ustxtxb_obs_1960_11_25_50_00001-00000_000.pdf

The one great rule of Composition is to speak the truth. Thoreau T ..,1/4,,,,,, …..\\.,,_ We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. A. ..c-Liberal Weekly Newspaper Window to the South Vol. 52 TEXAS, NOVEMBER 25, 1960 15c per copy No. 34 From Our Dallas Correspondent DALLAS Dallas Democrats, cudgels in hand, are plotting a quick, brisk thrashing for Republican Congressman Bruce Alger two years hence. Coincidentally, Alger’s wellgroomed Princtonian scalp is the rallying point for insurgentsboth loyalist and conservativewho seek. an end to present leadership by county party heads. L’affaire Adolphusthe antiJohnson demonstration Alger led with gustowill be the key emotional issue in 1962. Indeed, this prompted the only public criticism of Alger that has reached anything approaching wide-spread proportions here since he was first elected in 1952. For the first time in two campaigns Democratic hopefuls are literally standing in line to take a crack at him. “Alger can be licked,” Joe Bailey Humphreys, a long-time loyalist leader, says flatly. “We’ve just got to hold our party back together to handle the mechanics of carrying out the job.” The conservatives agree, although for somewhat different reasons. A businessman whose wholesale plumbing company grosses $7.5 million annually puts it this way: “Dallas is beginning to feel the pressure on the pocketbook, and Dallas always has been sensitive to that sort of pressure. “It’s nice to have a congressman with what he calls principles, but we are ready for some practical politics for a change.” Federal Ceriter Sore spot for the city’s financial community is lack of action of the $24.5 million federal center in the west end of downtown. This would group all federal agencies under one roof and save, General Services Administration says, $150,000 annually in rents. AUSTIN Contending, basically, that more invalidly marked votes were counted for Kennedy than for Nixon, Texas Republican leaders fought Democratic state officials all week in the mails, the courts, and the press. Under state law, voters have to scratch all candidates they do not want to vote for, leaving unmarked the names of the candidates they are voting for. Many voters failed to scratch candidates of two minor parties, thus invalidating their ballots. Thad Hutcheson, state Republican chairman, said that in the 238 counties using paper ballots, where about 1,250,000 votes were cast, at least 10% of the votes were invalid on the average, but the percentage thrown out varied from zero to 43%. “I think the margin would narrow if all these invalid ballots were put in or all thrown out,” he said. He believes 100,000 to 200,000 When President Eisenhower whacked this item from his budget in 1959, Alger defended the action as “good economy.” When Democrats refused to go along with the appropriation in 1960, Alger called the action “bad politics.” As a speculative deal, combines headed by W. W. Overton, Sr., Texas Bank & Trust Company chairman, and the Clint Murchison interests have bought millions of dollars of land in the vicinity of the building site, located in the 1100 block of Commerce. Right now their purchases are covered by parking lots instead of the desired office buildings and smart shops. The area even has a title, “The Cimiotti Soil Bank,” named for S. P. Cimiotti, agent for the purchases before the true buyers came to light early this fall. This year Overton made a token bution to the campaign of Joe Pool, who did not do any serious campaigning until the weekend of the Adolphus deal. Pool, former state legislator and a frequent office seeker, lost Cong. Bruce Alger ballots are involved. “My feeling is that more were thrown out in conservative, better-income precincts with a heavy Republican vote,” he said. “I do not say it’s a conspiracy or ‘anything like that, but Nixon lost more votes. My personal feeling is, there is a chance that it would overturn the results if all the votes were counted and the improper ones disqualified.” Monday GOP officials asked Atty. Gen. Will Wilson for a state investigation. He denied it, but consented to a court test on ground the GOP selected, Wichita County. Wednesday Dist. Judge Harris Gardner in Austin agreed with Wilson’s contention that there was not enough evidence of fraud to justify an investigation in Wichita County. Thursday GOP leaders demanded of Gov. Price Daniel, Atty. Gen. Wilson, and Secy. of State Zollie Steakley a “fair and legal recount” in the 238 paper-ballot counties. Friday to Alger, 129,886 to 96,709. He crammed a lot of work into radio and TV spots on the Adolphus issue. For his efforts, he received many protest votes and was the target of a $200,000 libel suit that Alger still avers he’ll pursue in court. At least one national pollster Elmo Ropersays that Nixon lost Texas because of the Adolphus incident. There seems to be no other reason than the Adolphus row for Alger running behind Nixon in the county by 20,000 votes. Nixon got 149,377, Alger 129,886. Word also filtered down from national Republican headquarters that GOP bigwigs are .fired at Alger’s actions. “He should have had better sense than to pull a damned fool stunt like that” was one quoted remark. Some Republicans point to the fact that Kennedy carried Texas by only 45,264 votes of 2,288,940 cast. That means a switch of 22,633 votesless than one per. cent of the totalwould have given Nixon Texas. Republicans in MarFhall, for example, blame Alger for Harrison County reversing its vote of the last two presidential years and going for Kennedy-Johnson. “This .15 Mrs. Johnson’s home county, and her husband probably gained a vote for every hair of her head that was mussed,” said a former GOP county secretary. The News Messenger said editorially “Big D is now little d” after the incident. Candidates These are the people Dallas is talking about as the men the Democrats might choose to run against Alger: County Judge W. L. Sterrett, who recoiled in alarm last week when his name was publicly advanced as a candidate. A shrewd