Newspapers / The Franklin Press and … / Jan. 23, 1958, edition 1 / Page 2
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EDITORIAL B>'?" Men And Money Franklin has l)een fortunate in having Yerlon Swaffprd as president of its chamber of commerce. Under his administration, the organization has made substantial contributions to the development and betterment of this community ? though it had to operate on a pitifully small budget. Now, as a new year begins, we are fortunate in the incoming president. Dr. George R. McSween. In addition to being a mart who has proved by deeds his devotion to a better Franklin, Dr. Mc Sween brings to his new responsibility a wealth of ideas, initiative, and energy. And he has an excel lent board ? Harmon H. Gnuse, Jr., Victor H. Per ry, S. A. Bundv, Erwin Patton, and Bob S. Sloan. The best president and the best board, however, can do no more than the community wants done. And the organization must have money if it really is to push forward. Last year, the Franklin Chamber of Commerce had a little better than $2,000 to work with. Com pare that with the chamber of commerce in Wayn esville. It's budget for this year is $20,550. And Waynesville is not ten times as big as Franklin, as the figures would indicate, but only two and half times as big. Achievement To a mere man (if he stops to think), a good dinner always is something pf an accomplishment. Because it must take some doing; to have a meal that is balanced, with every dish a delight to the palate, and all got ready at the same time so all are served piping hot. When there are more than 150 to sit down, that every day task is multiplied many times. Add the fact that the m^al is prepared and served in quart ers designed for a crowd not half that big, and the result is not just an 'accomplishment, but an achievement. Well, that's just what Macon County women did last week, when this county was host to the annual Methodist district conference. V It was not the first time, of course, that women here have served a good dinner to a big crowd. What made this one so remarkable, the job was done not by one organization, but by many ? the Woman's Societies of all the Methodist churches in the county. And everything went off like clock work ! Somebody did some planning and organiz ing; and a lot of somebodies did their share. This is one more welcome indication of how we're learning to work together ? and of what can be done when we do. Tax On Tax As income tax time approaches, those who pay income tax to the state are reminded again of a long-time injustice. Uncle Sam, who is no piker when it comes to getting all that is coming to him, allows taxpay ers to deduct from their incomes the tax money they have paid the state. Not so North Carolina! Our state government charges its citizens tax: on that portion of their incomes thev have paid the federal government as income tax. That, of course, is a tax on a tax. And, 'in the case of an employe, it is tax on income the employe has never even seen, because it was deducted from his pay check t>y his employer. This is double taxation. It isn't right. Nobody in Raleigh attempts to defend it as right. The only excuse ever given is that the state needs the money. Well, the last General Assembly felt the state could afford to give the big taxpayers, the corpora tions, a break. Shouldn't the next Legislature give the average citizen not a break, but ordinary jus tice? Congratulations Congratulations to the Franklin Board of Alder men on its decision to take definite steps to remedy the "red water" situation. Immediate action for temporary relief is planned ; then a more thor oughgoing program in March. How successful these experiments will prove re mains to be 'seen. It is possible neither will be ef fective, and something else may have to be tried. But we are sure the board will find the water users patient so long as something specific is be ing done. Letters 'Wonderful Job' Editor, The Press: I enjoy The Press very much, and think you are doing a very wonderful job for the people of Macon County. ' E. P. JARRETT. Long Beach, Calif. 'Toughen Up, Learn Up' Editor, The Press: Mr. Sloan was so right (in his Views column of January 2, ?? suggesting "we put too much emphasis on the pleasures rather than the duties of children"). What he said should be in headline form so all us parents could not miss it. We have as parents softened up, so what else should we expect of our children? When I was a school boy, I walked four miles each way to school. My lunch usually contained a baked yam and cup of black syrup and hard biscuits. I wonder what would happen to the school boy of today if he or she had to live such a rugged life. - Well, I notice he mentioned the Russians getting ahead of us in science. Is it actually the Russians or is it the two thou sand German scientists the Russians kidnapped after the war? X remember hearing some news reporter state that the Rus sians had taken all the good German scientists to Russia. Krushchev said he would bury us. He didn't mean under ground, he meant under rubble, and it surely could happen unless we wake up and toughen up and learn up. HERMAN "WILSON. Highlands. The Real Need (Windsor, Colo., Beacon) The U. S. may need more science specialists, but we need, in much greater degree, imaginative non-specialists to head our scientific programs ? to give vision and direction to these programs, if we are ever going to proceed any further than blowing ourselves off the face of the earth, we must take this leadership out of the hands of our professional warriors. Spreading It Out (Lamar, Mo., Democrat) Little Johnnie was a terror and his Daddy was surprised when Mama suggested they buy him a bicycle. "Do you think it will improve his behavior?" Daddy asked. "No." said Mama grimly. "But it will spread it over a wider area." LESSON FROM LITTLE ROCK GOOD SCHOOLS MORE IMPORTANT THAN INTEGRATION Greensboro Daily News The New Orleans Federal Ap peals Court decision that Dallas, Tex., need not Integrate Its public schools on January 27 ? thus over throwing