The Charlotte News
Thursday, January 8, 1959
FOUR EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Havana that "war crimes" trials for followers of fallen dictator Fulgencio Batista had begun in Cuba with 15 military leaders already having been executed. Provisional President Manuel Urrutia had said that thousands of persons would be tried by revolutionary courts in "the same manner as war criminals were tried in Germany." They would be charged with crimes against the Cuban people. Some of the accused were still being sought on Wednesday night. At least 1,100 persons had been reported arrested since Sr. Batista had fled to the Dominican Republic in the wee hours of New Year's Day and victorious rebel leader Fidel Castro had proclaimed Sr. Urrutia as provisional President. Gunfire had flared briefly in Havana again on Wednesday night, with machine guns and other automatic weapons fired for about 15 minutes near the American-operated Nacional Hotel, as rebel militia reportedly pursued several carloads of men who had been shooting at random in the streets. The militia was still trying to eliminate diehard Batista supporters, including members of a private army called the Tigers, which had belonged to former Senator Rolando Masferrer, who had fled by yacht to Key West, Fla. Minister of the Presidency Luis Bush had said that Cuba would demand the latter's extradition on charges of taking away 17 million dollars belonging to the people. U.S. Customs officials said that Sr. Masferrer's party of 36 men had about $90,000 when it landed, the men having been put on parole to the Miami Immigration Office. The Government had forbidden sales of alcoholic drinks in Havana this date in expectation that Sr. Castro would finally reach the capital. Officials hoped that the ban would prevent heavy drinking which might add to the unstable security situation. Sr. Castro had reached Matanzas, 60 miles east of Havana, on Wednesday, on his slow progress through adoring crowds. His 20-car column had careened into the city at breakneck speed and the rebel leader, as usual, had been besieged with people who wanted to cheer him and hear him speak. Sr. Urrutia said that his Government would respect "all international agreements on rights of asylum." Hundreds of followers of Sr. Batista had been left in the lurch when the dictator had suddenly fled without tipping them off, having taken refuge in Latin American embassies. Traditionally, political refugees were granted safe conduct from embassies to the border, but those charged with common crimes might not be given that privilege. Trials of 207 of Sr. Batista's men charged with brutally beating prisoners and in some cases with killing them, had begun on Wednesday in Santiago in eastern Cuba. Authorities said that ten officers had been executed in Santiago on Wednesday, including Sr. Batista's chief of operations in Oriente Province, Col. Arcadio Casillas Lumpuy. Five other military men had been executed in Santa Clara in central Cuba, including a police inspector charged with torturing prisoners. Trials were expected to begin in Havana shortly, with about 800 persons being held there on political charges. President Urrutia also said that Cuba would consider each case of diplomatic relations as presented, avoiding direct comment on relations with Communist countries. Sr. Castro had been quoted by a Havana newspaper as saying that he thought Cuba ought avoid diplomatic relations with Communist countries. Both the U.S. and Britain had extended diplomatic recognition to President Urrutia's Government on Wednesday and more than half a dozen Latin American nations had done so earlier. Full guarantees for foreign investments had been pledged by Sr. Urrutia and he added that Cuba wanted to be sure that the investments benefited the people.
Incidentally, do not impart to insane El Presidente this notion of the political purges in Cuba, as he already obviously believes himself to be in los zapatos of Fidel and Che, and it might give him even more ideas. Soon, we predict, he will grow a beard and don an army-type shirt to go with his little red cap. Also, please do not disclose this program
In Daytona Beach, Fla., it was reported by the Daytona Beach Morning Journal this date that an armed B-26 Cuban bomber had flown within striking distance of the missile test center at Cape Canaveral on New Year's Day and had never been challenged by U.S. air defense. The newspaper had quoted a Federal aviation spokesman that apparently the Air Force did not believe the enemy would bomb the Cape. According to the newspaper, the Pentagon in Washington had begun checking the report. Two Cuban Air Force men fleeing the island after the downfall of El Presidente Batista had landed the plane in Daytona Beach, seeking asylum. They told the newspaper that they had flown into the U.S. without a flight plan and had made no radio contact during the 300-mile trip up the coast until they called the tower at Daytona Beach municipal airport for landing instructions. They said that they knew how to fly the "U.S. airways", apparently meaning the authorized route up the East Coast. The public information officer at Dobbins Air Force Base in Georgia said that neither the 32nd Air Division log nor the log of the 660th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron at McDill Air Force Base in Florida had contained information on the flight. The 660th monitored air traffic headed north and when a plane penetrated the defense zone and no flight plan was found, F-89 fighters from McCoy Air Force Base in Orlando checked it out. The chief of the Federal Aviation Agency, formally the CAA, at the Daytona Beach airport said that he understood that the tower had no knowledge of the Cuban flight until they asked for landing instructions near Titusville, 47 miles south of Daytona Beach and about 17 air miles from Cape Canaveral. Asked how the Cubans managed to fly so near the Cape unchallenged, he said that the areas immediately overhead and east of the Cape were restricted, but that the area west of it was not restricted and not in a defense zone. The newspaper quoted him as saying, "Apparently the Air Force doesn't believe the enemy would bomb the Cape and therefore they haven't put it inside the air defense identification zone. The farther north you go, the tighter the air defense becomes."
Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson said this date that he was agreeable to a quick showdown on a move to substitute a stiffer proposal for his own compromise anti-filibuster plan, indicating that he was confident of mustering the votes to beat back a counter-attack plan by strategists for a bipartisan bloc of Senators advocating a tougher rule of cloture of filibusters. Senator Johnson had outflanked them the previous day by advancing his compromise at the opening of the new Senate session before they had a chance to offer their own proposal. Senator Mike Mansfield of Montana, the assistant majority leader, had defended Senator Johnson against charges of high-handed tactics, saying there had been "talk of hijacking and blackjacking" because Senator Johnson had jumped the gun on the bipartisan collection by acting first. Senator Mansfield said that he wanted to make it clear that Senator Johnson's move would not prevent the Senate from voting on any and all alternate proposals for revising the cloture rule. In the background of the filibuster fight was the simmering row over civil rights legislation and the issue of racial segregation, as the filibuster had long been used to defeat civil rights measures. Senator Johnson had won the first skirmish in the rules battle, but Senators Paul Douglas, Hubert Humphrey, and Jacob Javits insisted that the anti-filibuster coalition was far from licked, also making it clear that they were banking on continued help from Vice-President Nixon, the Senate's presiding officer, who sided with them in contending that each new Senate had the right to adopt its own new rules by a majority vote. If that view were sustained, a simple majority could vote to adopt different rules without operating on the restrictions of prior rules, which permitted unlimited debate on any motion to change the rules. Opposing that was the view that because only one-third of the Senators were elected every two years, both the Senate and its rules continued from one session to the next. The anti-filibuster forces had planned to open the battle with a motion by Senator Clinton Anderson of New Mexico that the Senate take up for immediate consideration the adoption of rules for the new Congress. Instead, Senator Johnson had proposed a change in the rules to permit filibusters to be closed by two-thirds of the Senators present and voting.
Republican Congressional leaders had struck back with cries of "politics" this date against the Democratic contentions that the Administration was lagging behind in the space age. In the opening round of what appeared likely to become a bristling two-party fight in the new Congress, Senators Styles Bridges of New Hampshire and Thomas Kuchel of California assailed the call of Majority Leader Johnson for his party to seize national leadership from the White House. Senator Johnson told fellow Democrats on Wednesday that there was a "deficit of vigor" in the Administration and therefore they had a mandate to assume constructive leadership "beginning now, not two years hence." Senator Bridges, who headed the Senate Republican policy committee, had described it as the opening shot in a political barrage which he said he expected the Democrats to fire at the President's fiscal and national security proposals. He said that he was happy that the President was making a dedicated effort to balance the budget and knew that he was deeply concerned that every necessary effort ought be made to maintain the nation's security, and could be trusted to do so. "But that won't keep the Democrats from making political attacks on his proposals," he added. The President would outline his legislative program in the State of the Union message on Friday and would send to Congress on January 19 what he said would be a balanced budget at about 77 billion dollars. Senator Johnson served advance notice that the Democrats were preparing a rough reception for a budget of that size. They contended that it would pinch defense spending and call for retrenchment in many domestic programs. Senator Johnson said: "We cannot afford to bankrupt the national conscience to serve the ends of political bookkeeping." Senator Kuchel, who had been elected on Wednesday as assistant Republican leader, indicated that Senator Johnson's attack on the Administration made it clear that "there will be no deficit of politics in this session of Congress." He suggested to the Democrats that they proceed with "just a little caution in their efforts to tear up the President's program. They control the Congress and they will bear heavy responsibility for their action." Although he was ready to defend the President's general legislative proposals, he had made it clear that he would not vote for drastic economies at the expense of natural resource projects and other domestic development proposals.
