4-The Dally Reflector, GreenvUle. N.C.-Wettoeaday. Noven^ 19.19

Council Act Proper

It was a thoug>itful City Council which a^^roved a referendum on mixed drinks last Thursday night.

The council had heard arguments from both sides those who favored a mixed drink referendum and those who were (i}posed.

They had been told they didnt have to approve the referendum and also that they owed it to the citizens of the community to allow them to decide the issue.

In the end the council agreed with the latter argument and calling of a referendum was approved by a 6-2 vote.

A previous referendum was

called by the county commissions and liquoer-by-the^lrink was defeated. However, it was approved in the Greenville boxes. (Opponents have pointed out that some Greenville box voters live outside the city limits and wont be eligible to vote in the municipal referendum).

The Greenville City Council was not in a position of endorsing mixed drinks. It was merely doing what the state law allows it to do that is giving its citizens the right and responsibility of deciding the issue. Wd dont see how they could have acted any other way.

AN UNPERTURBED LiniE STUDY GROUP! pp 0q| Qf

Gradualism

Free Speech Protection?

If there is one thing more difficult for the Supreme Court to decide than pornography, it is how much literature of religion should be allowed in the schools.

So the court ruled this week that the Ten Commandments should not be posted in the public schools of Kentucky.

Court rulings often seem to contradict themselves in the area of

THIS AFTERNOON

religion in the school, and we are quick to say that we dont envy the justices the burden of making the decisions to conform with the Con-stition.

Perhaps the courts could end it all by proclaiming that freedom of speech and the press protects re-ligous documents posted in the schools.

By HARRY F.ROSENTHAL

Thot Fifth Branch Aeeting With Civility

ByBILLNOBUTT

RALEIGH - In the quiet after the storm of this Novembers elections, and conversation with winners and losers, it is clear that the results mean some things and do not mean others.

One thing which all agree that it did mean is this; a major change has taken place. It could even be termed revolutionary. But both sides express their deep pleasure in the peaceful nature of change. All that with no mobs screaming in the streets or soldiers and guns... Gov. Jim Hunt commented.

Vice President Walter Mndale put it another way, commending the "staggering power of the voters.

Something it might mean is tha* the worst fears of many that frustrated and disenchanted citizens would wash their hands of politics are not realized. You can throw away that line about voter apathy, Gov. Hunt pointed out.

On The Right

The morning after moanings of many people centered around a fear that the rabid right had risen up in awesome numbers to control the nation. The figures dont support that. There is a fringe of rightwing reactionaries just as there is on the left. Neither is well organized enough, large enough, or smart enough to control things. An overwhelming majority of citizens expressed a rational decision. Dont wake up and look under the bed for jackbooted, cross-burning, white-sheeted fascists. Or spying moral soldiers.

The two party system is alive and well. . .and probably will be made stronger as a result. Republicans managed to pull together the very kind of coalition which has been supporting the Democratic Party for so many years: young, middle-income, edu

cated, conservatives.

Senator-elect John East put his finger on trends; we will likely see that the Democratic zealot is a vanishing species. Before the election there was much attention paid to the need to "reform the reforms in the Democratic Party which has turned power over to minorities, liberals, and gov-

BILLNOBLITT

emmental employees. Both Gov. Hunt and former Gov. Terry Sanford have spoken forcefully on this subject. Hunt went to the national convention prepared to push for reforms in the way presidential nominees are chosen and the convention quietly agreed to proceed - but after the election, because to do so before, and with publicity at the convention, would smack of criticism of their standard bearer.

Now, reform can be pushed ahead without fear of hurting Jimmy Carter and a revitalized Democratic Party will be in the trenches facing an invigorated Republican Party next time around.

Big(iovemment

The major thing the election did not accomplish is a return of government to the hands of the people who vote and pay bills. That fifth branch of government - the

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bureaucracy - 'remains in firm control with no Constitutional authority to run things, with no turnovers by elections, and with no direct accountability to the people.

