The Charlotte News
Tuesday, February 14, 1956
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Moscow that Communist Party Secretary Nikita Khrushchev, speaking before cheering delegates at the 20th Congress of the Soviet Communist Party in the Kremlin, had said this date that "there are only two roads, peaceful coexistence or war", declaring that the Communist bloc was presently invincible and that the Western position was weakening while the Soviet Union and other Communist nations were growing stronger. He had added that war was not inevitable. It was the first such gathering since the death of Joseph Stalin in March, 1953. He put forward a five-point foreign policy, including improvement of relations with the U.S., Britain and France, maintenance of the "defense potential of the Soviet Union" and ensuring that Russia did not lag behind the Western powers in armaments. He stated that "the principal feature of our epoch is the emergence of socialism from the confines of one country and its transformation into a world system," that "capitalism has proved impotent to hinder this world historic process. The simultaneous existence of two opposed world economic systems of capitalism and socialism, developing according to different laws in the opposite direction has become an irrefutable fact." He stated that violent revolution was not necessary to bring about a socialist state, that the five principles of Soviet foreign policy were respect for coexistence, strengthened relations with the Soviet satellites, strengthened friendly relations with India, Burma, Afghanistan and countries not belonging to "aggressive military blocs", to work for better relations with the U.S., Britain and France in all fields, especially economic, technical and cultural, to remain vigilant while there were still people who wished "to threaten peaceful coexistence" and to maintain the defense potential of the Soviet Union. He had also paid tribute to Stalin, the first mention of him in connection with the opening of the party meeting since his death.
Eight members of the House, all Democrats, asked the President this date to declare that he would not allocate Federal funds to any public school system maintaining segregation, stating that such a declaration would make it unnecessary to propose an anti-segregation amendment to the bill to provide 1.6 billion dollars in Federal construction funds to aid the states in relieving overcrowded public schools, a bill presently awaiting clearance by the House Rules Committee. The letter said that there was good reason to believe that the bill, with the segregation rider, would either be defeated in the House or filibustered to death in the Senate. It said that Representative Adam Clayton Powell of New York, who had proposed the anti-segregation amendment, would not offer it if the President made a declaration along the lines they were suggesting. The letter suggested that where there was doubt in the President's mind as to whether a particular school system was compliant with the Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education, he would direct the Attorney General to submit the matter for a declaratory judgment or some similar procedure by the appropriate Federal district court. The story does not identify the eight House Democrats who submitted the letter.
Dr. Paul White, the heart specialist who had consulted on the President's condition since his September 24 heart attack, and five other physicians consulted at the White House this date, preparatory to providing the President with a "more or less final" report on how his heart was standing up under the burdens of his office. The consultations dealt first with analysis of the new medical tests which the President had undergone the prior Saturday at Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, and the White House said that there was a possibility the physicians might confer with the President briefly, in advance of giving him their report. What if they deliver the report in a small box formed to resemble a casket?
A Federal grand jury this date had begun an inquiry into the $2,500 campaign contribution which had been rejected by Senator Francis Case of South Dakota during the Senate debate on the bill to deregulate natural gas. Three witnesses were set to appear before the grand jury, indicating that they were prepared to answer all questions and had nothing to conceal, one of whom had been the Nebraska lawyer who had left the contribution, another also being an attorney for the same company, Superior Oil of California, and the third, a sheriff who had accompanied the man who left the contribution. The special four-man Senate committee, which had held a public hearing on the matter, had heard testimony the previous day, its last of two days of hearings, that the contribution had come from personal funds of Howard Keck, president of Superior Oil.
In Winston-Salem, a fire, shooting flames some 150 feet into the air, had blazed through a furniture factory this date, taking at least one life. The B. F. Huntley Furniture Co., extending over a full city block, apparently had been a total loss. All available equipment from the Winston-Salem Fire Department and fire companies from Greensboro and High Point had fought the blaze, which was discovered in the early morning hours. The man who had died in the fire was an employee of the company, with speculation being that he had fallen or had been overcome by smoke and flames, in an effort to reach safety. The outside walls of one building had collapsed and police and firemen had pushed back crowds of spectators to points of safety. The company had been organized in 1900 as the Oakland Furniture Co. and was one of the older furniture manufacturers in the Winston-Salem area, having about 500 workers, making both bedroom and dining room furniture. In 1952, it had an authorized capitalization of 1.5 million dollars worth of common stock and its total production was about seven million dollars per year, with an annual payroll of over a million dollars.
