The Charlotte News
Monday, October 1, 1956
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that Secretary of State Dulles had begun this date a round of talks which might largely determine whether the U.S. would have to pull all of its military forces from Iceland. Iceland's Foreign Minister had arrived the previous day, suggesting the possibility of a compromise between his Government's demands for withdrawal of U.S. troops and the U.S. efforts to keep them in Iceland as a link in the North Atlantic defense system. The two men were to meet during the afternoon for the first cabinet-level talks on the problem, which had worried U.S. officials and NATO military leaders since the previous March. The demand for ouster of the troops was supported by the Communists in Iceland and the U.S. viewed removal of the troops to be of benefit only to the Communists. Iceland believed that the lessened possibility of war with Russia made it unnecessary to maintain the U.S. troops there. But Iceland's Foreign Minister had said that they wanted a solution which would be acceptable to both countries.
It was one of three major issues with which the Secretary of State was to be concerned during the week, the other two being the restoration of U.S.-British-French cooperation in dealing with the Suez Canal issue as it went to the U.N. for debate, with Mr. Dulles scheduled to confer with British Foreign Minister Selwyn Lloyd, coming to the U.S. in advance of the first U.N. meeting on the subject on Friday. The Secretary would also be involved in developing tentative conclusions on what Marshal Tito of Yugoslavia was doing in his current conference with the Russians and, as a result, what the President should do about continuing aid to Communist Yugoslavia, after Congress had ordered the aid program halted unless the President determined by October 6 that it ought be continued.
In London, the premiers of Russia and Hungary had joined President Tito and Soviet Communist Party Secretary Nikita Khrushchev in mystery-shrouded talks, believed aimed at ironing out conflicts within the Soviet alliances. Premier Nikolai Bulganin and Premier Erno Geroe of Hungary had appeared the previous day at the Yalta meeting, billed by Moscow radio as a vacation gathering, but seen by the West as a crucial phase in a Kremlin power struggle. Diplomats in London believed that Mr. Khrushchev had enlisted Tito's support for his campaign to downgrade the late Joseph Stalin, with informed sources indicating that the campaign had embroiled Mr. Khrushchev in a bitter struggle with old Bolsheviks within the Kremlin. Two veteran Stalinists, former Foreign Minister V. M. Molotov and Deputy Premier Lazar Kaganovich, were said to believe that Mr. Khrushchev's switch to a more liberal type of Communism had weakened Moscow's control of the satellite countries. Marshal Tito was reported to be disturbed over a letter which Soviet leaders had sent to the satellites warning them against espousing too heartily Tito's avowed independence from Moscow. Should Soviet-Yugoslav relations again sour, Tito's Government stood to lose more than a half billion dollars in Communist credits and grants. Since relations with Tito had been improving during the prior three years since the death of Stalin in March, 1953, the Soviet bloc had provided Yugoslavia with economic benefits to compensate for the 1948 Stalin-initiated boycott, ejecting Yugoslavia from the Cominform. The uncertain status of relations between the two countries had caused intense interest in Washington, with the U.S. Ambassador to Belgrade, James Riddleberger, having returned to the Yugoslav capital the previous day after a three-month vacation, expected to ask Tito for an update on the Yalta talks when the latter returned from the Crimea. The whole question of continued U.S. aid to Yugoslavia was under review, with Secretary of State Dulles reportedly having told the Yugoslav Government that a full return to the Soviet sphere would result in cutting off American aid.
