared to be an uphill drive for three major changes in the bill, the addition of about 40 million dollars to prevent a cutback of about 12,000 troops in the Marine Corps between the present time and the end of the following fiscal year, the addition of about 250 million dollars to prevent a similar reduction by 88,000 troops in the regular Army, and the addition of another 200 million to accelerate production of supersonic and jet fighter aircraft. The first two proposals had already been defeated in the Appropriations Committee and normally the full Senate accepted those decisions. Senator Dennis Chavez of New Mexico, the floor manager for the measure, was on the losing side in those votes, but told the Senate the prior Friday that he would now vote to uphold the Committee decisions, and Senator Leverett Saltonstall of Massachusetts, the former chairman of the Armed Services Committee, was expected to aid Senator Chavez in opposing the additional increases.
There were signs this date that the Senate might seek to block a Democratic-sponsored proposal to expand Social Security benefits, with Senator Harry F. Byrd of Virginia, chairman of the Finance Committee, saying that preliminary studies indicated that it would be very costly to put into effect plans agreed on in principle by the Democratic leaders in the House, to provide immediate benefits to the disabled and to lower the age at which women could draw benefits.
In Buenos Aires, Argentina's new armed forces chief pressed grimly ahead this date with efforts to return Argentina to normal after a bloody revolt had erupted the previous Thursday. The general had rescued El Presidente Juan Peron's Government from the navy revolt, calling on the nation the previous night to stamp out "false alarms", disturbing efforts to restore peace. Refugees from Argentina to Uruguay had reported that army leaders were negotiating with El Presidente and the navy in an effort to set up a three-man ruling junta consisting of El Presidente, the vice-president and the commander in chief of the "Forces of Repression", the army minister.
In Frankfurt, West Germany, evangelist Billy Graham was welcomed this date by a Lutheran leader who expressed concern at "certain forms of American evangelization." He further had said that "demonic abysses may be opened by stirring of the masses" and that they did not have the "delicious and disarming naïveté of the Americans", explaining their exercise of a certain reserve. He added that they would give their brother Graham every opportunity, however, to fulfill his mission, that the Lutherans and other Protestant churches in Germany had contributed financially to Rev. Graham's meetings. Rev. Graham told a news conference that the spirit of religious revival was alive in Western Europe and that reports from the Iron Curtain countries indicated that the same was true there as well. He said that the world was looking for answers and suggested that the answer to all problems was in the Bible, that he had not come to Germany to organize mass meetings but to open the Bible and explain it. He said that when he spoke to a mass meeting, he forgot the crowd and talked only to one person, that in the same night he had given his life to Christ, six others had become ministers, and on the following day, he had read in newspapers that the meeting was superficial. He said that they had documentary and statistical proof that those who made their decisions for Christ stayed with Christ. He stated that his method was not an American method, but a method used for centuries. He said also that he did not yet know whether he would be able to accept invitations sent to him sometime earlier by the Russian and Hungarian church leaders to speak in those two countries.
In Charlotte, Donald MacDonald of The News reports that a 48-year old man, who had led police on a 70 mph chase through the Double Oaks section of the city early this date, had been shot in both legs by the police, after he had turned on them and threatened to strike one of the officers with a brick. They said that the shooting and arrest had occurred after the man had thrown four half-gallon jars of white lightning whiskey from his speeding automobile. He was in good condition at the hospital. The officers drew up eight warrants against him, charging two counts of assault with a deadly weapon, reckless driving, speeding at 75 mph in a 35 mph zone, failing to heed a police siren, assault on an officer, transporting illegal whiskey, and having no operator's license. Bond was set at $1,000.
Dick Young of The News indicates that an extension of time was, according to a member of the City Council, urgently needed for six old-age convalescent homes, to comply with state law requiring that they be not more than one-story in height when constructed of wood. The convalescent homes in question were two stories. The member of the Council had said that closing the six homes would create a serious problem in care for the elderly presently quartered there. The Building Inspection Department had notified the operators the previous week that they were in violation of state law and would have to correct the problem within 30 days.
