Newspapers / The Pilot (Southern Pines, … / Sept. 29, 1955, edition 1 / Page 2
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. I PAGE TWO THE PILOT—SouUtern Pines. Nbrth CaroUna ——— I i.iiii I. - THURSDAY. SEPTEMBER 29. 1955 ILOT North Carolina Southern Pines “In taking over Tlie Pilot no changes are contemplated. We will try to keep tWs a go^ paper. We will try to make a little money for all concerned. Where there seems to be an om sion to use our influence for the public good we will try to do it. And we will treat every alike.”^—James Boyd, May 23, 1941. The President’s Illness This newspaper joins the press of the nation, and speaks, we know, with the voice of the people of this community, in expressing concern and regret for the illness of the President. The term “moderate,” which has been used by the doctors on the case, gives a picture of more than the frequent warning heart attack which simply tells a patient to slow down. We are thankful the term used was not “serious,” but “mcderate” is not “mild,” and the way for the President to retire to those happy acres in Pennsylvania of which he seems so fond, has been made clearer, if not unmistak able, by this happening. With knowledge of heart conditions and treatment so amazingly greater than they used to be, there must be every hope that he will re cover fully and go on to years of useful, happy living, but that he can continue in high office must be extremely doubtful So, for him, and his family, perhaps, this event will have happy consequences. He mcfy retire with a clear con science, feeling that he has performed a mighty service to his nation and the world. The change in the political picture wrought by this event is gteat. The hopes cf the Demo cratic Party have shifted with lightning speed. The very fact—and how he must regret it now of GOP chairman Hall’s week-old statement; “If the President doesn’t run, I will commit suicide,” shows how his party feels. No Repub lican mentioned as successor would seem ca pable of capturing the hearts and minds of the nation. In the Democratic ranks, several stand high, but with, in our estimation, the status of Adlai Stevenson highest of all. Time will tell. Meantime, we repeat: we think of the man ill in the army hospital in Denver and join w'ith the nation in deepest hope for his speedy recovery. People Losing Faith In Courts “Something’s radically wrong” comments the Chatham News of Siler City in a recent editori al pointing out that only 13 cases were tried cut of 34 on the Superior Court docket for a week’s term in Chatham county. Shucks, that’s nothing. Only one case from a docket of more than 40 was tried in the recent two-week civil term cf Moore County Superior Court. The first week in Moore County, as the week in Chatham, was cut short by the Labor Day holiday and, in Moore, the entire first week was consumed in trial of one very complicated case. But what about the second, or “special” week’s term cf court in Moore—the term that was set for the specific purpose of clearing up the overcrowded docket? Why nothing about it, that’s what. The judge held court for part of Monday. That’s all. He heard the jury’s verdict in the case that had taken all the previous week for trial, heard a marriage annulment case from another county, signed a few motions and judgments and dismissed a new ju^ which had taken their seats. Because federal court opened at Rockingham and Superior Court opened at Sanford, and no doubt for other mysterious reasons beyond our ten to comprehend, attorneys were not available, plaintiffs, defendants and witnesses were scat tered and, except for part of Monday, there just wasn’t any court held during the second week of the term. According to The Chatham News, the Labor Day holiday and a district bar meeting were the reasons the Chatham court was cut short. “Law yers involved were absent. Other lawyers with cases ready found themselves without a court tO' try them in.” Wliat worries us most about the situation is that these postponements and delays—which strike at the heart of the average man’s faith in justice—seem to be engineered so smoothly and accepted so placidly by the judges and law yers involved. This may not be so in every case and with every lawyer and every judge, but we have yet to hear a lawyer or a judge stand up and say, in regard to these delays, postpone ments and evasions in the administration of justice: “This is an outrage. This weakens the people’s confidence in bench and bar. Of what signifi cance is our great constitutional right to obtain redress for grievances it a case, for whatever • reason, can continue on the docket for months and years without coming to trial?” Maybe some lawyers, some judges think such thoughts, but we don’t hear them publicly ex pressed. It is up to the lawyers and judges to clean house and restore the people’s faith in the administration of justice. The Public’s Stake In The Land Twenty-five per cent of North Carolina’s farms, representing 40 per cent of the state’s cropland, benefited last year from the Federal payments made to