practical politician, he knows the danger of getting too they continued their protest as the state canvassing board tabulated the official results. They were contending that without a recount, “there is no possible way to ascertain the true presidential winner in Texas.” Hutcheson says the GOP also has evidence of irregularities they will ask be prosecutedfrom four to ten in each of the big counties, for example. In San Antonio, FBI special agent in charge T. E. Bishop disclosed the Justice Dept. in Washington instructed him’ to conduct a preliminary investigation into alleged irregularities in south-side precinct 138, which went for Kennedy, 247-80. In Harris County, the county GOP chairman, James Bertron, said ten alleged violations will be taken to the FBI and the district attorney before November ends, and another 20 will be pursued later. “We intend to prosecute every last one of the cases we can prove during the next two years,” he said. AUSTIN Enthusiastic as ever, yet cautious before the changing political winds, Sen. Ralph Yarborough discussed the prospects of the new administration and his own views of the crisis in American education during a two-hour session with the Observer. Declining to predict his future relationship with the White House, the new senior senator said bluntly: “Under Washington protocol relationships aren’t established by you. They’re ‘established by the president.” He added jocularly, “I’d definitely say better than under Eisenhower.” Yarborough is fresh from a stint of hard campaigning for the Kennedy-Johnson ticket. He foresees a “very active” administration and believes “the caretaker phase of government is ended.” The early weeks of the new Congress should witness “about a cross between the 100 Days end a normal rate of progression.” The senator and his staff expect to leave for Washington just after Christmas. Conservative strength in Congress, Yarborough feels, will not be “nearly as strong as under Eisenhowerbecause under Eisenhower it was nurtured, bolstered, encouraged by the executive branch. Under Kennedy it \(conbe encouraged by the executive branch,” but will be “countered” by a strong executive. Yarborough apparently does not wish to encourage speculation on any new role he might have as the senior senator from Texas. “When I went to the ‘Senate in 1957 the Republican press referred to me as the ‘minority senator,’ ” he said. After he defeated William Blakley in the regular election of 1958, “they didn’t start calling me the majority senator, either.” The same Republican press, he said, has been calling him the “junior senator” and now “I don’t anticipate much ‘senior senator talk’ ” from them. Johnson, he predicts, will be a “very active” vice-president, and will be “a key figure in the early parliamentary battles over the rules in the Senate.” Will he support anyone in the forthcoming Senate race? “Oh, no,” Yarborough said. “I feel that’s a matter for the people. The people have enough intelligence to fill the position and they don’t want you to tell them.” He would not comment on Gov. Price Daniel’s announcement to give “first refusal” on the interim appointment to Yarborough’s rival in the 1958 Senate campaign, William Blakley. “I don’t think it would be appropriate for me to comment,” he said. Texas Better Off Yarborough said he will ask for a place on the important Senate appropriations committee. What are his chances for the assignment? “It’s impossible to say,” Yarborough said. “It depends on how many other people apply and how many are senior to me.” A number of other factors are involved, including wholesale shifts in committee assignments. “It might be possible for me to get on,” he said, “even if I don’t have the seniority for it. If I were from a small state I don’t think there’d be any chance to get on it.” But Texas has a “big stake” in appropriations bills. “Tvias as a whole l is much better off by having a man it’s supported in the White House,” Yarborough said, “and a Texan as vice-president, Texan as speaker, and many Texans with seniority in the House all in the same political party as the president. “I feel definitely that we’ll get more done in this Congress,” he said. He believes also that he personally will be able to get more done. This will be his third Congress and his fifth session, he said. He has gotten acquainted with his Senate colleagues and with the permanent committee staffs. His own staff, he said, has grown increasingly efficient and familiar with the intricacies of Washington. “So many of the things I hope to accomplish,” Yarborough said, “are part of Kennedy’s program.” He favors the “broad principle” of “a slackened hard money policy and reduction of interest rates to start the country moving toward a 5% growth.” Legislation that he will actively support in the next Congress include his cold-war GI Bill \(which passed the Senate 57-31, but not tional Defense Education Act of 1958, which he co-authored and now hopes to see expanded to scholarships and to cover teachers doing summer school work; loans and grants for college classrooms; and the depressed areas bill. Tuition Hike Recommended AUSTIN A recommendation for a $50-a-year tuition-increase for students at Texas’ tax-supported colleges and universities was made by the Texas Commission on Higher Education Tuesday. The commission suggested a $150 tuition charge for the full nine-month term, or $75 a semester. Present fees are $50 per semester, or $100 for nine months. The recommendation will go before the next legislature in January. Although the legislature may accept, reject, or modify the proposals, the commission’s decisions always carry much influence with legislators. The 1957 legislature increased tuition fees $25 per semester. The commission also recommended, with certain provisions, that the University of Houston be fully tax-supported. At present the school receives state money only for the first two college years. Trouble for Alger? `L’affaire Adolphus’: Repercussions for ’62 A Talk with Yarborough Ralph on Education And Next Congress GOP PROTESTS VOTE COUNT