Federal and state agencies will go on writing regulations which have the effect of law, levying charges and fines, regulating and inspecting until legislative bodies begin to actively supervise and restrict their actions. Meanwhile, the bureaucrats will hunker down with every intention of surviving the storm and carrying on as usual this year or next. After all, protected by civil service rules and with retirement assured, they go on year after year. Elections come and elections go, but bureaucrats go on forever.

The darkest mood seen widely is a little frightening. Many people are saying: We tried it that way; now we are <going to try it this way. If this doesnt work...what happens next?

WASHINGTON (AP) -When Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan get together Thursday, with great civility and almost a sense of ceremony, it will be a far cry from past transitions.

John Adams found it expedient to sneak out of the White House at midnight because he did not want to meet Thomas Jefferson, the incoming third president, on the day of his inauguration.

Harry Truman thought Dwight Eisenhower had a chip on his shoulder when they met, post-election, in the Oval Office. Eisenhowers demeanor, Truman wrote, was one of frozen grimness.

William Howard Taft rode with Woodrow Wilson to Wilsons inauguration but did not fill him in on any government business.

Herbert Hoover privately confessed that in 1932 he tried to trap Franklin D. Roosevelt into decisions that would have forced the incom-

Public Forum

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To the Editor:

A response to the staff editorial of November 7 concerning the merger of the school systems must vindicate unequivocally the integrity of the Pitt County Boards decision. 'The boards statement of opposition to the merger followed months of careful study. It was an expression of the people of Pitt County and the concensus of all the schools advisory councils. The impending disaster implied by the editorial is supposition which in no way reflects the best intentions of the board.

There was not a short sighted attitude demonstrated when the board considered the inability of the County Commissioners to guarantee funds needed beyond their term of office. Nor was it shortsightedness to resize that large school systems can become impersonal, producing at less efficiency and with a dilution of efforts, which, in turn, are a waste and an excessive local tax burden.

We applaud the county board for taking its stand. It should be noted that on at least two previous occasions, the question of merger was cut short by a board other than the present one.

We recognize problems exist for both school systems, but the solution is not a merger of these systems.

To be commended is the Pitt County Boards wisdom in looking beyond the issues of financing and district lines. Their view considers the people they serve who have warranted pride in their schools. Lets continue to work out solutions -yes, but not at the expense of the communities.

C.P.9iaw

(Chairman

D.H. Conley High School Advisory Council

Strength For Today

o

LOVING AND LOVELESS HOMES The love story of the great English poet Robert Browning and his almost equally famous wife, the poetess Elizabeth Barrett Browning, is one of the most appealing in the history of English literature. Elizabeth was treated harshly and un-appreciatively by a tyrannical father. The story of how Robert by a ruse got into the house, whisked her out and married her has amused many generations of Englishmen.

Theirs was a home made

beautiful by love through the whole of their lives, even thoug^ Elizabeth was a semi-invalid. What a contrast to the thousands of loveless or broken homes today! 'The sum total of unhappiness in the world due to the inability or unwillingness of men and women to get along with each other is staggering.

This is not a situation that lends itself to easy solutions, but perhaps it would help to read about and remember the Brownings as an ideal. Elisha Douglass

ing president to abandon 90 percent of the soK?alled New Deal and adopt the Republican administration's major programs.

Carter, on the other hand, coupled his telephoned congratulations to Reagan on election night with a vow to do everything in his power to smooth the transition.

The practice of formally helping the new president hit the ground running dates back only to 1952 and Truman, who thought it was an omission in our political tradition that a retiring president did not make it his business to facilitate the transfer of the government to his successor.

After Eisenhower won the Republican nomination in 1952, Truman invited the general to Washington for foreign policy briefings. In a new book, Off the Record: the Private Papers of Harry S. Truman, author Robert H. Ferrell writes that Ike refused because his advisers evidently thought it would hurt his campaign.

Truman wrote in his diary, the president-elect has been coy about cooperating for the turnover ... Ike and his advisers are afraid of some kind of trick. There is no trick.