The new term of the Supreme Court began this date, with three appeals pending concerning the immediate admission of pupils to white schools in Texas and South Carolina, filed during the summer recess, with more expected during the current term. Another major case pending before the Court was seeking reversal of a lower court decision holding unconstitutional an Alabama statute and a Montgomery city ordinance requiring segregation on Montgomery buses, the basis for the continuing Montgomery bus boycott, led by Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. During the previous term, the Court had dismissed an appeal from a similar decision which had declared a South Carolina bus segregation law unconstitutional. In another case, the Court was being asked to reverse a lower court decision indicating that the state of Virginia could not lease a State park under any plan which would result in discrimination against blacks. A long list of cases raising a variety of issues affecting Communists and subversive activities also awaited consideration, with nearly 800 cases in all on the Court's docket. Justice Sherman Minton, who had announced his retirement for health reasons in mid-September, to become effective October 15, would be spending the ensuing two weeks wrapping up his work on the Court. The prior Saturday, the President had announced his appointment of William Brennan as Justice Minton's successor, to be a recess appointment which would be formalized in about ten days. It would be subject to Senate confirmation when the new Congress convened in January. As Drew Pearson had pointed out in his September 26 column, some advisers to the President had urged appointment of Judge William Hastie, the first black member of the U.S. Court of Appeals, appointed to the Third Circuit in 1949 by President Truman. The idea had first been floated in a letter to the President by Judge William Denman of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, and the President's advisers were aware of the potential benefit for attracting minority voters, that an expected Southern filibuster of the nomination might also backfire—but as the appointment was a recess appointment, that latter prospect would not have materialized until after the election.
In Henderson, Ky., State and local police this date cleared a path through a yelling and shouting crowd of 100 people for a black mother, after she had delivered four black students to an elementary school, the first time police had to intercede since the boycott of the school by white students had begun the prior Monday in protest against integration of the school, with an enrollment of 870. The principal said that 460 students had reported to classes during the current morning, nearly double the attendance of the previous week during the peaceful boycott of the county school and two other city schools. The crowd of men, women and a few children had begun running toward the school parking lot exit when the woman, mother of two of the black students, started to drive away. The sheriff said that a city police cruiser had forced a path through the jeering crowd. Later, the crowd remained on the street outside the school and shouted, "Get 'em out of school." (The prior Tuesday, much stronger language by the crowds had been reported.) The county superintendent of schools said that the school board would meet in the afternoon to discuss the latest developments.
In Dallas, Texas, the NAACP, under threat of ouster from that state, where it had scored some of its greatest victories, this date would seek a Federal court order to admit black students to the Dallas public schools. The suit had been filed in September, 1955, seeking the admission of 27 black students to the Dallas white schools. When the suit had first been heard, the same District Court judge before whom it was currently scheduled had ruled against the NAACP, saying that the case was premature, but the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals had reversed the decision and remanded it to the judge to grant a full hearing to the black students. The Dallas school district had appealed to the Supreme Court, seeking a stay of the judgment pending action on the appeal, the Court having denied the stay but slated to hear the appeal in the current new term. (Upon remand, after further dismissal of the petition the following December by the District Court, the Fifth Circuit again would reverse the following year and order the schools desegregated "with all deliberate speed" per the 1955 Brown v. Board of Education implementing decision's mandate.) In a separate action, a court of inquiry in Dallas on Saturday, conducted by aides of State Attorney General John Ben Shepperd, had heard five black students involved in the suit testify that they had not discussed the matter with any attorney and had not authorized any attorney to file suit on their behalfs, with the Attorney General stating that the inquiry was not connected to the Federal suit. A hearing on a petition by Mr. Shepperd for a temporary injunction to ban the NAACP from operating in Texas had begun on Friday in State court at Tyler, with that judge having earlier granted a restraining order directing the NAACP to cease all operations in the state, not to file further school integration suits and not to collect any more money. Following two days of testimony in that case, the hearing had been adjourned until the following Wednesday.
In Philadelphia, a court battle involving a total of 370 million dollars and pitting 37 trucking companies against 16 Eastern railroads opened in U.S. District Court this date, with the judge acting as fact-finder in the lawsuit, expected to continue for two months. The trucking companies and the Pennsylvania Motor Truck Association had begun the suit in 1953, seeking 250 million dollars in damages, claiming that the Eastern railroad presidents' conference and the 16 railroads, including the Pennsylvania, which was the largest in the country, had started an illegal conspiracy in May, 1949 to force the truckers out of business.
