North Carolina Newspapers

Page Two Wednesday, Sept.. 20, 1961 Unwalled Border J;; 77s sixty-ninth year of editorial freedom, unhampered by restrictions from either the administration or the student body. The Daily Tar Heel is the official student publication of , the Publications Board of the University of North Carolina. All editorials appearing in The Daily Tar Heel are the personal expressions of the editor, unless otherwise credited; they are not necessarily representative of feeling on the staff. September 20, 1961 Tel. 942-2356 Vol. LXIX, No. 2 " eath Of An Issue D Every college editor at some time 'during his countless hours behiici a typewriter, views the campus and finds it serene. Bereft of his sacred and time-honored "issue" to line into the sights of his editorial pop gun, he invariably falls upon the Fraternity Question. As a subject for college editorials, the fraternity system is nearly ideal:, firmly entrenched, powerful, conformist, stifling. It is tall enough to warrant whittling and wide enough to make a fat target. And, since newspapers grow fat oh controversy, the fraternity al ways looks appetizing. As a college newspaper, The Daily Tar Heel is no exception. The reams of copy that have poured from its battered Underwoods on fraterni ties would fill books most of which would make rather repetitious read ing. The faults of the Carolina fra ternity system have been cata logued afresh for every freshman class for decades. Ten years, however, might well rob the 1971-72 DTH editor of the comforting presence of this seem ingly immortal issue. The editor who occupies this chair 10 years Ihence if that long will be forced to aim his epithetic generalizations at another standard target. Fraternities will no longer be a target. For, if the present trend con tinues, the huge system of national ly organized fraternities will be dead, perhaps replaced by local po litical groups or other variations of the "local." If luck accompanies the demise of the national fraternity system, it will be replaced by action groups bodies organized around a common purpose: political or social reform, academic excellence or my riad other valid goals. "Along Fraternity Row , local chapters are making up their own progressive house rules. They're re Triting the sacred rituals, pledging whomever they please, and beating 'the national instead of the dean. It looks as if the whole system . . . is on the way out." The above is quoted from the Oc tober issue of Esquire magazine. Although Esquire's comments are not as appropriate at Carolina as they are at other schools, the situa tion is the same, tempered only by UNC's characteristic resistance to change. The same conditinos that have driven nationals are present in their pubescent stages at Carolina dis criminatory clauses, inflexible sta tutes and other unpopular national dictates. Withdrawal from the national is still a relatively novel idea around big and little fraternity courts novel and .sometimes shocking. Re bellion is not a characteristic of Carolina fraternities. The process will be slow here, but it will come. Sooner or later even Carolina fraternities will react to national dictatorship. Then the sys tem must change, or die. Which alternative will come about is difficult to predict. But in either case, the local organization that survives will not exist as it does at the present. Most of the potential inherent in fraternities stems from generally close-knit organizations; they are held together by strong ties of friendship. Thus they are prime breeding grounds for concerted efforts. As they now exist, they are wont to drift aimlessly, with few construc tive goals to guide them. Given a common goal, a locally organized group modeled along fra ternal lines would be a potent force. Severed from strong national ties, fraternities might become such a group, with action as their goal rather than social gratification. When national fraternities die at Carolina, few will bemoan their death. The editor who has been robbed of an issue will certainly feel only fleeting sorrow if they are replaced by action groups. The death of an issue is insignifi cant, compared to the birth of a con structive force. Welcome 'Uncle Mot John Motley Morehead arrived at Raleigh-Durham airport today to pay a visit at UNC. WAYNE KING Editor Margaret Ann- Rhymes Associate Editor JlM ClOTFELTER Assistant to the Editor Bill Hobbes, Bill HObbs Managing Editors Lloyd Little Executive News Editor Sieve Vauchjt News Editor Nakct Bark. Linda Cbavotta m Mill IS 'I m if m U m Harry W. Lloyd.. Feature Editor Sports Editor ass 1 TIM BURNETT ; Business Manager Mike Mathers Advertising Manager The Daily Tar Heel is published daily except Monday, examination oeriods ' 6nd vacations. It is entered as second- class matter in the post office in Chapel i Hill. M C mtrcnont witH 4V.o Si'5 March 8. 1870. Subscription rates: $4.60 per semester, $8 per year. ..The Daily Tar Heel is a subscriber to the United Press International and utilizes the services of the News Bu rjeau of the University of North Caro- V ?yblisi?ed fcy the Chapel Hill ub- iuiuu5 wo., inapei tiui, N. c. '5 S.'.WSVS--ww.