The Charlotte News
Saturday, July 13, 1957
TWO EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that Senator Richard Russell of Georgia had urged the Senate this date to strike out of the Administration civil rights bill its most controversial provision, that which supporters regarded as the heart of the measure, the proposed authority for the Attorney General to seek in Federal courts injunctions against violations or threatened violations of voting or other civil rights. He also wanted the Senate to have a measure of control over the proposed civil rights commission to investigate violations. The Senate had met this date in an unusual Saturday session to provide members a chance to air their views on the record regarding the bill. Backers of it had cleared the first hurdle the previous day when no objections had been raised to a Senate vote late on Tuesday on a motion by Senator William Knowland of California to bring the bill up formally for action. That did not prevent the possibility of a Southern filibuster against the bill later, and much appeared to rest on the results of efforts to compromise. Senator Albert Gore of Tennessee said that he was consulting with colleagues of both parties about a possible substitute for the Administration bill.
In Knoxville, Tenn., a Federal District Court judge was studying three newsreel films this date, in preparation for his decision whether the Government could use them in the trial of the "Clinton 15" plus John Kasper, charged with contempt for violating the District Court order not to interfere with integration efforts of the Clinton High School the prior fall. Not all of what the films contained had been disclosed but it appeared that defense attorneys were fighting to keep the all-white jury from seeing any of the films. By agreement, the lawyers on both sides had declined to discuss the point with the press. The judge saw the newsreels in his chambers following the previous day's session, with the trial to resume on Monday.
The President and Prime Minister Suhrawardy of Pakistan said this date that international Communism continued to be a "major threat" to the security of the free world.
Senator Mike Mansfield of Montana had proposed this date that Secretary of State Dulles visit Eastern Europe for a "first-hand exploration" of changes behind the Iron Curtain.
House Democrats, angered at a reported Presidential order to hold Federal spending below Administration budget requests for the new fiscal year, had spoken this date of applying some tighter curbs of their own.
Democratic and Republican floor managers had joined this date in predicting House passage without major change of the foreign aid bill approved by the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
Senator Russell Long of Louisiana said this date that the Senate Finance Committee's investigation of the country's financial condition might last longer than the two-year term of the present Congress.
In Richmond, Va., the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals this date had held unconstitutional Virginia's pupil placement act, prompting attorneys for the school authorities to indicate that they would seek review in the Supreme Court.
In Vatican City, Pope Pius XII had issued an encyclical this date, in which he sharply criticized the materialism of both East and West, had hailed the forthcoming centennial jubilee of Lourdes and called for a Christian renewal in modern society.
In Chicago, it was reported that
boats
At the Atomic Test Site in Nevada, the atomic test explosion known as "Diablo" had been postponed for 24 hours again because of unfavorable weather conditions.
In Greensboro, it was reported that two 18-year old boys, suspected originally of auto theft, reckless driving and speeding, were now in more serious trouble, as one was in a hospital where he was being treated for two bullet wounds, one self-inflicted and one from a police officer's pistol, and the other had surrendered after the pair had engaged in a gun battle with police in a wooded area near High Point.
High officers of the North Carolina National Guard had expressed disappointment this date over the appointment to the state's top military job of a man with limited military background, after Governor Luther Hodges had the previous day appointed veteran politician Capus Waynick of High Point to the $9,200 per year position of State Adjutant General, succeeding John Hall Manning. Mr. Waynick had entered the Army shortly before the end of World War I as a private and later had received a second lieutenant's commission, a rank which he had retained while serving in the Army Reserve between 1918 and 1929. His duties in his new position would include "supervision of the relationships between the National Guard and the State and Federal authority at the Pentagon." The Governor had said that his prior service in the National Guard and in the Army during World War I, plus his years of subsequent membership in the Army Reserve had amply qualified him technically for the new position.
Julian Scheer of The News reports that the tempo of the drive for city's limits extension had picked up this date and so had the opposition, in advance of the Monday vote on the annexation.
