4The Dally Reflector, Greenville. N. C.Ttiursdaiy. March 19, 1979

Upheaval Among Bureaucrats

Recently 1800 HEW employees have demanded an accounting from their boss, Robert H. Flinch for Nixon administration civil rights policies.

More that a third of the HEWs civil rights division protested the ouster of their director L.eon E. Panetta, in a strongly worded letter to the president.

The Labor Department faces a minor rebellion from Neighborhood Youth Corps directors objecting to a 25 percent cut in money job trainees can

earn.

Associated Press writer G. C. Thelen. Jr. saw this as dissident young bureaucrats, angry over such issues as the Vietnam war and the Nixon administrations civil rights policies who

are

Most Of Th Will Grow Up

(Today's guest column was written for N.C. Association of Afternoon Dailies by. Loyal Phillips, general manager of The Daily Advance. )

By LOYAL PHII.LIPS

KLIZABETH CITY - Kids are reckless rascals and its a good thing most of them grow up otherwise civilized society would eventually deteriorate to the morals and customs of barbaric jungles

The outrageous and illegal b<*havior if young people on our campuses and big city streets in recent months has frightened us and perhaps given us a false impression of the fibre of America's youth We are learning that most of the worst behavior occurs as a result of dare devil leadership by w icked ^ si-oundrels who are in their twenties and no longer kids

Excluding the extremists and their fringe of followers.

It seems that most of today's young people think and behave just about like kids have done for the past 50 years or longer.

Perhaps one of todays biggest problems is that parents teachers and law enforcement officers are turning their heads and letting bad kids get by with murder Kids are getting braver and adults are getting baffaloed

In an effort to help develop effective methods of coping with the juvenile delinquency problem, several organizations have recently conducted surveys to find out what the majority of todays young people are thinking.

A November study made by the South Bend. Ind. Tribune disclosed some discouraging reactions along with a few-good reasons for optimism. The study was based on questionnaires filled in by the 1689 youngsters, ages 14 through 19 About half the participants were female and 3 per cent were black. About one half the respondents were 16 or 17 years old.

A good shocker for openers was the disclosure that one out of three approved of premarital sex!

However. further questioning revealed that some pf the kids interpreted premaritial sex to mean necking, as well as more involved sex relations.

One out of six kids think marriage soon will be obsolete and this prospect is particularly frightening. The examples being set by adults must of course be considered a basis for the prevailing opinion among the young.

Eighteen per cent (about the same number of girls as boys) say they smoke cigarettes and 10 per cent have tried marijuana. Twenty six per cent think

marijuana should be legalized and HH per oent approve of sex education in school

Sixty per cent believe indecent literature has a relation to sex crimes and this disclosure may arouse additional opposition to the pornographic trash on our newsstands

About half the 1689 participants said they attend movies which are recommended for adults only ^ and 69 per cent said morals are generally declining.

It was encouraging to learn that 91 per cent expressed belief in the lO commandments and one out of two said parents are not strict enough with their children.

Generally speaking, the study indicated that the present young generation is following precedent so far as anti-establishment is concerned. 57 per cent approved of teacher strikers; 59 per cent favor immediate withdrawal from Vietnam; 62 per cent say the U.S. should grant amnesty to all those who avoided the draft by reason of conscience.

Fifty one per cent do not believe in capital punishment but 47 per cent favored continuing our present system.

As might be expected, youngsters are sold on the space program and favor its continuance. Fifty two per cent said the U.S. should make a strong attempt to land a man on Nlars.

The youths were asked. Do you believe in busing to establish racial balance in schools? The responses were: Yes 22.5 per cent; No 75.6 percent. There was no breakdown as to race.

Members of both races will be genuinely concerned about the youths reactions as to intermarriage.

Would you marry a Negro (a white) 38 per cent of Negro respondent said yes; 14 per cent of whites said yes. Fourteen per cent of the white youngsters participating would amount to around 210 individuals. It may be assumed that most of those white kids who said they would marry a Negro would change their mind by the time they reached marriage and vice versa.

To the question; would you date a Negro (a white) 72 per cent of the black said yes and 29 per cent of the whites answered in th^_ affirmative.

Twelve per cent of Negroes would object if whites moved next dow and 16 per cent of whites would object to having Negroes next door.

It should be pointed out that the Negro population of South Bend is not high and that only .3 per cent of the participants in the Tribune survey were Negro.