In Raleigh, as reported on an inside page, the all-male jury had reached a verdict on Saturday afternoon after four hours and 40 minutes of deliberation, finding the 21-year old man, accused of fatally shooting a woman on a Raleigh sidewalk on May 13 from his hotel window, albeit accidentally, guilty of involuntary manslaughter for the negligent homicide. He had originally been charged with second-degree murder but the judge had directed a verdict for the accused at the close of the State's case for lack of legally sufficient evidence to support that charge, there having been no evidence presented of intentional conduct or malice aforethought. The judge had immediately sentenced the defendant to between five and ten years in prison, rejecting a plea by his counsel for probation, with the judge saying that he could not do that because the laws were for the protection of people "against this sort of thing" and if they did not do that, there might as well be no law at all.
Also on an inside page, and not previously reported at any point on the front page, was a story that at Guilford College, N.C., near Greensboro, an oak tree, predating the Revolutionary War by a hundred years or more, deliberately dynamited on June 8 near the campus while former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt spoke nearby on the campus at the 22nd annual meeting of the Carolina Institute of International Relations, had not been seriously damaged after all, initial stories having stated that it was damaged beyond repair. They might wish to start their investigation by interrogating Robert Chambliss of Birmingham as to his whereabouts at the time, as the incident occurred eight days after the implementing decision was announced on May 31 by the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education, although the bomber might also have been upset about Mrs. Roosevelt's work in the U.N., all of a piece, however, within the mindset. The mind-print also may have concocted at the crossroads, consciously or unconsciously, a concatenation having to do vaguely with the Red Cross and the Dumbarton Oaks Conference, prelude to the U.N., in fall, 1944. The old oak, incidentally, which, by the time the story is retold enough, may have been there since the beginning of recorded history, would finally give up the ghost to high winds in the backlash of Hurricane Gracie, on September 30, 1959. Someone should have simply counted the annular rings
On the editorial page, "UNC's Best Seats Go to the Rich" tells of UNC football ticket application forms having been mailed to thousands of alumni, as the team had a stellar home schedule, including Notre Dame, Oklahoma, Maryland and Tennessee, causing a rush to get season home tickets. But it wonders what the chances were of being able to obtain seats on the 50-yard line for one of the games, suggests that they were pretty good if one had enough money to contribute to support an athlete.
The list price of a ticket for the Notre Dame game was $4.50, but the UNC Athletic Association indicated that if one wished "preferential treatment" or one of the high "priorities" among the seats, one should be prepared to contribute. It finds that it was best to be a member of the "Century Club" and have the ticket processed during the special June 1-15 "priority" period, better than being a mere member of the Educational Foundation, organized many years earlier, to raise money for worthy athletes. The Club was composed of members of the Foundation who contributed an annual amount of $100 or more to grants-in-aid for athletes. They were provided the highest preference on seating location, while Foundation members shared the priority period, but were not promised "highest preference" or "permanently assigned" seats. Other alumni, whom it presumes would pay only the face value of the ticket, would have to wait until the June 25-July 1 "priority period" to obtain their tickets. The general public would have to await then the ensuing 15-day period to process their order forms.
It indicates that despite the fact that all citizens of the state supported the University with tax money, it had no objection to the alumni having first preference on tickets, but finds that beyond that, there should be no favoritism in seating, that tickets ought be distributed on a first-come, first-serve basis. It finds it distasteful for a State institution to provide preferential treatment to the wealthy, suggests it as a symptom of "super-commercialization of athletics at a great institution of higher learning", which had no place within the value system at Chapel Hill.
When do us people down by the swamp get our tickets? We'll bring our own peanuts, as long as you promise to shell 'em for us.
"Surprise: The U.N. Is Now Ten" comments on the tenth anniversary of the U.N. this date, finds it surprising that it was still around given the boycotts occasioned by the Soviets and the fact that it had been bypassed on occasion by the U.S. It had still been the battleground of great powers possessing unlimited means of destruction, the scene of insults, taunts and threats between nations of irreconcilable ideologies. Russia had been angered by consistent U.N. rejection of its demands and designs, such as the admission of Communist China. Some Americans had condemned it for not being able to fulfill its promised permanent peace. Yet, it had survived and grown, with a waiting list of potential members.
