The Charlotte News
Saturday, June 30, 1956
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Berlin that Western travelers had said this date that scattered fighting between armed workers and Polish troops continued in Poznan, Poland, where rioting had broken out two nights earlier, resulting in numerous deaths and injuries. Three Western businessmen who arrived in Berlin from the Polish industrial city during the morning had said that rifle and machinegun fire, and occasional bursts from antiaircraft guns, had sounded throughout the city during the night, indicating that isolated groups of armed workers were still battling with troops backed by tanks and jet planes, despite the Communist Government in Poland having claimed the previous day that the revolt had been crushed and order restored. The travelers said that they had heard reports that the workers had offered a cease-fire on condition that all persons arrested in the revolt would be released and all troops withdrawn from the city. The businessmen said that they and other foreigners leaving Poznan were taken to the railway station under police escort. They also said that food was running short and hotels had been ordered to conserve water, that candles were being issued to guests in case of a power failure.
The Senate passed the previous night a 4.56 billion dollar foreign aid authorization bill by a vote of 54 to 25, pleasing to the President, but his foreign aid program still faced a series of tough Congressional hurdles, needing compromise with the House bill, which had authorized a lower amount, and then facing battles over actual appropriations. The Senate had added 60 million dollars for two special programs to that which had been recommended by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, but was still about 340 million below what the President had requested.
In Moscow, the Soviet Government this date published the will of V. I. Lenin, in which he had called for the expulsion of Joseph Stalin as Secretary of the Communist Party, a will which had been suppressed for 33 years. The will had described Stalin as rude, rough-mannered and capricious, indicating that he could not be trusted with a position as responsible as that of Secretary of the party. The publication of the will was the latest step in the official process of degrading Stalin before the Russian people, and was the most authoritative condemnation yet published in the Soviet Union, given the reverence for Lenin.
In New York, negotiators had met for three hours this date and reported no change in the deadlocked effort to avert an industry-wide strike by 650,000 United Steel Workers, whose contract would expire at midnight this night. Negotiators said they would meet again in the late afternoon. The steel companies had insisted on a five-year agreement to succeed the present two-year contract and the union said that it could not bind the steelworkers to such a lengthy contract, although having curtailed its demand to four years and four months.
In Cincinnati, O., a gasoline truck-trailer had overturned and exploded this date, setting fire to ten stores and residences, and destroying at least four parked cars, with one woman having died as she was being helped to safety from her burning home, apparently resulting from either a heart attack or shock. Approximately 50 people were routed from their homes as burning gasoline sprayed over the buildings.
In Miami Beach, Fla., Charlotte businessman John Stickley was elected president of Lions International this date, as covered more extensively in an editorial below.
Dick Young, Jr., of The News reports that the surplus of the Park & Recreation Commission had turned out to be the most baffling statistical mystery which had ever plagued City Hall, with estimates of the surplus having ranged from $750,000, an estimate made by a "sensation-seeking reporter", to about $89,000, as supplied by the parks superintendent. The members of the Commission appeared quite confused, themselves, and would attend the public meeting on Tuesday morning in an effort to sort things out. We can't wait. We may have to look ahead.
Waldo Proffitt of The News reports on the same issue, trying to figure out where the Commission got all of its surplus money.
Charles Kuralt of The News reports that public controversy was nothing new for the Commission, as the current issue was one of a series of postwar Commission fights. In 1948, the Latta Park Center, then unbuilt, had been the center of controversy, when the Commission proposed to build it along with five or six other buildings, utilizing money from a million dollar bond issue, prompting nearby property owners to object on the basis that the center would produce noise and turn the quiet park into an eyesore. But the Commission had gone ahead with the plans and the center had been built. In the same year, the superintendent of the parks had resigned to become vice-president of American Trust Co. and was replaced by a man from Texas who had resigned in 1953, lashing out privately at what he believed was the park board's confusion of policy-making with administration.
In White Plains,
N.Y., Marilyn Monroe and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Arthur
Miller were married quietly in a five-minute civil ceremony at City
Hall the previous night. Afterward, they had returned to Mr. Miller's
country home at Roxbury, Conn., and would remain there until going to
England the following month for their honeymoon, provided Mr. Miller
could obtain his passport, blocked by the State Department on the
grounds of his prior associations with Communist front organizations,
a subject on which he had recently testified pursuant to subpoena before
HUAC. A few hours before the ceremony
Elvis
On the editorial page, "Parks Surplus and the Soap Opera" compares the story of the park board surplus to a soap opera, with a new installment every day featuring worried officials, fluctuating bank balances, suggestions of secret operations, and other such matters.