-jyr. Benefactor of more than 140 re cipients of the Morehead scholar ship, Mr. Morehead has over the years contributed greatly to the en richment of the physical facilities and academic program at Carolina. The Morehead scholarship pro gram has enabled Carolina to attract a large number of outstanding stu dents who, without the program, might have gone elsewhere. During the years since the inception of the program, the Morehead scholarship has become the most coveted award granted for study at Carolina, and is highly regarded throughout the country. Mr. Morehead's gifts and grants to the University, among them the Morehead Planetarium, have con tributed immeasurably to UNC as an institution of higher learning. Carolina is grateful for his gen erosity, proud that it has been jus tified by the furthering of Carolina's reputation as an outstanding Uni versity in the South.- PAT CARTM" Southern Custom Like Pisa 's Leaning Tower Otelia Blasts Litter Bugs The Dean of our college used to Say that anybody who strewed papers around streets or lawns had a disor derly mind. There are certainly some disor derly minds in this town. (Never have I seen so much litter on East Franklin Street as I saw this afternoon when 1 went for my daily walk. There were paper cups galore, chewing gum wrappers, wax paper, paper pie plates, newspapers, from Hillsboro Street on up through the business section. I AM SURE there is an ordinance against throwing litter on the streets and sidewalks, but the problem is catching the offenders and reporting them. You can turn in the license number of an automobile, but you can't report a person whose name you don't know, and there is no way a citizen can obtain another person's name. I have seen college students throw paper cups down, but the college stu dents are not here now, so this lit ter is evidently made by children. It is mute evidence that these people, whatever their age, have had no training in their homes. If the policemen would pick up a few litterbuggers ami if the courts would fine the parents, it wouldn't take the parents long to correct this deficiency in hteir offspring's up bringing. THE SCHOOLS could help by pointing out to the children that dis orderly habits are a reflection on themselves, and that self-respecting people fVrn't throw things down for other people to pick up. THE CAMPUS LOOKED so beau tiful and green as I walked through it, marred only by some litter beside the Vahce-Pettigrew-Battle dormi tory. Let's help keep our campus beau tiful and our village clean of litter. Otelia Connor Sept. 4, 1961 THROUGHOUT THE summer months on the campus, the UNC News provided the ultimate example of w.iat damage a free press might do. While good intentions were no doubt in the mind of those who edit ed tiie News, it appeared that some big contest was going on to see who could write the most copy on inte gration and the NAiACP. Now the problem involved no doubt had its due place in the news. But every issue? And what was espe , daily disconcerting was the position taken by the writers. Certainly the editorial page is the place to ex press opinion, but sometimes a more subtle approach accomplishes more. We would venture to bet that the News would win no prizes in how to influence people, much less win friends. In hopes that the Daily Tar Heel doesn't jump on this same horse and rid? him to death, we would like to give a few impressions on the ques tion which we hope aren't "out in left field." CUSTOM AND TRADITION are as commonplace in America's heritage as they are in any nation's. Some times, however, this strong force which more often than not guides the present is overlooked or disregarded. Since 1953 and the United States Supreme Court's ruling, the subject of integration vs. segregation has been batted around so much it's been nigh beat to death. Without going into the pros and cons of the ques tion, the fact remains that some people do not and cannot appreciate the position of the white or the Ne gro in the South. On a recent trip through the north ern Midwest we were pleased at the number of people who would eye the North Carolina license tag on the car and venture some sort of chit chat. .More often than not, the sub- ject got around to the problem of race relations in Uie Soirtn rrnd more specifically to the then current inci dent hi Monroe, N. C. '"Why do you people down there have so much trouble whli the Ne groes?" tiey would ask. "We got along with them alright up here.' HOW DO YOU EXPLAIN custom and tradition, hundreds of years of it, to someone? We tried to point out that blood is thicker than any Supreme Court ruling, ar.d how people become set in their ways. It still didn't click. We explained how in pre-Civil War time it was a felony for anyone to teach a Negro how to read and how this has hampered him intellectually and socially. But it's hard to explain the whys and where fores of the course of history and man's place in it, especially when you don't fully understand it your self. One point in our favor was the ac tion by the schools in Atlanta. It gave us the opportunity to say, "Well, we ARE making progress." IT IS EVEN more difficult to ex plain the situatk : by venturing the philosophy that the Southerners of today are the children of the Uiinl and fourth generations, and