Comment from the Capital —
ARE WE A NATION OF SHEEP?
by Vant Neff
Making a 100-year forecast
is one thin#. Having history
prove it right is another.
Alexis de Tocqueville, world
famous commentator on Amer
ican democracy, did both.
Well over a century ago, he
warned how the growth of big
government could put the skids
on our free enterprise system
and reduce us to “nothing more
than a flock of timid and in
dustrious animals, of which
the government is the shep
herd.”
What’s more, he was right.
That’s exactly what’s happen
ing today.
The fact is that our govern
ment is mushrooming into a
massive monster, with an in
satiable appetite for power.
And as it grows bigger and
bigger, it’s crowding the price
less Americq/n traditions of
rugged individualism, freedom
and self-reliance, closer and
closer to extinction.
Let’s take a close hard look
at what’s going on.
Fifteen years ago, there
were 7.1 million workers on
public payrolls. Now there are
12.3 million—a jump of 73 per
cent. And don’t expect it to
stay at that.
But that’s only a small part
of this story. Those on the
receiving end of federal pro
gram funds, and their depend
ents, plus those on federal,
civilian and military payrolls,
and their families may well
acid up to hall* the population
of the United. States.
Who says so? A highly re
spected Democratic congress
man—Senator Harry F. Byrd
of Virginia.
All this, of course, takes
money, and in the end it’s
always the taxpayer who suf
fers. Federal, state and local
taxes take away from us about
35 percent of our national in
come—more than third of what
all people and business corpo
rations earn.
Naturally, a big fat bank
roll like this commands a lot
of deference in the nation’s
marketplace. And well it should.
One out of every five dollars
spent on goods and services is
spent by the government.
Now take a good look at
those government dollars and
you’ll make an important dis
covery. They have strings at
tached to them—long strings
that more often than not
stretch all the way back to
Washington.
When the strings are pulled,
people and companies all over
the country dance to whatever
tune the Administration chooses
to whistle. No dance, no dollars.
After all, does it make sense
to bite the hand that feeds
you?
For the sake of example,
let’s say that you head up a
major steel corporation. To
stay solvent, you need your
share of United States defense
contracts. Then suppose that
GOVT $U3SWinwG0VT CONTROL
FtfM BUSINESS SCHOOL iwm LABOR
the government starts telling
you how to run your business.
Would you tell them where to
go? Or would you toe the line
in order to keep those defense
contracts ?
Or suppose you are the head
of a great university with a
contract to train members of
the Peace Corps. The govern
ment tells you not only what
you will teach but insists on
passing on the members of
your faculty who will be al
lowed to teach. Do you sur
render your academic freedom
or give up the Government
contract?
Suppose you are a farmer.
The Government offers you a
subsidy with the one hand and
with the other it compels you
to grow or not to grow what
ever the Government chooses
on acreage which the Govern
ment determines, with your
product to be sold at a Gov
ernment-established price. Will
you knuckle under or forego
the subsidy?
It happens far more than
you think, even though you
don’t read about it in your
daily paper.
And there doesn’t seem to
be any end to it. The federal
government keeps growing big
ger, spending more money and
acquiring more and more
power.
As a result, there’s prac
tically nothing of any signifi
cance* that hasn’t been meddled
with, in one way or another,
by the administration.
For example, radio and TV
stations can’t operate without
a license . . . who issues the
license? The government, of
course. But only if they decide
you deserve one.
Railroads, electric-power
companies, pipelines, interstate
truckers and barge lines aren’t
permitted to set their own
rates. The government tells
them what they can charge.
“Management of the news”
—a newr polite term meaning
“distortion” — has apparently
become a standard government
procedure. (It’s no secret that
the White House virtually os
tracized reporters from a
famous New York newspaper
because the President resented
something it printed.)
In labor-management rela
tions, government meddling
has been downright disastrous.
It’s all but hamstrung business
and it’s also deprived the
American worker of his basic
freedom to decide for himself
whether he joins a union and
what he settles for.
Remember that the White
House has issued directives to
all government agencies, even
the military, virtually inviting
unions to move in and sign up
civilian employees.
The administration’s toler
ance of monopolistic unions is
obvious, and leads to an in
escapable question: Why?
Could it be to curry favor
among unions for votes that
would perpetuate an adminis
tration’s existence?
All this just doesn’t add up
to the American way of doing
things. The tragic fact is that
within the past few decades
the government has spun a
web of supports, subsidies, in
terventions and controls that
threaten to extinguish the spir
it of free enterprise.
It would be difficult to name
a basic American freedom that
has escaped the long arm of
government. Power breeds on
power, and the bigger the gov
ernment grows, the more
greedy its demands become.
I refuse to believe that self
reliance, thrift and freedom of
the individual are obsolete and
have no place in modern so
ciety.
To me, just to sit back and
let the Big Government take
over all of my freedoms and
responsibilities, and make all
the decisions would be intol
erable.
How about you?
Supersonic Jets Will Soon Flash Across
The Heavens Throughout the World
Delivery positions for the first
70 United States supersonic air
liners to come off the production
line have been established by the
Federal Aviation Agency, Deputy
Administrator for Supersonic
Transport Development Gordon M.
Bain announced this week.
The nation’s supersonic trans
port development program is now
in the initial stage of design com
petition for selection of a prime
contractor. The program's future is
dependent both on Congressional
and industry action.
