The Charlotte News
Wednesday, June 12, 1957
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page
reports from Provincetown, Mass., that the Mayflower II,
reprising the Pilgrims' voyage to Plymouth in 1620, had come down the
last few miles into Provincetown harbor this date at the end of a
Coast Guard tug's towline, amid whipping seas and 40-knot gusts of
wind. It had been 53 days since the vessel had left Plymouth,
England, under the captaincy of world-famed sailing master, Alan
Villiers, crossing 5,000 meandering miles. The Pilgrims had
originally taken 66 days to cross on a more direct route, logging
about 3,000 miles. Comparisons had no application, however, as the
captain, an Australian, was a veteran of the last of the windjamming
races from Australia to England and thus was no stranger to long
voyages. He had deliberately taken a ship the long way around to take
advantage of wind and currents, of which the Pilgrims probably had no
knowledge. He followed a course far south of the original track so
that he could pick up trade winds, following them to the West Indies
and then into the northerly flowing Gulf Stream. Thousands of eager
spectators had lined the strand and sand dunes as the vessel rounded
Race Point, the tip of Cape Cod, on a fish-hook shaped approach to
the harbor. Its sails had been furled after the Coast Guard tug
passed it a hawser, resulting in the ship engaging in "preposterous
gyrations" without the steadying influence of its sails. The
captain said that he intended to remain in the harbor less than half
an hour as he intended to get to Plymouth
In Raleigh, the General Assembly ended its 1957 session this date during the morning, as many bills were still being typed and proof read in the enrolling office, preventing adjournment the previous day when work on legislation had actually completed.
In Gastonia, N.C., a 30-year old mother of five children had been shot at her home this date, and her husband, a 32-year old textile worker, was being held on an open charge pending the condition of his wife, which was described as serious. The sheriff said that the woman had told him that she and her husband had been arguing all morning, that her husband had left the home and returned with a borrowed rifle and shot her in the stomach. He had then called an ambulance and turned himself in. The couple's five-year old son told the sheriff that he had witnessed the shooting. The other four children had been away from home attending a vacation Bible school.
In Asheville, N.C., the McDowell County sheriff had concluded his testimony in his own behalf in Superior Court in his trial for murder of a man on the streets of Marion the prior January 28. During his testimony, at the request of the State, he had demonstrated with an empty pistol how he had shot the victim, claiming that he had killed him in self-defense, contending that the victim had returned from Alaska a few weeks earlier and had threatened his life, indicating that the man had reached for his pocket just before the sheriff shot him. He had been on the witness stand all of the previous day, and wound up testifying for seven hours through the current morning. He had been the first defense witness, with the clerk of the McDowell County Superior Court following his testimony, corroborating the events which had led up to the shooting.
In Shamokin, Pa., a call for fresh help had been issued this date as rescue workers continued digging through 50 tons of shale and rock which had trapped a miner 100 feet below the surface the previous morning, as hopes of finding the 19-year old former high school football player alive 28 hours after the accident had dimmed. An official of the Independent Miners Union, directing the search, said "anything can happen" and that the union refused to abandon hope for the rescue. They were planning to continue digging until they were able to get him out of the mine. Workers had been hampered during the current morning by heavy rain and they hoped to effect the rescue by the afternoon. The slide had occurred 40 feet down a shaft of an independent mine operated by the trapped boy's father. Rescue workers reported that at times, as much shale and loose earth was falling back into the shaft as they were able to take out. The trapped miner was believed underneath 30 to 50 tons of shale. He had failed to respond to the cry of a fellow worker seconds after the shale had collapsed. Rescue work was also delayed by the necessity of shoring up the walls of the shaft with timbers as debris was cleared. About 50 men, including many miners who had quit work to help, participated in the rescue effort. A state mine inspector was also on the scene.
