Tuesday, March 5, 1963

If We Wanta Get To First Base

Step To Restoring Common Sense

r

The Supreme Court decision that the nations railroads have the right to eliminate featherbedding 'work practices represents a new milestone in restoring common sense to labor-management disputes over work rules.

The decision means that railroads can legally make sweeping changes in work rules pointed toward eliminating thousands of jobs which the carriers contend are no longer necessary in railroad operations. In a very real sense the courts ruling bears on the increasingly important disputes over automation in industry and the jobs which are eliminated because of automation.

So far as the railroads are concerned, the jobs in question have been rendered unnecessary througti automation in the railway industry over a long period of years. Particularly is this the case with I'espect to railroad firemen. In the days of the steam locomotive, the firemen performed a vital and necessary function to the engines operation. With the coniing of deisel locomotives, ho'w^ever, th^ fireman was no longer needed. Yet the railroads continued, at union insistence, to carry on their trains men classified as firemen.

As the railroads move to eliminate the jobs that are no longer necessary, many men will be thrown out of work at least until they can find other jobs. While this is a regrettable situation, it is to be preferred to a continuation of featherbedding practices that sooner or later would bring the nations railroads to the brink of financial disaster.

(Automation in industry is a fact of life with which the United States must learn to live if its economy ir remain vigorous and continue to grow. In the case of the railroads, the elimination of jobs is coming many years after automation has taken place, and thus its impact will be complicated by the long time lag. The railroads and their workmen would have been far better off had the elimination of the unnecessary jobs been taken step-by-step as automation of rail operations progressed gradually.

Unless the industrial and economic strength of the nation is to be severely weakened by clinging too long to antiquated methods of operation, it must be recognized that automation is going to eliminate many jobs in many industeies. It must also be recognized that as economic and industrial strength increases through automation new jobs will be available foT those whose jobs are replaced by new innovations.

Heart

-forsetth

OTHER ANP TELl TO TAKE

Why Not Just Leave It To Local Govmts?

Committee To Decide Reforms

By WILLIAM A. SHIRES BALLOTS The fate of absentee ballot reforms in t h i s session of the legislature probably hinges now on the makeup of a subcommittee expected to be named in the next few days.

It Is conceded generally that a Republican bill to repeal North Carolinas absentee ballot law will be killed.

But what happens to the changes in the law proposed by the State Board of Elections probably depends on the disposition of a subcommittee that will undertake a decisive study of the measure. It is expected that such a subcommittee will be named shortly, possibly this week.

CHANGES The full joing Elections and Elections Laws committee headed by two west-m North Carolina lawmakers devoted two meetings last week to an explanation of the reforms by the chairman of the State Board of Elections, William Joslin.

Joslin was subjected to close questioning by committee members, and opposition to the reforms was voiced on several counts some of them Involving technical details.

It was apparent after the "windup of Joslins testimony last Friday that the committee wanted further study. There was no request for an immediate vote. In fact. House chairman Lacy Thombui^ of Sylva Indicated the committee would want to go through the lengthy proposals line by line, a task that clearly Indicated a subcommittee study.

FURTHER There 'W^as no motion at the Friday meeting for a subcommittee, but the implication was clear.

Almost a dozen committee members called simultaneously for adjourning the meeting which, when Joslin had finished and Thornburg said there was not enough time left to begin a close study, had reached an awkward point.

Another meeting of the full committee was scheduled, at least tentatively, but adjourning the session Friday allowed a weekend or longer for committee members to study what had been said and find out more about thinking back home.

It also allowed the committee chairmen more time to think about the ticklish problem of subcommittee membership, MEMBERS Quite a few

members of the full committee made no secret of their wish to be on such a subcommittee.

Others, however, also expressed a reluctance.

Committee sources said they felt some amendments would be offered to the State Board of Elections bill and that what happens in the way of amendments may determine eventual success or failure of the proposed tightening of the absentee

A few committee members are known to be firmly against tampering with the present law in any way.

FINANCE The legislature's joint Finance Committee, which was told its work load would be far less this session, is accumulating quite a stack of bills anyway.

Finance must consider any bill dealing with taxation or public revris. Some of these measures go to other committees first, but always must also get over the finance committee hurdle too.

Some major Items already In the Finance committee include Gov. Terry Sanfords proposals to afford some $8 million in tax relief, a Republican bill to repeal the sales tax on food and now Sen. Irwin Belks bill to repeal the intangibles tax.