Eisenhower, by all accounts, was warmer when he turned over the government to John F. Kennedy. I dont think we have asked for anything that they havent done, Kennedy said after their two pre-inauguration meetings in the White House.

Kennedy made transition plans long before the election, saying if Im elected, I dont want to wake up on the morning of Nov. 9 {Election

Day) and have to ask myself, What in the world do I do now?

One of the major benefits, but also one of the biggest headaches, of any new administration is the power to fill jobs. In Kennedys day those jobs were listed in the Green Book and totaled 1,200. Nowadays the shopping list is in the Plum Book and the positions number more than 2,000.

Once, during the transition, Kennedy exclaimed: People, people, people! I dont know any people. I only know voters. How am I going to fill these 1,200 jobs?

Then, as now, there was no trouble.

The transition from Richard Nixon to his appointed vice president, (TeraJd Ford, in one of the most traumatic periods of the nations history, was greased through the foresight of Fords friend Phil Buchen.

Months before Nbcon resigned, Buchen - without telling Ford or anyone else formed a sub rosa transition team, which met on a regular basis.

They realized that had I known of their activities, I would have demanded that they stop, Ford said later.

If Nixon or any one of his supporters found out, it woidd have been construed as an act of disloyalty on my part, and the results could have been disastrous. It was a dangerous and qiwstion-able undertaking.

But, he added, it did provide a good start.

By ROWLAND EVANS

and ROBERT NOVAK

WASHINGTON - As Ronald Reagan conferred in Los Angeles with his economic advisers, congressional Republicans warned that early catastrophe awaits him unless he adopts a radical budget policy from Day One of his presidency.

Several confidential memos and papers prepared for Reagan are desi^ied to push him toward this pirficy: appointment of Rep. David Stockman of Michigan as director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB); immediate reforms to strengthen OMBs control over the runaway budget; dramatic proposals to cut back this years federal outlays and stunt their future growth.

TTiis conflicts with the talk by many Reagan economic advisers of gradualism a word redolent of the failed Nbconomics of a decade ago. 'ney seem unaware that the federal budget is careening off the tracks and that money markets are dan^rously disortiented. Hyper-inflation could end dreams for the new Reaganite coalition before it fairly starts.

In truth, Reagan encounters a rare instance where governmental reality is worse than was depicted in his campaign rhetoric. November spending estimates for the present fiscal year defy credulity, showing runaway growth of $157 billion in just 13 months. Since 0)ngress passed its budget resolution in June, spending has leaped $36 billion, m(t of it not subject to President Carters discretion.

The cause is in no small part what Stockman described to us as an automatic coast-to-coast soup line -spending legally triggered by the economic downturn. Just since June, trade adjustment assistance for laid off workers has automatically leaped from $400 million to $2.5 billion. For the same period, unemployment pay cost an extra $4.7 billion.

If Reagan adopts wait-and-see gradualism on the budget, inflationary expectations are bound to escalate. One astute Wall Street financier told his colleagues after the election to expect hyperinflation around 25 percent by 1982. Reagans deep tax cuts intended to restore incentive and growth would be blamed and probably curtailed, as Reagans men fought with each other.

'That is why conservatives on Capitol Hill pass transcontinental advice to Reagan to press the panic button. They want him to sculpt his hundred days, buttressing tax reduction and regulatory relaxation with budget reform.

'This would rule out old-school ties from the budget bureau (such as paper company vice president Paul ONeill, President Fords deputy OMB director and a candidate to be Reagans director). To stave off a business-as-usual appoint-ment, prominent

Republicans in the House and Senate have launched a campaign fw 34-year-(dd R^. Stockman, viewed by many colleagues as one of the partys most innovative young figures.

Only OMB would tempt Stockman to give up both a safe congressional seat and a chance at the Soiate in 1982. This one-time divinity student and aide to Rep. John Anderson impressed Reagan by playing the roles of Anderson and later Jimmy Carter in debate rehearsals. He is a persuasive advocate of supply-side economics, seeking to restore incentive throu^ steady tax reduction.