a lower district court ruling ? is vastly significant in the changing climate of opinion, north and south, since Little Rock. It follows a similar tack by the new U. S. attorney general, Wil liam Rogers, who favors a "cool ing off" period in the realm of civil rights and will recommend no sew legislation to Congress. Uttle Rock, with its shadow of federal bayonets across the South, was a millstone or a milestone in race relations, depending on one's point of view. Like a giant block buster. it focused national atten tion on the ugly collision of an ir resistible force and an Immovable object. Both sides ? Governor Fau bus" and President Elsenhower's ? found themselves frozen in atti tudes of rigidity. A nation looked on with shock and shame as mobs rioted around Central HiRh School and XJ. 8. airborne troops moved In to enforce a new Supreme Court-made law. little Rock will be historically memorable for many reasons ? a prime one being that It operated as a shock treatment for opponent* in the fight over racial integra tion. It made the non-Southerner look around him, in the teeming cities of the North and West, to discover that racial discrimina tion is as widespread there as in the South. It galvanized Southern hate groups into self-righteous ac tion and gave them support they previously could not obtain. It pro duced a pause, if only momentary, in the activities of pro-integration groups which had viewed race mix ing as the millenium. Suddenly there was a deeply realized feel ing that desegregation produced at the end of a bayonet could never refill the fast-emptying res ervoir of good will between the races. Those who thought they could achieve racial revolution ex clusively through a court decision suddenly saw that not everything that is legal is necessarily salu tary, that perhaps the law pushed to its extermity could not compen sate for friendships, kindliness and good will between individuals. Certainly Little Rock provided shock treatment for certain racial crusaders, men and women of good will, who had underestimated the size and scope of the revolution they proposed. One of these 13 Mrs. Agnes E. Meyer, wife of the publisher of the Washington Post and a long-time advocate of racial Integration. Mrs. Meyer had an article in the new Atlantic Month ly called "Race and the Schools ? a Crisis North and South." In it she lectures some of her liberal friends, notably school officials of Manhattan who would force arti ficial integration at the expense of the quality of schooling and the welcome of the white major ity. Mrs. Meyers writes: "Ill-considered, hasty attempts at integration, especially when carried out in impoverished and overcrowded schools, instead of furthering the education of the Negro will surely result in the re tardation of all students, White and Negro, and increase rather than alleviate raoial tensions. "Before our emotions became overwrought, we were committed to the expansion and improvement i of our public schools as education al institutions where the young can learn to live together not as blacks and whites but as American citizens. This is still our first ob jective. The education of the white child must not be sacrificed for the Negro, nor that of the Ne gro for the white, or both races will lose and the future *>f our na tion will be imperiled." Then Mrs. Meyer discusses in detail the alarming plan of the Board of Education of New York to scale down the quality of the Manhattan School system by mak ing every school contain, regard less of consequences, one-third white, one-third Negro and one third Puerto Rican children. "Whether in the North or the South, we must not allow Uie pro cess of deviation to wreck our pyblic school system." This, of course, is exactly what moderate Southern leaders have been crying since 1954. There are principles more important than mixing the races in public schools. If, through bullheadedness and disregard of what any given reg ion will tolerate, the federal gov ernment persists in forcing inte gration where it cannot work, then the public schools, the' white and Negro children and the na tion as a whole will be the losers. Perhaps Little Rock has brought that issue in all its starkness home to those groups which would insist on all or nothing. If so, something good has been accom plished, even in the midst of a seeming tragedy. The federal government cannot operate the schools at the end of a bayonet. The South and the rest of the nation must set their own pace In interpreting "delib erate speed." Otherwise the trag edy of Little Rock will be tripled and quadrupled In 1958. Stamp Of Disapproval U.S. POSTAGE HIKE "WHAT! IN AN ELECTION YEAR? NEVER# The United Nations In The Search For World Peace (EDITOR'S NOTE: Below is the text of the talk that won for Miss Dwain Horsley, Frank lin High School Junior, a trip to New York to visit the United Nations. See story elsewhere in this issue.) Today, perhaps more than at any other time in history, the hopes of people everywhere are directed toward a lasting world peace. The United Nations is tak ing a big step in the search for this peace. We realize that a lone voice is like . a cry from within the wilderness ? it cannot be heard, but a number of voices, speaking out as one, can be heard. We have those voices in our Unit ed Nations. Any measure of the success of the United Nations in its search for world peace should be preced ed by the question: "What do you expect of the United Nations?" CHOICES A Thought for Today (From yesterday's talk by the editor on The Press' weekly 8:20 a.m. Wednesday program, "A Thought For Today", over Sta tion WFSC). Henry Thoreau said it: "It is not enough to be busy as are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?" What the New England philos opher had in mind was the prob lem that faces each one of us, every day ? the problem of selec tion, of discrimination, of choos ing. Often the question is not: What is right and what is wrong? but which of two things is more important, and timely, and wise, and desirable? If we don't ask ourselves that