In New York, bandleader Jimmy Dorsey, 53, had died this date of cancer. He was the brother of bandleader Tommy Dorsey, who had died the previous November. They had formed one of the best-known brother combinations in the popular music world. Jimmy Dorsey had undergone surgery in January for a lung tumor and two months later had left his band on the road to enter the hospital. The two brothers had come out of the hard-coal regions of Pennsylvania to become one of the most famous bands in America, noted for the music they had made both separately and together, also noted for the celebrated feuds which had driven them apart. They had buried the hatchet in 1943, and in 1953, had formed a band together after nearly 20 years on separate bandstands. Tommy had choked to death accidentally in his sleep on November 26, 1956, and Jimmy had carried on as bandleader. The latter had been an accomplished musician and a coal-mine worker before age 16.
News sportswriter Max
Muhleman, in the first of two articles on automobile racing and the
danger it posed to racing fans, indicates that auto racing fans had
exceeded baseball fans by more than 10 million the previous year in
the United States, proving that the boom in auto racing, which had
begun in 1954, was still going strong. There were more than a dozen
sanctioning organizations from Florida to California, which had
attracted 25 million fans, who "came to watch iron-nerved men
and sometimes women hurl every type of machine imaginable over
thimble-sized dirt tracks and sprawling road courses that would
dwarf a small town." In the process, the fans sometimes fell
victim to the race cars, occurring usually on the stock-car circuits,
but also occasionally in motorcycle races. "Because 90 percent of the
appeal of automobile racing lies in the danger element, people began
crowding closer and closer to the tracks, anxious for a close-up view
of any violence." It was little wonder, therefore, that fans
themselves had become involved in the violence. Nothing yet had
occurred to rival the carnage of the European open road races, where
dozens of spectators were sometimes killed in a single day, but the
incidents in the U.S. were mounting. Safety regulations had been
drawn up by the sanctioning bodies, such as NASCAR, but it was the
responsibility of the promoters to act on those regulations. Some of
the promoters did their best to abide by them while others were more
nonchalant and some were flagrantly neglectful. Penalties were
practically nonexistent in many cases. It finds that the major danger
lay in sheer spectator stupidity, with fans entering off-limits areas
after warnings had been posted. One prominent North Carolina promoter
had stated that it was like trying to herd cattle sometimes, that the
fans wanted to obtain the best seat possible, "even if it
literally kills them. You have to watch them every minute or they'll
be someplace they're not supposed to be." Often the design of
the track was at fault, with grandstand placement on turns where the
straightaway led directly toward the crowd, making them impossible to
render completely safe. Grand National point champion Buck Baker of
Charlotte said that there was nowhere on a track which was completely
safe, that he had seen doors fly off cars and sail a hundred feet or
more in the air, dropping behind safety fences and even crashing
through roofs. The biggest danger point for flying parts,
particularly loose wheels
On the editorial page, "The Teacher Pay Problem Will Continue" finds that the General Assembly had pleased no one by its compromise on teacher pay, finally permitting its disengagement from the issue. It had pleased no one who believed that the teaching profession was in steady decline in the state, but had done all that it could for the teachers consistent with sound fiscal policy, it having been a fiscal impossibility to remedy in a single session the neglect and parsimony of the past.
The final compromise measure guaranteed an average of a 15 percent increase and provided for annual bonuses to bring the average to 16.09 percent, provided state income would sufficiently exceed revenue forecasts, a compromise between the Senate version of the bill, which had provided for the 15 percent increase, and the House version, which had provided for the 16.09 percent increase. It finds that the House version had been unrealistic, however, because it was not associated with guaranteed revenue.
It suggests that the compromise measure had to be a start for the 1959 Assembly to be fully sensitive to the plight of the schools, as the 1957 session had been. To suggest that the current session had solved the problem would be to suggest that the conditions were resolved which had caused the loss of experienced teachers and the failure to attract new teachers, with recognition for the fact that teacher pay had risen in the state by only $100 since 1954 while the national average had risen by $700, while also remembering that almost half of the state's newly graduated teachers had gone to other states or other professions the previous year.
It concludes that the plight of the teachers and the larger problem of generally inadequate support for North Carolina schools could not be solved in one desperate effort to correct it. While the current session had accomplished a lot, it would be up to ensuing sessions to continue that effort.