Fourteen nations, including Austria, Italy and Japan, had been kept out of the organization by the veto of the Soviets, while seven Russian satellites had never been able to muster sufficient votes to obtain membership. Not one of the 51 charter members had ever seriously thought of withdrawing.
U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., had stated that the reason it remained was because it was "the biggest single engine in the world for influencing public opinion." No nation wanted to be seen as running away from any organization which talked of peace.
It suggests that its tenth anniversary was a good time to recall that it had been more than just a sounding board, that its mediation teams had worked out cease-fires in Indonesia, Kashmir and Palestine, had helped to remove unwanted foreign troops from Iran, Syria and Lebanon, had made the principle of collective military action against aggression a reality during the Korean War, and its agencies were engaged all over the world in resettling and feeding refugees, working out programs for seed and crop improvement, land reclamation, increasing of electrical power, controlling of narcotics, fighting disease and establishing the principles of human rights.
It suggests that most of its weaknesses were inherent in the veto power on the Security Council among the five permanent members thereof. That veto had been utilized by Russia 60 times, with it having been exercised only two other times, both by France. The U.S. had insisted, however, as much as had Russia, on its inclusion in the Charter originally, and probably would still want it.
It concludes that imperfect as the organization was, it had served well the cause of peace, quotes Walter Lippmann's piece of the prior Saturday that it was something new in human history and something of great significance, "the presence through mankind of a will that the sovereign governments shall preserve the universal society."
"The Reds on a Real Cool Kick" finds that the Soviets, having been critical of American jazz for years, calling it "psychopathic bedlam of the decadent West" and "banshee cry of Wall Street!" now, via Moscow radio the previous week, had broadcast a short wave musical program to European listeners, with U.S. jazz featured, dominant in the seven solid hours of music, without a single interruption to extol the virtues of Communism or other favorite subjects of Radio Moscow.
It wonders whether the Kremlin might be loosening up at last and becoming jovial in their attitude toward the arts, including proletarian jazz. If so, it suggests some requests for the first night when Communist Party Secretary Nikita Khrushchev might sit in as the guest disc jockey: Benny Goodman's "Peace, Brother", Billie Holiday's "I Can't Believe That You're in Love with Me", Wingy Manone's "Stop the War, the Cats Are Killing Themselves", or perhaps Chet Baker's "I Get Along without You Very Well". It suggests that the hipsters would dig what they were putting down.
Whatever it meant, it finds it refreshing that the cold war had become the cool war.
Like, you're way behind the times for the most part, favoring those prewar and wartime charts. How about gettin' with the action, like, daddy-o, with Cannonball Adderley's "Spontaneous Combustion"
A piece from the Durham Morning Herald, titled "Young Ideas at 134", tells of being amused by a story about a 134-year old Polish woman who had run away from a home for the aged because old people bored her. It finds her boredom not surprising, as many old people, especially those who lived to such an advanced age, retained remarkably youthful viewpoints and cared very little for the company of the typically old person. While some people who were elderly lived in the past, some did not. The latter were more concerned with the present and maintained a project or two ahead, as an outlet for their intellectual energy and active interest.
It suggests that the 134-year old woman, who was obviously older than the other residents of the home, probably got tired of answering questions about the distant past so that others could check their memories. It wonders what difference that which had taken place 100 years earlier made to her, when she was interested in new styles and new household gadgets, frozen foods and new fabrics. So it does not blame the woman for running away from the home, and hopes that she would find companionable friends on her escapade, and that she would not have to return to those whose living in the past only bored her.