The President had accused his Democratic critics this date of talking "wicked nonsense" and "political bunk" during the presidential campaign regarding the claimed Republican stance against labor. He said that the record showed that organized labor was larger in numbers and greater in strength after three years of a Republican Administration than ever before in the nation's history. He said that Democrats had 20 years to do something for the most needy farm families, but at the end of the 20 years, "they had done nothing except to bypass the small farmers as they made corporation and big farming more profitable than ever before." The address was prepared for delivery in Cleveland, not mentioning his opponent, Adlai Stevenson, by name, but attacking him on the farm issue, cost of living, labor and several other campaign topics. He said that in his Administration, one could not find "those ugly marks of the past, special favoritism, cronyism and laxity in administration." He was also scheduled to deliver a nationwide radio and television address this night from a Republican rally in Lexington, Ky. The White House had announced the previous day that the President would make a 5,500-mile, 48-hour air trip in mid-October to Minnesota, Washington and Oregon, all key states in the drive for re-election and recapturing Republican control of Congress. Press secretary James Hagerty listed one major address for Portland, Ore., and informal talks in Minneapolis, St. Paul, Seattle and Tacoma.
Mr. Stevenson, meanwhile, had disclosed his plans for intensive campaigning the following week in California, with speeches set in half a dozen cities and in other far Western states. He had stopped at his Washington headquarters the previous day for a brief rest, but planned to start touring the Eastern states the following day. Vice-presidential nominee, Senator Estes Kefauver, said that he and Mr. Stevenson had talked over the campaign the previous day and agreed that "the situation is looking fine, and we are making very good progress." Senator Kefauver would begin another campaign swing this date across 13 states from coast to coast, to last for two weeks, with the first stop scheduled to be in Dallas.
In London, a huge delta-winged plane, the Vulcan, one of Britain's secret atom bomb carriers, had crashed and exploded in fog and rain at the London Airport this date before horrified dignitaries welcoming the plane home from New Zealand. Ejector seats had saved the lives of Air Chief Marshal Sir Harry Broadhurst and Squadron Leader D. R. Howard, captain of the plane, just before it had crashed. Both received only minor injuries in their fall of about 300 feet, as parachutes had eased their descent. Four bodies had been recovered from the wreckage. The builders of the aircraft said that the canopy had mysteriously come off the plane as it came in for a landing after its 26,000-mile test flight to New Zealand and Australia. At that point, the nose had sagged and two loud bangs had signaled the ejector seats being deployed. A group of Russians, at the airport to welcome the Bolshoi Ballet arriving from Moscow in Soviet jetliners, had observed the crash. Nearby had been a welcoming delegation from the Royal Air Force, the British Government and families of the crew members. It was scheduled to be a major occasion for the RAF and for British aviation, already plagued by the failure of the Comet jet airliners and serious delays in deliveries of fighters, as well as the setback in service for the Britannia airliners.
In Oroville, Calif., a young fisherman was in fair condition this date after a dramatic rescue from a remote Sierra canyon where he had tumbled over a 35-foot waterfall. Relays of rescue workers, working in the glare of searchlights, had toiled for more than six hours early the previous day to haul the 23-year old man 3,000 feet along a tortuous trail up the sheer granite face of Bold Rock Canyon. The man had been swept over the falls on Saturday while fishing in the swift, icy waters of the Feather River. He had escaped with some broken ribs. A 30-year old companion had climbed the canyon wall and summoned help.
Ann Sawyer of The News reports of traffic stop signs having been promised before sundown the following night for the Cotswold school area by the commissioner of the State's tenth highway division, also promising a crowded room of residents from Cotswold and Thomasboro that he would ask State officials to conduct a traffic survey at every school in the county. The County Commission members were discussing steps to be taken to assure Cotswold schoolchildren greater safety when walking along and crossing Old Sardis Road. Residents of the area had previously asked the Commission for a stoplight at the school entrance, but the State traffic engineer said that the situation at the school did not warrant it.