The Daily Reflector

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sHattering the stereotype of the federal employe as a faceless civil servant

Xo the increasing discomfort of their politically appointed bosses, a vocal minority among the under - 40 crowd in government is making discernible waves in a distinctly unservile fashion, Thelen wrote.

Kunny thing. In reading the same news reports we had seen power mad bureaucrats~who were at last being told that they had to treat public funds as if they really did belong to the publicreacting with a last ditch effort to hold on to their dictatorial

powers.

We were inclined to think of immature types who couldn't hold jobs outside of government finally being told that they had to treat all sections of America equally; that they werent occupying troops from a conquering nation with license to destroy anything they chose in a defeated country.

We had seen government employees fighting for the glory days when they could snap their fingers at southern school boards and demand the impossible, with the threat of withholding the taxes the southerners had paid, to hang over them-

We had seen all the unreasonablenSs that had

been so evident in every HEW plan which had come down to the various school districts with which we are familiar.

Of course, that is just from the point of view of southerners living under the oppressiveness of bureaucrats who have been in the delightful position of having laws at their disposal w'fiich apply to only one section of the nation.

Now, however, we have been enlightened.

School Lunches Prove To Be A Big Business

Obviously feeding school children is big business, as indicated by a recent news story.

Pitt County schools served 1,572,739 meals to students during the 1968-69 school year, while 463,210 meals were served to Greenville school students.

Pitt County schools were reimbursed S214,073.57 for free or reduced Mice meals. Greenville served 47,652 free or reduced price meals and was reimbursed a total of $35,955.41.

Colleges and universities seem to have seen a decline in students eating at their cafeterias. In the city and county schoc^, however, schocrf-served meals are a major thing.

Too Familiar,

And Tiresome

Bv HAL BOYLE

NEW YORK (AP) Remarks that a college president gets tired' of hearing:

Theres a delegatton of outraged students waiting to see you, sir.

Your office will be quite shipshape. Dr. Bedrock, as soon as we finish sweeping up the broken window glass. Do you teach anything at

this place except rebellion? Certainly the board feels you deserve a raise. Dr. Bedrock, but lets look at it realistically. After all. youre already earning more than a master plumber.

Theres a delegation of outraged alumni waiting to see you. sir.

It was bad enough for them to scatter your confidential files to the winds. Dr. Bedrock, but when they also stole your Phi Beta Kappa keywell, thats

really playing dirty pool. Good old Cobweb College. No wonder Im sentimental about it. Some of the best riots of my life were fought here.

It's tbe mayor on the phone, sir. He says hes sorr>-but be has to have his police force back. City Hall is under attack.

In a way I enx^y you fellow s who live the academic life. It helps protect you from hax'ing to face reality.

No, this isn't a battlefield. It's our campus.

I know^ you must be starving.sir. If youll give me permission. Ill try to break through their picket lines and bring you back a sandwdch. Exen though they know Im your secretary, I dont think theyll strike an old wcnnan. I hate to twist the arm of an old classmate. Bedrock, old buddy, but for old times' sake cant you overrule your admissions committee and get my son in somehow? He lasted almost a full semester at his last college.

Theres a delegation of outraged parents waiting to see you, sir.

It's the governor on the phone, sir. He says hes sorry but hell have to withdraw the National Guard troops in order to protect the State Capitol. Its surrounded by a delegation of outraged taxpayers.

Of course, we will admire your scholarly reputation. Dr. Bedrock, but what this college needs is more endowment money. To put it bluntly. you'll have to get it or

go-

About the only real emergency we have to confront this morning. Dr. Bedrock, inxcdx'es the student infirmary. Theyre out of birth control |h11s againand there's a full moon tonight. I don't mind them hanging >x>u in effigy, sir. but that thing they are hanging doesn't really look much like you.

There's a delegation of outraged student athletes wixes waiting to see you, sir. They say they can't live on what we pay their husbands.

Strength For Today

GENERAMON GAP An Egyptian boy, writing about the year A. D. 200. sent

tbe following letter after his fatber. who had gone on a journey. This choice bit of impudence was discovered at a place where the dryness of tbe Egyptian sand had insured its preservation.

Tbeon to his father Theon. Greetings.

A fine thing you did to mel * You didnt take me with you to tbe town. If you wont take me*^ with you to Alexandria, then Im not writing you any more letters; Im not going to talk to you or greet you any mm^e. And if you are going to Alexandria by yourself, then I sbauit stick up for you any more. I shant even say hullo.

If you wont take me with you. thats what will happen!

My nnother too would say to Archelaus: He makes me fed up; off with him.

KILLED IN ACTION!

