| Show WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS revolt interrupts bogota parley miners ed walkout GOP aspirants in primaries fight by bill staff writer EDITORS NOTEs notel when are r pre d 1 in thes her they the are r the thom e 1 west union news new analysis and nd not necessarily of c this REVOLT bogota it was a peaceful early afternoon in bogota colombia and the inter american conference was droning along in customary style in the capi caal tol building on the plaza bolivar then with the tiring firing of tour four assassins bullets into the body of jorge E ficler baltan popular leader of 0 colombians Colom bias liberal party one of the worst revolts latin american has seen exploded into violence during the first afternoon bogota descended into a state of complete P it 0 e anarchy mobs prowled the streets streets burning and looting S scores c ores were killed the residence 0 of r president ospina perez was attacked and windows were broken before army troops drove away the crowd above the confused clamor of the throng could ba heard shouts of down with the government down with the conservatives three days later as the riots simmered to a halt person were dead many others injured downtown bogota was a welter of destruction st colombia had broken relations with soviet russia and the inter amerlean conference had almost cracked up with delegates uncertain ln as to whether they could continue on the face of it the revolt was a sudden eruption of violent sentiment of liberal party followers against the conservative government in power immediate result was the formation of a new coalition cabinet equally composed of liberals and conservatives big question was how much communists had to do with the bogota riots US U S secretary of state george marshall who with other americans in bogota got through the riots unscathed scat hed claimed the revolt was communist the occurrence goes beyond colombia lorn bla it Is of the sarn same definite patterns pat ans as s the occurrences which provoked strikes in france and italy and the colombian government in severing relations with russia declared that a communist insurrection had touched off the mob fury finally it was announced from bogota that the inter american conference would resume so that communism could not triumph over colombia and the rest of 0 the nations ol of the hemisphere settlement coal strike john L lewis exactly in the position of t a man who had asked friends out to dinner and then found he pay the check but he was verging merging on some such situation half a million soft coal miners started to straggle back to work after a 23 day strike when lewis in formed them that the fight tor for a month pensions had been won but lewis himself had to appear before federal judge T alan goldsborough to answer a contempt ot of court charge lewis was cited for contempt by goldsborough his 1947 nemesis on the grounds that he ignored an april 3 court order to call off the strike apart from the contempt of court citation settlement of the coal strike was distinguished mainly by a slightly marvelous amalgam of po lotical action and expedient compro comero mise beginning of the end came when speaker of the house joseph martin rep mass moved into the dis d is by persuading lewis and 11 ezra van horn a mine operator to meet with him in his office martin then suggested that son sen styles bridges rep NH N H be named the third member of the board which administers the miners welfare and re ti rement fund lewis and van horn are the other two members at a subsequent meeting of the three bridges proposed a plan that would give a month pensions to 62 year old miners with 20 years of service who retired after may 28 1946 the date on which the miners welfare fund was set up bridges plan was accepted and the strike called off actually lewis in approving the new hampshire senators proposal had descended several notches from born his original demands politically the most fascinating aspect of the affair was how joe martin managed to take the play away from the administration in arranging tor for a settlement EDUCATION nearly hau half of the world war 11 II veterans who entered special education and training programs under tinder the GI bill of rights have abandoned their courses course veterans administration says more than completed their work however of 0 them under the GT gl bill and the rest under the rehabilitation program for or disabled veterans many of those that quit plan to return later it was endl bated on wisconsin I 1 4 P io in his south st si paul pan home stas stag ten sen grinned with the comfortable cheer of a cat who had bad just swiped all the cream in wisconsin as he be sat with his wire wife and received reports stating that he had bad run off with 19 of the 71 27 delegates in that 6 tates states primary election PRIMARIES S wisconsin ra ins presidential primary election edtion el to choose delegates to the republican national convention in philadelphia on june 21 was regarded as usual as a straw in the wind but this year the political breeze was a shifting one for harold stassen ex governor of minnesota a hard thorough campaign waged by himself and his volunteer supporters up and down the state paid off nobly when WI wisconsin voters granted him a total of 0 19 of the states 27 delegates to the GOP convention gen douglas macarthur took the remaining eight to run a poor second despite a flamboyant publicity drive carried out by his backers notably the hearst newspapers which was built around the theory that he is the only man equipped to deal with russia gov thomas E dewey of new york drew a complete blank in wisconsin where he had been the republican favorite in 1940 and again in 1844 1944 As a result ot of the wisconsin election stassen was catapulted into public consciousness as a leading contender tor for the republican nomination it was bertan t that hat his victory there would