farmers under the Agricul tural Conservation Program (ACP) which is administered by the Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation (ASC) committees for the state and its counties. While not too many persons outside the farm population know about the activities of these agencies with the mouth-fiUing titles, we all have a direct interest in them, as it is our money that is being handed out when farmers go to the courthouse at Carthage and receive payments for planting cover crops, meiking permanent pastures, improving forest stands and carrying out on their farms other needed soil and water conservation practices. Why these payments? Is this a case of the government playing Santa Claus? Why can’t farmers do these things for themselves and why should the taxpayers have to help improve any body’s farm? There is a simple and, we think, convincing answer to these queries: everyone has a stake in the land. Though privately owned, it is thp source of all our nourishment, all our food and water; and demands on the land are increasinig to such an extent that we, the public, through our government, must help assure that the land is properly cared for now and will be able to meet the demands made on it in the future. Entirely apart from the ACP program, many farmers are carrying out extensive conservation practices entirely at their own expense. And there is no question in our mind but that thous ands of farmers in North Carolina and else where have been motivated by ACP to under take soil and water conservation measures they would not otherwise have begun. Tragedy In The Making The murderers of 14-year-old Emmett Till, whether or not they are the two men who were acquitted by a Mississippi jury last week, no doubt think of themselves as patriotic Ameri cans. Perhaps they do not link their patriotism to the dreadful crime they committed—although they may indeed do just that, for we have yet to see hatred of minority groups that does not wrap itself in the flag—^but these men are no doubt good citizens ready to respond if their country is in danger, in their own eyes. Therein lies a monstrous tragedy—a tragedy of which we are only just becoming aware in its potential implications for this nation. It is a two-fold tragedy, as we see it: (1) A tragedy of morality—that in a land of almost 100 per cent literacy, a land where there is no remote community without schools and churches and the basic ingredients of civiliza tion, there should still be produced adult and not insane human beings who would murder a child. (2) A tragedy of leadership—that this nation, destined to stand before the world as strongest and best champion of man’s yearning for free dom, security and dignity, should be marked with the stigma of this murder, so that the three-quarters of the world’s population whose skins are not white see only the besmirching stigma when they look toward us: that Emmett Till’s skin was brown. Isn’t this the classic element of tragedy—^the great being brought low by some flaw within, some combination of circumstances against which the greatness, goodness and power are ineffective? “How are the mighty fallen!” Crains of Sand Liberal Trade Policies Essential Tobacco Export Problem Affected By Competition, Dollar Shortage 'That is the essence of tragedy. We who live here know that America is great and good and most of us are revolted by what happened to Emmett TiU, but a very large pro portion of that colored three-quarters of the world’s population doesn’t know much about us and often what they do know is distorted even before they get the news that we tore a dark- skinned child from his home and killed him. What we are saying is not that the United States has been breught irreparably down in tragedy—that would be absurd and we believe in the continuing greatness and human promise of this nation and what it stands for—but what we are saying is that this nation is gravely threatened by racial attitudes and the incidents they produce and that this is something that we obviously' do not entirely comprehend or link directly to our national destiny. William Faulkner, Nobel prize winning au thor, summed it up in his eloquent indictment cf the Till murder, before the trial: “If we Americans are to suryive, it will have to be because we choose and elect and defend to jbe first of all Americans to present to the world one homogeneous and unbroken front, whether of white Americans or black ones or purple or blue or green. . . Perhaps the purpose of this sorry and tragic error committed in niy native Mississippi by two white adults on an afflicted Negro child is to prove to us whether or not we deserve tO' survive. . .” All this is a matter for deep, pondering, long thought and conscience-searching by the Ameri can people. To us, Mr. Faulkner’s words have the ring of authentic prophecy. Can we afford to ignore them? “Regardles of how good our to-1 leaf, the shortage of dollars in bacco salesmen are, they cannot'most parts of the world is a “per- sell our tobacco in the four cor- jjroblem.” ners of the world—or even one comer—unless