EDITORIALS
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Never Forge* That These Editorials Are The Opinion Of One Man
___ And He May Be Wrong
Bitfer Lessons
Monday night a standing-room-only
audience in Grainger High School audi
torium was given a pointed lesson in
totalitarian socialism and School Board
Member Felix Harvey learned how it
feels to he a Jew in Cairo or a Baptist
in Rome.
After more than two hours of wasted
time the school hoard, which had made
up its mind two weeks ago, voted to do
what it had previously decided to do,
which is to install all seventh grade
students next year in Harvey School, all
eighth graders in Adkin High and all
eleventh and twelfth graders at Grainger
High School.
* This was done over the lone dissent
ing vote of Harvey, whose prepared
’ statement expressed the view that the
move was not in the best educational
interests of all the children, and was not
necessary under current court and ad
ministrative rulings.
The other three school board mem
bers who spoke, Ray Jones, John Gray,
and John-HooteiL all repeated over and
over again that their personal prefer
ence was like Harvey’s; one in favor of
unfettered freedom of choice. . . but
then each of these three attempted to
ygpiain why he was voting against his
best judgment and according to the
dictates of that distant dictatorship in
Washington, D. C.
Jones, freely confessed his lack of
experience and explained his vote against
his better judgment with letters from
the North Carolina delegation to con
gress, all of which were written before
test month’s statement on this issue by
president Nixon, and before some prob
ing comments by the new chief justice
Republican Legis
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lative Candidate Fitzhugh Wallace proved
beyond the slightest doubt that lawy
ers can be the most boring conversation
alists since the art of conversation be
gan, as they gnawed the judicial bone
completely dry; each, of course, draw
ing the exact opposite conclusion from
the same set of purported facts. Harvey
was asked! at two points what he meant
by saying educational standards would
be lowered under the system re-approv
ed last night and he agreed to point out
just one of the ugliest 'aspects; which
is that by direction of the school board
in the 1970-71 school year the faculty
and joint high-school administration must
pick four white marshals and |our color
ed marshals.
So much for local government and
so much for quality education
If there were ample souls who swal
lowed the frightening myth that
marijuaiia was no worse than a martini
events oflhe past twoweekends ought
to shake them out of their stupidity.
The capture of two large shipments
of heroin in Lenoir County and indict
ment of three people make it terrifying
ly dear that the ugly face of the most
deadly of ah the deadly narcotics is in
me to a degree here in our community
that most of us have been reluctant to
admit.
Law enforcement agencies are to he
congratulated for what they have been
able to do, but they are the very first
to confess that ah they can do is not
nearly enough.
underpaid \
much too long.
Today another set of Robber Barons
must have a curb-bit jammed into their
mouth or they will devour the country
just as greedily and just as blindly as
their fellow travellers of a century ago.
Nothing separates a Jimmy Hoifa from
a John D. Rockefeller except their titles.
They were ,equally ruthless and equally
bad for the majority of the people, and
ultimately bad for the very people and
principles which their ruthlessness at
tempted to protect.
For a generation now, since the early
New Deal days, labor, unions have dom
inated congress, the federal courts and
the Charlie MacArthur type board which
laughingly is charged with controlling
those -who actually control it: The Na
tional Labor Relations Board.
Untold billions of dollars stuffed in
union trust accounts that go very large
ly unsupervised and more billions thrown
into , the balance of national and local
politics give these fierce union animals
of prey more power than is good for
either themselves or the nation as a
whole.
It is just dne more example of one
evil breeding another. The Mind greed
of the Robber Barons beginning with
the Civil War and lasting until well
into the 20th Century forced the labor
they were raping and robbing to organ
ize.
And for a long time the leaders of
these newly organized workers were
men of great courage and great integri
ty but in all too many instances today
labor unions are controlled by men who
exploit the nation and the worker just
as ruthlessly as their intellectual kins
men did a hundred years ago.
cally resulted in not guilty verdicts in
local courts — not federal courts —
on the thinnest technical excuse.
It is later than we dare think. These
peddlers of poison are after our chil
dren. . .even after our very civilization.
Any brief review of the decline and fan
of the greatest civilization ever known
prior to our own reveals what a drugged
populace very quickly reduces itself into.
The Saracen culture which extended
from Spain to India contributed more
to science, art, literature and global de
velopment than any that existed until
the 19th century. But drugs, beginning
with marijuana and ending with opium
sappedthe menfal and physical energies
of this noble breed in three generations
and reduced it to the level so recently
seen in which a nation of less than three
million (Israel)'overwhelmingly defeated
the combined forces of a better armed
group of nations with more .than 45 mil
lion population. ‘
Those who try to equate tire abuse of
alcoholic beverages with the addiction
to drugs abuse us with the sophistry
that one
is no worse than an
other.
a disease.
Drug
the
of
Barrus Construction Co. to begin pay
ing union dues have circulated the lie
that I oppose this unionization because
1 am in the pay of Barrus Construction
Company. Of course, those who are will
ing, to believe such a damned lie are not
likely to be swayed by the truth, but
for any who may care to know the
truth this is it.
A. K. Barrus, the former owner of
Barrus Construction Company, does dwn
$500 worth of stock in the company
which publishes this paper, and the com
mercial printing company which is own
ed by the same company has done
through the years a small part of the
printing used by Barrus Construction
Company. The total outstanding stock
of this company is slightly over $19,000,
of which my wife and own $11,800, so
the $500 worth ot stock owned by Bar
rus does not put him in control of this
corporation.
But Barrus is one of the best friends
I have ever had, and I appreciate his
help, his counsel and his friendship, and
I highly respect him as one of the most
constructive citizens this community has
known in my lifetime. And for a lot of
reasons, but foremost among these, is
that in our long association he has never
asked me to write one word for or
against any issue or any individual. I
flatter myself in believing that Barrus
knows very well that I am going to do
just like he would do under the same
circumstance; which is to try to do what
is right, but above all to do just exactly
what I want to do and not what anyone
else suggests, or asks. So if one wishes
to accept that we belong (Barrus and I)
to a mutual admiration society, then I
assure you that this is 110 per cent cor
rect insofar as myself is concerned and
I hope to hell he feels the same way.
So much for the personal relationship
of Jack Rider and Alban Barrus. Now
as to my opposition to this union. I
have never belonged to a union and hope
that I can make it through this veil of
tears without having a slice of my pay
cut off each payday and sent to some
socialist union boss in a plush office in
Washington, D. C. It’s bad enough to
have taxes do this, but even worse to
have union parasites also gnawing at
the sweat of my brow.
But I know there are good unions;
unions that have done great good for
the workers they represent. But even
a quick look at the union that is trying
to organize the workers of Barrus Con
struction Company has convinced' me
that it is not a good union, and I rest my
opinion on just one fact:
Aubrey B. Dixon, who is the chief
union organizer here in Kinston, is on
-federal "probation- for stealing union
funds as the result of his pleading guilt
ty in Federal Court in Charlotte on Oc
tober 15, 1970, and I say a union that
win keep a man on the payroll at
$27,232.42 per year, who has admitted
stealing union funds is not the kind of
outfit I would want my Beagle hound
to belong to.
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JONES COUNTY JOURNAL