Stockman is what the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, has in mind in its job descriptkm for Reagans OMB director: More important than any issue, the new director must have an unwavering commitment to the substantial reduction of marginal tax rates for both individuals and business.

Simultn^usly, the Herita^ Re^rt (prepared for Reagan by Republican Hill staffers) wants Reagan to reduce OMBs management functions and make it his chief policy arm. Specifically, that would enlarge presidential authority to reduce the budget.

Another paper, this one unsigned and not dealing with the OMB directorship, was submitted last week to Reagan by Capitol Hill Republicans who warned of an economic Dunkirk for Reagan unless he frontally attacks the budget. It talks of full-scale financial panic and unprecedented global monetary turbulence.

That points to a Reagan emergency budget effort far exceeding the efforts of the three previous Republican presidents - Eisenhower, Nixon and Ford - who failed to master their first budgets in far less critical situations. Reagan is being implored to defer and reduce federal grants and subsidies to local government and private business, with least possible impact on federal help for the poor.

The goal: reduction of federal outlays by around $25 billion this year, with a cutback for ^h of the foUo^g (Continued ai page 6)

Sharing

Housing's Cold, Hard Winter

ByJOHNCUNNIFF AP Business Analyst NEW YORK (AP) - The rate of home building is heading down again, according to Kenneth Thygerson, chief economist of the U.S. League of Savings Associations. Next year will not be a good year, he said.

Thygerson believes the first half of 1981 will be very weak, and the improvement he foresees later in the year is likely to bring starts back only to an annual rate of 1.4 million or 1.5 million.

'That first-half weakness, as he sees it, will be a continuation of a decline that has already set in, and which could drop starts during the winter to an annual rate just above 1 million - 1.2 million almost.

We see a fairly substantial dip that should show up in the October starts (when figures are reported) and which should persist into next February or March, he said. Therell be no reprieve this winter.

Dismal news of this sort is so common now that, like background noise, it is often

ignored. But for those who have waited years for a home of their own it is more like the rattle of throttled hq)es and goals.

Such extreme pessimism may not be as widespread by the mid-1980s, when it is hoped new building and financing techniques might bring some relief. But for a year or so, the scene is not a happy one.

'hie reason, lenders will tell you. is high interest rates, about 14.5 percent at most savings and loan associations but with some already exceeding 15 percent. Atop those rates might be up-front charges.

A Connecticut savings bank, for example, now charges $150 merely to consider a mortgage application. If it is granted, the borrower is confronted with two or three points percents of the total mortgage that must be paid before the borrower ever lives in the house.

When very stiff terms are offered, said 'Thygerson, no terms really are being offered. 'The lenders are telling people we dont have

money look elsewhere. But where?

Some realtors report that in recent months more than half their deals have been consummated with the help of seller financing, and now it appears that some of these mortga^ might be acceptable for resale.

Private financing has been cumbersome and dangerous from the buyer and seller viewpoint. said Thygerson. mainly because the mortgages follow no standard form and generally are nonmarketable.

Now, however, the Federal National Mortgage Association has indicated it will buy some seller-financed^ paper that meets its specifications and is serviced by a third party, such as a savings and loan.

While seller-financing is likely to remain a market force, much help will be needed from the conventional sources, including savings and loan associations, savings banks and some commercial banks.

'Thygerson expressed hope for some moderation in interest rates by late spr

ing, a hope upon which his second-half recovery forecast is based.

Over the longer term, he said, were cwivinced that the single biggest problem in the 1980s will be affordability. As things stand, he said, the first-time buyer now cannot afford a house.

Downsizing, is viewed by Thygerson and others in the housing and finance industries as an emerging solution. In fact, builders already are building down for perhaps the first time since the 1950s.

Its similar to cars, said Thygerson, who foresees footage shrinking and houses being more densely clustered.

'The most potent new financing instrument, he predicts, will be the shared equity mortgage, in which the lender lowers the borrowing charge in exchange for a portion of the appreciation.

So long as we have 8-10-12-15 percent inflation, and volatility too, well have innovation of one sort or another in building and financing, he said.