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Show iniimniniiiniiiiniiiiiiiiitmiHiiniiiiniiiiiiniisniiiiiiiHiiiimiitiiiinniHnmiinii Anniversary Waltz DESERET NEWS ! SAIT LETTERS LAKE CITY, UTAH Wc Stand For The Constitution Of The United States ; ' As Having Been Divinely Inspired 14 A EDITORIAL PAGE . MONDAY, AUGUST 25, 196? Hoy Rails Can Avoid Federal Safety Rules Railroads are the only major form of transportation not covered by copious federal safety regulations. That may seem like an odd oversight, particularly since railroads cross state lines and have their rates set by Washington all of which makes them prime candidates for federal safety regulations. But railroads have enjoyed such a good safety record that until recently, that federal regulations seemed unnecessary In the past seven years the number of accidents on American railroads has virtually doubled to 8,028 in 1968. About two accidents in three were caused by .derailments, and there are now some 15 derailments a day compared with nine in Why Demos Are In Disarray 1964i in 1967, the latest year for which figures are available, accidents cost the nations railroads half as much as they earned, or $266.3 million. Moreover, 2,359 persons were killed in railroad accidents year and 24,608 were injured, compared to 351 fatalities , , ' from airline accidents. This is why a task force on railroad safety recently concluded that some effective steps must be taken to bring the problem under control. After studying the situation for 13 mqnths, the task force recommended: That Congress authorize the Secretary of Transportation to promulgate rules and regulations governing standards in all areas of railroad safety, with the advice of a committee headed by the Federal Railroad Administrator and composed of an equal number of members from state regulatory commissions, railroad management, and labor. That the advisory committee be directed to study the existing delegation of authority to the Association of American Railroads in specified areas of the Transportation of Explos- ives and Other Dangerous Articles Act. That, since railroad safety research is inadequate because it is sporadic and uncoordinated, the committee also initiate a study by government and the railroad industry into railway safety technology. Since railroads avoided wholesale federal safety regulation before their safety record started deteriorating, they shouldnt need to be told what it will take for them to keep on avoiding such regulation. ", i , Dr. Durham's Big Job As a former Utahn, Dr. G. Homer Durham is highly fa miliar with thi3 states unique educational problems, its way of doing things, and the great emphasis we place on education. As president of Arizona State University since 1960, he demonstrated a capacity for innovation and leadership, having directed the construction of 12 new buildings at ASU and organized new colleges of fine arts, nursing, law, and a graduate school of social services. And since Arizona has a single governing board of higher education, he is not unfamiliar with how such a system works as Utah embarks on a somewhat similar path. It is a strong background, then, that Dr. Durham brings with him as he becomes Utahs first commissioner of higher education, the top executive officer of the new State Board of Higher Education. like most new undertakings, the success or failure of Utahs new college board will depend greatly on the character and performance of the man in charge. The kind of decisions he makes will shape the quality of higher education in Utah for years to come. The law establishing the college board was intended to keep the boards of the individual schools from fighting among themselves for appropriations from the Legislature and to eliminate unnecessary duplication among school programs so Utah can get the most from its limited funds. But laws dont enforce themselves; people do. Dr. Durham and the college board will have to be firm from the outset, or Utah will find itself right back where it was before it adopted the new governing system for higher education. Then, too, there are some fears that the new system will be dominated by the University of Utah. As a former teacher and administrator at the Salt Lake City school, Dr. Durham should take pains to emphasize that the best interests of Utah higher education as a whole, not any one school, come first. The Deseret News congratulates Dr. Durham on his new job and wishes him well in what seems likely to be the most :hallenging, demanding assignment in Utah education today. I I I I THE DRUMMONDS . By ROSCOE and GEOFFREY DRUMMOND WASHINGTON A whole new politi- cal climate is developing in the nation on domestic policy. The Democrats have lost the initiative. They never dreamed a Republican President would do that to them. They were confident Richard Nixon would be helpfully timid. Theyre waking up to their plight now, but it is too late. Suddenly Mr. Nixon's bold welfare program has put an embarrassed Democratic Congress on the defensive. It doesnt know whether to attack the new relief resolution, try to do it one better or just hold its breath until voter reaction becomes more evident. Some Democratic liberals are starting to pick at the program; thats just about all. They suggest it wont work but offer no solid evidence. They suggest enough money isnt going into it, but even at its inception it does far more to help the needy and the working poor than anything previous. The Democrats are now in a ditch of their own digging. They got into it policy, certhrough their own tain that the President, occupied and perhaps stymied by Vietnam and inflation, would also be doing nothing. Despite