It started when City Manager Henry Yancey had told the City Council that the Park & Recreation Commission had a large surplus which would justify a two-cent cut in the Commission's tax rate, to which the Council agreed. At that point, the superintendent of the Commission sought to show that the surplus was not really hidden but was merely a normal contingency fund, and was not that large. Meanwhile, several Commission members admitted that it was large but said its existence had been concealed from them.
The piece finds it confusion with suspicion developing of financial mishandling, though no evidence had thus far been produced to show any criminal wrongdoing and eschews premature speculation on that point. But the furor had shown glaring inadequacies in the park board, as several of its members did not know what was going on and the superintendent had failed to prove his point that the surplus was merely a contingency fund for the poor revenue-producing summer months.
It urges that a plain English explanation from the chairman of the board issue to allay all of the concern.
"Charlotte's Ambassador to the World" finds the stalest news item in the newspaper this date to be that Charlotte's John Stickley had become president of Lions International, as everyone had known that it would happen from reports issuing through the week from Miami. The textile executive had become Charlotte's first ambassador to the world in the process. Wherever he would travel for the Lions, he would be a representative of Charlotte as well as of the organization which had honored him. It finds Charlotte as fortunate as the Lions to have him as their representative, as he was an outstanding citizen who had contributed generously of his talents to the betterment of the community.
The principles to which Mr. Stickley and his fellow Lions adhered included creating and fostering a generous spirit of consideration among the people of the world, promoting social and moral welfare of communities, and encouraging efficiency and high ethical standards in business and professions. Basic to those principles was the need for friendship among individuals and among nations. Mr. Stickley had risen to high honor because he was a past master at the art of friendship, and would make new friends for the Lions and for Charlotte.
"Soviet Sorcery Still Packs a Wallop" indicates that the riots in Communist Poland offered the free world tangible evidence of what had been called "critical malcontent" in the Soviet camp, finding the disorders to have brooding significance.
It recalls the June riots of 1953 in East Berlin, having begun as an industrial action but leading to angry demands for the resignation of the Soviet-backed Government, having had a profound effect on the Kremlin leadership and the conduct of Soviet foreign policy. Two weeks later, L. P. Beria was removed and multiple conflicts in the Soviet leadership were brought to a head in the immediate aftermath of the death of Stalin in March. Order had been restored in East Germany only after a declaration of martial law and a display of Soviet armed force. It had been the first time that the U.S.S.R. had been compelled to use public force to break up a working-class revolt. Consequently, the East German Government lost face in the eyes of the German people, and to bolster the regime, the Kremlin had been compelled to cancel East Germany's reparations payments and make other economic concessions. It also stepped up efforts to consolidate their influence over all of Eastern Europe, China and North Korea.
But the hopes of the West that discontent was widespread and would erupt in other parts of the Soviet empire were soon dashed. The same hopes were now being voiced, but despite the violence in Poznan and the commentary of the Soviet leaders around the globe, the optimism was possibly being blown up and distorted out of all reason. The Communist regime was backed by naked force and fanatical zeal, having total disregard for "bourgeois-democratic" scruples regarding legality, human decency, honesty and the like. The free world was up against the toughness and persistence of a "satanic" foe. It was likely that the remedy to set things right again would give new impetus to the Communist conspiracy, but the West could only hope while not being deceived by the odds against it.
"The Labels" indicates that Southerners, unwilling to buy any presidential candidate who did not hail from the South, had longingly waited for a boon for Senator Lyndon Johnson of Texas, finding Adlai Stevenson too liberal. Yet, Fortune magazine, the business bible, said that Mr. Stevenson's economic philosophy was several yards to the right of Senator Johnson's. It concludes that the moral was to look before one labeled.
A piece from the Baltimore Evening Sun, titled "Money Makers", indicates that Samuel Johnson, George Bernard Shaw and the late Michael Arlen had nothing in common as writers except two things, that they had all used the English language and all believed money was both desirable and important.
Dr. Johnson had said: "There are few ways a man can be more innocently employed than in getting money. No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money." Mr. Shaw, who had left an estate of between $600,000 and a million dollars, had once written: "Money is indeed the most important thing in the world; and all sound and successful personal and national morality should have this fact for its basis." Mr. Arlen, who had recently died, had said, according to the accounts of his life, that he had set himself up early in life to become financially independent by the time he reached age 30, and that thanks to The Green Hat, he had accomplished that goal and thereafter quietly enjoyed the results of the achievement. Among writers, he had been exceptional in that respect.