In Davidson, near Charlotte, almost two million dollars reportedly would be needed for improvement of the physical plant and endowment of Davidson College, if the college increased its enrollment ceiling from 850 to 1,000, as the trustees of the College were set to consider increased enrollment in their semi-annual meeting the following day. During the afternoon, the 15-man executive committee of the trustees was to receive the report of College president John Cunningham and an additional report of the committee on population trends, the latter having made a study during the previous two years, recommending that the College gradually increase enrollment to a maximum of 1,000 students, but only after certain current goals were reached. The College had opened the current school year with an enrollment of 863, a slight increase over previous years and the highest enrollment, other than postwar, in its history. Forecasts that college enrollments generally would at least double by 1970, coupled with the responsibility of Davidson in education, formed the basis for the projected enrollment increase. The ceiling was determined by a study of Presbyterian institutions within the state, made in 1955, the survey setting that size as the maximum which could be handled by the extant physical plant of the College without major additions. The population trends committee had estimated that nearly two million dollars would be needed for plant and endowment to achieve that size, in addition to funds necessary for other improvements.
Donald MacDonald of The News reports that the two arrested juveniles who had allegedly wrecked Harding High School, the Latta Park Recreation Center, Harris Supermarket, two local restaurants and a laundry, had been convicted on misdemeanor charges of damage to property in City Recorder's Court this date and each sentenced to three years on the roads. The two defendants, arrested the prior Sunday, would still face six additional felony charges of storebreaking and larceny in Superior Court. The judge in the case called their actions "deliberate, mean, contemptible and the most ridiculous I have ever heard of." He sentenced each youth to six months on the roads on each of six counts of damage to property, with all of the sentences to run consecutively. One of the youths had admitted his participation in each of the break-ins, but the other had denied participation in all of them except the vandalism at Latta Park. The latter youth was also charged with carrying a concealed weapon, after police had found a hawkbill knife in his possession at the time of his arrest. The court also found him guilty on that charge and sentenced him to an additional 12 months on the roads, suspended on condition of payment of $100 in fines plus court costs. On the other 12 cases of storebreaking and larceny, a $5,000 bond was set for each youth. Damage estimates at the six locations reached a total of $1,350. The youth who admitted participation in all of the break-ins, had testified that the other youth had been with him on each such occasion. Clothing had been taken from a laundry which had been entered, and a police sergeant testified that both of the youths had been wearing the stolen clothing when they were arrested. In addition, police had found phonograph records with the labels of the Latta Park Center on them and an electric razor, stolen from the Harris Supermarket, inside the room of the youth who claimed only to have participated in the Latta Park break-in.
We still wish to know about all the candy strewn about on the floors. Such an act implies some deep-seated psychological hostility toward candy and sweetness, which we believe might prove the key to the case.
Charles Kuralt of The News tells of the recall election taking place on the UNC campus this date regarding the student editors of the Daily Tar Heel, the student newspaper, which had resulted from fraternity and sorority members resenting the efforts of the newspaper to crack their secret Inter-Fraternity and Panhellenic Council meetings by sending a reporter to them, as well as the editors' criticism of the hiring of Jim Tatum as the UNC football coach, plus their statements regarding a number of student politicians whom they had characterized as "do-nothings" and a "megaphonic minority". The two editors, Edwin Yoder and Louis Kraar, were being contested by a senior who charged them with "pulverizing student opinion" in their editorial columns. Another student had started the petition for recall, apparently supported by most of the fraternity and sorority members, as well as students angry about the criticism of coach Tatum and the student politicians. A non-partisan committee of students had come to the defense of the editors and had spent the previous week campaigning through the campus dormitories for the editors' right to say what they pleased in the newspaper. Most of the letters to the paper since the recall had begun had taken the form of the maxim of Voltaire, disagreement with what they said but defense of their right to say it. Professors and administration members had also entered the fray, with University chancellor Robert House and dean of student affairs Fred Weaver having indicated their hope that both editors would retain their jobs. The dean of the Journalism School, Norval Luxon, said this date that the recall election was a "dangerous precedent" and that it was impossible for the editors to represent the views of the majority of students in all cases, expressing the hope and belief that the student body would understand the issues involved well enough to vote against the recall by an overwhelming majority. Coach Tatum had also expressed the hope that the editors would remain. Mr. Kuralt, who had been the editor of the Daily Tar Heel the previous school year, indicates