the fact that the old welfare system had come to the end of its road and was proving both disastrous and destructive, two Democratic administrations over eight years did nothing about it, and the present Democratic Congress did nothing about it in the past eight months. They showed little dissatisfaction and proposed no alternative. This is why the Democrats are in acute disarray. And now they see President Nixon doing what was open to them to have done. He has dared to say that the old must go, and he has dared to propose that something better be put in its place. He reminds one somewhat of FDR. Franklin Roosevelt didnt know whether the things he proposed would ease the depression, but he was determined to try. Mr. Nixon doesnt know whether his towering new program breaking new ground on welfare, wage supplements for the working poor, federal revenue sharcenters and manpower ing, child-car- e will work well at all points. training But he knows that what they are replacing has worked badly, and he is ready to try something new. Thats what the Democrats didnt expect, and that is where Richard Nixon caught them asleep. v What, then, will this Democratic Congress do with the Presidents welfare By SYDNEY J. HARRIS 6 I'! ij jjj I Technology does not stand still. If an object is put in its around it. or a waterway way, it builds a road Such is the case with the Suez Canal, once so vital a waterway that it generated an estimated 4 million a week in canal fees for Egypt. But since the June 1967 war, the canal was closed by sunken ships. All efforts to reopen it since have proved futile, despite sporadic Egyptian and Israeli agreements to do so. In fact, several ships with their crews are sSll stranded in the blocked waterway. ' Now, however, the Suez economic importance is waning, for two major reasons: Oil tankers are now being built so large they could only navigate the relatively shallow Suez Canal empty if at all ; and the emergence of Libya as one of the worlds top oil exporters. 1 Libya, on the Mediterranean shores, is only 24 days sail in time to Rotterdam compared with 40 to 42 from the canal. the Gulf Furthermore, Libyan crude Persian through oif.is nearly free of sulphur, an important concern for smog-- I conscious industrial nations. Although the Cape of Good Hope route is nearly double the 6, voyage by way of the Suez, the supertankers make it as ecosoon to range from 200,000 to 350,000 tons nomical as the canal route for smaller ships. Egypt thus finds itself presiding over a deteriorating a&et, with only itself to blame for forcing technology to develop alternatives to the blockaded Suez. 500-mi- le 1 i L The way Mr. Nixon developed his views and made his decision sheds interesting light on how he works. HEW Secretary Robert Finch, urban affairs adviser Daniel P. Moynihan and Labor Secretary George Schultz were its principal advocates. But Finch knew and others quickly learned that the President wanted to master the facts before he got surrounded with conflicting opinions. They fed him information without suffocating him with solutions. When the point of decision came, Richard Nixon could test proposals on the basis of his own knowledge. For the final Cabinet discussions at Camp David, Fine, Schultz and Moynihan thoroughly prepared themselves to answer the Cabinet critics. They didnt have to say a word. President Nixon said it all. We were talking about his Social Studies, and my older boy asked me to tell him about the Depression. I tried to explain it as humanly and graphically as possible although the memory still hurts and happened to mention the number of men who committed suicide in those days. What surprised him most was that the majority of suicides were men of affluence bankers and brokers and and not the very poor. He found it hard to understand why this should be the case. As we grow older, however, we begin to recognize that a privilege withdrawn is more painful than a deprivation we have always lived with. As Aristotle said long ago, no man feels cheated for not having an eye in the back of his head; but if men were born with such eyes, a person without one would resent his busi-nssm- blindness. ' Growing older is also corrupting, in a sense. We become used to what we never had before, and find it harder to live without such advantages than we ever dreamed would be possible before we had them. If anything proves original sin in human nature, it is the insidious way a luxury turns into a necessity. And it is far easier to do without a higher standard of living than to retrench after having it. Poor people were not much worse off in the Depression than they had been before; there was a tightening of belts, but belts had always been tight for them. It was the prosperous suddenly facing poverty who took a look down the precipice and found the distance so shattering and many preferred to jump than to roll down into the deep economic chasm. (Indeed, for those who remember it, there was a certain kind of grim camaraderie among the poor in those days, a feeling of everyone being in it together, much like Londoners in the Blitz and this sense of sharing a common misery provided the poor with a morale that was lacking in the newly deprived.) Actually, suicides have always been more common among the affluent than among the poor; the latter have hopes that if they could get a little more money, most of their problems would be solved. But the prosperous already see that there is no end to this process, and are forced to the candid conclusion that personal happiness does not depend upon the acquisition of more worldly goods. What is a pity is that the social and moral virtues engendered