"A New Industry Brings New Promise" indicates that after the General Assembly had delivered the tax program of Governor Luther Hodges to bring in new industries to the state, the Governor had announced the prior Monday that a 40 million dollar plant would be established at Wilmington as a direct result of the new tax program. It had been a fine first installment on a renaissance of industrial progress in the state. The new plant would produce titanium metal from native raw materials.
It indicates that the natural resources of the state were being used to build a brighter economic future. At Shelby, a 20 million dollar plant would soon be constructed to produce glass fiber from processing sand, and other firms were interested in the native ores which would be processed in the production at the Wilmington plant.
It finds that there was irony in the fact that instruments of the electronic age were being made from raw materials which previously had made little or no contribution to the state and its low economic status. No one deserved credit for the raw materials, but the Governor deserved a great deal of credit for his sustained attempts to sell industry on the advantages of locating in North Carolina to use those raw materials.
"'Disregard for Death' Carried Too Far" indicates that Ernest Hemingway had once described bullfighting as "a growing ecstasy of ordered, formal, passionate, increasing disregard for death."
It finds that fans of automobile racing might accept a similar definition of their own special mania, exposing themselves to actual personal danger in "their zeal to be a party to the splendid terror of a racing accident". The tragedy of racing became at times the tragedy of the spectator, as had been the case at Le Mans, France, in the summer of 1955, when a Mercedes-Benz race car had exploded into the crowd, killing 78 people. Carnage on a lesser scale was too frequently recorded at U.S. race tracks.
News sportswriter Max Muhleman had provided the first in a series of special articles on automobile racing this date, finding that laxity within the framework of regulation was a familiar condition. There were rules and regulations by sanctioning bodies such as NASCAR, but they were not uniformly enforced and the penalties were virtually nonexistent.
Mr. Muhleman had found that promoters had the responsibility to protect the spectators and sometimes adhered to that obligation conscientiously, but at other times did not. Most spectator mayhem was preventable and safeguards could be provided, regulations enforced, and the safety of the spectators ensured.
If nothing were done, such that spectators continued to be maimed and killed because of callous indifference by the promoters, then the public had an obligation to act through its governing bodies, as being well within the public interest given that automobile racing was a public spectacle, and if the promoters did not make it safe, the government would.
"Ike Was Always One for Candor" indicates that people had advised the newspaper that members of Congress had averaged only a little more than one commencement address apiece during the 1957 graduation exercises while governors had averaged about three apiece.
It suggests that the reason might be the President's lead in addressing the graduating class of Washington College in Chestertown, Md., saying: "I do want to tell the student body that no matter what they hear about Washington, D.C., I have two United States Senators and one Congressman here today with me to prove that we do need brains."
A piece from the Raleigh News &
Observer, titled "The Man and the River", suggests that
each spiritual hermit had his own river, "his in fee simple,
spiritually, and he sits beneath the shade tree watching the floating
poems go by. The river is all his and it delights him beyond reason.
And yet he can never get all of its varied and subtle music inside
his brain. He carries some of its previous essence home with him as a
stop for the future razors of discontent and uncertainty, but a
thousand of its uncatchable songs
He would never be recalled as Robert
Burns was with his Afton
Drew Pearson indicates that a lot of people had forgotten why commissions had been established in Washington, that it had been for the purpose of providing impartial judges between business and the public to protect the public from unreasonable rates by big business, false advertising, and monopolistic practices. They had not been set up to promote the profits of business, but rather to protect consumers.
Now, however, many commissioners appeared to believe that their job was just the reverse, that they had been appointed to promote profits of a dozen large companies, not to protect the pocketbooks of 160 million people. He cites as example Jerome Kuykendall, chairman of the Federal Power Commission, charged with protecting the public from paying too much for electrical power and natural gas. He was now up for confirmation by the Senate for another term after the President had reappointed him. The natural gas lobby and the large electric power companies were strongly behind him and most Senators were either too blasé, too lazy or too afraid of the major power companies to vote against him. But, despite his supposed neutrality, he had been protecting the profits of the large corporations.