that students at the University traditionally made up their own minds on campus matters without tolerating interference from their elders, and that the present fight was no different. He reports that an enterprising student bookie of Cobb Dormitory was offering 4 to 1 odds for the opponent late the previous week, and had so many takers that he stopped taking bets before the opening of the polls during the current morning. The newspaper was completely student owned and operated, supported by advertising and student fees, without any faculty supervision or censorship. The student who had started the petition, a Charlotte native who had been president of his senior class and editor of his school newspaper and yearbook during his senior year in high school, said that the two editors were "not qualified to do their job as the students feel it should be done." Mr. Kraar, also from Charlotte, countered that "although many students disagree with Daily Tar Heel editorials, few will go along with this attempt to silence opposing views." He believed the whole issue was "whether traditional Carolina freedom is going to stand up under this assault." The originator of the petition, however, asserted that freedom had nothing to do with it. The issue had spread to the wire services, out-of-state newspapers and even Time magazine, among others. One alumnus from the class of 1925 had written to the newspaper from several hundred miles away, asking that someone telephone him after the ballots were counted, no matter the hour. Mr. Kraar stated that they had all learned something about editorial freedom during the controversy but that exactly what they had learned would be more clear after the votes were counted—which Mr. Kuralt indicates would probably not be before 10:00 this night. As indicated, the editors would be retained by a substantial majority, and both would go on to have distinguished careers in journalism. With the next election for the editors just around the corner in April or May, the whole thing seemed a bit wasteful of effort. It does suggest, however, why we do not elect, in the general population, editors of local newspapers or other editorializing media. Although, in the case of Fox News and its ilk, we might be tempted to make an exception. But then, they would all be subject to such an election and the demagogy against the demagogues and reaction to it would never end.
On the editorial page, "Charlotte: A Bad Noise in the Alleys" suggests that any community satisfaction coming from the arrests of the two youths on 25 counts of vandalism and burglary was premature, as arresting two persons would not arrest the general problem of delinquency in the community, though the police were to be commended for having made a start.
It suggests that the courts could help by dealing firmly with the youths if they were to be proven guilty. But it finds the real answer to lie beyond the police and the courts, being a concern of each individual in the community and of the community as a whole, suggests that the city take stock of what needed to be done to check the social illness, of which the conduct of the two accused youths had only been a symptom.
It indicates that the community was one of active churches, organized youth activities, and well-supported charities, with a mental health clinic and a fine school system which sought to instill the principles of good citizenship in students, all being to the good. But supportive organizations would not suffice either, as they did not touch the lives of all children, the piece suggesting that the first line of defense against antisocial conduct ought be in the home where examples of conduct were set, where the rule of law was either upheld or derided, where principles of responsibility and citizenship were instilled, or a "vacuum left for infection by uncontrolled forces outside the home."
It concludes that there was "a terrible noise in the alleys between these handsome edifices" of Charlotte, and that "the two boys in city jail weren't making all the racket."
"Playing Politics with the Race Issue" suggests that sensitive citizens, in both the North and the South, were deeply disturbed by the injection of the race issue into the Democratic Party's campaign on the West Coast, that the nation could not let excited politicians carry it to lower levels of thought and action without suffering moral danger. It suggests that for party leaders to exploit that emotional issue was irresponsible and selfish.
Some of the canniest political pundits were pointing out that the Democrats could win the Presidency in the current year with 16 Southern and border states, plus New York, California and Illinois or Ohio. The black vote in the four non-Southern states could be decisive in a close contest and Northern Democratic leaders were concerned about large-scale defections among black voters. In consequence, tremendous pressure had been placed on Adlai Stevenson to take a militant position against segregation.
He had recently been asked whether he would use Federal troops to enforce school integration, and had replied, which the piece finds to his credit, that he believed it would be a "great mistake", as it was what had brought on the Civil War and that desegregation could not be accomplished by troops or bayonets, but by proceeding "gradually, not upsetting habits or traditions that are older than the republic."
Nevertheless, many Northern Democrats believed Mr. Stevenson was carrying moderation to extremes, with New York Governor Averell Harriman, in particular, having actively pursued a get-tough policy designed to embarrass Mr. Stevenson and impress black voters. In California, Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver had been using the segregation issue to attract black votes away from Mr. Stevenson.