Dick Bayer of The News
reports that no matter what fashion experts said about bathing suits,
two of Charlotte's most promising female swimming stars were sticking
to diapers. They were sisters, plump, with considerable charm, who
took to the water "like the latest descendants of the royal
house of Neptune." One was only ten months old and the older
sister was 21 months. Under the instruction of their mother, the
sisters had started to paddle before they had thought about walking.
The younger of the two still did much better underwater than she did
on land. The mother directed swimming instruction at a swimming pool
operated by her parents on Wilkinson Boulevard and said she had first
taken the younger sister into the YWCA pool when the baby was just
five weeks old, that it had taken about seven more months of frequent
dips before she let the infant kick for herself. Now, both entered
the pool without the slightest hesitation, entering four feet of
water and paddling toward their mother. The mother said that the
secret to training was to start them young and to stay close to them,
that the burden of bravery lay with the parent, indicating that
training could start as soon as the parent had enough nerve to put
the little ones' faces under water
A long stretch of 90-plus temperatures was expected to last in Charlotte over the weekend, with a slight chance of cooling thundershowers the following night. The previous day, the temperature had reached 97 and was predicted to reach the same this date, with a high of 95 predicted for Sunday. This night, the temperature was expected to drop to 72, three degrees higher than the lowest temperature the previous night.
In Los Angeles, German film actress
Ursula Thiess
On the editorial page, "Progress Requires Ballots in the Box" encourages the voters of Charlotte and the perimeter areas to be annexed by the election on Monday to get out and vote, and also urges an affirmative vote on annexation to ensure a greater Charlotte and a more prosperous future for all of its citizens.
"Senate Should Reject Civil Rights Bill" finds that though the House vote of 286 to 126 on the civil rights bill the previous month had been an accurate indication of national sentiment on the measure, sentiment alone could not wisely be used to determine such precedent-setting legislation.
It suggests that the Senate might be the only place where the South had not lost the Civil War, but it was also the last refuge of detachment, meaningful debate and the "long view" in the legislative process, more likely than the House to subject legislation to the tests of wisdom and sound precedent as well as popularity.
Regarding the civil rights bill, the South, for instance, already had raised and carried the point to the President that the bill was not merely a right to vote proposal but was also one which would extend the Attorney General's power into all areas of civil rights, including racial segregation. That had apparently surprised the President and the public, though the piece finds that it should not have, as Attorney General Herbert Brownell had said the previous February that "the proposals … would, of course, go beyond the voting cases and give to the Department of Justice the authority to invoke civil remedies in other cases of civil rights violations."
It thus suggests that the House had approved authority for massive intervention by the Attorney General "in the most sensitive social dilemma the nation has faced since Reconstruction." It finds that Federal judges could hold in contempt and punish without resort to a jury trial any person accused of violating the civil rights of another, possibly applicable to school board members, election registrars and private citizens.
Already there were indications of a compromise to limit the measure only to protection of voting rights. It finds that heartening but not enough, favoring defeat of the measure completely for being tainted with sectionalism, smacking of a force bill which would inevitably arouse old passions and fanaticisms, and for being self-defeating to its purpose.
It indicates that there was nothing wrong with its purpose and did not agree with Senator Sam Ervin that the bill was an "insulting and insupportable indictment" of the people of the South. It finds that if it was insulting, the insult arose indirectly from legitimate national desires to see that the rights of citizens were not denied by others. It indicates that while the bill might be insupportable as it related to voting in North Carolina, where there was universal suffrage, it was quite supportable in other Southern states, citing for example Forrest County, Miss., where only 16 of a possible 13,000 black voters were registered, and Lowndes County, Miss., where only 52 of a possible 9,200 black voters were registered. Gerrymandering in Tuskegee, Ala., to eliminate all black voters, presented another example of mass denial of a constitutional right.
It finds that for the South to continue to fight off Federal intervention, it had to find a way to enter the court of public opinion with cleaner hands, stating that it was not suggesting that only the South tolerated discrimination but that the South was cast in the role as the chief offender and therefore could not escape that role except by protecting the rights of all individuals.
