Newspapers / The Franklin Press and … / Oct. 11, 1956, edition 1 / Page 2
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?1 xt Ifltnnklin tyttsa nnb 1 1 Che BiitjWan&s JEarxmratt Entered at Post Office. Franklin. N. C., as aecond class matter Published every Thursday by The Franklin Press Franklin, N. O. Telephone 24 WEIMAR JONES Editor BOB 8. SLOAN Advertising Manager J p. BRADY News Editor-Photographer MBS. ALLEN SILER Society Editor-Office Manager MBS MARION BRYSON Proofreader nt?' P. CABE Operator-Machinist FRANK A. STARRETTE Compositor a. *. CRAWFORD Stereotypsr CHARLES E. WHITTTNGTON Pressman DAVID H. SUTTON Commercial Printer SUBSCRIPTION RATES Outside Macon CouifTT One Year $3.00 81 M Months 1-75 Three Months .... 1-00 Two Tears 3.23 Three Tears .... 7-*0 Insidk Macon Coxjwtt On? Year ...... $230 Six Month* Three Months .... 100 Two Years 4-25 Three Years 0 00 OCTOBER 11, 1956 New Problem Try to solve a problem, and you often find the solution creates its own problems ; not such ser ious problems as the original one, maybe, but new problems all the same. That has proved true with one-way streets here. This newspaper believes the experiment is a step in the right direction; certainly it is an experiment that deserves a fair trial. That, though, is no rea son for any of us to close our eyes to new condi tions it has brought about. The most serious one is the temptation to speed on the one-way streets. Within 48 hours after the new system was put into effect, automobiles were being driven along Main and Palmer Streets at speeds far from safe ; and the tendency is becom ing more and more pronounced. The obligation to drive slowly along a business street is primarily one for the individual driver; after all, a difference of a few seconds in when you or I get to the post office or a store and through Main street is of no world-shaking importance. The problem, though, is one for the town author ities, too. Those who won't voluntarily drive with care must be taught, the hard way, to do so. Other wise, we may pay a far worse penalty than having traffic jammed ? we may pay in lives needlessly lost. Schools And Sense For ten years, this newspaper has been saying that the way North Carolina county boards of education are named doesn't make sense. Well, it looks like something may be done about it at last. But not because it doesn't make sense, from the viewpoint of the schools ; an entirely dif ferent fuse may dynamite the mental log-jam of North Carolina legislators. Members of county boards of education are nominated in the primary election ; they are ap pointed by the General Assembly. And the Demo cratic Legislature always appoints Democratic boards of education ? boards that are 100 per cent Democratic. The result, of course, is that Repub licans are disfranchised in this important field of choice; a visitor from Mars might well assume that a Republican is a person with no children in school. But not only does the law result in disfranchise ment of Republicans, making up about 40 ,per cent of North Carolina's voters ; sometimes the Legis lature disfranchises the Democrats as well. For. though the law says the Legislature "shall" ap point those nominated in the primary, it provides no penalty for failure to obey its mandate ; so sometimes the Legislature repudiates the officially expressed will of the voters in the primary election and appoints a board of its own choosing. Well, today the strategy of the State of North Carolina, in meeting the school desegragation decis ion, is to argue that the schools are locally con trolled. How can they make the argument .stick, when the State Legislature appoints them? Obvi ously, they can't. So something that should have been done 25 years ago may happen at the next session of the General Assembly. And, as the Greensboro Daily News comments, in an editorial reprinted elsewhere on this page, "If no other good comes out of the present school crisis . . . this gain can certainly be entered on the credit side". All American University Is a vast athletic association where, however, some studies are maintained for the benefit of the table bodied.? Chinese student, at American university. What Is The Difference? President Eisenhower has said the result of the national election will hinge on which party has done more in recent years to help all the people meet their every-dav problems. Though Mr. Eisenhower didn't say it, the impli cation is plain : The result also will hinge on which party promises to do more to help .people meet their every day problems. Is that a proper function of government? , The question isn't just an academic one ; what is happening right now in the campaign makes it a practical one. For we have the spectacle of each party trying to out-promise the other; and as the campaign advances, the promises become more and more not to all the .people, but to certain seg ments of the population. Each party is trying to out-do the other in promising what it will do to help special groups attain purely selfish ends ; each is openly bidding for pressure group support ? for the lab^r vote, the Negro vote the Jewish vote, the Southern vote, etc. And that situation raises another question: What is the moral difference between the buying, and selling, of votes on an individual basis, and the buying and selling of votes wholesale? Courts And The Press V. A court's dignity and orderly administration of justice take precedent over freedom of the press, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has ruled. Well, now, we wonder about that . . . We wonder if the