The piece wonders how party leaders believed they could win the black vote in such a manner and also keep the South solid behind it at the same time, but believes that, regardless, playing politics with the race issue was "reprehensible". It opines that segregation was a matter between the Southern states and the Federal courts and that no good would be served by fashioning it into a cheap political war cry. The mood of the South was already irritable, and reckless talk of "federal troops" and "compulsion" merely rubbed salt into the regional wounds. It suggests that such rhetoric might appeal to the votes of some, but would be an appeal to political immaturity and serve no genuinely useful purpose, while potentially doing lasting harm.
"Gas Lobby: Skirting the Tarbaby" finds that the Senate special committee, which had conducted a narrow investigation into the rejected gift from the oil company to Senator Francis Case of South Dakota, had succeeded too well. The larger question of the effect of an estimated 1.5 million dollar oil and gas lobby on the opinion of the public and the entire Senate was that which the special committee had avoided like "a fat tarbaby" and the one which had to be answered before the Senate could allay suspicions that the lobby's influence had impacted votes on the Senate floor regarding the recently passed bill to deregulate natural gas.
It finds that the integrity of both Senator Case and of Senator Thomas Hennings of Missouri, regarding the latter's eagerness to initiate an overall investigation, had been demonstrated, though the special committee had shoved aside Senator Hennings. Now that the special committee had finished its work, the Elections subcommittee, formerly headed by Senator Hennings until he had stepped aside because he was facing re-election, ought proceed quickly.
It urges that whether it was illegal or legal, the massive spending of money to influence legislation had gone too far and that the best remedy for the situation was a public examination by the Senate of those pressures. All of the Senators had to run their campaigns and neither Senator Case nor the newspaper was satisfied that the oil lobby had centered all of its affection on Senator Case.
"St. Valentine Is Our Favorite St." suggests that a visitor had accused the newspaper of spoofing Santa Claus, slandering spring, hooting at hobgoblins, lampooning leap year, jeering at jack-o'-lanterns, libeling leprechauns, fuming at fairies and belittling blue poodles, to which the editors had replied with indignant denial, as the visitor told them to go ahead and lampoon love on Valentine's Day.
It says that it would do no such thing, that there was a limit to viewing with alarm and a time to point with pride. "We love love; can't do without it; don't intend to." It endorses love wholeheartedly. "Love is that which there is no whicher."
"It is the sweet
A piece from the LaGrange (Ga.) News, titled "The Missing Bartender", says that a dependable bartender was respected by his regular patrons, that the customer asked for his favorite drink and received it in a precise recipe, suggesting that promoting that tradesman to the capacity of Chief Bartender in Democracy's Tavern and projecting his skill to satisfy international customers in political circles, might produce "an exquisite blend of diplomacy and military strategy", resulting in peace and prosperity in the world as one.
It laments, however: "There never was a bartender with such powerful skill. There never will be. Sad, sad."
Drew Pearson tells of the mounting pressure on the President to decide whether or not he would run again, as he was taking his final medical checkups, coming from three different groups, those at the White House who wanted to retain their jobs, the major Republican leaders in the Congress, such as House Minority Leader Joseph Martin and RNC chairman Leonard Hall, who could not see how the party would get along without the President at the top of the ticket, and the businessmen, such as General Lucius Clay, former commander of U.S. troops in Germany, Sidney Weinberg, head of the giant Wall Street firm, Goldman-Sachs, and former Governor Thomas Dewey, who believed that the President was essential to saving the peace and the U.S. economic way of life, plus their point of view regarding American business.
He next indicates that there was good reason why the President had withheld his second reply to Premier Nikolai Bulganin of the Soviet Union regarding the proposed U.S.-Soviet friendship pact, after the President had issued his first reply slapping it down, that being that he had discovered that he had fallen into a Soviet trap. Secretary of State Dulles, as usual, had acted without consulting his advisers, especially U.S. Ambassador to Russia Charles Bohlen, acting instead as if Senator McCarthy was "glowering over his shoulder." The Kremlin wanted more than anything else to show the U.S. as not wanting peace. Ambassador Bohlen had advised that the Russian people had come to believe the Kremlin's peace propaganda, such that they could not easily be stampeded into war. In the past, the Kremlin held the whip-hand in initiating war, as it had no Congress to consult or critical newspapers to worry about, or commentators to goad it, such that war could have been declared at the drop of a hat. But since the Kremlin's peace propaganda had taken hold, sudden action would be difficult. He posits that it was the reason for Premier Bulganin's friendship notes, to trap the U.S. into rebuffing Russia's amicable overtures so that the Kremlin could reverse itself and point to the U.S. as having spurned the peaceful tenders, claiming that the U.S. wanted war.