It quotes Telford Taylor, a noted attorney, from the New York Times Magazine: "Racial discrimination is a social ailment, and many of its manifestations lie beyond the proper reach of court proceedings. The law cannot stamp out the physical differences between races, nor can it eliminate the low standards of living, lack of education and other disabilities which are both cause and consequence of anti-Negro discrimination, especially in the South. Furthermore, since the ultimate objective is to cultivate friendly relations based on mutual respect between the races, litigation is not the most propitious avenue to this end. Regardless of their outcome, lawsuits rarely foster harmony and trust between the parties. Therefore, litigation to enforce civil rights is not a desirable first step toward their fulfillment, but rather is a last resort when the prospects of voluntary remedial action by the community appear hopeless."
Mr. Taylor had concluded that with regard to voting, the "last resort" had to be taken and portions of the bill passed. The piece finds, however, from its vantage point, that it must not be taken and that if it were, civil rights would be set back rather than advanced.
As we indicated the previous day, the Act, as finally passed in September, would, in its sections IV and V, be limited to enforcement of voting rights via court orders and would afford the right to jury trial in criminal contempts where a sentence of more than 45 days was imposed, otherwise discretionary with the court, with a maximum available sentence of six months.
A piece from the Raleigh News & Observer, titled "Whacking the Sunbeams", indicates that in times past when a lawyer or doctor reached age 60, his associates had presented him with a walking stick, while the caneless man of 60 at present wore sport shirts and augmented his politics with a "philosophical quivering golf club".
In times past, the envious cry had been, "O, to be 60 and to cut the sunbeams like puppy dog tails with a Malacca as Squire Johnson does."
"The august old colonel with the radiant cane was a wonderful historical period piece. But the modern utilitarian with the tobacco stick thinks of 60 years as barely enough room to turn around in before he really gets to going good."
Drew Pearson indicates that Senator William Knowland, the Minority Leader, had indicated to the President in discussing the civil rights legislation that the filibuster could conceivably keep Congress in session until the following October, stating that he would be ready to discuss a compromise to prevent a prolonged filibuster which would tie up appropriation bills and other important legislation. He added that the only compromise he would accept, however, would be an assurance from the Democratic leadership that the measure would be placed on the Senate calendar for debate on a specific date in January. The President had inquired in response as to what would happen to the rest of their program, including the school construction bill, the extension of reciprocal trade and the postal rate increase, among other things, to which Senator Knowland responded that he supposed it would have to be put on the shelf until the next session of Congress. The President had said that he hoped it would not happen and again stressed his hope for action on the school construction bill. Republican leaders had nodded without comment, as they considered the latter bill virtually dead because of opposition to it from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
When the House had recently passed the civil rights bill, the President had congratulated the House Republican leaders, Joseph Martin and Charles Halleck, saying it was an excellent measure. But at the most recent meeting at the White House, the President seemed to be getting cold feet, stating that he was concerned about section 3 of the bill, as Senator Richard Russell of Georgia had objected that it might open the door to the use of troops, the President stating that nobody wanted that, that he did not and that he hoped the Senate would carefully look over the section and make any necessary changes.
There had been a chuckle when Senator Knowland had suggested that the President should not let the filibuster interfere with his "vacation plans", saying that he was not letting the House off during the filibuster, as its members would be taking a recess while they were working in the Senate. Mr. Martin had jovially suggested that the President come along with them and the President had happily agreed.
The reason the President had sent such an icy message to the Truman Library dedication, in contrast to the fact that former President Herbert Hoover had come a long way to be present at the ceremony, had probably gone back to the speech which the former President had made in San Francisco during the 1952 campaign, in which he pointed out that General Eisenhower, as the U.S. commander in Germany in 1945, should have taken a stand against the Russian corridor around Berlin. President Eisenhower had snubbed the former President ever since and would not get out of his car to greet him when the pair had driven to the Capitol for President Eisenhower's first inauguration in 1953, had refused to see Mr. Truman when the latter had sought to pay a courtesy call during the President's visit to Kansas City four years earlier. State Department officials had suggested that Mr. Truman ought be sent abroad as a goodwill ambassador to counteract the visits by Communist Party Secretary Nikita Khrushchev and Premier Nikolai Bulganin to various countries, but the President was against it. Mr. Pearson adds that despite Presidents Roosevelt and Hoover never having gotten along, there had probably never been a President who felt so strongly toward his predecessor as President Eisenhower did toward President Truman. (We have now a new champion in that category since 2017, not only with respect to a predecessor in office but, morever, his successor—and how. It is the only thing that individual has yet won in his relatively short but eventful political life, other than being the most demagogic figure ever "elected" to the White House, whether only by dint of the electoral college or by both that and the popular vote.)
