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Show L'egro, Indian - And Harry S. Truman President Harry S. Truman still carries the apparently vain hope of eventually getting his civil rights legislation through Congress. His insistence on legislation' leg-islation' of this type is a paradox, para-dox, in that while Mr. Truman, as a humanitarian, pleads relief re-lief for the poor, slaving Negro, he does nothing to alleviate the poverty and actual famine visible vis-ible on many of the nation's Indian In-dian reservations. The reason for Mr. Truman's self-contradiction in regard to human rights for one class of " minority group and continued neglect for another is quite obvious. ob-vious. The Negro population, in many states of the northeast and midwest, controls enough voting power in a close election to swing their states to Harry and the Democrats. Thus, how these Negroes vote is important enough to go all-out in an efc fort to see that they adhere strictly to the Democratic party line. Civil rights, of course, is the bait. So long as Harry can make Negroes believe he and his party are solidly behind civil rights for them, the better his chance for political benefit. And even though legislation to relieve the Negro's burden is snagged in Congress, Harry can always keep his Negro - vote hopes alive by blaming the calamity ca-lamity on the Republicans and Southern Democratic rebels. The Indian, however, comes under a different category. He is a member of a vanishing race, and doesn't exist in sufficient numbers to merit political plums. Five hundred votes, for example, on the. Uintah-Ouray reservation, even admitting that all the Utes are qualified and capable of voting, would seldom swing an election in Utah. Circumstances Cir-cumstances are the same in other oth-er Indian states. Under such circumstances, it is hard to concede Harry's Democratic Dem-ocratic reputation as the "good Samaritan." GWH |