He says it was why U.S. allies, plus skilled U.S. diplomats, had wished that the President had not been so hasty in rebuffing the note of Mr. Bulganin, that if he had waited a day or two to consult with Prime Minister Anthony Eden, he could have let the latter share responsibility for his slap-down, or could have waited longer, appearing to give the matter more deliberation. That was why, Mr. Pearson suggests, he had waited longer to answer the second note of the Premier, which had been fired back so quickly at the President after the initial rebuff.
Joseph & Stewart Alsop find that the Administration's legislative program was a masterpiece of political strategy in an election year, brilliantly calculated to exploit the deep divisions within the Democratic Party, causing the Democrats, in control of both houses, to be paralyzed on a whole series of politically potent domestic issues, with one of the shrewdest observers in Congress having remarked: "The Republican candidate is going to have a dandy time denouncing 'that no-good, do-nothing, Democratic 84th Congress.'"
Regarding proposed school construction, the Democrats were prepared to exploit the emotionally charged issue by passing the Democratic school aid bill as almost the first order of business in the House, while the Administration had produced a bill of its own, preventing the Democrats from claiming the sole glory for helping schoolchildren. At the same time, Congressman Adam Clayton Powell of New York threatened to introduce his amendment to the bill to prevent Federal aid to school districts still practicing segregation. Republican House leaders Joseph Martin and Charles Halleck had passed the word to support the Powell amendment, thus almost assuring its passage, and, therefore, that it would be filibustered to death in the Senate, leaving the Republicans in a happy situation, able to claim credit for supporting the Powell amendment vis-à-vis black voters, while at the same time able to pin the blame for its non-passage on the Democrats. The Democratic leaders had kept the school bill off the floor of the House while they wrestled with that dilemma.
The same sort of paralysis impacted Democrats on other issues. The President had announced that he would ask Congress for legislation to establish a civil rights commission to inquire into racial discrimination, with Southern Senators making it clear that they would filibuster that modest proposal to death. Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, for example, had written to his constituents that he would speak against the issue while there was "breath in his body." Some Democrats believed that the Administration intended to produce more civil rights proposals to exploit further the North-South division in the party.
The President had also proposed broadening of coverage of the minimum wage, but many Southerners were opposed to that proposal and it was expected that it would also be killed off. The President had also recommended that provisions of the McCarran-Walter Immigration Act, an emotional issue among minority groups, should be re-examined, but it was quite unlikely that the Democratic leadership would even attempt such a revision. The President had proposed a modest health reinsurance scheme, which, along with proposed revision of Taft-Hartley, would also almost certainly be blocked.
They conclude, therefore, that it was easy to see why the Democrats were pressing the farm issue, as it was about the only issue they had on which they could achieve some unity. But even there, they might be disappointed, as the present expectation was that 90 percent of parity would be added to the Administration's farm program, with the help of Republican votes, with the belief growing that the President might sign such a bill on the grounds that it was, on balance, good legislation, despite the parity provisions. Thus, the key Democratic issue for the fall campaign could be undermined. Furthermore, if Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson resigned in protest of such a measure, as he had suggested he might, it would cause little pain to farm state Republican representatives.
The Democrats were convinced that the Administration would produce a vote-getting tax cut toward the end of the session during the summer, and the Democrats might also have a trick or two up their sleeves, but were in danger of being backed into a corner on many issues. It was clear that the Administration had "been putting on a remarkably sure-footed and sophisticated political performance, in sharp contrast to the clumsiness of the first couple of years."
Marquis Childs tells of relations between the U.S. and the uncommitted nations of Asia being at a low point, with the American position deteriorating steadily for a variety of reasons. At the same time, the challenge of Soviet Communism was being presented in a more insidious form than ever before, with the Soviets having adopted the technique of economic aid and penetration to neutral nations. They were offering, with none of the restraints imposed by the U.S. and public opinion, not only aid to Burma, India and Afghanistan but also to U.S. allies, Turkey and Pakistan, and in South America.