Five United States and foreign
air carriers have to date requested
delivery priorities for 39 aircraft
and submitted a total of $3.9 mil
lion in advance royalty payments.
The airlines, the number of deliv
ery priorities requested in each
case, and the date of submission of
each request accompanied by $100,
000 advance royalty per aircraft
are as follows:
Trans World Airlines, six air
craft, October 14, 1963.
Pan American World Airways,
fifteen, October 14, 1963.
American Airlines, six, October
21, 1963.
Alitalia, throe. November 1, 1963.
Trans World Airlines, four, No
vember 13, 1963.
Japan Air Lines, five, November
15. 1963.
In the first 70 delivery positions,
29 were assigned to United States
international carriers, 26 to for
eign carriers, and 15 to United
States domestic carriers. It is the
objective to make aircraft avail
able to at least 14 carriers within
these initial 70 delivery positions.
The first United States super
sonic airliner lias been assigned to
Trans World Airlines, which sub
mitted the first request for deliv
ery priorities.
The second airplane will go to
Pan American, which submitted
the second request for delivery.
The first foreign carrier to re
quest delivery, Alitalia, will re
ceive that fifth airplane produced.
After final selection of the man
ufacturer, the government will not
take part as intermediary in fur
ther assignment of delivery posi
tions. This will then become the
subject of normal manufacturer
airline relations.
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NATIVE STORE
Freedom and Justice Take a Back Seat
With Malevolence & Hatred Driving
By JAMES MARLOW
Associated. Press News Analyst
WASHINGTON GPi — It’s time
America took a look at itself.
When an African or Asian lead
er is slain it may be regarded as
the result of a society less ad
vanced than this one. This is an
American myth, as Americans
have demonstrated once again.
A President and a policeman
shot to death and a governor
wounded in Dallas and the man
charged with the crimes in turn |
murdered, before he got a fair
trial, by a gunman who leaped
through police lines to shoot him.
These crimes are a product of :
the American society where vio
lence and talk of violence increase
as state officials defy federal court
orders until troops are called out
to stop them.
i Yet, supreme achievements of
the Western world are supposed to
be respect for law, democratic and
orderly change in government, a
fair trial, and freedom and pro
tection of freedom for the indi
vidual man, no matter who he is.
If President Kennedy had been
the first President killed in office,
it would be awful enough.
It would mean one individual,
ignoring constitutional and peace
ful change in government, decided
to take the law into his own hands
to eliminate an elected leader.
But killing American Presidents,
or trying to, is now assuming the
complexion of a tradition. Four
have been assassinated: Lincoln.
Garfield. McKinley, and now Ken
nedy.
Attempts were made on the lives
of three other Presidents: Jackson,
Franklin D. Roosevelt and Truman.
A gunman shot Theodore Roose
velt after his Presidency but while
he was seeking re-election.
In that same period of almost 100
years not one British prime min
ister was assassinated. A madman
did kill a prime minister, Spencer
Perceval, 151 years ago.
It can’t be argued the British
j are basically different or that
I among them the percentage of lu
natics or discontented are pro
portionately smaller. They are
simply more dedicated to peaceful
and orderly government.
As long ago as 1200 B.C. an
Egyptian king, Rameses III, look
ing over his own administration
of law and justice, said: “I made
the land safe so that a lone woman
could go on her way freely and
none would molest her.”
That’s more than the United
States can say today, 3,100 years
later, even about the safety of its
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Presidents. But the worst crim
inal. even the killer of a President,
is entitled to a fair trial.
Even here in Washington, the
nation’s capital, there is growing
uneasiness about walking the
streets at night because of the
number of people being robbed,
stabbed, shot or dragged into al
leys to be raped.
Adlai E. Stevenson, twice a
Presidential candidate and now
US. Ambassador to the United
Nations, found exactly one month
ago, also in Dallas, that not even
a man in his position was safe
from some violence on the street.
After leaving an auditorium,
where he made a speech on the
18th birthday of the United Na
; tions, he was surrounded by pick
ets, one of whom spat in his face.
He was hit on the head with a
sign carried by a woman.
Stevenson, who has a fine sense
| of history, freedom and justice,
told her: “It’s all right to have
your own views but don’t hit
anyone.”
Sunday, Chief Justice Earl War
ren, at a eulogy beside Kennedy’s
casket, wondered what moved
“some misguided wretch” to mur
der the President.
:
i
I
He said: “We do know that such
acts are commonly stimulated by
forces of hatred and malevolence
such as today are eating their way
into the bloodstream of American
life. What a price to pay for
fanaticism.”
He knows about fanaticism. Hate
! has spilled all over him and the
1 other justices of the Supreme Court
for their decisions on the side of
; freedom and civil rights.
He has been ridiculed and
■ mocked. There have been calls to
lynch him and impeach him for
“giving aid and comfort to the
Communist conspiracy.”
Also Sunday former Vice Pres
ident Richard M. Nixon asked all
I Americans to “pledge themselves
to fight this tendency of hatred
and violence we’ve seen in the
last two days. We cannot help but
I deplore a man taking the law into
his own hands.”
And Dr. Raymond Grant, a
I Methodist bishop in Oregon, said:
I “I shuddered when I learned that
crowds cheered when Lee Oswald
had been killed. God have mercy
upon us, that human life has be
come so cheap and that tragedy
has been heaped upon tragedy.”
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