question, we are likely to fritter away our lives, doing things that really don't, matter. That has always been true. And in today's world of rush and dis traction, it is truer than ever be fore. Should we go to church or stay home and care for a sick child? Should we go to the job and earn money or stay home and do the task that will make the home more comfortable and convenient? Should we watch television or visit a friend? Should we go to the movies or read a book. And if we decide to read, which book shall we select? And always we face this inex orable situation: There is only so much time, and we can't Use the same time to do both. We must choose, one or the other. Whether we do our duty or fail, whether we accomplish something, whether our lives are full and happy or frustrated, depends largely on these little choices we must make every day. It Is not enough to be busy. The question Is: What are we busy about? We might, sometimes, do well to be less busy, and take time to plan a better use of our time. Answers will vary, but varia tions will 'be a matter of degree; for the usefulness of the organiza tion, in a positive way, is undeni able. Some expect it primarily to accelerate the peaceful uses of atomic energy. Others say it should divert important amounts of fis sionable materials from atomic bomb arsenals to uses beneficial to mankind. Some would say it should increase man's knowledge of his own body and of the plants and animals that nourish him and of the pests which threaten him. Such answers, like the descrip tions which the fabled blind men gave of the elephant, are wrong ? ? and yet they are right. Wrong be cause the United Nations in its search for world peace does much more than any one of those limit ed tasks, and right because they are all included, along with many others, in the overall program of the organization. The United States made a great contribution to the beginning of .the United Nations. It was largely our dream. It came to life under our auspices and found its home on our soil. But we frequently fail to understand its purpose. We think in terms of physical secur ity and feel that if the United Nations does not have a military force that is effective it will not protect us. Yet the United Nations has dem onstrated that it has a potential for preventing war. It offers a way through negotiations, Inquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitra tion, Judicial settlement, and all other peaceful means by which human beings may adjust their differences. Speaking at the United Nations on September ZO, 1956, Admiral Lewis L. Strauss, Chairman of the U. S. Atomic Energy Commission had this to say: "This Statute or Charter Is not a panacea for all ills of the world. It will not with in any precisely measured time turn all deserts into green pas tures. It will not relieve men of the necessity to labor for their daily bread. It will not usher in the millennium." In spite of this statement and: many others like it we still hope for miracles, but we should real ize that it takes a long time to explore the hopes and fears, pride and prejudice, ambitions and frust rations of millions of people. It takes a long time to find even a tiny spot of common ground on which to try to build a structure of peace. We are an impatient people. We grow uneasy if mirac les are not performed overnight, even though the conflicts have roots that are centuries old. We fail to realize that the ob ject which the sovereign states hoped for when they wrote the Charter in San Francisco was that we could use this machinery as united nations to achieve a peace ful world. But it is only machin ery, and machinery doesn't work by itself, it is the peoples who make it work. Some would say that the United Nations is just a debating society and that it never accomplished anything. Well, there are (82) soverign nations, all representing peoples with different customs and habits, frequently different religions, frequently different le gal systems. How can we expect them immediately ? within 10 or 12 years, that is ? to arrive at con clusions which would enable unit ed efforts? True, the breach has widened between us and the So viets, but that breach might have broadened into a war if there had not been a place where we were able to meet and talk. As I write this, the impact of the little ball in the sky on the fate of man on the ground is still indirect and uncertain; but it is certainly important. In the free world, there is little tendency to shrug off the Russian Sputnik ? and, where there is any tendency to such complacency, there ought not to be. It has sparred our scien tists to send their shafts higher and higher. The bomb specialists are fashioning explosives that are mightier and mightier. And the sea, the air, and the earth are churned with testing. What lies ? Continued Back Pare 1st Sec. DO YOU REMEMBER? Looking Backward Through the Files of The Press 65 TEARS AGO THIS WEEK (1893) Measurements taken last Thursday showed the snow to be 19 Inches deep. We are glad to see Miss Mary Lyle home from. Tennessee, where she has been teaching since August. Mr. George A. Jones had an Ice house built last week, and a company went to work cutting Ice on Sller's pond Saturday, and storing it for next summer. 25 YEARS AGO (1933) The Highlands chapter of the Red Cross decided at a meet ing held January 18 to merge with the Franklin chapter. Mr. and Mrs. Lawson Shook and family, of Highlands, were visiting Mrs. Shook's parents, Mr. and Mrs. C. G. Mincey, re cently. ? Ellijay item. 10 TEARS AGO With the thermometer hovering around the zero mark, Highlands had all the appearance of a winter resort over the week end, with 200 or more ice skaters trying their skill on Mirror Lake Sunday. Approximately 125 Macon County veterans (of World War 2) are now, drawing allowances from the North Carolina Unem ployment Commission.
The Franklin Press and the Highlands Maconian (Franklin, N.C.)
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Jan. 23, 1958, edition 1
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