The Intangibles tax is levied on funds on deposit in the banks within or without the state, and on money on hand. Belks measure would classify such funds as nontaxable intangible property not subject to local listing or assessing for ad valorem tax purposes.

LICENSES Various revenue-producing licensing laws affecting specific groups are among those bills which go first to one committee and later to France.

For example, there may be a bill introduced to repeal a $750 a year license fee requirement for certain agricultural credit concerns, cooperatives and agencies. A bill has been introduced already to repeat the hunting and fishing license requirements for persons 65 or older.

The state insurance department is preparing legislation which would put most automobile and motor membership clubs under state licensing and regulation, especially in regard to so-called tie-in sales of motor club memberships with applications for auto liability insurance.

Local governments in North Carolina have been saying for many years there should be a clear demarcation of avenues of taxation to be used by local governments and by the state government.

They have supported their contentions by pointing to the increasing financial pinch that has faced local governments as state and federal governments have reached out into new areas to raise tax revenues. Against such a background, it is natural that county and municipal governments have denounced the proposed removal of the state intangible tax on bank deposits in which they have shared with the state government.

Elimination of the state-wide tax would reduce local government revenues in North Carolina by about $2 million annually. While there is feeling at the legislative level that the state would not find it difficult to compensate for revenues it would lose by killing the intangibles tax. county and city officials feel they would be hard pressed to make up the revenues from other sources.

In view of the conflicting position at the state government and local government levels, perhaps it would be possible to compromise the issue bv reducing the intangibles tax, eliminating the state government altogether in participating in its receipts, and allow municipal and county governments to collect a smaller intangibles tax on a uniform rate throughout North Carolina.

By ALVIN TAYLOR

Fhe Story Got Around

She Big Task

Years Ago

City Judge Cliarles_Whedbee's court has been gaining In stature in recent years.

The recorders court judge of 10 years, has seen his couiT s fame grow in this area, particularly its handling of traffic cases. This has received favorable recognition in Greenville, Raleigh, Charlotte, Richmond, Charleston, S. C., Charleston. W, Va. and elsewhere.

The judges wisdom was sent round the world as the result of a recent case, however.

Involved was a man given a ticket for reckless driving. He tore up the patrolmans ticket and threw it on the ground. The highway patrolman promptly gave another ticket for Utter-bugging.

The case came before Judge

Whedbee, who foimd the defendant hmocenl of the reckless driving charge, but fined him $25 on the litterbug charge.

The unusual story was picked up by the Associated Press which sent it out on its worldwide network.

This happened a couple of weeks back and Judge Whedbee has received a letter all the way from Germany. Writing him was a Capt. John S. Whedbee who is stationed there. He enclosed a clipping of the Associated Piess article which had appeared in the European Edition of the Stars and Stripes.

Capt. Whedbee, of Tuscaloosa. Alabama, had noticed that he and the judge have the same last names.

In readingStars and Stripes

he continued, he came upon the article. It Is so seldom that I meet or hear mention of someone with my name that I am taking the liberty of writing.

He reported that he and his brother had been searching the family tree for about eight years. We have established most of the line from its beginning in the U, S. in early 1600s in the Albemarle Sound area to our families migration to Tennessee in 1845 and to the present.

Since I have been In Europe. I have located Whedbee s in Southampton. England. During the course of my search. I have met Whedbees in Hertford r Ah^kie and several other places In Virginia and North Carolina.

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By JAMES MARLOW WASHINGTON <AP) Thirty years ago Monday a dreary and pathetic day, weather-wise and otherwise President Roosevelt took office. No one who listened to him on their radio jwill forget it.

War with Hitler was unimagined and eight years away but that day the nation, frightened and broke, was at war wdth a depression. Roosevelt in his inaugural address offered action and action now.

The familiar world was falling apart, but here suddenly was a sense of hope through a mans voice, a feeling that maybe the pieces could be put together again. There was some bewilderment in it t(X).

He made many promises of government help which he was to fulfill in the years ahead. At the same time he promised to cut spending. That was the bewildering part. How could he do both?

Roosevelt himself probably . had no idea. Maybe it just sounded good to him. It was only an echo of the economy promises in the 1932 Democratic platform, for in the end he did the opposite.

He never balanced the budget In his 12 years in the White House. That was not the kind of thing which could matter much to a man who was hungry or out of a job or a home.