Mr. Pearson indicates that the column (which, likely because it had appeared on Sunday, was not carried by The News) had not meant to insinuate that Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts had made his speech on Algeria merely to scoop Vice-President Nixon, any such implication having not been intended. He says that Senator Kennedy had long been a student of Asiatic-African affairs and felt strongly that the U.S. ought take a lead toward promoting independence in those areas. (Incidentally, note to future Presidents, re the note of Mr. Pearson regarding the increasingly voluminous nature of Presidential records: You can now simply digitize everything and download them to a couple of large thumbdrives, as long as not in the process violating the Presidential Records Act, and put them in your pocket when you go home, not bothering with all those cumbersome boxes stored in bathrooms and publicly accessible ballrooms and so on.)
Senator Milton Young of North Dakota had been in Washington during the Hells Canyon battle but had not voted. He would have voted for the bill and against the Administration, but White House lobbyists had astutely made an engagement for him with the executive offices on a matter very important to North Dakota so that he would not be on the Senate floor during the vote.
A letter writer comments on the editorial, "Sims Mustn't Be Hung by Headlines", commending it, but finding no such concern by the newspaper for the many thousands of citizens whose petition to the Legislature for a statewide liquor referendum had been overlooked.
Another letter writer responds to the same editorial, indicating that it was the facts behind the headlines which were hanging Mr. Sims, not the headlines.
A letter from the director of region five of the AFL-CIO responds to an article which had appeared in the June 28 edition, titled, "Attorney Blakeney Discusses Issues in Compulsory Unionism", indicating that his press release, which had appeared in the newspaper on June 24, had not been a personal attack on that attorney and that they had been careful to differentiate between the North Carolina State Bar and the North Carolina Bar Association. He indicates that the Federal Government was not ardently protecting the right of workers to organize and bargain collectively, but instead the law was being flouted every day and workers were being discharged and union organizers beaten because of attempts to organize and establish trade unions. He says he could not draw an analogy between membership in any church and membership in the trade unions, that collective bargaining agreements should be analogized to insurance policies, whereby if one did not pay premiums, there were no benefits derived from the policy. His union, the United Steelworkers of America, following 60 years of violent conflict with the basic steel companies, had been recognized by the United States Steel Corp. as the bargaining agent for its employees who were members of the union in 1937, and after nine years of collective bargaining, the Union had been given a modified union shop agreement, a relationship they had enjoyed, however, for only a short time until the right-to-work laws had been enacted by practically all of the Southern states, wiping out the accomplishment of all of their efforts.
A letter writer finds that the city was meddling with the rights of citizens to determine whether they wanted to live in Charlotte or outside it by virtue of the annexation vote which included city residents. He finds that it was part of an ongoing effort since the New Deal to build up a dictatorship in the country, indicating that people outside the city limits would not have an opportunity to be heard fairly in an election when the city residents could outvote them. He says he would vote against annexation because he lived in the city and considered it none of his business what those outside of the city did, and that they alone had the right to determine whether to be annexed.
A letter writer from Pittsboro
indicates that he had read in the Sunday newspapers the address of
Winston-Salem's leading integrationist attorney, Irving Carlyle, in
which he had used an illustration of the growing acceptance generally of
integration, by virtue of its acceptance among basketball players, with a black player, a Jewish
player and a Catholic player having participated in the NCAA finals
the prior March 23 when UNC had won
A letter writer from Cheraw, S.C., indicates that Senator Knowland had taken the lead in the Senate on behalf of Attorney General Brownell, Vice-President Nixon and the President's civil rights bill, favoring making it the law without further amendment. He finds that the law as it was presently written could cause a person to be sentenced to jail without a trial by jury. He urges people to fight back for their rights and to contact members of Congress and let them know where they stood.
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