that we are perhaps suffering from the ini quities of our ancestors. This would be merely shifting the blame Cut the truth of the matter remains. Southern custom and tradition are like the tower of Pisa leaning in the direction of uKimate destruction, but majestically holding on. Once long pants and short hair for boys and long hair and dresses for girls was a solid American custom. But this custom no longer stands on the pub lic pinnacle. And who can tell. Pisa's tower may yet fall. Sacrifice For Squad? The returning scholar is greeted with a variety of new sights around the University. Franklin Street has received a new layer of asphalt pav- TTl O Hi WADE WELLMAN icemaiiii, Israel "The case of Adolph Eichmann," said a friend of mine last April, "is the case of one man standing up be fore an entire nation of men who have no other thought on their minds but to hang him." This statement whirled in my memory one night two months later, as I sat in Harry's talking with a political science major. I asked him to sum up the case for me. He shrug ged slightly: "I just wish they'd hang him and stop boring us." "Do you think they will hang him?" I inquired. "I don't know, but it doesn't mat ter they've already made complete fools of themselves." HERE ON CAMPUS, a large sec tion of student opinion is distinctly unfavorable to Israel. The illegal seizure of Eichmann in Buenos Aires last year; the insult ing note to the Argentine govern ment; Ben-Gurion's long sanctimoni ous letter to President Frondizi, and Gideon Hausner's bombastic tirades have all created widespread annoy ance. But even the sharpest critics ad mit that the trial has been far more objective than they expected. On May 23, 1960, when Eichmann's seizure was announced to the Israeli Parliament, the members gasped aloud with astonishment. Tuvia Friedmann, widely ridiculed in Israel, sneeringly dubbed "Herr Eichmann" for his rabid revenge-lust, had ap parently brought off the impossible. He had organized a search which finally resulted in Eichmann being tracked down, snatched from a pub lic sidewalk, and, allegedly, drugged for the flight to Israel. Many had believed it impossible. Now it was a fact. Last April, when the trial opened, the astonished gasps were replaced by exclamations of dismay. Hearing the details of Eichmann's colossal sadism, and seeing his un repentant smirk, the spectators look ed at one another with disbelief. Many in Israel had almost forgotten the cataclysmic Buffering that was visited on their people. Hearing it fully descrlbe'd, mdhy were close to tears;" some got up and left he courtroom, unable to stand any more. -A- THE PROSECUTION FINISHED its case with films of the death camps, during which Eichmann smiled coldly. Since Israel had re fused to grant safe conduct for SS witnesses, Eichmann himself was the only witness for the defense. Questioned by Hausner, he dodged and weaved, argued verbosely, and slipped into long-winded speeches. Hausner had difficulty keeping his temper. Eichmann admitted to moral guilt in his co-operation with Himmler's extermination program, but insisted that he was legally unaccountable. "Maybe what your friend really meant," someone told me dryly, "was that he wished they'd stop re minding us." In July the trial ground to its cumbersome finish, and the court be gan private sessions to find the de fendant guilty and decide on the sentence Kthe death penalty is not mandatory). On August 2 I called on Rabbi E. M. Rosensweig, at his office in the Hillel Foundation. Hillel House is a beautiful structure; the posters, the corridors, and the esoteric books take one almost into Old-Testament Israel. Surely it's been long since the Jewish people were carrid off by Nebuchadnezzar as slaves, but even today the Hillel Foundation, with its intimate halls and rooms, reminds us of the terrible persecutions which have driven these people into close fraternity. RABBI ROSENSWEIG spoke calm ly and politely, but with great firm ness. He explained that, as an op ponent of capital punishment, he did not want to see Eichmann executed. The world press reaction, he ad mitted, was at first hostile to the abduction of Eichmann, but he felt that the objectivity of the trial had mellowed that resentment. I quoted my friend's statement that the trial in Jerusalem was a bore. "The tragedy of that remark," Rabbi Rosensweig said pensively, "is . that it shows hott bitterly a human being resents being exposed' to lufh self." "Do you think the West is generally anti-Semitic?" I asked. "It seems to be a deep-seated attitude of Western civilization, and especially so in Germany," he said. HE AGREED THAT the Anglo American powers had been remark ably unsympathetic toward Eich mann's victims. British airpower re fused Jewish requests to bomb the transportation routes to the death camps, or the camps themselves. Refugees from the massacres were unwelcome in other countries, before and during the war. The entire West, by looking the other way, had shared Eichmann's guilt. Was revenge the motive for the seizure? Rabbi Rosensweig didn't think so. Revenge for so monstrous a crime as Eichmann's was a con tradiction in terms. But, when we parted company after an hour's dis cussion, I still