He had made a tour of the Southwest, with expenses paid by the Texas Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association, an unprecedented tour. Members of the FPC had never taken trips previously at the expense of any utility, and consumers were not sufficiently organized to conduct such tours for FPC members to serve as a counter-balancing force, and in any event, FPC members were supposed to remain neutral from both sides. The chairman had also attended a cocktail party given in Mr. Kuykendall's honor by a member of the law firm Wheat, May & Shannon, which represented the West Coast Transmission Co., then applying for a certificate from the FPC. He had attended two dinners given by a lobbyist for Niagara Mohawk Power, Consolidated Edison, Delaware Power and Light, and a dozen others. He had gone to Chicago to attend the National Association of Railroad and Utility Executives dinner, with the Government paying his expenses, whereas in the past, members of the FPC had stayed away from such partisan meetings, and using taxpayer money for the purpose had never previously occurred. The chairman had waited two days after Congress had adjourned in 1955 to announce a decision to turn the much sought Hell's Canyon over to the Idaho Power Co. Senator Estes Kefauver had claimed that Mr. Kuykendall had deliberately deceived Congress when he implied shortly before Congress had adjourned that no action had been taken with regard to Hell's Canyon, despite it having been taken earlier but held up until after the adjournment. Senators had also claimed that Mr. Kuykendall had lied when he told the Joint Atomic Energy Committee that FPC attorneys had not reviewed the Dixon-Yates contract, and later his general counsel had said that it had been reviewed. Actually, two FPC attorneys had vigorously condemned the Dixon-Yates contract, which Mr. Pearson believes was the probable reason why Mr. Kuykendall had denied that anyone had ever seen it. Finally, the latter had now admitted holding secret meetings with three natural gas lobbyists to draft a gas bill, with no representative of the public present. With his job being to pass on such matters impartially between the public and the utilities after they became law, his secret meeting with lobbyists to help pass the law appeared contrary to his responsibilities. Under cross-examination before the Kefauver committee, he admitted that he had gone to three individuals and had admonished them that there should be no publicity but rather absolute secrecy regarding the effort to pass the law.
Marquis Childs, in Ottawa, indicates that in the early fall, Canada would reverse its policy on Communist China and follow the lead of Britain, perhaps not granting recognition in the initial phase, but would provide a liberalized trade policy, according to Minister of External Affairs Lester Pearson, indicating so privately during the election campaign, after being criticized, primarily by Conservatives, for following too much the U.S. lead with respect to Communist China.
Canada might await the issue arising in the U.N. as to admission of Communist China before possibly abstaining, after having voted with the U.S. consistently against admission during the previous seven years. If they were to abstain, it was likely that Communist China would be admitted to the organization.
Canadians liked to believe that they represented a bridge to understanding as both a part of the British Commonwealth and North American neighbors to the U.S. In the discussions in Paris regarding trade with Communist China, which had ended with the British insisting on following the same policy as with Russia, Canada had sought a compromise, putting forward a revised embargo list, scaling down the items forbidden in trade with Communist China. But the U.S. held out for no change in the policy and so Canadian efforts to serve as an honest broker between the two principal Western powers had inevitably failed.
The President had said at a recent press conference that he believed trade with mainland China would inevitably increase, but based on prior experience, the President's words of moderation and goodwill did not always translate into policy.
Leading Canadian newspapers had sent reporters to the Chinese mainland to report from the Canadian point of view what was happening there, contrasting sharply with the U.S. which was forbidding newsmen to enter mainland China, with Secretary of State Dulles providing a variety of reasons for the policy, stressing the need for protection of journalists because of the lack of diplomatic recognition of Communist China by the U.S. The conservative Globe and Mail of Toronto was running a front-page series by William Kinmond, which was a serious effort to appraise the successes and failures of the transformation in Communist China, finding it deviating in many respects from the course followed by Russia. Blair Fraser, one of the editors of MacLean's Magazine, found that, in the ideological war for the allegiance of the Asian people, Communist China appeared to be the winner.
