THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday and Friday by The
NOME PUBLISHING CO.
Nome. Alaska
Telephone: Main 125 P. O. Box 6IB
$1.50 PER MONTH $16.00 A YEAH
W. A. and EMILY BOUCHER.Editor*
Entered as second class matter October 14, 1943, at the postoffice
at Nome, Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Friday, September 26, 1947
TB. X-rays Start Monday
FOR WANT OF A NAIL the shoe was lost; for want
of a shoe the horse was lost; for want of a horse the
rider was lost, and so on runs the ancient tale clear up
to the tremendous climax when a nation was lost.
There’s a modern parallel to that graphic word pic
ture of a snowball that rolls to mountainous proportions.
It is the contagion of tuberculosis. This month The Ter
ritorial Department of Health and the Nome Health
Council reveals something of the malevolent spread of
this disease. Eight out of ten people who enter the sana
torium are in advanced stages of the disease. These late,
or undiscovered cases may easily infect eight more un
discovered cases and so on, multiplying until—as in the
adage—a “nation is lost.”
A nation forewarned is a nation forearmed. The
American Government builds battleships on the theory
that it is a precautionary way of avoiding war. Just one
of the new battleships will cost well over $50,000,000.
It is interesting to note to what lengths preparedness!
can go in the face of an unknown conflict.
But, on the tuberculosis front the war is on constant
ly with the enemy located, the campaign mapped. Fifty
million dollars adds just one unit to our national arma- S
ment. What would it do for the offensive against tuber
culosis? Just this: for $50,000,000 every man, woman
and child in the United States could be x-rayed for the!
possibility of tuberculosis infection. What a victory that
would lead to in the age-old battle against this disease!
That is intelligent warfare. These are the tactics the!
Health Department would wish to have employed gen
erally throughout Alaska. Help find those eight cases
before it is too late. The x-ray will do it. Have your
chest x-rayed in the Community X-ray Survey.
Dr. Mann's Diagnosis
(Anchorage Daily Times)
WHILE THE WAR was on there was a good deal of
talk about the tremendous task of de-educating and re
educating the Germans. One hears little of such talk to
day. This is not because the task is finished. On the con
trary, it is bigger than ever; after two years, it is scarce
ly begun.
There are several reasons why the subject has drop
ped out of general conversation. Our authorities in Ger
many have been in much the same fix as the postwar
British government. Crisis after crisis has had to be
dealt with, delaying a real start on a long-range plan.;
Our military government authorities have had to cope
with the grim and unforeseen struggle with Russia over
the political shape of post-war Germany. On lo*wer ad
ministrative levels there have been a number of bother
some problems: discontent in the occupying forces, lack
of food for the Gormans, too-easy fraternization, black
marketing, stirrings of Nazism, and increased grumb
lings over meager rations.
Here at home the public does not identify itself with
the problems of peace as it did during the war. This is
unfortunate, though perhaps it is inevitable.
The war demanded common participation in the fight
against a common danger. This unity quickened our na
tional conscience and sharpened our national vision in
a manner scarcely possible under less tragic circum
stances. We could see quite clearly when the immense
job to be done on the collective German mind is another
threat by German militarism were to be averted. To
day? Well, we seem to have lost interest in the whole
matter.
In such an atmosphere it is particularly interesting
to read a current appraisal of the German people
i
THE TAMING OF THE SHOWOFF
> a^L
by Dr. Thomas Mann. Dr. Mann, a German through apd
through, was one of the first non-Jewish writers to
leave his country' in protest against Nazi policies. He
departed in 1933, the first year of Hitlerism—not under
compulsion, but out of disgust.
As one of the world’s most eminent novelists, Dr.
Mann has a gift for probing an individual or national
mentality.
“Germany,” says Dr. Mann, “takes a morbid pride in
her own tragedy, believing it to be unique. It is a self
pity, part of the national egotism, which is preventing
Germany from cooperating with the Allies in her re
vival.”
This describes an actual condition which many per
sons foresaw before Germany’s collapse, but which
seems to have been forgotten in the face of more imme
diate duties. The Germans, fancying themselves be
trayed, still consider themselves the master race. They
insist upon being waited on. They are arrogant in defeat
as in victory.
