THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday. Wednesday and Friday by The
NOME PUBLISHING CO.
Nome, Alaska
Telephone: Main 125 P. O. Box 618
W. A. and EMILY BOUCHER .Editors
$1.50 PER MONTH $16.00 A YEAR
*
Entered as second class matter October 14. 1943, at the postoffice
at Nome, Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Wednesday, May 12, 1948.
ALASKA IS OUR VITAL FRONTIER
(Seattle Post Intelligencer)
GOV. ERNEST GRUENING of Alaska observed in a
recent press conference in San Francisco that it
is a mystifying and irrational policy which con
gress pursues with respect to Alasa. The economies
which are the purported object of that policy, he
pointed out, can be effected only with incalculable
loss to the country economically and with incredible
danger to.the country militarily.
Economy at the expense of Alaska's economic
and military development, as governor Gruening
gravely remarked, is a particularly false and vi
cious form of economy. Alaska is one of the last re
maining great frontiers to which the American peo
ple may turn for their own enrichment in time of
peace. And it will be our most vital frontier in the
event of a war which would require the American
people to defend themselves against the devastat
ing weapons of an $tir age.
As a repository of natural wealth, Alaska is one
of the great storehouses of the eareh and its vast
agricultureal and mineral treasures are virtually
untouched. Still the niggardly policies of congress
prevent all but the most casual improvements of
transportation and communication.
If America is able to achieve a permanent peace, j
as the American people so devoutly hope, there
is no greater source of wealth and opportunity for
the productive and constructive implementation of
peace than the fabulous Alaskan territory. To neg
lect it would be to let an almost inexhaustable area
of national enrichment lie fallow. f
But since we have no assurance of pemmanent
peace, and indeed we are even now confronted
by the ominous possibility of imminent war, the
military and strategic aspects of Alaska are mat
ters of most immediate importance and challenge.
In the last war, the Japanese failed only by the
narrowest margin to establish, invasion bases in
Alaska which would have created a springboard
for conquest of the entire North American main-'
land.
In any future war, which will be decisively fought
in the air and won by the nation able to achieve
air supremacy, Alasa will be the defensive barrier
which will determine our victory if it stands. And
it will precipitate our defeat if it falls—particularly
if Soviet Russia is the aggressor against us.
All o/ our most responsible and authoritative mil
itary and aeronautical leaders have repeatedly and
urgently warned us that in any future Russian ass- j
ault against America would be by air and would
come by way of Alaska.
Yet w e are no better prepared now against aer
ial assault by Russia than we were against the in
cursions of the Japanese. By shocking contrast, as
Governor Gruening cryptically warned:
‘'Across the Bering Sea. the Soviets have been
pushing agriculture farther and farther north . . .
and have been integrating it with industrial and
military development."
In its continued failure and persistent refusal to
develop either the economic or military resources
of Alaska, congress is not merely overlooking vit
HB MMHTMOW
I
al national interests but is risking national secur
ity.
"We feel the development of Alaska* strategically
and economically is a matter of national concern,"
Governor Gruening earnestly advises congress and
the country."
"We do not have adequate defenses in Alaska
because congress has not appropriated the money.
"The army and navy have programs and those
programs have been presented to congress.
"But the necessary funds have been refused."
This is a serious and forthright appraisal of our
negligent national policies in Alaska, and it is an ■
indictment of our course of national neglect in Al-1
aska which can be pursued only to our injury and
peril. |
THE WASTE MUST GO ON
(Cincinnati Enquirer)
When the rulers of Russia determined to sabo-;
tage the peace of the world and made it impossible
to stabilize international affairs, they did a dread
ful disservice to humanity—even if no war comes
from it.
Instead of concentrating on the long-neglected
tasks of peace able reconstruction, the world is
forced back to the making of cannon. Instead of
roads and schools and churches and civilian con
veniences and comforts, we and the other peace
loving and freedom-loving peoples of the world
must begin again to build armies and planes and
guns. Instead of being able to command the power
of atomic energy to health giving and useful pur
poses, we must concentrate on it as a zealously
guarded weapon of wor.
United States military men now are talking about
a $20,000,000,000 budget for national defense as a
minimum requirement. That sum would endow all
higher education in the United States. It would
wipe out most or all of our slums. It would make a
Priceless contribution toward the eradication of hu
man suffering and disease here at home. But, be
cause another coterie of foreign madmen still are
on the loose, we must forego all these, and for sheer
protection must spend our billions on weapons to
destroy and kill.
Mankind still pays a bitter penalty for exalted]
greed— for men of little souls in places of large
authority. i
.LOOKING
F AHEAD
*r GEORGES. BENSON
^ President—Harding College
B Sea reg. Arkansas
ONLY THE BEGINNING
Some of the people supporting
proposed ‘‘federal aid" to edu
cation bills admit frankly that
these represent only a beginning.
Once the principle had been ad
opted, they say, increasing am
ounts could be expected. Those
acquainted with the way federal
projects grow and grow and grow,
would naturally expect this to
happen. Within a decade the fed
eral government would be car
rying the chief burden of pub
lic education.
Is this bad? Just to suggest the
idea is to show the danger. De
cisions of policy for public edu
cation would be made on the
national level. After such nation
alization of the public schools,
it would be easy to obtain legis
lation requiring all students to
attend public schools for “nation
al indoctrination” purposes. This
is exactly the type of thing wre
decry in Russia.
HOW TO CONTROL
These were the methods that
made millions of school children
just like Hitler and Mussolini
wanted them. To favor federal aid
is to argue for the exchange of
our present public school system,
with, locally controlled public
operating alongside many private
and church related schools, for
a nationally financed and nation
ally controlled system. No two
ways about it, federal aid would
mean undesirable federal controls.
Controls do go along with fin
ancial assistance, and our fed
eral government has no record
to the contrary. In fact, the Su
preme Court of the United States
has already declared, in the case
of farm subsidies, that the fed
eral government may control that
which it subsidizes. When one
federal aid bill was debated in
the Senate, amendments to con
trol not only the aid. But also that
which it supplements, were of
fered and accepted.
POLITICAL SPOILS
When we recall powerful in
fluences within our own genera
tion to get political influence into
nearly every American institu
tion, it doesn’t take much im
agination to see federal control
of the American school system
following any general federal aid
program.
We can all remember when, at
e^ction time, WPA workers were
told:: “Remember who your
friends are” when you vote.
Dependence upon Washington
sets up a political system, super
deluxe model. I would look upon
the nationalization of American
education, which could be expect
ed to follow federal aid bills, as
a decisive step in the develop
ment of a totalitarian state. If
America nationalizes her educa
tion, it is my conviction that full
nationalization of industry, and
agriculture would follow within
a generation.
LET'S KEEP FREEDOM
We must remember that one
nation in the recent war which
was able to arm itself against
the axis powers was not a soc
ialized state. The one country now
being called upon to help all the
rest of the world is not a social
ized nation. The one nation now
providing the greatest educational
system the world has ever seen