What did matter was the Roosevelt got to work immediately, trying to get the country on its feet, even though he sometimes operated like a man playing by ear, which he often did.

That was the difference between Roosevelt and the more cautious and conservative President Hoover, Roosevelt w' a s willing to use all the resources of government against the depression. Hoovers administration wasnt.

For instance, it was unwilling to grant direct relief. It wanted local goveniments and private charity to do that. Hoover even vetoed a bill for establishing a national system of employment agencie.s.

It was no wonder ho said his campaign against Roosevelt was a contest between two philosophies.

Yet it was Hoover, not Roosevelt, who was operating within a long tradition of American history in his reluctance to see the government assume responsibility for the general welfare.

In 1854, President Pierce said the welfare clause of the Constitution did not empower C(mgress to provide for the poor generally. That remained federal policy on relief until 1933 when the Federal Emergency Relief Act was passed.

In 1937, the Supreme Court, upholding the Social Security Act, blessed Roosevelts new philosophy.

Justice Benjamin N. Cardozo, writing the majority opinion, explained why: Needs that were narrow or parochial a century ago may be interwoven in our day with the wellbeing of the nation. What is critical or urgent changes with the times. ^ally in 1946 Congress wTote into law, in the employment act of that year the Roosevelt philosophy as a naticmal philosophy. That act says the government has a responsibility for the general welfare.

But there was nothing revolutionary about Roosevelts social legislation. It might have been new for the federal government, but this government was decades behind conservative nations like Britain and Germany, Before 1912 the British hkd a program for feeding hungry school-chlldren, a workmens compensation law, old age pensions, unemployment and health in,surance much expanded in the 1940s and an eight-hour day for coal miners,

Germany, as early as 1882 under Bismarck, put through accident and sickness Insurance and old age insurance with an annual pension for disabled workers and those who retired at 70.

The Roosevelt measures to regulate business were bitterly opposed but these were certainly not new. Back In 1887 Congress had begun the regulation of business with the Interstate Commerce Commission,

The Securities and Exchange Commission had its ancestry In the Grain and Commodities Exchange acts of the Coolidge and Harding administrations.

Even Roosevelts so - called 'Continued on Page f>

Other Editors Saying...

Image Of U.S. Woman

(Rocky Mount Telegram)

Is the American woman domineering. lazy, unfeminine and forward? American women do not think so, and many family counselors agree with them. The entire question arose because of a poU conducted in Western Europe on the impressions there of American women. The results were mixed, but the one fact shining through is that those who feel American w'omen are domineering, lazy, etc., got the impressi(wi from movies, books, television the stereotype woman.

Of course, we have a .stereotype impression of the French woman, gained mostly through people like Brigitte Bardot, and Italian women through folks like Gina LoUobrigida and Sophia Loren. It goes without saying that all French and Italian women are notcouldnt be like Brigitte, Gina, and Sophia. Nor are all American women like some of those represented by movie actresses, TV personalities, or otherwise.

Some Europeans think American women wear the trousers in the average family. This impression could have been developed because American women do have more freedom than their Eluropean counterparts. In the U. S. it Is not unusual for women to take part In politics, science, the arts, or any oth-field once dominated by

ers and wives as those in Europe. That the^ get out and participate more In conunun-ity life is obvious. And perhaps that is partially the reason for the impressions gained in Europe.

Ameiican women aie more independent, but this doesn't detract from all their womanly qualities. As for feminine charms, most American men traveling abroad return with a little more appreciation for the American woman. One sociologist in Chicago, in talking about independence in American women, said we cant have it both ways. We cant have free women and obsequious, well-behaved, tame cmes at the same time. What appears to be domineering Is the asserti(Mi of rights that are not well-distributed in Europesm families.

The prevailing opinion among American women can best be summed up by Judge Theresa Melkle of San Francisco who called the American woman the greatest power for good In the world today. Judge Melkle. who has handled thousands of family relations and divorce cases in her 38 years of public service, said of the American

Ooinions

'n Brief

Of The

Menace

The ^ captain (jffered to exchange any family Information vilth the local judge.

While the local news story w'ent to Europe, it also was read In the Far East, as Judge Whedbee learned.

Dr. Lucille Charles, professor of English at East Carolina College, received a clipping from the Straits Times, a Malayan English lauiguage newspaper published in Singapore.

The story of the lltterbugging conviction appeared on the front page of the Feb. 23 edition. Li this case the story was attributed to Reuters, the British news service.