Yes, its a fine thing youve done to me! You have sent me presents, big ones: pips to you! They tricked me, on this twelfth day, the very day that you have taken yourself off. Well now. have me fetched. I shant eat and I shant drink. Thats what Ill do!

I hope that things may go weU with you.

The eighteenth of the month Tybi.

Deliver it to Tbeon. From his son Ibeon.

By Earl L. Psaglass

By JAMES J. KILPATRICK

Ponder Welfare, Too

One trouble with

presidential messages especially long presidential messages is that they tend to become instant classics. Everyone talks about them, but few persons really read them; such messages are interred in the tombstone type of the Congressional Record, and then are obscured in the rusb of events.

The Presidents message of March 3, dealing with education, deserves a better fate. Mr. Nixon said some things about our schools, public and private, that need badly to be said. His major point is that in certain important areas of our society, current procedures in education notably Federal aid to education simply are not working; and before throwing good billions after bad, he want to know why theyre not xvorking.

For all the sputterings of the educationist lobby, the Presidents cool appraisal is undeniably sound. Yet the anomalous aspect of this

recent message is that nearly everything Mr. Nixon said of our failings in education could be said with equal precision of our failings in public welfare.

Thus he began by observing that our Federal education programs are largely fragmented and disjointed, and too often administered in a way that frustrates local and private efforts. True. And the same criticism exactly applies to Federal welfare programs.

The President singled out one program in particular as an example of recent disappointments. More than a billion dollars a year is going into compensatory education for disadvantaged children, most of them poor blacks in the central cities. Yet tests indicate that fewer than 20 per cent of these children are measurably benefited. Mr. Nixon, who is nothing if not pragmatic, therefore proposes to take in sail. He wants to find out what is wrong.

Other Editors Say

One-^Jpmanship

(The Charlotte Observer ) One Frank B. Aycock Jr., an attorney in Currituck, says he has a friend in Hat-teras who is irate at Dr. Leo Jenkins, president of East Carolina University.

In a letter to the Raleigh News and Observer, Aycock says he has been tmable to disabuse the minds of several people in his area of the notion that Dr. Jenkins arranged for tbe center of totality in Saturdays eclipse of the sun to pass directly through Greenville.

Writes Aycock :

He (the man in Hatteras) said that be was grateful that Dr. Jenkins bad placed a branch of ECU in Dare County. However, as to the eclipse, he felt that if Dr. Jenkins had kept out of it. Cape Hatteras would have been in the center of totality.

Aycocks efforts are in vain. There are two believable theories about why Dr. Jenkins arranged this event for Greenville. One is that he wanted to put to rest once and for all any assertions that East Carolina was not ready for university status. Another is that he had to do something quickly to restore the prestige ECU lost when it was upset in the first round of the Southern Conference basketball tournament.

For all we know, it could have been a mixture of these reasons. At any rate, scientific interest last Saturday was centered on the home of ECU, and the Hatteras man had good reason to believe his area had been done in. The sun may occasionally be eclipsed, but ECU and Leo Jenkins never!

Can't

Rush

Program

As his message makes clear, the President suspects that a great many things are wrong, chiefly that educational administrators are navigating in a fog. Conventional wisdom tends to place great importance upon a low pupil-teacher ratio, upon audio-visual equipment, upon new physical plant, upon higher outlays per pupil in average daily attendance. Nixons challenge is to ask if other factors, especially a childs home environment as early as 18 months, are not still more important. If so, entirely new approaches may be needed.

In any event, the Presidents main purpose . just now is to seek a better understanding of the basic truths of the learning process. Toward that end, he proposes a massive increase in funds for educational research. A new National Institute of Education would be created. The moribund National Advisory Council on the Education of Disadvantaged Children will be reactivated. A new Office of Child Development will set up a network of experimental centers. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting will tackle new approaches to educational TV.

All this study and experimentation is necessary, says the President, to make certain that our education dollars are being wisely invested to bring back their highest return in social benefits.

Splendid! Mr. Nixons approach is the very model of prudence and frugality. But where is his sense of prudence and frugality in the equally baffling field of public welfare?

Conventional wisdom hasnt worked in public welfare, either. This was the opening theme of the Presidents message on welfare last August. No one knows exactly why welfare rolls have swollen so disproportionately; no one knows much about these

(Continued On Page 5)

By ALTON BLAKESLEE AP Science Editor The galloping popular campaign to clean up the nations polluted environment wont witness some magical quick fix.

And that is worrying some experts in pollution control.