Mr. Childs suggests that the danger thus posed was as great as the Soviets assembling new armies bent on direct conquest. Nevertheless, the U.S. was facing that danger by continuing to be preoccupied with old quarrels of at least six years' duration, diverting time and energy from the central task of making the U.S. strong and resolute for world leadership.
The quarrels remained over who had "lost" China to the Communists and over who had been to blame for the Korean War, with that conflict arising anew in the bitter dispute between former President Truman and General MacArthur—as had been placed before the public in the Life magazine series of the former President's memoirs, with General MacArthur's response printed to accompany one segment.
It had been reported for more than a year that there was no challenging discussion within the State Department of the American stalemate in Asia, with the fact that Robert Bowie, a member of the Department's policy planning staff, had merely suggested the need to rethink the U.S. position on China having raised opposition to his confirmation as Assistant Secretary of State, that opposition having subsided as a result of his answers to questions put to him during a hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Regarding the dispute between former President Truman and General MacArthur, he suggests that a man of the General's stature might have rested on the dignity of his reputation and awaited the eventual verdict of history, with the publication of documents proving that he was right and the former President wrong, but his reply had been rife with the familiar insinuation of treason in high places, being so violent that it was bound to generate "more heat and even less light."
He indicates that the record showed that regarding the threat of Communist aggression in Asia, no one had been wholly right or wholly wrong, that in 1948 and 1949, as the Nationalists were being forced out of mainland China, there had been far too little understanding of what that meant to the U.S. He regards it as true, as General MacArthur had said, that the preoccupation had been with Western Europe, but that the General, in March, 1949, had been remarkably complacent about America's stature in Asia. In an authorized interview distributed by the United Press and printed in the New York Times on March 2, 1949, the General had drawn America's defense line in the Pacific, leaving out Formosa and Korea, which had since been shown to be vital to America's security. Formosa was Chiang Kai-shek's last bastion and was being defended at present with the help of U.S. fighter squadrons. The truce line of 1953 in South Korea was being held by Korean and U.S. forces, with some additional U.N. troops.
On January 12, 1950, then-Secretary of State Acheson had drawn a defense perimeter, during an extemporaneous speech at the National Press Club, which included the same territory as that circumscribed by General MacArthur, excluding Formosa and Korea, just six months before the attack in late June, 1950 by the Communists in Korea. Secretary Acheson had been repeatedly accused in the aftermath of inviting the Communists to take all of Korea by his limited defense perimeter. But, posits Mr. Childs, the statement previously by General MacArthur could have been considered an even more direct invitation to attack, as, at that time, the dispute between the General and the Truman Administration had not developed to the point that it was recognized that General MacArthur's public statements were made on his own hook and did not necessarily represent those of the Administration. The Communists could have therefore assumed that the General was expressing the policy of the Government when he set forth the same defense perimeter.
Mr. Childs indicates that to continue that quarrel was to compound the fearful damage which had already been done to U.S. relations, broadcasting divisions in the country to the world and spreading American weaknesses onto the record, at a point when time was rapidly running out. He equates it to the situation in May, 1940, when Britain's fate had hung in the balance, with Europe overrun by the Nazis, at which point a violent attack had developed in the House of Commons directed at those in power who had failed to keep England strong and ready, at which time Winston Churchill, about to replace Neville Chamberlain as Prime Minister, had warned: "If the present now engages in a quarrel with past, then surely the future will be lost."
A letter writer suggests that the way to achieve the educational ideal was first to realize that there was no royal road to learning, that one succeeded only as one individually strove, that second, a person had to realize that they could not succeed at the expense of others. He favors striving "without rancor, without bias, without accusation, without bitterness, without superiority or inferiority, each in his and her own individual determination to wrest from the vast unknown all that is knowable, the better to equip ourselves spiritually for the ennoblement of the eternal present NOW with which we are always confronted."
A letter writer expresses humility in acknowledging the sincere letters which readers of his letter of January 12 had written in response, many of which had been "most pathetic and heartrending". He had passed their plea for consideration to members of Congress, and hopes that the pleas would reach them and bear fruit. He hopes that others would also write him regarding the issue of lowering the age for eligibility for Social Security to 62 for both men and women and to 50 for the handicapped, as he had previously proposed, adding that his proposal included thorough examination by physicians of those who claimed to be handicapped.
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