Drew Pearson indicates that the U.N. had begun ten years earlier in "an aura of hoopla and hope", which he recalled vividly as he had been present in San Francisco at the Charter conference. Then Secretary of State Edward Stettinius, who had risen to the top of General Motors as a public relations expert, had exerted those talents anew at San Francisco to smooth the way for approval of the Charter. Small town representatives of newspapers from the heart of the country had been personally invited by the Secretary to come to San Francisco, and church people, racial groups, labor groups, women's club presidents had all received personal invitations from the Secretary to come to the conference. Mr. Pearson suggests that possibly the late Mr. Stettinius had carried things too far, but that he was basically right, that the peace of the world and the new machinery for keeping that peace had to be founded on people, their hopes, their fears, and their dread of war.
Hope had been high at the time, permeating everything which happened at the conference. It drove back an unpleasant warning from Ambassador to Moscow Averell Harriman that Russia was up to no good in the future. It had also dampened the effect of Mr. Pearson's own report that Stalin had written a savage note to FDR shortly before the latter's death on April 12, 1945, and that General Eisenhower had withdrawn U.S. troops out of the suburbs of Berlin back to the Elbe River because of Russian protests. It had even made slightly glamorous the "crusty, unglamorous person of Molotov."
He posits that permanent peace had to be born of hope, that it could not function otherwise, and that there still remained hope after ten years, and the determination for peace in a still extant U.N. A lot of people had tried to wreck the organization in the interim, including the Minute Women, the Liberty Belles, and the mayor of Santa Monica, who had refused to have the U.N. flag flown from the schools there on U.N. day. The creation of NATO as a separate organization in Paris, circumventing the U.N., had not done it any good. Neither had the mess over Indo-China and the truce constructed in July, 1954, with both the French and Secretary Dulles sidestepping the U.N. Nor had the U.S. recent refusal to refer Formosa to the U.N. for resolution.
The Soviets had been the most potent force seeking to undercut it. But despite all of those efforts, it still functioned, was too important to disband, still representing the world's best hope for peace.
It had also achieved some great victories, some of which people did not know about. People had forgotten, for instance, that the U.N. had stopped Russia when the Red Army was about to move into Azerbaijan in northern Iran in 1946, as the Soviets considered Iran as part of the Soviet sphere of influence. No opposition was thought possible to occupation by the Soviets, except from Iran, itself. Then the U.N. came into the picture, with the force of public opinion behind it, and the warnings from the U.N. rang around the world, such that the Russians angrily withdrew.
The Congressional Quarterly discusses the lobbying effort ongoing to try to convince the House alternately to expand or curtail the public housing program, following the surprise Senate rejection on June 7 of the Administration's plan to authorize 35,000 public housing units for each of the ensuing two years, the Senators having instead voted for a Democratic proposal to build a maximum of 135,000 low-rent units per year until the original 810,000-unit authorization of 1949 would be exhausted, with the time period for that to take place being in dispute.
Public housing advocates wanted the House to retain the broader authorization, while real estate and builders' groups, opposed to public housing in principle and practice, urged elimination of the public housing provision in its entirety, or at least to reduce it to the Administration's request.
Senate passage of the Democratic plan had caught everyone off guard. Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson was "positive" that the Administration's proposal would pass, but his backstage wire-pulling was credited also with the switch to the Democratic proposal.
After the Senate had voted, each side of the issue began an impromptu campaign trying to exert their will on members of the House through press releases, telegrams and long distance telephone calls, as well as personal visits. The National Housing Conference, with 4,000 members, was the major spokesman for the advocates of public housing. It headed a coalition of such groups as the AFL, CIO, the National Conference of Catholic Charities, the American Veterans Committee and the Cooperative League of the U.S. That group had announced recently that 15 million families lived in housing which they described as "a shame to the richest nation on earth". They contended that slums were being expanded and created more rapidly than being removed, and that the public housing programs were tools to eliminate slums. They contended that private industry had failed to supply enough new housing for low-income families, and in addition to backing the public housing provisions of the Senate bill, they favored improved credit aids, better housing research, and expanded farm housing.