They are concerned that enthusiasm will fade when the drive to clean up air, water and land runs into inevitable practical realities, even if given all the good will in the world to do the job.

Disappointment and fading interest could deflate the pressure to do what is really requireda continuing commitment and motivation to raise the money, to pass and enforce the laws, to develop technology and to do all the work first to halt and then correct man-made insults to the environment. And then to keep improving antipollution controls as population expands.

As one reality, take a river basin which is being polluted by raw sewage from a number of

tOWTlS.

By popular demand, even law. all towns are asked to halt their pollution, right now. People along other rivers make similar demand.

But would there be enough engineers to make the essential surveys, then to plan and design the sewage treatment plants, or would there be enough skilled construction firmsgiven contracts for the lowest bidsto build all the plants for all the towns and cities at the same time?

The point is raised by Reinhold W. Thieme, a deputy assistant secretary of the Interior, not in terms of suggesting any slowdown, but merely to point out that some cities might have to wait their turn to complete the clean-up of the entire river.

Another caution against expecting instant paradise comes from a distinguished leader in efforts to save mans environment, Dr. Rene Dubos of Flocke-feller University, New York City. He says much basic knowledge is lacking concerning some actions to take.

While a river of dollars will be needed to stop pollution, even if we had limitless resources we could not formulate really effective control programs because we know so little about the origin, nature and effects of most air pollutants, Dr. Dubos writes in Psychology Today.

Seventy per cent of the solid particles contaminating urban air have not been identified, and "no one really knows at present which of the air pollutants are most dangerous and where priority should be placed in control measures.

Even greater ignorance exists concerning chemical pollutants in water supplies, and about which ones may be harmful to health, he adds.

But it is essential that as a society Americans commit themselves to solving problems of pollution not because we are threatened with extinction but because, if we do not understand what the environment is doing to us. something worse than extinction will take place, a progressive degradation of the quality of human life, Dr. Dubos declares.

Specialists such as Thieme and Dubos are not suggesting any excuses for not going ahead Immediately with a mammoth attack against pollution, but to give perspective that the struggle will take time, and will involve more than the most obvious sources of pollution, such (Continued On Page 5'

Revolving Credit Suit Impact

By ELMER ROESSNER A New Jersey suit demanding millions of dollars of refunds from revolving credit plans under the states usury laws may have far-reaching effects. If successful and the final decision probably will be up

ELMER

ROESSNEli

to the Supreme Court it may affect almost every revolving charge account in the nation. Even if it is unsuccessful. it may affect every taxpayer.

The suit is a class action filed in the Superior Court at Newark by A. Robert Roth-bard and Sanford Schneider, representing a group using revolving credU -plans.

against a number of retailers, credit and plans and gas and oil companies.

It alleges that their revolving credit plans charge 18 per cent a year on unpaid balances but that any interest charge over 7*/2 per cent is usury under New Jersey laws.

Millions At Stake

The action asks that the defendants deposit an amount equal to all collections above 7>^ per cent with the court which would be many millions of" dollars and that any person who paid more than 7^ per cent be given p refund from the sum. It also asks an examination of the defendants records and an injunction against further overcharges.

The crux of the case is that operators of rvolving.credit funds have always insisted that their charges include more than interest, paying for such things as credit

investigations, accounting costs and other services in connection with the credit.

The Internal Revenue Service has gone along with this theory and has refused to allow shoppers to deduct the 18 per cent paid on revolving credit charges. Usually the IRS allows only 6 per cent as interest and rules the rest is a fee for service.

If the courts uphold that view in the current case, taxpayers could use the judgment that the interest they receive on bank deposits, bonds, etc.,'is not all interest, that part of it is a reimbursement for costs of getting the money to the bank, cashing interest checks or coupons and so on. However, the IRS would probably retort that its all income anyway, hence taxable.

Repercussions Possible

If the suit should be successful, similar suits will

probably be filed in other states. Almost all states have usury laws, setting various limits on legal interest.

In fact, many mortgages across the country specify interest rates higher than state usury rates and some lawyer may figure a way to get a refund for home buyers ora cut in interest payments

There was considerable excitement last year over [M-oposed laws limiting credit bureaus and permitting individuals to see credit reports on themselves and demand correction of errors. The Senate passed such a bill, but many people think the whole matter, is dead.

Such is not the, case. The-House Banking & Currency Committee on Consumer Affairs is holding hearings on a similar bill this week and Congresswoman Leonor K. Sullivan, D-Mo., who introduced it, says it is much tougher than th^ Senate bill.