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THE SOAPBOX SCALAWAGS TO HELL WITH THE FACTS \(A column in the manner and quite possibly the spirit of Mr. Westbrook Peg The State of Texas is in the hands of a terroristic band of soapbox radical s, perverted pinkos, and dirty Reds. They control the Legislature; they’re stacked t h r e e deep on the boards; they slither into the Executive; they’re rotting in the Courts. They stink. What do they do? I’ll tell you what they do. They’re making a dirty debauchery of everything. First there’s this so-called and alleged 45-carat phoney land scandal. Leftists in the House nd Senate are trying to cover up the Communist conspiracy, throwing a smokescreen in the way of patriots. The whole civilized human race is the loser. They’re “investigating” the so called scandals. The attorney general, the courts, and even a few misguided grandjurym en are in league with them. They have returned hundreds of indictments against a handful of patriots. Just because these men were able to turn a few fast, red-blocided American bucks from a socialist-inspired, state-sponsored real estate venture for veterans, they’re trying to send them to jail. And the questions the investigators are asking! They ask a tormented and badgered Congressman if he ever accepted fees from clients while representing them before the Veterans’ Land Board. They ask a few persecuted land speculators if they. ever tried to bribe the Land Commissioner. They pummel promoters with highly irrelevant inquiries into their free and enterprising business dealings. Do they ask them what they think of Yalta? Do they look into their lodge affiliations? Are they sponsored by the .American Legion? Are they Fifth-Amendment Democrats? The basic issue, my friends, is this: Are they Anti-Communist? Are they free-wheeling, redblooded, income tax evading, Bolshevik baiting, wonderful and happy capitalists, salt of the earth? Anything else is immaterial and subversive. The same holds true in the phoney insurance scandal. The question is not whether gonefor-broke insurance companies have watered their stock or hornswoggled their customers. More power to them! It’s simply whether these brilliant businessmen believe in such socialist inspired schemes as TVA, slum clearance, Eisenhower for President, Social Security, and the Post Office. If they do, bamboo sticks should be driven beneath their fingernails. The Governor does nothing. The Legislature busies itself trying to figure way to tax the incentive out of imaginative, idealistic robber barons. The country has gone to pot. There is no hope for us. The hell with you! All of you! BB IKE ‘BORDERS ON SUBVERSIVE’ subverters.” His argument goes like this: The Constitution set up the state legislators as the agents that selected U. S. senators. Electors for the presidential election were also chosen by the state legislatures. Ignoring subsequent amendments, he concludes: “Each -state is sovereign, making up a Federal Republic, a federation of sovereign republics, each supreme in its own domain rather than a duchy’ ruled over by SovietsSoviet commissars. Where the people come in is selecting the state representatives.” Eubank attended the 1952 Republican conventions Of it he says, “Man, the buying and bribing of delegations that went on to get Eisenhower nominated!” I asked him if he thought Eisenhower was a leftist. “If you figger that he borders on the subversive type I would say yes. The things he is advancing in legislation are strictly in line with the socialist ideology. If you want to say that a socialist or an internationalist is a leftwinger, then he’s a leftwinger.” \(I didn’t say what I wanted to “And a socialist is by the nature of the brute an internationalist,” Eubank said. “You don’t think there’s any difference between an internationalist and a socialist?” “Not any particular difference that I can figger out,” he said. PHILLIP EUBANK “Eisenhower when he was sent over as head of this occupation army, he said ‘I am one-twelfth American,’ ” Eubank said. “His actions have all been on that line.” \(“That tells it, doesn’t it?” Mrs. Eubank’s theory that 90 percent of all Americans are communists is advanced in perfect seriousness. “They fall into two sections,” he said. “One section believes in the violent overthrow of the government. The others are those who believe in the government getting what the communists called for Here, let me show you ….” He felt around his pockets but couldn’t find it. “I have one,” Mrs. Hance said. She hurried into her office-library and came out with a red-and-black pamphlet published by the Warner Electric Brake and Clutch Company of Beloit, Wisconsin. \(I guess they thought they a red book entitled “Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx,” is in flames, and the title of the pamphlet is: “Has This Become the Guide to America’s Destiny?” Inside it says: “In 1848, Karl Marx, in the Communist Manifesto, outlined the steps necessary for a socialized state. The counterparts of many of his doctrines have been proposed or enacted into law in this country.” Among t h e Marxist principles listed are abolition of property in land, a heavy progressive or graduated income tax, and “free education for children in public schools.” In evidence that the U.S. has gone Marxist, the pamphlet cites public housing, federal income taxes, inheritance taxes, the federal government in banking and financing,” radio and television “tightly controlled by the government,” and so also “the railroads, truck, and air lines”; government “sponsorship” of irrigation projects and rigid crop controls, dispersion of industry, and federal aid to education. These programs, to these people, are communistic. Since the overwhelming majority of the people are for some or most of them, they think 90 percent of the people must be communists. It’s as simple as that. Listen to some of the literature Page 3 April 11, 1955 THE TEXAS OBSERVER Children at Play To the Editor: Simple and Gile-less the two S’s stand Apart from the mess over veterans’ land; No mud on their rompers, no egg on their chin, One S slightly plump, the other quite thin, Crying “Fie!” on their playmate accused of sly sin. Oh Heaven the poor little cherubs defend, Along with the meetings they didn’t attend. Protect them from phrases they were tempted to write “The end is in sight” and that word “expedite.” Don’t take them to task for not being quite bright. And if you find missing a million Or SO Well, Texas is still quite tremendous you know. Now no words that are harsh, and no dirty looks Or mean little questions with mean little hooks While they pick up their marbles and close up the books! MARIE SIEN HALPENNY San Antonio Should Be Proud To the Editor: I am sure that F. D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman were plain, fallible human beings and made some mistakes, but none were made’ by them selfishly and intentionally. No party ever gave finer and more liberal and humane legislation to a country than the Democrats from 1932 to 1952. In my opinion, every good Democrat should be proud of the Democrat Party and very grateful to Roosevelt and Truman, whose only crime was standing by the platforms they pledged to carry out. This includes the Democrats’ stand for better labor and health laws for all of our people. When the reactionary trickledown Republicans g e t through smearing, history will record Roosevelt and Truman as two of our greatest presidents. M. D. WARREN Neuville, Texas Significant Absence To the Editor: To prove the big-business-con trolled daily papers slant the news ers at the mass meeting of the principals and teachers at Irving … To get the facts one must read a paper like The Texas Observer …. W. L. WILLOBY Houston Texas at Large Land Scandal Jokes in Vogue Land scandal stories are still making the rounds. It seems that a Congressman is thinking of retiring and becoming a man of letters: , Ire -will soon write his memoirs in several installments. The titles will be “The Hinge of Fate,” “The Grand Alliance,” “Our Finest Hour,” “The Gathering Storm,” “Closing the Ring,” and “Triumph and Tragedy.” There’s also the story that Rep. Curtis Ford won’t have much luck with his resolution calling for Governor Shivers and Attorney Gen Enbank sends out in his “Constitution Press”: “United Nations is an enemy of this country.” “Law is government government is force. Stop demanding more law and begin demanding repeal of the force that is destroying liberty.” “Notwithstanding the fact that the people have all political power, they cannot exercise it effectively as individuals.” “The actual act of subversion must be by legislative, executive, or judicial edict.” “The old political party labels are controlled by enemies of this country. Continuing to vote for those labels, and the men and women who deceitfully profess them who are in fact socialists, communists, Internationalists, One. Worlders, et cetera, is only giving aid and comfort to the enemy.” And Eubank has learned well from McCarthy: “In case anyone does not know tration gets its inspiration for a one has only to read the Communist Daily Worker. The blabber about PEACEFUL CO-EXISTENCE appeared in the Communist Daily Worker March 17, 1954 …. and who began mouthing the line?” Marie Halpenny, who was one of the fighters in San Antonio for a free library, has watched closely the activities of the Constitution Party of the United States. She has written a series of articles for The Texas Observer on that party. It will begin next week. The McCarthy era seems to have passed, but its legacy will be with us a long time. RD …. Omar Burleson, U.S. representative from Anson, says that if an all-out defense of Formosa and neighboring islands is ordered, “the defense will be by bombing the mainland of China.” He approves. eral Shepperd to appear before the full House to explain their parts as members of the Veteran& Lar d—– B-em-d ..–Tire –fe -alon: They’ll proba bly send ex-officio representatives in their places. …. R. K. Towery of the Cuero Record ran an editorial on the DeWitt County grand jury’s condemnation of profiteering and influence peddling by state senators. Criticizing “the established custom of employing elected officials to ‘expedite’ matters pending before various state agencies,” Towery called for safeguards to protect the unrepresented individual. “The spectacle of thousands of veterans patiently awaiting their turn to buy land under a program supposedly set up for their benefit while other hundreds become landowners in a matter of weeks through questionable maneuvering is only an example of what can happen when those safeguards are lacking,” he wrote. …. In case any of our readers have a penchant for having the headlines they read make sense, the page one headline in last week’s issue which read “Party Harmony Hinted Despite the World War” should have read “… Despite the Word War.” Not that the error lacked a certain irrational irony. …. The company that owns a lot of the Padre Island beach at the Corpus Christi end is trying to get the beach cut off from the public so they can use it for private property. Nueces County has already spent $3 million on causeways and developments. …. Governor Shivers is in Chicago this week. He is accompanying his wife to see a specialist there about an increasingly painful condition in Mrs. Shivers’s ear. A mastoid operation was performed more than a year ago. The Governor said he expects to be gone about a week and that he does not expect to attend the Rayburn dinner. 90 Percent of American Are Reds, Constitutionalist Eubanks Believes SAN ANTONIO Philip Eubank, a quiet little man in San Antonio, thinks 90 per cent of all Americans are communists. Eisenhower borders on, the subversive type; Senator K: -owland is all right though he was sort of New Dealish for a while; McCarthy would be a better president than any we’ve had in a long time. Socialists are internationalists, and internationalists socialists; and when are the people going to get over their foolish idea that they have a right to run the government? Thus does Eubank soberly and honestly defend the platform of a group that polled 6,128 votes in the 1954 Texas electionthe Constitution Party. He is the national chairman. I met Eubank one night when I was talking to Myrtle Hance, the former Minute Woman who stirred up theiy, -San Antonio public library. After hearing him out, I asked him if he voted in the last election. Yes. he had written in General MacArthur. I told him he really shouldn’t vote in a democracy he didn’t believe in, and he said: “Well, yes, but when in Rome ..” Eric Sevareid noted the increased activity of the Constitutionalists in 1954 and said some able observers think they detect the makings of a serious, nation-wide effort by extreme right-wing and isolationist people, chiefly of Republican identity, to select the Republican nominee in 1956 or run a third party candidate. “The Sentinels,” a pro-McCarthy outfit, has organized in Corpus Christi. “Pro-America,” a Midwestern isolationist organization, has three Texans on its Board of Directors. The Minute Women operate very actively in Houston and San Antonio and less actively in Dallas and other Texas cities. “The Cornmittee for Constitutional Government” is another America-First group; it works closely with Eubank’s. All these people could band together into a fairly effective splinter party, labeled as “the true Republican Party” in the spirit in which an organization formed several weeks ago in the Midwest with the declared purpose of winning the Republicans back to “conservatism.”