A more active recognition of the attitude which Dr.
Mann described will not solve all the problems of Ger
many. But it might serve to help set a firm, consistent
American policy and thus simplify the task that is still
to be done.
A Charter for World Freedom of Press
(Minneapolis Sunday Tribune)
AMERICANS, whether they realize it or not, have a
big stake in an international conference on freedom of
information and the press to be held in Geneva next
March.
For until professional newsgatherers can move about
other countries as freely as they do in ours, and until
they are permitted access to foreign news sources as
freely as they have access to domestic news sources, our
understanding of what is going on outside our borders
is bound to be incomplete.
The most competent American reporters cannot be
expected to cover foreign news as completely or as ac
curately as they do domestic news as long as they are
denied access to news sources or are muzzled by cen
sorship.
In an attempt to clarify its own thinking in prepara
tion for the Geneva meeting, the state department asked
Richard J. Finnegan, editor of the Chicago Times, to
draw up a draft treaty designed to further the free flow
of information between nations and peoples. Finnegan
consulted 75 leaders in the newspaper, magazine, radio
and motion picture industries. Copies of the original
draft went to 4,000 others for critical analysis.
The result is a brief, simply-worded document pro
viding that reporters may move freely into and out of a
country, visit whatever places that interest them, talk to
whom they please and send their copy out without cen
sorship. Should there be delay in transmission, they
would be immediately informed of the reason. An inter
national commission would deal with any charges of
treaty violation. A possible bug in the draft is the
1 provision which permits signatory
governments to “make and en
force regulations applicable to for
eign correspondents relating di- -J
rectly to the maintenance of na
tional military security, if such
regulations apply equally to all
correspondents.”
Censors long have justified
their work in the name of “mili
tary security.” There is no assur
ance that they could not continue
to do so under this provision. Per
haps, as the New York Times sug
gests, a better way to handle pro
tection of military secrets would
be to deal with them in the article
relating to travel within a nation.
An agreement such as Finnegan
envisages probably would not in
terest Russia or its satellite nations
in eastern Europe. No dictatorship
ever has felt so confident of popu
lar support that it would grant
such broad privileges to its own
information agencies, let alone
those of foreign nations. But Fin
negan does not expect Russia to go
along. In his letter of transmittal
he said:
"We should enter into no treaty
with any country on any terms
that shrink American practice one
jot. We cannot abridge freedom of
the press under our Constitution;
we should not do it by treaty."
This is a sane and defensible po
sition to take. It should be adopted
by our negotiators at Geneva. The
number of countries willing to
subscribe to our high standards of
press/ freedom may be discourag
inglv small at first. But our c.iuse
would be ill served by lowering
those standards for the sake of de
ceptive unanimity.
■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■■ i ■!
\zooxrm
I AJIEAD
Fit GEORGE & BENSON
^ PmUcat—Mardlaf CaUaga'
j Start/. Artaaam
IT HAS HAPPENED THERE
Most of us thought it would
never happen. But it has. Accord
ing the the Associated Press, the
House of Commons on August 8
approved a bill giving the British
government authority to tell it?
people where they must work anc!
what they must do. This means
that the government may order
men and women to do whatever
job it pleases: coal rhining, farm
ing, fishing, anything. Moreover
it means the government may
choose the place where any man
or woman must work.
This is a drastic step. Why is in -
dividual freedom thus aest) oyeci
by a country with such a long rec
ord of high devotion to the indi
vidual citizen and to freedom? The
answer is simple. Two years ago
a socialistic government embarked
upon a campaign for government
management of leading industries
in England. Things were in su$h a
bad way, because of weakness
from war, that the people <v -
mitted this.
Crisis Upon Crisis
The socialistic government re
lied upon nationwide sympathy
and cooperation. However, this
lasted only a few weeks. Then, an
absenteeism set in and productiv
ity lagged, the whole system bog
ged down. The crisis came last
winter, when a terrible coal fam
ine came to that country with
plenty of coal under ground. Un
der socialism, crisis thrives on cri
sis, and there were more tn come.
In these crises, it is easy for men
to accept disaster, if they think it
will prevent more disaster.
That is what has happened. In
an apparent final resort to keep
government management of in