a favorable trade climate is maintained for them to operate in,” according to J. C. Frink, assistEmt to the president pi Tobacco Associates, Inc, Tobacco Associates, supported by all fluecured tobacco growers, exists to promote the leaf export market. During the year just ended, Frink said, the United States ex ported 428 million pounds of flue- cured leal to 74 foreign countries. ;‘This is ample evidence that a Manufacturers in many coun tries which use U. S. tobacco, he said, do not know from one year to the next whether they will re ceive an allocation of dollars for U. S. tobacco purchases. Then too, he added, there is always the un certainty of whether or not ad justments will be made during the buying seasons by those coun tries which do receive allocations. , He said that another important factor tending to restrict tobacco Elephant in the Auditorium Folks have been having a lot of fun over Charlotte and Vicki, the runaway elephant. Eluding her pursuers with more than elephan tine agility, Vicki hid for days in the swamps of the, and we quote, “Jungle City,” apd apparently not even the dulcet calls of Char lotte’s GOPoIiticos could lure her forth. And in Greensboro there’s al ways the matter of the long-voted, long-overdue memorial auditori um still waiting to be built. BiU Polk’s prodding editorials in the Greensboro Daily News on this subject have been appearing with almost the regularity of The Pilot’s pleas to Save The Trees. We suggest as Neatest Trick of the Editcrial page his, or at least the GDN’s double-riposte printed below. ELEPHANT WANTED Greensboro ought to have an elephant. Look what Vicki has done for Charlotte. A town pachyderm is inval uable- for publicity and par ade purposes among other things. If Greensboro won’t buy its own elephant, it ought to bor row or rent Vicki and get her to lay the cornerstone of the coliseum-auditorium. We un derstand elephants live a long time. Put 'Em Up, Mr. Bear! Bears frequenting the highways of Great Smoky National Park are hereby advised to watch their step. Writes Dorothy Avery from her well-earned librarian’s holiday with Margaret Bishop at Banner Elk: “A black bear tried to get into our station wagon and did carry off our auto refrigerator which I rescued, armed with a flashlight.” Can’t blame him for trying to get into the station wagon but next time he has the urge to med dle with folks’ refrigerators he’d better steer clear of Moore Coun ty librarians. It seems they don’t scare so easy. I Trivolous and Malicious' There were several cases in Re corders Court at Carthage Mon day wherein wives had had hus bands arrested and then refused tO' testify against them. One such young man was charged with being drimk and legislation, preferential tariff ^ disorderly and with breaking a rates, mixing regulations, smd ex-1 lamp and an electric fan in his port subsidies were also presented home. But not a word against him by the Tobacco Associates official would the wife say in court, as restrictive devices affecting the exports of U. S. leaf. Frink pointed out that these fort by purchasing, to the greatest extent possible, their raw materi als from the areas which wiU buy German industrial goods. Bilateral trade agreements, to bacco monopolies, import quota strong demand exists for our leaf many countries. “In Germany, for throughout the world He warned, however, “If we Me to further develop our world mar- jeets for tobaccoo and other com modities—or even keep from los ing some of the markets we now have—it wiU be necessary fo^r our foreign trade policies to continue to be developed along the liberal trade lines represented in the Re ciprocal Trade Agreements Pro- grapi, the proposed legislation authorizing U. S. membership in the Organization for Trade Coop eration, and legislation for fur ther simplification of customs.” Viewing some of the factors whiph tend to restrict tobacco ex ports, Frink said that-pext to competition from Judge J. Vance Rowe cited the old story of the shepherd boy who iiiiiiv uui, iiiai, wiCDc called “Wolf, wolf” as a joke so types of restrictions and regula-1 much that when the wolves did tions not only hurt the export come nobody paid attention, trade for tobacco, but also the gome day, there might be real export trade of other U. S. com-:trouble at the homq, the judge exports is the trade policies of modifies and manufactured goods, pointed out, and officers might “In 1953,” he said, “North Caro-1 net take the summons seriously, lina exported not only about 200' example, there is no actual limi tation of dollars which manufac turers may spend for the purchase of tobacco. However, there is a policy within the government to actively promote the export of its industrial goods.” The tobacco in dustry, as well as other industries, Frink said, cooperate in this ef- million dollars worth of tobacco, but also between 150 and 200 mil lion dollars worth of other com modities, including some 70 mil lion dollars in textiles, 30 million in manufactured tobacco pro ducts, 15 million in cotton, aiid 14 million in chemicals.” On Behalf