In Moscow, it was reported that Soviet scientists had figured that the space rocket "Mechta" was presently in orbit around the sun, predicting that it would reach its top speed of 72,000 mph by the following Wednesday. They expected the peak velocity to be reached when the rocket got to the point nearest the sun, a distance figured to be about 91.5 million miles in its elliptical orbit. The official Soviet news agency Tass had said, "At that moment it will reach its maximum speed of more than 32 km (about 20 miles) a second." That would be nearly triple the speed at which the rocket had been launched the previous Friday. The missile had been hurled clear of the earth's gravitational field to become the solar system's first artificial planet. According to Soviet calculations, the rocket on Wednesday had gone more than 621,000 miles on a direct line from the earth. Tass said that the distance between earth and the satellite would increase at "a terrific pace since the earth and the artificial planet are diverging in the cosmos." The Soviet reports on the rocket's position and what it was doing were presently all based on calculations. Radio contact had been lost on Monday when the rocket's radio batteries had become exhausted, and it was too far away from the earth to track with optical instruments. In short, it may be as dead and extinct as a brontosaurus.
The President, noting demonstrations against Soviet Deputy Premier Anastas Mikoyan, called this date for courteous treatment of the visitor. The White House made it clear that the President was disturbed by the demonstrations against Mr. Mikoyan while he toured the country. In Cleveland the previous day, Mr. Mikoyan had been greeted by chanting, shouting, sign-waving demonstrators. One young woman, identified as an Hungarian refugee, had been arrested for throwing a rock in his general direction. Protesting pickets had also been present in Detroit when he arrived there this date. White House press secretary James Hagerty had been asked at a press conference about the President's reactions to the demonstrations, and Mr. Hagerty had promptly pulled out a prepared statement which said that the President hoped that wherever Mr. Mikoyan went in the country, he would be met with the courtesy which Americans traditionally showed visitors from abroad. It said that the President wanted him to see the "real America, so that when he returns home he will be able to carry an accurate picture of our good manners, as well as our strength, our confidence, and our determination in the cause of freedom and peace." When asked whether the President felt the demonstrations against him did not reflect a true picture of the country, Mr. Hagerty referred newsmen to the first sentence of the statement, dealing with the President's hope that Americans would show Mr. Mikoyan traditional courtesy.
In Rangoon, Burma, President Tito of Yugoslavia arrived this date for a two-day visit on his tour to see closer relations with other neutral nations.
In Cairo, it was reported that Premier Gamal Abdel Nasser's plan for an Arab economic union had about ground to a halt from obstructions erected by the Iraqi delegation to the current Arab League council meeting.
In New York, it was reported that a bingo game in a Bronx church had gone on as scheduled the previous day despite the service of a license suspension summons while the game was in progress. The Church of the Holy Resurrection, the first group in the city to obtain a bingo license under a new state law which had become effective on January 1, was the first to suffer a license suspension. The Ukrainian Orthodox congregation had been celebrating its Christmas under the ancient calendar when the license suspension was issued, stemming from a bingo game conducted under the auspices of the church the previous summer. During the earlier game, three women had won $1,000 and complained that they never received the money. The district attorney's office had been investigating the matter. Church officials said that the lay operator of the game had been responsible for nonpayment, not the church. Many churches and other groups were running bingo games before the recent legalization. As the bingo session got underway the previous day, about 300 women and several men were taking part. When the assistant license commissioner appeared with a summons, there were cries of "Leave us alone" and "Get out of here". The dean of priests at the church had ignored the summons when it was handed to him, but it was then placed on his knees and he brushed it to the floor. Official action against the church had been taken Tuesday night when church officials had been notified that the bingo license had been suspended. The previous morning, the dean of priests had sent a telegram to Mayor Robert Wagner, which read in part: "Our church is small and poor and heavily depends on the revenue derived from bingo. Once closed we would not be able to open again." The Mayor had not intervened and the service of the summons had followed. The dean of priests said that they were being persecuted since they were a minority. The church officials were scheduled to appear before a magistrate on January 22.