Dr. Johnson had never gained full economic independence, and many writers who had earned large sums, such as Sir Walter Scott, Thomas Macauley, Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo, and Honore de Balzac, among others, had never really become rich, although some had lived accordingly. In his study of the American writer in The Literary Situation, Malcolm Cowley had estimated that of the 15,000 "professional" writers in the 1950 census, less than 200 earned their living by writing hardcover books. Earning a living meant scraping along more often than having financial independence, and even those who had deliberately set their sights on making money, as had Mr. Arlen, rarely did so well. "The pen remains a fragile and inadequate instrument with which to dig for gold."
Drew Pearson indicates that a scandal had developed in the Government-owned nickel plant at Nicaro, Cuba, where the manager had bought a Cadillac with Government funds and the paymaster had obtained more than $10,000 with the help of his family. The plant had been built by the Government to supply nickel during World War II and was now being operated for the Government by the Nickel Processing Corp., a subsidiary of National Lead. When the column had asked National Lead in New York about the operations of the two employees, they had no comment, suggesting that they call back, which was done four different times, still with no comment.
Franklin Floete, the new administrator of the General Services Administration, charged with operating Government property, was refreshingly frank, having said that his agency had detected shortages in May and promptly sent a letter to the Nickel Processing Corp. on May 29 asking that the matter be cleaned up. There had been subsequent discussions with the company about the two employees and the GSA had forwarded the entire matter to the Justice Department for possible criminal prosecution. The man who had received the $10,000 had returned $8,000, while the other man was paying the Government on the installment plan, with still about $1,500 remaining.
Senator William Langer of North Dakota had entered the Senate restaurant recently, toured the tables shaking hands with fellow Senators and announced his candidacy for the presidency on the Republican ticket, asking for their support, adding that he had an unbeatable platform, that he was older than the President, was sicker than the President, and needed the rest more than he did.
Jonathan Wainwright V, son of the hero of Corregidor during World War II, had been blocked from heading the Kings Point Merchant Marine Academy by his cousin, Republican Congressman Stuyvesant Wainwright. The irony was that the latter had been elected to Congress largely on the basis of the famous name of General Jonathan Wainwright, who had defended Corregidor until the Japanese had overwhelmed it at the outbreak of the war.
Doris Fleeson, in Atlantic City at the Governors Conference, which had just concluded, indicates that national politics was in a transitional phase as the old landmarks were gone. Former New York Governor Thomas Dewey, who had once dominated Republicans for his ability and the sense that he might one day become President, was back in private life practicing law. Benign former California Governor Earl Warren, who had combined charm and practicality, was Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Former South Carolina Governor James Byrnes, who had turned against the New Deal after helping to establish it, had stepped down only the previous year.
Other somewhat lesser lights were on the way out. Massachusetts Governor Christian Herter would retire the following year, and Texas Governor Allan Shivers, vanquished by the combination of Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson and House Speaker Sam Rayburn, had conducted a press conference which was only a dull affair. He would not be a delegate to the Democratic convention in August. Governor Frank Lausche of Ohio, running for the Senate to succeed incumbent Republican Senator George Bender, appeared somewhat old hat in his "pixy act".
Meanwhile, the national press focused on new faces, emblematic of the dependency of the Republicans on the President. Few Republicans were seriously considered to be future presidential timber while many Democrats got favorable mention. Governor Goodwin Knight of California was precluded by age from running since the 1956 process was closed. Illinois Governor William Stratton was capably managing a large state but had never caught on nationally. Governors Fred Hall of Kansas and Robert Smylie of Idaho had made new friends, but were from what Jim Farley had called "typical small prairie states". Reporters agreed that Governors Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut, Robert Meyner of New Jersey, Luther Hodges of North Carolina, Edmund Muskie of Maine and Orval Faubus of Arkansas were rapidly making their way toward the front of the Democratic Party. (Governor Faubus would stumble and fall nationally during the Little Rock school desegregation crisis of the fall of 1957.)
The President was expected by the professional politicians to run again and was favored to win, and yet there was remaining uneasiness among Republicans about his health and Vice-President Nixon's unpopularity with Democrats and independents. They had shuddered when Governor Hodges, a stable, forthright man, albeit a Democrat, had calmly said of Mr. Nixon that he was untrustworthy, a damning indictment in politics which had cost Vice-President Henry Wallace a repeat position on the ticket with FDR in 1944, in favor of Senator Truman.