Of Country Roads Some day, when we have fin ished a few more super-highways, someone is going to make a lot of friends by advocating the con struction of a few thousand miles ,of narrow, winding dirt roads that foreign-grown lead nowhere in particular roads John Marshall Given Recognition John Marshall, whose bicenten nial is being celebrated this month, is perhaps not as well known as some of the great fig ures of his day; but it has been said that in his way he may have contributed as much, if not more, than any of the founding fathers to the strength and endurance of the American nation. An officer of the American Revolution who saw ample action, a noted lawyer, a member of the House of Delegates .in his native Virginia, a member of Congress, j Minister to France, and Secretary of State, Marshall’s great contri | butions to our national heritag* were his accomplishments a; Chief Justice of the Supremi 1 Court under six presidents fron | 1801 to 1835. As the present Chief Justice Earl Warren recently put it: “Stone by stone he built the foun dation of our constitutional struc ture, and he constructed it suf ficiently strong to support every thing we have since built upon it.” It was Marshall who established the right of the Supreme Court to declare invalid actions of the Congress and the Executive; who gave practical force to the right of every citizen to seek redress from the courts for any injury; who as serted the authority of the Fed eral Government to weld the states into a nation. Before Marshall came to the high bench, the Supreme Court was feeble and ineffectual; when Marshall departed, the Court was recognized as the most powerful judicial tribunal in history. As the OenstitUtion itself is great and enduring, so is John Marshall’s contribution to our national heri tage, for it was he who enuncia ted those principles of freedom and justice under the Constitution which guide us today. that just wander off across the countryside, up and down hills, across valleys; typical, old, coun try roads, with all the natural hazards and charm left in. Such roads will be built for dawdling, for stopping on hill tops, for wild-flower admiring, for bird-watching—for things the prudent shouldn’t do on a four-lane high way. We still have many country- road drivers who want to see a tree, not a blur of woodland; who want a breath of country air; not :highway fumes; who want to stop l and look without creating a traf fic jam two miles long behind them. I recall one back road where we parked one day to watch a wood thrush and after we had been there half an hour two foxes came into a clearing close by and play- [ ed like puppies. It’s a grass-grown trail that leads past an old cellar hole and two very old lilac bush es, fragrant remembrances of a farm family who lived and raised a family there, and is buried there beneath a weathered sandstone marker. 'These back roads lead to some thing many of us don’t want to forget. Something placidly beauti ful, something as natural as a stand of fine old hemlocks. Some thing that isn’t too much changed by the years or by the things man does to the places where he lives and works. . We live in a world of change, often violent and siodden, and it is good for the soul to be aware of things which change only on their own terms and in their own time. —Hal Borland in New York Times Magazine. The arrest was ruled frivolous and malicious and the wife was taxed with the court costs. “That’s the silliest way I’ve ever seen for a young couple to make a dent in the family bud get,” commented a spectator. A few minutes later up came another young couple, the hus band charged with assaulting his wife and infant son. Same thing. The wife smiling an(^ affable, re fusing to testify. “It wasn’t nothing,” she* volun teered to the judge. “We was just mad with each other. It’s all right now.” The sincerity of the reconcilia tion was so obvious that a mur- mur of appreciative titters ran all the the courtroom, as though motorist'it a relief to see a couple of happy people on trial in contrast to all the hostility and misery usually seen before the bench. Judge Rowe sighed and, appar ently hoping that this couple would also take to heart his wolf, wolf lecture to the preceding hus band and wife, simply motioned toward Carlton Kennedy. “Let the wife pay the costs, Mr. Clerk,” he said wearily. And the ^ext case was called. The PILOT Published Every Thursday by THE PILOT. Incorporated Southern Pines, North Carolina 1941—JAMES BOYD—1944 Subscription Rates: One Year $4. 6 mos. $2} 3 mos. $1 Katharine Boyd EkJitor C. Benedict News Editor Dan S. Ray Gen. Mgr. C. G. Council Advertising Mary Scott Newton Business Bessie Cameron Smith Society Composing Room Lochamy McLean, Dixie B. Ray, Michael Valen, Jasper Swearingen Entered at the Postoffice at South ern Pines, N. C., as second class mail matter Member National Editorial Assn, and N. C. Press Assn.
The Pilot (Southern Pines, N.C.)
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Sept. 29, 1955, edition 1
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