Dr. Charles friend In Malaya had visited her here in Greenville at one time and noticed the Greenville. N. C. dateline when the story was published there.

So went a local news item.

er

men.

But the American family is still a strong unit, the cornerstone of American .strength, and the woman has her place in that unit. We feel American women are just as good moth-

women:

They have time to woric (xi projects for the benefit of community and humanity. It is my experience that women leave business to men, but with their taking a larger part now in public affairs and club work, they are of assistance to their husbands. This has not interfered with their continuing to be women, or feminine. Besides, American men seem pretty well satisfied with their lot.

India is now at cold war with China. The plan to triple the Indian defense budget can only bring a gasp of admiration and of concern from the outside world. The people of India had long since answered the Chinese attack with a powerful upsurge of nationalist feeling, But the Indian Government had not acted In any major way,The Christian Science Monitor,

Every elected or appointed government official or board, receiving or otherwise handling public funds, should publish at regular intervals an accounting showing where and how each dollar of taxpayer money spent.Marksville (La.)

is

News.

By JOHN CHAMBERLAIN

Copyright, 1963, King Peaturej;

Syndicate, In6.

MIAMI, Fla.-A Northerner, coming to Floridas Gold Coast for a sojourn, is suddenly made aware that the heart of the Cuban menace, to many who live in the closest proximity to Castros Soviet-provided weapons, is not planes or missiles; It Is something that might be ed galloping subversion.

Native Floridians argue that if the Russians are going to fire off any expensive atomic explosives from Cuba, thelf aim will be cities weD to the North as well as the local^oc-ket installations at Cape Canaveral. But If Floridians seem relatively calm about the direct military menace of CTuba, they are apprehensive about the political safety of the whole Caribbean region that lies directly under the horizon to the South.

The fears crop up In all sorts of articles In the local papers. There are the worries that Ca.s-tro-trained Conununist saboteurs may make a shambles of Bene-zuela. And there are the reports that guerillas trained in Cuba have been infiltrating Haiti, which is only fifty mUes by water from the eastern end of Castros ideological power house.

In worrying about gall<ving subversion Floridians are far -more realistic than those who , are primarily concerned over the amount of Russian military power that may be stashed away In Castros isle. For if Communism Is to i^ln further victories In Latin America. It will be by methods already tested In Cuba itself. The methods emphasize trickery, not tht use of missiles.

The technique of Ccwnmu-nLsm. as has been demonstrated in Cuba, is to proceed to ifi objective by Indirection. After all. Fidel Castro did not taka Havana by armed assault; Indeed. he did not move out of his guerilla strwighold in the Sierra Maestra until it had become apparent that the army of Dictator BattsU would not fight. When Castro did flnaUy move into Havana, It was to the huzzas of all manner of Cuban* who hoped for a free democratic republic based on prlvat* property and bourgeois capitalism. It was only later that the democratic Chibans woke up to thr fact that coirammlsts had taken over Castros guerilla forces by an Infiltration presided over by Fidel Castros Communist brother Raul.

Once in control in Havsna, Pidel Castro, abetted by brother Raul and the Argentine Marxist adventurer CJhe Cuevera, proceeded to weed out even the anti-Batista officers in the old Cuban army, replacing them with trusted C^tnnmunist operatives. The whole thing was accomplished by stealthand the Cubans were presented with a fait acc(Hnpll long before Pidel Castro admitted to the world at large that he had been a Marxist all along.

This is the classic pattern of take-over which Communism can be expected to follow in any country that is not contiguous to Russia or to Red China. The recipe is first to mak* sure that the army of the existing government will not support the regime. Then, one* the caikure of the State haa been achieved by having victory presented to democratic' forces (Ml a idatter, the truck is to make certain that th centers of power are transferred to Marxists who hav* hitherto concealed their true ideol(icai identification.

What drives anti-CcKnmunlsts crazy is that this method of combining the techniques of immorallsm and infiltration has never been a secret. The anti-Communlst warnings fall on deaf ears because Americans. being open and moral themselves, cannot really believe that stealth will be used by the enemy. Long before WashingttMi had become convinced that Fidel Castro was in league with the Communists, a bright reporter, Alice Leone Moats, who happened to hav* sources of informatlcm In Mexico, exposed the Communist nature of the Fldelista movement. But Miss Moatss article, which appeared in William Buckleys National Review, sank without a ripple. Miss Moatss fate as an anti-Communist pn>het was (Continued on Pxg* 6)

Factors Influencing A Decision

By ELMER ROESSNER

Strength For Today

By EARL L. DOUGLASS

THE IMPORTANCE OF NOW

There is a lure about the future which is both good and bad. It Is good when it keeps us keyed up with a sense of expectancy. There are b e 11 e r things ahead than have ever happened to us in the past.