The rigidities of U.S. policy had been a source of strain on the partnership between Canada and the U.S., at times seeming to Canadians that they would be forced into a satellite role. But the partnership was vital to Canada as it expanded, with immigration taking place at an unprecedented rate. The gains coming from the unwritten alliance between the two neighbors would appear too costly if they came at the expense of a growing Canadian belief that the big power took for granted that the smaller power had to follow in its wake.
Doris Fleeson finds that the Administration had again run into difficulty on the public power issue, in which it had been consistently clumsy. Its nemesis was Senator Estes Kefauver, who, leading a team of investigators, had undertaken an uncompromising look at the controversial contract between the Government and Dixon-Yates the previous year, regarding the supply of electricity to West Memphis by a private combine. By the time the investigation had concluded, the Government had been forced to cancel the agreement, with the Dixon-Yates claims for compensation still pending in the Court of Claims.
Senator Kefauver was presently investigating circumstances under which the Idaho Power Co. had been granted permission to build three low dams on the Snake River in preference to a single high dam which public power advocates had hoped the Government would construct at Hell's Canyon. According to the testimony of Jerome Kuykendall, chairman of the Federal Power Commission, Idaho Power had received its certificate of convenience and necessity for construction of its three low dams on the basis of an understanding by the Commission that the dams would be built at no cost to the Federal Government. Yet Idaho Power had immediately sought quick tax amortization for the costs of the dams under the defense emergency. The director of Defense Mobilization, Gordon Gray, had granted the quick tax amortization privilege, despite Secretary of the Interior Fred Seaton having written a letter to Mr. Gray, strongly protesting the award to Idaho Power. The chief of the accounting division of the FPC had testified that by virtue of the fast amortization, the cost to the taxpayers would amount to more than 83 million dollars. Idaho Power, he had said, might eventually benefit by as much as 339 million from its tax privilege. As a result, Mr. Kuykendall said that the Commission had "made a mistake".
The Kefauver committee was now looking into the flurry of activity in the Idaho Power stock on April 17, the day on which Mr. Gray had approved the fast amortization schedule. The decision was not announced publicly until more than a week later, but on the day it had been approved, 4,300 shares of Idaho Power stock had changed hands, compared to the previous daily average of only 700 shares. The Kefauver committee had issued subpoenas for the records of both the New York and San Francisco Stock Exchanges and was conducting during the current week a study of all transactions, in an attempt to see who, if anyone, had engaged in insider trading.
The committee was also expected to ask for a list of Idaho Power's stockholders. White House chief of staff, Sherman Adams, whose name had often come up in connection with Dixon-Yates, had also apparently entered the Idaho Power controversy. Senator Kefauver had elicited from Mr. Gray the fact that the latter had conferred with Mr. Adams regarding the announcement of the grant of rapid tax amortization, but beyond that matter, Mr. Gray had pleaded executive privilege. Mr. Adams might again be asked to testify, although the committee was certain that he would refuse to do so. Since it was unlikely to obtain Mr. Adams as a witness, and since other Government officials refused to testify as to conversations they had with Mr. Adams, Congress might never learn of the role he had played in the Administration's approach to power problems. Nevertheless, it had been the intransigent attitude of Mr. Adams regarding public versus private power which many Senators had blamed for the Administration's consistent difficulties in that area.
A letter writer from Great Falls, S.C., asserts that recently appointed Undersecretary of State Christian Herter had taken advantage of his high standing with the American people and sought to impress them in an article as to how important it was for the security of the nation that the foreign aid appropriation be approved in full by Congress, as requested by the President. He suggests that for all of the foreign aid provided different countries, the U.S. had not received any assurance for its security, and that during the course of the Administration, the people had not been told what the foreign policy actually was. He believes the money previously appropriated for foreign aid had been provided carelessly and recklessly, that no money should be provided without a commitment from the foreign country receiving it. He believes that there was no reason that the U.S. military should spend so much money on duplication, that the three branches of the service did not need to engage in so much experimentation, often overlapping between the services. He believes they could combine their experiments and save large sums.
A letter writer hopes that all of the nations would stop making atomic bombs, that if they did not, there would be untold suffering in the world. "We have become too modern and forgotten our Maker." He urges that the world forget about atomic energy, as it was too dangerous for the human race.
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