THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday and Friday by The
NOME PUBLISHING CO. - ;
Nome. Alaska
Telephone: Main 125 * P. O. Box tfix
51.50 PER MONTH S16.00 A YEAR
W. A. and EMILY BOUCHER.?.Editors,
~~ ~ ~ ' . " *.- 1 "" - . ~~ t
Entered as second class matter October 14, 1943, at the postoff’'**!
at Nome, Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
--—_1
Friday, June 27, 1947
An Editorial by Bernard Baruch
THIS EDITORIAL shall be made up from quotations.
The author is Bernard Baruch. The occasion, the presen-1
tation of a bust of Mr. Baruch to the National War Col
lege in Washington.
In his brief talk were these lines in response to re
marks by such dignitaries as Secretary of State Mar
shall, General Eisenhower, the Secretaries of War and
Navy, Admiral Nimitz, and Mr. Baruch’s close friend.
Herbert Bayard Swope:
“I marvel at the regularity with which errors are re
peated. That is not a military characteristic. ... But it is
definitely true of the civilian and political mind.
“In America it is not an army we must train for war;
it is a nation. The spirit of man grows in freedom; it
withers in chains. He has the right to live a free life.
That right springs, inalienably, from within himself. It
is not existent by decree of the state. Let us better our
selves; then will come a bettered state.
“We look forward with hope to a world ruled by the
force of law, and not by the law of force. To that end we
have devoted our lives.
“Now in the afternoon of my life, I reaffirm my faith
in this country of ours—this infinitely patient, this
quick-rewarding, this slow-to-anger, bold, independent,
just and loving mother of us all.
“To uphold her, we oppose dictatorship of the right
or left. We oppose despotism. We oppose totalitarian
ism. We oppose slavery—whether imposed by the state
or individual.
“That is the heart of democracy: The maintenance of
rights, not privileges; the dignity of each man and wo
man; that is what we are fighting for.”
Marshall Forces The Issue
(The Denver Post)
THE RUSSIAN REACTION to the Marshall program
for reconstruction of Europe was exactly as expected.
The spluttering of Pravda, organ of the Russian Com
munist party, may be taken as the forerunner of an offi
cial Soviet rejection.
It is blast at the U. S. plan, Pravda says the United
States seeks to make it appear it wants to help Europe
while Russia and the nations of her eastern European
bloc are “excluding themselves from Europe because
the conditions of America’s ‘assistance* are unaccept
able.” This is sharp propaganda, for it takes the truth
and gives it a twist favorable to Russia.
What are the conditions of U. S. aid Secretary Mar
shall set them forth in his significant speech at Harvard
university June 5:
“ . . . Any goverrftnent that is willing to assist in the
task of recovery will find full cO-operation, I am sure,
on the part of the United States government. Any gov
ernment which maneuvers to block the recovery of
other countries cannot expect help from us. Further
more, governments, political parties or groups which
seek to perpetuate human misery in order to profit
therefrom politically and otherwise will encounter the
opposition of the United States.”
Are those conditions onerous? Not for nations of good
will.
Great Britain and France have taken up the Marshall
proposal with enthusiasm. They have undertaken con
sultations with Russia, which Secretary Marshall made
* clear was welcome as a participant. Rejection of the
plan by Russia should be regaYded as a cue for the de
mocracies to proceed by themselves with a co-operative
m ^
THE OLD ORDER CHAN6ETH
program for the reconstruction of western Europe.
For the western democracies the choice should not be
difficult. The alternatives are collaboration with the
United States in the revival of a free and prosperous
Europe or playing along with the Russian design—now
sharply clear—of perpetuating the miseries and chaos
of the present day as a prelude to totalitarian revolu
tion.
The Marshall plan has forced the issue.
Building On Sand
(Rocky Mountain News)
ISTAN RIES, Hungarian minister of justice, has an
nounced plans to revise the country's election laws, now
that the new Russian puppet government is firmly in
the saddle.
“All who without a doubt are enemies of democracy
must be excluded from the franchise,” he said. “Demo
cratic rights can be given only to democrats.”
‘When Mr. Ries says “democratic” and “democrats,”
of course he means Communistic and Communists. “En
emies” are those who do not vote the Red ticket.
The Communists were found to be in the minority at
the last election in Hungary. Now it appears they are to
be made the majority party by forbidding all but Com
munists to vote at future elections.