On the other hand, this lure of the future is bad for us all if it takes our mind away from present tasks, leads us to be impractical, causes u.s to live in a dreamy world of fantasy instead of in a real world with Us demands, its losses, its sacrifices and its requlremcnts.

The people who liave no thrilling sen.se of the future are dead at the very center of their lives. The slave who lives under the fear of the la.sh and wlio knows that he must toil as a slave

and die as a slave is one who has no thrilling sense of the future filled with manifold possibilities.

The very fact that We wish for certain things vigorously and continuously has something to do with our finally getting them. But the greatest fact in achievement is not wishing but work, not anticipating but ambition, not dreaming but diligence.

This w'orld in which we live Is a pretty practical place. We get out of life what we put Into it. There is a place In human experience for dreams, for anticipation of the future but this sort of thing can be damaging and devastating If we let it get out of hand.

Right now Is the period to which we have to give our most .sincere and thoughtful consideration.

Two factors may have influenced President Kennedy's decision to ask for a tatx cut and an unbalanced budget.

1. United States economic growth has been 3 per cent or less per year since the fend of the war. The growth in Western Europe has been much greater, in spurts almost 10 per cent a year. Western Europe has a labor shortage; the United States has embarrassing unemployment. We may lag even further behind Europe.

2. The war babies are coming Into the labor market. Three and later four million persons will enter their twenties each year from now on. A start must be made now to provide jobs for them or we wUl be faced with unruly mobs, some economists say.

GRAVE CHALLENGES

cuts, deficit spending, more Inflation or worse.

But the implications may be far less than they seem.

Europe's rate of growth has been much faster than ours since the war. Europe was starting from a wrecked economy and a .smashed industrial plant. The U. S. finished the war with undamaged plants and. in addition, a vastly expanded industrial complex. Under pressures of war needs, an enormous plant capacity has been built up.

Therefore, it was imperative that Westeni European nations make great leap forward, just to catch up with the 1960s. And they did.

MORE DAMAGE, MORE RECOVERY

On the surface, these appear to be serious matters, constituting a challenge to ,the American ability to solve its own problems as well as the worWs.

If they are as grave as they seem to some observer, then no price Is too great to pay for solution, whether they be tax

Note that the greatest gains were made where the destruction had been worst. The biggest leaps were made by Germany, France and Benelux, which had suffered vast demolition, and the least gains were made by the neutrals, Spain, Portugal and Sweden. Intermediate gains were made by Britain and Italy. which suffered greatly but not as much as Franc* and Ger

many.

Piuthennore the greatest galrm occuired where the United States gave the most aid. In money, food, materials and defense. 'The Allies limited Germanys rearmament. The Germany economy, therefore, was not burdened by costs of supporting an armed force, while Americans. Britons and a few others shouldered the cost of defending Germany.

By refusing to assist, the U. S. kept Frances nuclear projects down while we poured billions into our own. This gave Prance more with which to develop the civilian economy; it gave us less for our own growth.

Western European economics grew faster than ours because we planned it that way and footed the bill.

WHAT OF THOSE WAR

BABIES?

The tide of youngsters born in the late war and postwar years wUl present something of a problem.

With the economy growing by no more than 3 per cent a year now. it will take time to absorb the.se largely untrained and little skUlcd people into business

and Industry.

But there i^ reasm for thinking that the solution lies within the problem itself.

These young men and women, even if living on their parent or on relief, will create a demand for food, clothing, used cars and other goods and services. This will require more production which, in turn, wUl create more Jobs.

Theres more to it than that*.

Those almost three mlUiMi who become 20 next year, and the millions more who become 20 in succeeding years, and the first four-million crop that becomes 20 in 1974 wlU have ideas, plans and energies.

They will have inventions we havent even dreamed of; they will devise processes that seem impossible today; they will provide skills and services that will enrich and extend life for everyone. And hi doing so, they will be creating jobs and In-creasing productivity far li. yond our expectatiohs. They may even find a way to pay off the tremendous debt we are strapping to their shoulders.

Lets not give up on the coming generations yet. It is an asset, not a liability.

/