In Boswell, Okla., it was reported that 16 persons, 15 of whom were children or teenagers, died this date in a fire in a four-room wooden home. One child had apparently been pushed out of a rear window before that person had succumbed, but the effort had been in vain, as the child was dead. The father of the family had been away hunting at the time. After returning, he walked aimlessly, apparently unable to comprehend immediately the disaster which had struck his family. He said that when he had left for his hunting trip, two wood-burning stoves had been in use. The constable said that he believed the disaster had been caused by the stoves and that the family had apparently panicked when the fire was discovered and rushed into one room, as the victims were found piled up at the rear door.
Bill Hughes of The News reports from Mount Holly that a smoldering fire had crept unnoticed through a downtown hardware store and erupted in the wee hours of the morning this date. Flames, fed by paint and ammunition, had destroyed the store, one of the largest hardware firms of east Gaston County. Damage was estimated in excess of $250,000. The cause of the fire had not yet been determined.
On the editorial page, "Charlotte's City Council Sees the Light" commends the action by the City Council prohibiting the unionization of Charlotte policemen.
Previously, the Police Department had been declared off-limits to the Teamsters Union, but the door had been inexplicably left open for another labor organization to seek to organize the police.
There were grave doubts about the labor movement's influence being permitted to invade such a sensitive field as law enforcement. The newspaper's view had always been that the risks were too great for influencing the officers in the field and that a line ought be drawn.
Until the previous day, the Council had been unwilling or unable to come to grips with that basic issue, but finally had help from an aroused public, with many Charlotte residents having expressed concern during the prior week.
Even Walter Reuther, one of the American labor movement's chief lawgivers, had told a Durham audience on Tuesday that he was opposed to the organization by unions of "people like policemen." Less than 24 hours later, the Council had registered its agreement, and it finds it about time.
"They Took It out on Old Joe Martin" indicates that the selection of Representative Charles Halleck of Indiana over longtime Republican leader in the House Joseph Martin had nothing to do with liberal versus conservative values, as Mr. Halleck was as much of a conservative as was Mr. Martin, but was younger, tougher and more vocal.
The sudden decision to depose Mr. Martin was indicative of Republican frustration, as he had been the party's link with the grand old days and, to many, the symbol of Congressional Republicanism.
Mr. Martin had done his share of fighting against fearful odds during the early New Deal, only to be beaten back by substantial Democratic majorities under FDR. When the Agricultural Adjustment Act had been introduced, it had been Mr. Martin who had shouted, "We're on our way to Moscow!" When the bill establishing the Tennessee Valley Authority had been introduced, he cried that it was "patterned closely after one of the Soviet dreams." Later, President Roosevelt himself had used Mr. Martin's name as part of a derisive campaign war cry, even leading a chant in Madison Square Garden with the phrase: "Martin, Barton and Fish".
Representative Charles Jonas of the local district had said of the defeat of Mr. Martin, "Politics is a cruel game." Senator George Malone of Nevada had sounded a similar note the previous year about the moral climate generally in Washington, when discussing the Senate with former White House chief of staff Sherman Adams: "You just don't understand Senators. They eat together. They work together. They play together—and when one breaks his leg they eat him."
It concludes that Mr. Martin had been swallowed whole.
"Life in America" regards a story out of Chicago about the late producer Mike Todd's brother who said that he was planning to mark his brother's grave with a giant reproduction of filmdom's Oscar. The Vermont marble statue would stand 9 feet in height, weigh to tons and cost $8,000. The brother said that the grave marker would bear no epitaph, amplifying, "We would want to keep the memorial simple."
"For Republican Liberals, That Was All" indicates that Republican liberals had been strangely inarticulate the previous day after the old guard of the party had put down a well-advertised "rebellion" in its ranks, and had voted Senator Everett Dirksen, a conservative, as its Minority Leader.
One disappointed insurgent had said that they had gotten whipped, and when asked by a newsman whether that was all, had said, "That's all."