court isn't a bit confused ; con fused, perhaps, on two points. We wonder, first of all, if it hasn't mistaken outward dignity and sur face show of respect for the real things. And we wonder if it hasn't become confused, just as some newspapermen have, about why we have a free press, and what freedom of the .press really is. If the court means that freedom and license aren't the same thing, well and good; if it means a court must not be subject to the whim of every publisher, reporter, and photographer, then it is on solid ground. But if the court means what it is reported to have said, then it has held that the people have a right to know only so much as the courts, in their superior wisdom, decide it is good for the people to know! Actually, a court's dignity and orderly adminis tration of justice rarely, if ever, conflict with free dom of the press ; that is, with the people's right to know what their courts do, and how they do it, and why. But if and when there is conflict, the courts would do well to remember that even their author ity comes from the people. They would do well to remember it not only because it is true, but also because if they don't, they will find themselves left with a mere shell of outward dignity that com mands no real respect. Others' Opinions (Opinion* expressed In this space are not necessarily those _____ of The Press. Editorials selected for reprinting here. In fact, * are chosen with a view to presenting a variety of viewpoints. They are, that is, just what the caption says ? OTHERS' Opinions.) Right At Home (Campbellsville, Ky? News Journal) There are some people who make you feel right at home and then there are others who make you wish you were. Encouraging (Fort Worth, Texas, Star Telegram) The fact remains that the budget Is in balance and a mod est surplus has been created. It represents the reversal of a trend toward deficit financing which had brought great dis quietude to conservative observers and had raised the national debt to a staggering $275 billion. Going Too Far (Windsor, Colo., Beacon) Until he reached Colorado last week, Richard Nixon had been qult^ faithful to his promise to follow the high road In his campaign speeches. But now he has to spoil everything by threatening the American public with three television sets in every home! TVA: A Dream Realized (New York Times) The Tennessee Valley Authority announces that It earned a net return of $53,000,000 on its power operations during the fiscal year ended June 30 last. This return is just under the average 4 per cent TV A has earned on Its power facilities during the past 22 years. The authority paid back Into the federal treasury a little more than this net earning ? 59 million dollars. Nearly three fifths of the 53.8 billion kilowatt-hours it produced were bought by federal agencies, principally by the Atomic Energy Commission's Installations at Oak Ridge and Paduca. Some additional billions of kilowatts go to Tennessee Valley industries whose output is essential to defense. i i This is something the late Sen. George Norris, father of TV A, never had to think about: it was not predictable. There will be arguments for a long time to come as to whether TVA's checks to the federal government and its pay ments to states and counties in lieu of taxes still leave it with an unfair advantage over private enterprise. What is certain is that no private companies could safely have been encouraged to develop the Tennessee River system for all purposes ? power, defense, flood control, navigation, food production and conservation. The valley Is populated by a conservative people, who would never have any truck with Marxism in any form. The proof of TVA's Integrity is that it Is about as hard to find an enemy of TVA among them as it is to find teeth in that species of poultry known as the Rhode Island Red. Still State Agencies? (Greensboro Dally News) If North Carolina is reverting to a locally controlled and operated public school system, as part of the Pearsall Plan, had not its leaders better be giving serious thought to existing means of naming county boards of education? It did not take the present school crisis to make us voice opposition to the partisan, undemocratic method which rules. While several counties have obtained legislative permission for other methods, the generally provided procedure Is for mem bers of the county board to be chosen in the primary and the winners formally named by the General Assembly. That means that in most counties there are no contestants save Demo cratic and that a large percentage of the state's citizenry, embracing Republican or independent voters, has no voice whatever in choice of those who run their schools on the county level. The Legislature, if It is so politically minded, can do otherwise in the omnibus bill anyway, and a way Is generally found to assure Democratic boards in those few counties which do go Republican. The resultant confusion, friction and lack of cooperatin between county commission ers of one political faith, chosen by majority vote, and school board members of another, named by a Democratically domi nated Legislature, are obvious. Democratic ? in the little d sense ? processes and the schools suffer accordingly. But that deals with the general and existing situation. How will its continuation fit in with the State's efforts to shift school respnsibility to the counties and allow local op tion and autonomy to rule in attempted solution of the seg regation crisis? So long as county school boards are named by the General Assembly can they be divorced from the