Governor Ribicoff had been especially impressive, showing sound political sense and complete honesty. Governor Meyner managed being both host of the conference and a presidential possibility with great skill and country-boy charm. Governor A. B. "Happy" Chandler of Kentucky handled a cynical press conference arranged to scoff at his presidential aspirations, still scoffing at its conclusion but laughing with him. He had shown genuine dignity at several tense moments, as when he had spoken of being at Harvard, when a female reporter had blurted out, "What were you doing at Harvard?" He had answered that he had gone to school there, just like the reporter's daughter had gone to Vassar. When he had concluded philosophically that it was his last chance for the national ticket but that if he lost, he would return home content, there was applause and regret for his fine talent having largely been wasted.
For the most part, reporters liked and respected governors, even if they believed that Minnesota Governor G. Mennen Williams was naïve, Washington Governor Arthur Langlie, pedestrian, and New York Governor Averell Harriman over-eager. But they knew it was no mean feat to be elected as a governor and run a state well, so saluted those who did.
Robert C. Ruark, in Palamos, Spain, states that he had never liked Matt Connelly, the former appointments secretary to President Truman, either as a man or as an official, and Mr. Connelly had not cared much for Mr. Ruark, but nevertheless believes that he had gotten a bum rap with his conviction for conspiracy to defraud the government based on allegedly having taken bribes to fix a tax case. Also convicted in the case was Lamar Caudle, the former head of the tax division of the Justice Department. The man accused of tax evasion had pleaded guilty but escaped prison time because of illness. Mr. Ruark points out that Frank Costello was also sick and the issue was the same.
He indicates that President Truman had succumbed to his allegiance to the Pendergast machine of Kansas City in appointing political buddies, placing more value on political friendship than had even President Roosevelt, who had appointed Henry Morgenthau to be Secretary of the Treasury because he had been a close neighbor of FDR.
He found that there had been a genial air of laissez-faire around the White House during the Truman Administration, which had not occurred since the Harding Administration, rife with scandal and corruption. He found raffishness about the executive branch which one expected in poolrooms and horse parlors, but not in the halls of state. John Maragon had been peddling influence and military liaison General Harry Vaughan had been good at whatever he had done, though no one could figure what it was.
He believed that Mr. Connelly and Mr. Caudle should not have been convicted, that instead they should have merely been forbidden from ever working for the Government again.
He says that he had written a piece during the Truman Administration around the time that the President was "shooting off his mouth" during the 1952 campaign, prompting him to comment that he respected the office but saw no reason to respect the man who held it or the people around him, says that his views had not changed since that time, but he still could not see why Mr. Connelly should be jailed for up to five years "without giving him others in the Truman entourage as cellmates."
A letter writer tells of there being two distinguished governors from the South at the Governors Conference, Governor Hodges of North Carolina and Governor John Bell Timmerman, Jr., of South Carolina. He opines that the latter was the better of the two for having a better "Democrat principle" than Governor Hodges. He finds Governor Timmerman to be abiding by the principles and the law on which the Southern states were founded—meaning regarding segregation, though he does not use the term. He hopes that the South would adopt Governor Timmerman's advice to leave the delegations uninstructed at the national convention so that they could support a candidate of their choice.
A letter writer from Rockingam responds to a letter concerning faith which he wants to dispute, finding that the previous writer's description of it as "blind and superstitious faith in gods" to be misled, as Christians believed in only one God. He also believes that no Christian would counsel a blind and unreasoning faith, but rather would recommend open-minded and reasonable approaches, taking the known facts of religion, weighing them and following them sincerely and thus experience personally the faith which had sustained many thousands of people through many troubled times. He indicates that Christianity did not urge ignorance or refusal of the truths of science and philosophy, but favored applying those truths to the existing problems of the world. Christians did not overlook problems in the world and did not believe that creation was perfect or that things would become perfect by themselves. Nor did Christians recite cant and say prayers to lull themselves into a personal state of bliss, being personally interested in the problems of others and willing to help where possible. He suggests that true faith was neither blind nor unreasoning and was not the product of superstition but an acknowledgment that man had need for more than self and that the need could be supplied only through God and more specifically through faith in Jesus.
A letter writer responds to the same previous letter writer, suggesting that the prior writer believed that his creed of atheism was a momentous discovery of truth when it was as old as religion itself. He says Christianity had endured for centuries and would continue to do so and wants to know what contribution the previous writer had made in combating the imperfections of the world of which he had written.
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