It will be interesting to see how this system of manip
ulated elections works out after withdrawal of the Rus
sian army of occupation. Hungarians never have en
joyed the political freedoms which are accepted as in
alienable rights in America, But they have fought cour
ageously to obtain them under varying forms of oppres
jsion. In all probability that fight will continue under
the new Red dictatorship.
The Hitler and Mussolini brands of Fascism did not
endure, and the Soviets are building their totalitarian
empire on the same foundations of sand.
Sooner or later the structure will collapse, whether
from pressure within or without.
THAT’S THAT By bruce gustin
' A
President Truman rut his own
political throat. His veto of the
tax reduction bill earned for him
the dubious distinction of being
the first president to veto a tax
cut. This action on the eve of his
campaign fur re-election, raises a
doubt, as to whether he really
! wants another term. Certainly, de
nying relief to all the millions of
American taxpayers is a strange
method of soliciting their ballots
in 194R. Even if the President’s
charges of inequalities and dis
criminations in the tax cuts voted
hv Congress are well founded any
kind of tax reduction is better
than none. •
In a recent address to the Fed
erotion of Taxpayers Association
of his state, Congressman Cotton
of New Hampshire warned that
“the government will spend all
the money it can get” and declar
ed “the only way to reduce the
cost of government is to reduce
the revenue of government.” That
is common sense. By his veto of
the tax reduction measure Presi
dent Truman took his stand w^lh
the spenders and called for con
tinuation of the .open season on
the taxpayers.
The President’s argument that
tax reduction now would increase
inflationary pressure is ridiculous.
Wlia*. it boils down to is a con ten
: lion that the federal government
I -»>-* spend the people’s money
' wiser and better than they can.
| The greatest inflationary source
1 in the nation is the government
' itself. As the late President Roose
fvelt said in 1932, “taxes are paid
ip the sweat of every .man who la
bors because they are •« tax on
production.” Oppressive taxation
is a brake on production. And in
creased production is the only
way to get prices down to a rea
sonable level.
President Truman is just as
right on universal training as he
is wrong on tax reduction. “The
justification for univer.nl trail
ing,” he says, “is its military ne
cessity. Peace-loving nations can
make only slow progress toward
the attainment of a stable world
unless their moral leadership is
supported by strength. Weakness
on qur part would stir fear among
small or weakened nations that
we were giving up our world
leadership.”
^\s the President points out, the
purpose of universal military
training in the United States is
i training not for war, but for pre
| vention of war_ But when and if
war comes, we would be better
j prepared than ever in the past to
meet it. Preparedness is* one se
curity method this country never
has tried. It can be achieved in
| only one of two ways. Either we
must have a big standing army or
universal military training. The
i latter method, as the President
; contends, clearly is “the most
economical and the most effective
method of maintaining the mili
; tary strength we need.” •
The purpose of Henry Wallace’s
third-party threats is obvious. He
i Is trying to sandbag President
Truman and the Democratic party
into giving him the vice presiden
! tial nomination next year. Wal
I lace undoubtedly realizes he has
not a chance in the world of beat
ing Truman for the Presidential
nomination. He couldn’t get any
where as a third party candidate,
but by splitting the Democratic
party he could insure Truman’s
| defeat. So the Wallace strategy is
‘ to try to force acceptance of him
as Truman’s running mate.
House Rejects
Cemetery Request
WASHINGTON, f/P)—'The war
; department’s request for funds for
I cemeteries in Hawaii, Puerto Rico
and Alaska was rejected today by
the House appropriations commit
tee.
Chairman Engel <R.-Mich.> of
the military appropriations sub
committee made public a letter in
| which he advised secretary of war
' Patterson he considered the pro
nosed expenditures “outrageously
'high.”
He said the department’s esti
! mates, submitted near the end of
t
j his committee’s hearings on a
[ money bill for army civil func
tions, included $7,000 for a flag
pole, $50 a foot for a fence and
$7,600 an acre for topsoiling.
Engel also said there is no legis
lative authority for appropriations
for cemeteries in Alaska and
Puerto Rico.
Engel said the war department
asked $308,700 for the cemetery in
Alaska, or almost $00,000 for each
of the six acres to be developed
! in the 20-acre cemetery.
i Proposed expenditures he item
I ized included $7,000 foj- a flagpole,
$52,500 for fencing at $50 a foot,
$14,000 for a temporary, shed
type utility building and $45,000
^for topsoiling, humus, fertilizer
i and seeding six acres. *