In Bellmore, N.Y., a nine-year old boy had been fishing for bass in a nearby pond the previous day when he instead hooked a duck, and in the ensuing excitement, another boy had hooked his friend after swinging his pole and accidentally snagging him above the right ear. A doctor had treated the boy at the pond and a game warden had freed the duck.
On the editorial page, "Southern Ham and Whisky Won't Do It" indicates that the Richmond News Leader, the exponent of interposition, states' rights and third parties, believed that the South ought organize a lobby to recapture states' rights. It would have select Southern gentlemen, armed with the spirit of John C. Calhoun and a half million dollars for food and drink, call on the practical politicians of various state houses in the rest of the country, as part of an effort to bring back resolutions from between 15 and 20 states, stating opposition to Brown v. Board of Education and other Supreme Court cases involving desegregation.
It finds the appeal of Smithfield ham and 100 cases of Virginia bourbon, which was to be some of the selected food and drink, undeniable, as was the power of practical state house politicians. But while the food and drink might persuade the politicians on many questions, states' rights was not one of them. Even Mr. Calhoun had been unable to convince a Congress in the mid-19th Century, far less subject to popular pressures than at present, that states' rights were sacrosanct. At that time, they had become synonymous with disunion and mistreatment of racial minorities, and that association continued to the present time. It finds lobbyists to be poor tools to correct that impression, particularly while interposition resolutions continued to stir memories of disunion.
It finds the first question before the states to be the preservation of the rights left to them through wise exercise, rather than recapturing states' rights. It suggests as example the vigorous support of the public schools, if unwanted Federal aid and intervention were to be forestalled, and equally vigorous championing of individual rights of all citizens. In North Carolina, it meant providing a state minimum wage.
It suggests that when state powers were not exercised by the states, they were relinquished to the Federal Government, and that nothing had happened thus far to indicate that once that had occurred, they could ever be brought back to the states, "even with the aid of bourbon, ham, and the eloquence of southern gentlemen."
"The Newspaper's Job Is To Report" tells of it being National Newspaper Week and that a favorite stance among newspaper editors was to insist that everything about newspapers was perfect while the rest of the world was out of step, the piece proclaiming that it was not the case.
The press was a human institution and thus subject to human foibles, despite many newspapermen claiming infallibility. Robert Hutchins had called the press "the most uncriticized institution in the country". While that was not entirely true, the statement reflected an impression that the press considered itself above criticism, the piece indicating that it needed criticism to respond properly to the needs of the community which it served.
Its first obligation was to tell the continuing story of that which was happening in the world in which the readers lived, to report on all of the stories of interest and importance to the readers, excluding libel, military secrets and occasional matters of taste and judgment. But otherwise, it suggests, there should be no boundaries, as suppression of news betrayed the raison d'etre of journalism, to present the world as it was, to the extent practically possible, "the good, the bad, the indifferent."
It suggests that it was the indifferent which had to be constantly and patiently explained to readers, as the newspaper had a duty as well as a right to report. It was why it believed it must be constantly on guard against governmental secrecy or any threat to freedom of information. It concludes that it was a great responsibility, one which it cheerfully and dutifully bore, according to the best of its lights.
"World Peace Has a Local Angle, Too" finds that the great issues had a local angle, those being the price of pigs and peanuts, public power versus private power, an increased minimum wage, and the quickest route to a four-day week, supposedly the "gut" issues of the campaign on which the people would ultimately vote.
But it finds it distressing how much was being said about those matters to the exclusion of the larger issue, peace and how to achieve it, which also had a local angle. But all references to it were fleeting and shadowy, the Republicans indicating that peace was present and the Democrats saying it was not. It finds both right, as the world seemed peaceful one day and perilous the next, but both also wrong to say that and nothing more. For the unanswered question was how they proposed to make a permanent peace and recover from the Soviet Middle East offensive, the U.S. approach to neutralism and how it was to recapture the friendship of the neutral countries. They were not easy questions to answer and no one could expect the candidates to answer them explicitly. But to ignore them made all their earnest talk about local issues appear as a mockery.