Most of the opposition came from realtors and builders who believed that private industry ought provide low-income housing. The National Association of Real Estate Boards, with 54,000 members, contended that public housing was the "wrong approach" and involved a concept "alien to our traditions". Its legislative allies included the U.S. Savings and Loan League, representing 4,200 Savings and Loan Associations, and the National Association of Home Builders, with 33,000 members. The latter group contended that additional public housing was unnecessary, that the increase in consumer income and the increase in home ownership during the previous decade had drastically diminished, if not eliminated, the problem on which the original public housing program was premised. Those two organizations offered alternatives to public housing, strengthening the program of Government insurance for home improvement loans, broadening the application of insured, long-term mortgages for financing rehabilitation of homes in urban renewal areas, and revising the charter of the Federal National Mortgage Association to make it more useful as a secondary mortgage market.
The public housing lobbies admitted that those suggestions had merit but claimed that they would be inadequate to meet the needs of families without proper housing. The realtors and builders replied that public housing spokesmen were "so ideologically involved … that their goals bear no relation to need."
It concludes that the outcome in the House was in doubt and that one Congressman had said, "Whatever the result, you can bet the fur will fly when the housing bill reaches the floor."
A letter writer suggests that a sadder commentary on the minds of public officials could scarcely be found than that which had occurred the previous week at the City Council meeting regarding the consideration of the ban of sale of beer on Sundays within the city limits, finding that the Council had completely sidestepped the issue and had also sidestepped the real issue, the enforcement of existing law against the sale of beer to minors. Instead, the Council had developed a new law prohibiting the curbside sale of beer at drive-ins, requiring that purchasers enter the drive-in and show proof of age. She thinks that a teenager under 18 determined to purchase beer would be able to do so, despite that new ordinance. She suggests that a better solution would be punitive measures against operators found to violate the law and against the youngsters who purchased the beer, that the real issue was enforcement of the age law.
A letter from the general secretary of the office of the Synod of the North Carolina Presbyterian Church in the U.S. indicates that a newspaper release from Raleigh had carried unofficial and erroneous information, that Peace College, Flora Macdonald College and Presbyterian Junior College would be consolidated into a four-year coeducational institution to be located somewhere within the Cape Fear Presbytery, under plans presently being carried forward, and that the trustees of the institutions had approved of that merger, that 100 men in Fayetteville had pledged $10,000 each to bring the proposed institution to that town. He says that on June 14, reporters from two Charlotte newspapers had called him, requesting confirmation of the facts contained in the release, and he had declined to do so on the grounds that the release was unofficial and contained errors, and that the official account remained confidential until after actions by the Synod at its mid-July meeting. He said that there was a proposal to that effect being considered, but that no action had yet been taken. He thus wishes to correct the record.
A letter writer from Hamlet finds that "the rantings of these Negro leaders about the time limit of desegregation in the schools makes interesting and enlightening reading and is also a preview of what we may expect when they take over, 'if, and when, they do.'" She indicates that an article from Houston on June 13 had stated that an official of the NAACP had filed petitions seeking desegregation of every Texas school district which had black children under its jurisdiction, placing a deadline for desegregation of 1956, that Thurgood Marshall, the lead counsel for the NAACP, had stated in an interview that desegregation would take time but that he would guarantee that it would not be 50 or 100 years hence. She finds that a "boastful and defiant assertion". She proclaims, "You have sowed to the wind, and the whirlwind is not far off." She wonders what the NAACP leaders were intimating by their words and actions, whether, if resistance would come to the program, as it would, violence and bloodshed would be their answer. She thinks that all pandemonium would be let loose, because of the "unwisdom of nine men who have no interest and regard for our customs and traditions." She thinks that many in the South had inherited "refinement and culture of great and noble ancestors", and to have it ignored was unthinkable. She finds blacks to be quiet and easy-going, but that their "obstreperous leaders" had spoken with a vengeance which was "unbecoming to those who have not wrought nor added materially, but who expects to reap what they have not sown." She says that she was 74 and was glad that she would not live to see the "havoc and desolation of our Southland. Forcing the mixing of these two races, if inevitable, and the mixing of the children in school are only the beginning of the end of southern culture, customs, and tradition."
You go on down theya and get you
some of Lesta's chicken, and you'll be alright in the mornin'
Framed Edition
Links-Date — Links-Subj.