disagreed on this point. Consider a tavern in Tel Aviv. Brilliant sunlight permeates the room. In a shaded corner a young Israeli divides his attention between a solid-geometry text and a bottle of dark gleaming wine. The bev erage is Rishon-LeZion, popular in Israel, and David takes it much more seriously than the assignment he's doing. At least, he turns to it fre quently when a problem baffles him. His cousin Epraim, older and ready for the university, comes up to the table. "Hello, David," he says. "Have you heard the news?" "I never hear any news I can steer clear of," David answers dry ly. His tone is discouraging, but Ephraim sits down and continues: "Eichmann's been sentenced to death." "My heart bleeds for Eichmann, David says coolly. "Well from the way you've talk ed, I almost suspect it does!" ' David smiles at that, and puts the book down. He faces his cousin more cheerfully. .The Eichmann case did a lot of harm and no good, as far as I'm con cerned. I wish he'd ha the decency to kill himself in 1945 and spare us this mess.' VWeTeiTC you gTad when They got him?" David shakes his head slowly. "No, I can't say that. Maybe I was at first. But after they brought him to Jerusalem I heard a story that made me wonder a bit. Some kids were playing a game called 'Eichmann's trial. They sentenced an eight-year-old boy to death and hanged him from a tree. He would have been killed, if his brother hadn't run up in time to save him." "It had some bad effects, Ephraim concedes. "But at least the trial taught the world a lesson." David is unimpressed. "The world never learns its les son. You know that. And Eichmann's trial didn't weaken the anti-Semitic mood in the least. I think it stirred it up, if anything. Most people in the West thought this wasn't justice but revenge and I'm inclined to agree. After all, Friedmann's search group called themselves 'the Aveng ers." His expression darkens. "I saw that American movie, "OPERATION EICHMANN," in the U.S. last spring. It showed the whole thing as a re venge plot and it glorified Eichmann as a runaway. If that's what the Americans were thinking then, what do they think now that Eichmann's got the death sentence?" "He had it coming," Ephraim argues, but David checks that with a tolerant smile. "You're naive. There's no punish ment for Eichmann, unless you be lieve in the Catholic or Christian hell." "Hasn't this trial done any good at all?" Ephraim demands suddenly. "I don't think so," David says. "I just wish it had never started. I will say we've put ourselves on the spot. Ben-Gnrion said the punishment Eichmann got wasn't too important. People will say, 'If that's the case, why did they execute him, with all the opposition to capital punish ment?' " "Maybe because the world's bet ter off without him," Ephraim ven tures. . "Maybe," David stands up slowly. There is nothing more to say. He walks over to pay the bill, and Ephraim reaches for the wine bottle, and smiles wryly at the few drops left at the bottom. ing; the grand old Davie Poplar, ab breviated but still verdant, no longer threatens to topple upon the heads of its admirers ; the new Modern Languages building is taking shape, such as it is, beneath the paternal gaze of all who watched its birth this spring. Such are the changes that remind us that the University, like a garden, grows and decays, dies and renews himself, perenially. SOMETIMES THE CHANGES are more startling than reassuring, and suggest decay rather than blossom and renewal, as if to topple us from our complacency in the wisdom of our administrators. Such a change is the walling off of a pen in Lenoir Hall's North Din ing Room devoted to the feeding of the University's athletes. Many of us are glad enough to be spared the company of these young gladiators, but the cost of this small blessing gives one pause. One look at the crowding this year fn Lenoir Hall is enough to make it fairly clear, even to a football player, that the large area permanently sub tracted from the usable dining hall space cannot be afforded. While the rabble scramble and stumble for a place to wolf their luncheon fare, the trusty football squad may pick their teeth and scratch at leisure in the privacy of their spacious, airy sanctuary. NOW SOME WOULD WILLINGLY surrender the badly needed space in Lenoir Hall to an eating club for athletes if this already favored band were making any worthy contribu tion to the life of the University. But no one can be happy sacrific ing space to a football team which has repeatedly demonstrated its in competence on the playing field, or to a basketball team distinguished chiefly in the past season by beins barred from NCAA games and by involvement in bribery scandals. To be brief, there is a number of cynics and ingrates who are wonder ing why we must mjike new sacri fices to a group of students which has been conspicuously impotent to make athletic, academic or moral contributions to the success of this institution, which is, I recall, a Uni versity. Junius Goodman WWm:wyww.' w.-.-..-.-... -. , 1 About Letters The Daily Tar Heel invites readers td use It for expres i sions of opinion on current topics regardless of viewpoint. 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