The U.S., it finds, had obligations to the world, as well as opportunities for more comfort and broader lives for Americans, and in making the problems of peace appear to be of no immediate concern to Americans and instead that they were more interested in wages, parity, the stock market and stock cars, the candidates were failing in their responsibilities.
A piece from the Greensboro Daily News, titled "How To Cuss", tells of a flood of do-it-yourself books on the market, with the latest being from a University of Tennessee professor, Dr. Clyde Crobaugh, titled Abusive Words or How To Cuss Effectively. In it, he pointed out that there were only 17 basic words of profanity, but that a thorough examination of the English language produced some 800 words of insult, which he had duly set forth.
It recommends the book for the
coming political campaign, to afford embellishment to ordinary cuss
words, such as calling the opponent an "esurient
slubberdegullion", meaning a greedy wretch, or
"higgledy-piggledy jobsterhead", a confused numbskull
It suggests that if the reader had trouble with the bridge partner who consistently trumped aces, one could coolly call him a "knuckle-headed muckworm", meaning a low person who wasn't very bright. Or one could call a neighbor an "absonant curmudgeon", a nasty, unreasonable man.
"Ah, the power of words—especially abusive words."
How about, for the average
Trumpster
Drew Pearson provides a list of the scandals within the administration of Illinois Governor William Stratton, a Republican, whom the President had lauded recently, saying: "I like a man who, when anything goes wrong in government, cleans up fast. That is the way Governor Stratton works." The remarks had caused consternation among some of the President's friends in Illinois.
The scandals had included the theft of 1.5 million dollars by Republican State auditor Orville Hodge, which had come to light by the investigation of the Chicago Daily News, a Republican newspaper, despite it having been easily detectable by the Governor, as his finance director was supposed to obtain an accounting of the State funds every three months, as done under the administration of Adlai Stevenson. The State Treasurer, Warren Wright, who had also not found the 1.5 million, had received a $12,000 trailer, a new Buick convertible to pull it, a jeep and about $25,000 for expenses, out of the proceeds of $57,000 raised at a $50 per plate dinner by bankers who wanted State funds. Governor Stratton had purchased a rundown farm north of Springfield and then used State tractors and equipment to improve it, making it one of the best farms in the area. Three top school officials in the state had been charged with defrauding the State regarding a school lunch contract. The Governor had not acted fast to investigate or clean up corruption pertaining to toll roads. A Senate investigator's report, which would shortly be made public, indicated that a law firm in Chicago had raised $250,000 for the 1952 campaign of Governor Stratton, after which the brother of the head of the law firm had been appointed the insurance commissioner by the Governor.
Walter Lippmann tells of the political situation having changed since early August before the party conventions, when no correspondent or political professional would have predicted anything but re-election of the President, short of another serious illness. But now, with the rejuvenated Democratic Party emerging out of the convention, no longer under the shadow of former President Truman but controlled by a new generation, that of Adlai Stevenson, the party was rejuvenated in a way it had not been since the days of FDR.
The old factional issues involving civil rights and labor had died down, with the North and the South having a new generation, as also had labor and management. Mr. Stevenson could thus go into a Southern state and take an unequivocal stand on the school desegregation issue and not produce an irreconcilable quarrel within the party.
Young and vigorous men
There was little evidence of a corresponding revival in the Republican Party. The President had spoken sincerely in his acceptance speech at the convention of the hope that he might be the leader of such a revival, calling on a new generation to form behind him in making the party anew. But there was no evidence that such a rally was taking place. The prime exponent of any such movement would be Vice-President Nixon, young and the heir apparent to the President. But nobody suggested that he would or could or even wished to remake the party into Eisenhower's new Republican Party. It lacked vigor because the new generation had not yet attained control of the party. While the President could advise and inspire the new generation, he could not lead it, as that would have to be done by members of the new generation.
Pepsi drinkers. Yeah, Pepsi...