by wars and depressions tend to erode in times of peace and prosperity. We act better toward each other when things are bad, but quickly forget the common welfare when the danger has past and just when we need it most The Oil Industry's Civil War By ROWLAND EVANS AND ROBERT NOVAK INSIDE REPORT - WASHINGTON The splintering of the oil industrys monolithic facade can now be seen in the fact that independent producers are eyeing Sen. William Proxmire of Wisconsin, longtime scourge of the industry, as their possible protece tor against one of oils favorite political friends: Richard M. Nixon. all-tim- Suez: Dwindling Asset plan? Will it founder on Capitol Hill or be approved? There is no certain answer now, but we venture that the Democratic Party cannot afford and will not dare to kill die Nixon program. The Democrats cant possibly justify continuing the old system, and theres little likelihood they can produce anything better than what Mr. Nixon has offered to put in its place. They may try to reshape it, but it will end up a Nixon Administration program. And if they oppose it, they will be carrying the political football backward over their own goal line. The Poor Cling To A Hope , But . . . . i Make Railroads Pay Utahs junior senator, Frank E. Ted Moss, has established his instinctive penchant for giveaways of federal taxpayers dollars. Traditionally, this is his solution for all problems known to man. Moss watchers thus are not surprised at his motion that railroad passenger discontinuances can only be averted through massive new federal subsidies which, he projects, will cajole the railroads into maintenance of present service. History suggests a better way. Based upon Nineteenth Century railroad promises that they would each serve the full public need and convenience, Congresses granted vast acreages of public lands to aid this objective to the various railroads. Now e railroads that, a century later, these seek to renege on their promises thus made, an equitable solution emerges. Let Congress authorize and command the Interstate Commerce Commission, which deals with railroad matters, to require as a condition precedent to permission to discontinue any passenger service in part or in whole, commensurate reconveyances of railroad grants or a fair cash value payment in lieu thereof. The present system of allowing discontinuances without recompense permits the railroads to have their cake and eat it, too. The Moss plan, even worse, makes new allowance for unfulfilled promises, and offers future emoluments to the railroads. Only appropriate indemnification, as here advocated, recognizes that railroads are not above all equity, a law unto themselves. Incidentally, the proposed solution might also have the salutary effect of impelling the railroads to rethink their present discontinuance blueprint self-sam- is. last TO THE EDITOR The reason is that Proxmire is offering a deal hard to resist: the Senates tax reform bloc will fight to keep existing tax advantages for most of the cou0 ntrys independent oil producers if they support a stiffer new tax bite for the 140 or so major producers than is bill or asked either by the House-passePresident Nixons proposals. Moreover, Proxmire promises the independents protection from Nixon proposals that would hurt them most. 10.000-12,00- d Thus, the imminence of tax reform has exposed old differences between oilmen. When their tax privileges seemed untouchable, they were united. Now, however, Proxmire is exploiting inherent conflicts n wildcat driller and between the the petroleum giant with worldwide producing, refining, and distributing operations. While the bill passed by the House reduces the cherished 275 per cent oil depletion allowance to 20 per cent for all producers, Proxmire offers a three-tiere- d plan which actually produces more revenue for Uncle Sam than the House bill: ins (1) Producers with annual come under one million dollars comprising almost all independents, would keep the full 27.5 per cent; (2) those with one million to four million dollars would drop to 21 per cent; (3) those giants over four million dollars would descend to 15 per cent. one-ma- oil-ga- One small step for taxpayers . . , one giant leap for politicians!'' This is nothing more nor less than a scheme long pushed by former Sen. Paul Douglas of Illinois. Why the independent producers who disdained Douglas are nibbling at Proxmire can be found in the radically altered climate. Proxmire offers them a better fate than either the House bill or the menace posed by Mr. Nixon. The Presidnts position is an accidental legacy from the 1968 campaign. With tax reform seemingly a Utopian dream, Mr. Nixon saw no danger in a rare unequivocal campaign promise: retention of the 27.5 per cent depletion allowance. When it became clear early this year that public pressure would force tax reform, Mr. Nixon reiterated in a meeting with Treasury officials that 27.5 per -K- ( t ENT SHEARER 1332 Harvard Ave. 