It reminded the piece of the yarn which Brooks Hays had told after he had been defeated in the midterm elections in Arkansas the previous November, unable to think of much to say to reporters when they kept pestering him, and so told of a man who knocked on the door of a woman who was hard of hearing. "Your house is on fire," he had told her. "How's that?" she had asked. "Your house is on fire," to which she responded, "Is that all?" "Well," the alarmist said, "it's all I can think of right now."
A piece from the Greensboro Daily News, titled "Note on a 'Real Metropolis'" takes issue with the News and its "fears that the good, gray Greensboro Daily News has tarried too long in the corn patch" because recently it had allowed that the Piedmont "has no real metropolis", The News having become defensive that it had not accorded that status to Charlotte.
It indicates that perhaps the "real metropolis" of Charlotte did not extend to the new north-south bypass, but it had seen winter grain growing along it recently and the previous fall had seen an old-fashioned horse-drawn mower raking in the hay crop along it.
It proceeds in that vein, mocking the urbanity of Charlotte, and suggesting that Greensboro was a place where people easily got lost when visiting from Charlotte.
"Just what was it Greensboro's O. Henry said about 'metropolis hayseeds'?"
Drew Pearson indicates that some more spectacular Soviet achievements in outer space could be expected during the year, the most spectacular of which would be the launching of a man into orbit and bringing him safely back to earth—not to be achieved until April, 1961, a month before Alan Shepard would become the first American launched into a sub-orbital mission. The second spectacular event would be the flying of an atomic plane around the world several times without refueling.
The U.S. would send Capt. Robert White on a short 20-minute flight 100 miles into space in the X-15 the following fall, but would not be ready to launch a man into orbit until late 1960 or early 1961—a prediction which was at least 12 months off.
The chief reason for the American lag was the Administration's failure to see the importance of the missile-satellite program and then allocate money fast enough for it. For instance, the U.S. still did not have a rocket launching engine capable of sending a large satellite into outer space. The Russians had a Soviet rocket launcher with a thrust of 850,000 pounds, compared to the 135,000 pounds of thrust of the American rocket, which could be combined with the Atlas missile to provide 350,000 pounds of thrust, while the Russians could combine their big launchers to get three times that much thrust.
In Huntsville, Ala., the previous month, rocket experts had told Mr. Pearson that the U.S. would soon have a rocket launcher of power equal to the Russians, which they had not had thus far because of budget cuts. Appropriations had been lacking after almost two years had passed since the Administration had first known that the Russians had that powerful rocket launcher, since May, 1957. Yet, only recently had the Administration authorized funding to catch up. That was the reason the U.S. had put up a payload of only about 30 pounds, while the Russians had launched a satellite weighing a ton and a half.
West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer had secretly offered to help France produce atomic bombs, but had placed a condition on the offer that the bombs had to be the joint property of the six-nation European Community. French Premier Charles de Gaulle was intrigued by Chancellor Adenauer's proposal but would probably delay any agreement until the first French atomic bomb was tested.
Friendly foreign diplomats had been flabbergasted at the casual manner in which Secretary of State Dulles and the White House had kissed off the U.S. visit of Russia's Deputy Premier Anastas Mikoyan, Secretary Dulles indicating that it would be "awkward" for him to see Mr. Mikoyan, that he would "try" to see him but knew nothing of a date being arranged in advance for such a meeting. Mr. Dulles had now paused long enough to see the Deputy Premier in Washington between his arrival from Jamaica and his flight to Canada. The reason the diplomatic corps were flabbergasted was because they knew how difficult it had been to get an allied united front regarding Berlin, that the British had been shying away from any showdown over Berlin, as had Premier De Gaulle, and also knew that when an important personality arrived from any country, the State Department took the initiative to make the person feel at home and see the right people, therefore, wondering why the Administration had not jumped at the opportunity to win over a man who could influence decisions at the Kremlin regarding Berlin, rather than giving him the cold shoulder.
Mr. Pearson notes that what members of the diplomatic corps did not know was that the State Department had been in a dither trying to decide what to do about the visit of the Deputy Premier, that they did not want the President to see him because they would have to brief the President in advance and could not brief him because the they did not know what Mr. Mikoyan wanted to discuss. They were waiting for Mr. Dulles to brief the President, but the difficulty was that the President left all foreign policy to Mr. Dulles, who was almost never in Washington.