be reflected in the other primaries to follow and that he hid gained considerable stature in the midwest it was difficult to tell which of of the two losers dewey or Bla macarthur cArthur had been hit harder by his defeat dewey who received no delegates m might ight seem to be in a position simi lar to that of wendell when he withdrew from the GOP race after losing ignominiously in the wisconsin primary but the new york governor previously had beaten stassen in the new hampshire primary and also he had the full slate of 0 f new york delegates pledged to him it was on macarthur who had claimed wisconsin as his home state that the axe of public disfavor appeared to have fallen with greatest es t force more hore to come from wisconsin the election year wind swung to the plains of nebraska where seven leading contenders in the republican presidential race fought it out in a free for all match with stassen again emerging as the big winner after nebraska the battlefield shifted to pennsylvania and massachusetts chu on april 27 A total of delegates to the GOP convention wag was at stake on may 4 harold stassen was to carry the fight to sen howard tafts home arena the state sta teof of ohio it was no secret that taft was worried over which way his fellow ohio ans go eo a by stassen would hamper materially tafts wh white lie house ambitions in his second pitched battle with governor dewey new hampshire was the first stassen was slated to invade oregon for or that states GOP primary on may 21 while results ot of the oregon primary were not expected to be conclusive they would serve to provide a first sampling of west coast opinion final presidential primary on the republican side occurs in Cali california forra on june juna 1 earl warren Is unopposed as the states state favorite son tor for the GOP nomination art ATY finns russ russia had what it wanted from F inland finland a buffer state to the dorth west the two nations signed a 10 treaty ot of mutual assistance which binds finland to fight within its own borders in the event vent either country Is attacked finland and russia stated the pact would battle side by side to repel aggression by germany 01 01 io another nother state allied with germany the treaty circumspectly failed ailed to mention any other state by name despite the fact act that Fin lands delegation virtually had been commanded to appear at moscow to sigr i a treaty with russia premier josel stalin beamed expansively ater after the agreement had been concluded hall hailing it as a treaty between equals and he said 1 I would like to see us pass from rom a long period of 0 mutual distrust distri st against each other to a new period in our relations to a period ot of mutual trust actually the tha finns got a better deal from russia than they might have hoped for their nation had not been f forced reed into a tight arbitrary military muntory accord with the soviets nor had finland lost its sovereignty although it was brought firmly into the bloc of states along dussias Rus sias exposed western flank ATOM BOMB no secret secretary of defense james forrestal put a name and a definitive edge after a fashion to all the restless postwar fears americans have been experiencing lie he did it by announcing to the house armed services com committee m attee that russia hussla knows how to make the it atomic bomb more specifically the russians possess the knowledge ot of how to put the bomb together but so far do not have the industrial capacity to capitalize on that knowledge edge e hussla does riot not yet have an atom bomb but the days of U S monopoly of A bomb production are numbered forrestal said he told the his information from dr vannevar bush chairman of the US research and development board during the course of his testimony regarding a two year draft of me men 19 through 25 the defense secretary answered queries with 1 I said they do not have the atom bomb I 1 did not say they do not no have the secret of the acomb boi bomb n 1 I am informed by dr bush that thai the scientific knowledge and cal procedure involved in the manufacture of the atom bomb are known to russia thus US russian relations on the ator atomic role level had developed to tc the point where there was only one unknown quantity how soon would the soviets acquire the industrial capac capacity ity to produce atom bombs secretary forrestal admitted he know italian style 1 e t aa 41 US ambassador to italy james clement annn right peers benevolently at an italian worker in taranto as he tastes grain that was I 1 among the foodstuffs delivered aboard the relief ship to bring food to italy CONTROLS cold shoulder the jeering specter of price wag and ration controls was invoked ag again a in by president Tr coun cil of economic advisers called for nationwide discipline tt ti prevent inflation under the impact of the new defense program As usual this advice rattled cheer lessly among the stony hearts ol 01 0 electioneering electioneer ing congressmen in its report three months of 1948 the council de bounced the tax cut law as iffla tio flonary tlona nary ry and recommended new taxes it if the planned defense spend ing is not offset by reduced govern ment costs in other areas republican dominated congress congre 5 received rather happily the coun ails call for reduced govern government meni spending but maintained a glum silence on the subject of selective price wage and ration controls congressmen indicated that they want to study possible inflation ar effects of the preparedness program pro grair and foreign aid spending under the marshall plan before they give any serious consideration to resurrecting economic controls although the council admit admitted tid thal thai foreign spending coupled with a bli bit defense outlay will not swamp our economy nor require us to pass from free enterprise to regimentation ii added that some rather systematic and vigorous discipline must be ex |