Robert C. Ruark, in London, says that he could not remember whether in Ocala or Lakeland, Fla., possibly in 1939, the Washington Senators had been playing the Kansas City team and Washington manager Clark Griffith had driven him to the stadium. Mr. Griffith stopped talking about the new Cubans on the club, who had to be smuggled into the country as they were too dark to live in Washington, the ones which Mr. Griffith had collected for the club not, even optimistically, to be called ballplayers. He griped about the Yankees getting Phil Rizzuto and Gerry Priddy to play the best midfield positions since Honus Wagner. Now, Mr. Rizzuto was the elder statesman of the infielders and off the active roster.
He says that he now could care less who won the 1956 World Series because the last of his personal identification was gone. Mr. Rizzuto had been with the Yankees for 16 years, playing in 52 Series games, more than any player in history, under five managers and through a number shakeups on the roster.
Mr. Priddy had left early and Joe Gordon became Mr. Rizzuto's assistant. The latter could hit what usually would be a triple inside the park and turn it into a home run. No one one he knew could lay down a bunt more purposefully behind a runner. He hit home runs when his batting average would have normally sent him back to the farm clubs.
He finds the Yankees to have been a cold organization and that George Weiss did not indulge sentiment, which was why the club won most of its games. But it seemed to Mr. Ruark that some exception could have been made on the terms of release of Mr. Rizzuto to allow him to finish neatly, if only out of deference to the elder fans.
He would go on to announcing for the Yankees, starting the following season, in competition with Dizzy Dean and Peewee Reese.
A letter writer finds the Citizens for Douglas Committee, referring to Ben Douglas, Congressional candidate running against incumbent Congressman Charles Jonas, to be suggestive of trying to throw off the Democratic Party label. He says that none of the Citizens for Douglas were known to be Republicans and were not Socialists, and so he deduces that they had to be Democrats, thus wonders why the committee had been formed. He says that Congressman Jonas had never asked any of the constituents in the district their politics and considered doing services for each constituent to be a part of the business of government, concluding that Mr. Douglas apparently felt the same way.
A letter writer wonders how many children appreciated the burdens of their parents, with the only way to prove it being to be good to one's mother and father, for when they were gone, one's best friends were gone. She knew for she had lost her parents.
A letter writer from Mooresville finds that there was no question that the President appeared to want to be a friend to everyone, but considers the record to show otherwise. Only by a stiff compromise had the age limit on Social Security been reduced for women to 62, after it had originally been proposed to be reduced to age 60, the lower of which the letter writer finds appropriate, as women had worked alongside their husbands and borne the children under a double burden. The President had stubbornly continued with Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson, despite the farmers clearly not wanting him, with the President and the Secretary attempting to cajole the farmers into complacency. The writer recommends that readers pick up a book by Arthur Larson, an underling in the Department of Labor, titled A Republican Looks at His Party, which the writer thinks would not go down as a great book. He says that if the Republicans were to win in November, Richard Nixon would be the next president, and that he was "as reactionary, and old guardist, as obstructionist as any of the old line Republicans, Harding, Coolidge and Hoover, dared to be. See who he represents."
A letter writer compliments an article appearing September 27 by reporter Jim Scotton regarding underpaid police officers. He says he that knew a man with two sons whom he had encouraged throughout their youth to join the police or fire departments of their hometown so that their income would be steady throughout boom and depression years, had also influenced his only daughter to marry a fireman for the same reason. Everything had gone as planned, and after more than ten years of service, his sons and son-in-law now had seniority in their respective departments and had steady pay and security while others doing other jobs made two or three times as much money, as there had not been a recent depression. He finds the article to have brought further light to the subject by pointing out that a substantial percentage of the fines paid by people who broke the law went to various funds and associations benefiting police officers and their survivors. He finds it to be biting the hand that fed them when they attempted to stamp out crime and suggests that it would be better if their pay were satisfactory so that they could buy insurance for their disabilities or survivors and let the fines go to providing for better jails for the lawbreakers who could not pay the fines.
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