Walter Lippmann indicates that with respect to Illinois Senator Paul Douglas, whom he says he respects highly, the question of cloture was not "majority rule" but rather what type of majority was necessary. Senator Douglas had proposed a rule whereby a simple majority of Senators could eventually effect cloture of a filibuster. Regarding ordinary business, a majority vote of a quorum, or 26 Senators as the body was presently constituted, could pass a bill. Senator Douglas thus recognized that a larger majority ought be necessary for cloture than for ordinary legislation.
The present Senate Rule XXII required that two-thirds of the Senators had to vote for cloture, other than debate on changes in the rules, which had no provision for cloture.
The proposed amendment of Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson, which would probably be adopted, required a two-thirds majority of those Senators present and voting, which theoretically could be as many as 66 or as few as 34, based on the 98 Senators in the current body. Senator John Sherman Cooper had now suggested adoption of a rule requiring a majority of three-fifths for cloture, which would theoretically be as few as 30 Senators or as many as 59.
He finds therefore that Senator Douglas was begging the question when he spoke of "majority rule" as if it were something obvious. He ignored the nature of the Senate, which was the representative of a federation of states, whereas the House was representative of all of the people, thus posing the question whether a majority was of the states or of the people.
Based on the 1950 census, the 25 smallest states, which had 50 Senators, represented about 29 million people or less than a fifth of the population. Against those 25 states were three states, New York, California, and Pennsylvania, which had 7 million more people than those in the 25 smallest states combined.
For those who preferred the Johnson rule revision rather than that of Senator Douglas, there were two outstanding considerations, one regarding civil rights of black citizens, and the notion that any legislation ought proceed with the assent of a large body of Southern opinion if it was to be effective, that otherwise, without the liberal South assenting, it would prove unenforceable. The other consideration was the desire not to entrust civil liberties of all people to simple and narrow majorities, as the times were dangerous and panic was always possible, easily producing a stampede away from liberty.
The Johnson amendment would require at most 66 votes to pass a controversial measure and he finds it reasonable. Legislation could be blocked by an unending filibuster only if all Senators of 17 states participated in it, and that would not, as some suggested who sided with Senator Douglas, give the South an absolute veto on legislation to promote the civil rights of blacks. In the deep South, there were only seven states in which there had been no desegregation at the primary or secondary school level. In ten other Southern and border states, there had been some desegregation. All of those states would have to combine with the deep South to impose such a veto.
Legislation which was opposed by all states of a whole section of the country, including the states beginning to comply with the new principle of desegregation, would be very doubtful legislation, promising more trouble than anything else.
Presumably, the Johnson amendment would be adopted, as Senator Douglas himself had forecast in his appearance the previous Sunday on "Meet the Press". When it was adopted, it would not stop his long, persistent and invaluable labors on behalf of civil rights.
A letter writer from McColl, S.C., indicates that Robert C. Ruark had professed fear that because of different tribal traditions, democracy would make no progress in independent Africa. Those who opposed African freedom had expressed the same fear, giving tribalism as their reason. He suggests that it would be well to remember that every other nation had traveled the same road. While there might be tribal differences in Africa, as well as confusion, strife and even bloodshed, in the end, the method would justify the means. "Long live African freedom."
A letter writer says that he felt like being a citizen of North Carolina was a good thing, though there was much to be done and problems to be solved, chief among which was improvement of education. He believes that the state lacked trade schools in which those who did not want to go on to college could learn honorable work with their hands. He suggests that elementary and high schools ought operate on the broad assumption that they were not the only means and approach to a college education and so had to prepare the children but increasingly had also to be the ends and means for preparing a child for citizenship. He favors a 12-month school year with breaks in between for job and recreation. He believes that North Carolina could make progress during 1959 if each citizen daily strove together to make greater citizens of one another and looked to the basic and fundamental requirements that were demanded of each citizen.
A letter writer comments on the news item from Alabama regarding a school teacher and principal who had been recommended for dismissal for teaching voodoo. He indicates that the teaching of voodoo entailed fire and costuming, just as the Klan used fire and costuming, but in a different manner. He suggests that residents of Alabama in some cases were members of the Klan. Thus, he wonders why the school in question had been annoyed by the teacher's teaching of voodoo and wonders whether it was because the classes were segregated.
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