State or held by the courts to be local rather than State agencies? If no other good comes out of the present school crisis save correction of an unfair school board selection pro cess, which should have been corrected long ago, this gain can certainly be entered on the credit side. Let this sink in: County school boards will, under proposed legislation, be empowered to call elections or alter district boundaries in their respective bailiwicks. But, from the prac tical as well as legal point of view, aren't these boards acting in the name or as creations of the State Legislature? How well will local school autonomy claims stand up under such a structure? I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives. I like to see a man live so that his place will be proud of him.? Abraham Lincoln. dutumn in FftANCE is a time of grape-gathering^ with folk processions through the streets of ancient towns and colorful fetes in Bur-, gundy, Bordeaux and { _ other wine-producing areas. -~w ?. fall months are favor i* ect by sophisticated travelers to EUROPE. Pays are mild and sunny, evenings plea sant/y cool and, with summertime crowds gone, sightseeing s particularly enjoyable. Typical of the spectacular scenery of ICELAND^ islheCullfoss (?golden) water fall, so named ?< because of the brilliant rain- \ bow colors ^lonin? through its clouds of Spray*. VIEWS By BOB SLOAN The present soil-bank program is being used by the Republican administration to win votes rath er than help the agricultural economy of the country. There are many facts which back up this statement. To begin with for three years both the President and his secre tary of agricultural, Ezra Benson opposed the idea of a soil bank. Benson declared on numerous oc casions that it was "unworkable." But this year Is an election year, and the vote of the farm states is in doubt, so the program has been recommended by Benson and approved by Eisenhower. If this were all, the charge of political implications would be demagoguery indeed, but there are further facts which substanti ate the charge. Seventy-five per cent of the total $26,000,000 soil bank outlay which is supposed to take 12,300,000 acres of crop land out of production this year will go to 12 mid-western states, where sensitive G. O. P. politicians detect signs of revolt. Further evidence of the willingness of Secretary Ben son to use this as political foot ball is found in the fact that he recently issued an order that waived stipulated penalties against farmers who, having signed up for soil bank benefits, had gone ahead and harvested a crop from the lands they were supposed to have with-drawn from cultivation. In other words they were paid for taking land out of production from which they harvested a crop this year. That is having your cake and eating it too. This ruling was made after there were indications to the administration ? that the mid-west farm states were not as inclined to the Republican party as four years, ago. Incidentally, the soil-bank pay ments made in Macon County so far amount to $5,073.02; $4,784.99 of which was made for the with drawal of tobacco acreage from production and $288 03 on wheat. Nor is the soil-bank the only phase of the agricultural pro gram that Messers Benson and Eisenhower have seen fit to use to attempt -to-: lure the farmers' vote with federal funds. Following the announcement that the funds paid out in soil bank checks more than a third of the total went to one state, the doubtful corn-belt state of Iowa, the announcement is made that the government will go into the lard market. By buying lard, the price of hogs will be raised. Now we know that just this past week we heard Mr. Eisenhower say that his administration would never design the moves of his ad ministration to lure the farmers' vote. So we suppose that it is a mere coincidence that in the corn belt hog prices are politics. Do You Remember? (Looking backward through the files of The Press) 50 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK Since the heavy rains that fell last Saturday night a week age, injuring a trestle on the Tallulah Falls Railway in Smith's Bridge, we have had no trains to Prentiss. The damage was under a trestle across the Tennessee. "Very low rates to Kansas, Missouri, Colorado, Indian Terri tory, Oklahoma and all other ?points." ? L & N Railroad Adver tisement. A few weeks ago, The Press did Mr. Wm. Phillips an unintentional injustice by stating that he was a delegate to the Republican con vention at Andrews. The truth is Mr. Phillips is a true Democrat, and was with the delegation to take them to Andrews with his team, they having employed him to do so. He, like Tray, being seen in bad company, got a bad name. 25 YEARS AGO The cooperative carlot beef cat tle sale conducted Wednesday by County Agent F. S. Sloan brought approximately $3,000 for 165 head of cattle. Average price was 3.05 cents. Top was 5 cents. H. L. Anderson fell and broke his ankle Sunday while chasing chickens in his garden. The farmers of Scaly are al most through harvesting their fodder and grass. Jack Frost has been a helper as he has given us a visit almost every morning this week. 10 TEARS AGO Macon County school bus drivers get a $5 a month Increase in their pay. This boosts them to <40. Mrs. L. O. Appley, of Highlands, is visiting her son. Pat, and fam ily in San Francisco. She made the trip west by plane.
The Franklin Press and the Highlands Maconian (Franklin, N.C.)
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Oct. 11, 1956, edition 1
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