'Fewer Laws' Your editorial writers should stop advocating more laws. More laws have been passed in the last ICO years than were passed in all the years of mankind previous to that time. By now, if more laws were the answer, we should hve weeded out all of the gross inequities that man is imposing upon his fellow men. On the contrary, the laws we are passing seem to produce more inequity. Your editorial writers have a blind faith in the puny men in political office. Such men eagerly try to manage problems that are too big for any man to manage. Night after night, your editorials prattle about the need for a new law for this problem or for that one. You complain that the Congress does not deserve a vacation, because more laws have not been passed this session. You cry out for a teacher bargaining law, yet your writers cannot find any place where such a law has made teacher bargaining less of a mess. Where they have the laws you advocate they are having more strikes and trouble than we are having in Utah. You only have to look at the chaos that has developed in private employment under the collective bargaining laws to know that these laws do not work. The little men who enjoy political power seldom have the courage to use it well They are so fearful of losing their office nd the worship of people like your editorial writers that they will sell out the public interest to any pressure group and never know they are doing it or, to use a current illustration, conceal the death of 4 young lady until a cover story can be concocted to save the man in public office. Your faith in such men is misplaced. -- B. V i ? t i V i I J 4 t I D. NIELSEN 4037 S. 563 East Thanks Highway Patrol Last night our family all went to bed under one roof. If it had not been for the quick thinking and efficient action of the highway patrol, our daughter might have been in another state still running away. .If people only realized the harm they did by picking up and transporting these hitchhikers, often runaway youngsters miles from home, I am sure they would stop. Teenagers can explode so easily, get out on the highways so quickly, and being too proud to turn back and find themselves in no time miles away from home; hauled there often by family motorists. Just as she was boarding one such family car, officers intercepted, took her into custody, notified us, and we all slept last night. How different this story could have ended. I, too, am Christian and never pass a fellow human on the highway without a twinge of conscience. Yet hitchhiking is against the law and picking up such people is not only dangerous, it often brings unforeseen calamities on the very ones you are trying to help. I am thankful to the highway patrol. If citizens would cooperate by obeying this law, it could eliminate such situations from our highways. cent depletion remained sacrosanct. But how could the Nixon administration endorse tax reform for everybody but oil? Clearly, oil had to be hit without violating the depletion allowance. The target was a less publicized tax advantage. Unlike other businesses, oil drillers can immediately deduct from taxable income such capital drilling costs as salaries, equipment rentals, and fuel as intangible expenses, instead of writing them off over several years. The Nixon proposals would drastically curtail this advantage. Whether intangible drilling deductions or the depletion allowance is more important to major producers is debatable. Not debatable is the certainty of small independents that they would be ruined if they cannot deduct intangible expenses. Indeed, they were terrified by last weekends announcement over national television by Under Secretary Charts Walker, that the Treasury would seek Senate reversal of the House bills full protection of intangible deductions and reduction of the depletion allowance. The independents fears had been fanned a week earlier on a missionary trip into oil country by Martin Lobel, Proxmires legislative assistant and an oil expert Lobel visited Kansas independent producers in Wichita Aug. 11 and Texas independents in Austin the next day, jarring them with this blunt message: The oil industry is in political trouble, Sam Rayburn, its great protectors Robert S. Kerr, Lyndon B. Johnson now departed. A bipartisan, coalition will be operating against oil on the Senate floor. Unless the independents deal with the reformers by accepting Proxmires proposal, they will lose their vital intangible deductions while major producers are barely nicked. f -N- AME WITHHELD 'Subversive' U.N. We stripped ourselves of our power to lead the world by abdicating authority to a United Nations. This conversion of our limited democracy is a death blow to this nation. As a first consequence of this treasonous agree- ment, this country lost its first military engagement in Korea. It was the U.N. that stalled and stopped us from saving North Vietnam from Communist China. It was the U.N. that haggled and hesitated and fumbled while Russian troops battered down the free people of Hungary in merciless slaughter. Our defeat in the abortive Cuban invasion can be laid on the doorstep of the United Nations as Russia holds the veto power in the Security Council. Why are we fighting communism in far away Vietnam, instead of Cuba? We had a Monroe Doctrine to protect this hemisphere from foreign powers. Whatever happened to it? Why didnt the U.S. government retaliate in the case of the Pueblo? Was it because we had lost our power as a nation to the Security Council of the United Nations? I think the United Nations is communistic. On June 5, 1945 a Conference on International Organization was held in San Francisco under the aegis of its Secretary General Alger Hiss, and company: Leo Pavlosky and Dalton Trumbo. Hiss was later to be exposed to the American people as a Communist spy and traitor. This was the same Alger Hiss who served eight years as President Roosevelts top adviser. He was also with him when he signed the infamous Yalta agreement. The late Harry Dexter White, espionage agent for the Russians, represented our Treasury Department. Trumbo was later sentenced to jail for his before a congressional commmittee investigating Communist penetration of the movie industry. The truth is that the Communist spy, Alger Hiss, was the chief architect of the United Nations. VENE DEE TURNBULL multi-region- al A Dragertp t |