ustxtxb_obs_1960_12_09_50_00005-00000_000.pdf

U.T. RECEIVING U.S. $$ DALLAS From Our Dallas Correspondent Conservatives have shaken signs of internal strife long enough to keep their grip on Dallas County’s Democratic chairmanship. Lee Smith Jr., who pledged himself to “Jeffersonian Democracy,” was elected last week without nominated opposition to succeed Ed Drake, who resigned effective Dec. 1 after seven years in office. Smith promised improvements in the county party organization to meet growing Republican strength in Dallas. He said it will be done by “conservative therapy, rather than by radical surgery.” Liberal-loyalists, in a corridor caucus before the executive committee meeting, decided their 47 sure votes were not enough to challenge the conservatives. Facing certain defeat, Joe Bailey Humphreys decided not to get into the race. The conservatives split over whether Manuel DeBusk should be retained as county secretary. The loyalists’ 47 votes were the deciding factor in DeBusk’s 88-38 win over Paul Bell, who was backed by a group whose core was 11 precinct chairmen who work for Mobil Oil Company. DeBusk thereupon went on record as favoring in “principle” an 8-point loyalist resolution that called, in part, for the new chairman to mold together a county organization that will back the party’s nominees at all levels. By voice vote the conservatives ,shunted the resolution to a committee that will be appointed by Smith. Loyalists got a promise of equal representation on the ommittee. Conservative Caucuses A series of conservative caucuses had repaired the split in their ranks. The Mobil group, headed by Charles Simons, executive vice-president of Texas MidContinental Oil & Gas Association, agreed to go along with Smith’s candidacy. Smith has been heir apparent to Drake for two years. This peace agreement ended any chance the loyalists had of electing Humphreys. They had counted on using their 47 votes as the deciding force in the previously-expected conservative deadlock. Loyalists were disappointed, but they took the setback philosophically. “We are going to continue to take the initiative in demanding that the county organization be active,, and that it be active for Democratic candidates,” said Rev. Baxton Bryant. Loyalists are now talking more of trying to get “middle of the road” leadership rather than making the party chairmanship a strictly liberal-conservative tiff. Smith’s election came on a voice vote. A few lusty “noes” made up his only opposition. He is a lawyer who earned a Distinguished Service Cross and four Purple Hearts as a rifle company commander in Europe during World War II. He told the committee members: “Let me assure you that I am not going to preside over the dissolution of the Democratic Party in Dallas County, nor am I going to aid and abet the election of Republicans. Let me assure others that I agree with Thomas Jefferson when he said the best government is the least government.” Virtually every speaker touched in passing on GOP sweeps in the county Nov. 8, when Republicans THE TEXAS OBSERVER Page 5 Dec. 9, 1960 gained majorities for president, U.S. senator, congress, a county commissioners court seat, and barely missed electing a state representative. ‘Distressed’ Simons conceded that DeBusk “is doing a good job as far as the mechanics of. his office are concerned.” But he said, “I’m distressed when I see a good man like John Field get beat \(in a He called for completely new leadership. Howard Allen countered that “if somebody is bellyaching, I don’t see why it should be the conservatives . . They \(Drake resented our cause.” Loyalist Resolution The loyalist resolution was largely the work of Bryant, Allen Maley of the Dallas AFL-CIO Council, and Jim Holbrook, Grand Prairie loyalist: The new ‘chairman “shall dedicate his office to the election of Democratic nominees in general elections.” OA divided Democratic Party cannot compete with GOP organization in Dallas County, the resolution stated, and the chairman should not “take sides in factional disputes leading to the selection” of nominees and once they are selected should back them. OThe party should encourage greater p-artiicipartion in precinct meetings. “Fairness of the presiding officers . . . is mandatory.” O”The practice of describing every person who differs in political belief as a radical or as a traitor must be discouraged …” ORegular executive committee meetings should be held to give precincts a voice in the party’s affairs. The committee “must ex plode and expose the myth that reactionary fanaticism is conservatism, loyal participation in the Democratic Party is radicalism, mob hysteria is courage, and tragic ineffectiveness in Congress is a matter of principle.” \(This section was aim dead-center at OThe Democrats should begin “now” to recoup losses= theysuffered at GOP hands this year. J. W. Hassell, answering for the conservatives, said the resolution “is not in the language of solidarity.” He said it should have a more positive approach to gaining unity. His motion passed to send the resolution to a committee for revision. AUSTIN Groups of Negro and white students from the University of Texas, ranging in size from 100 to 200, have staged three demonstrations against the segregated Texas Theater on the Drag across from the main campus. Leaders say the demonstrations will continue. The theater, which features . “fine arts” and foreign films, is part of the Trans-Texas chain. Manager Leonard Masters has told the group he cannot sell tickets to the Negro students because the board of Trans-Texas sets policy. The whites-only policy has just been re-affirmed, he said. The demonstrations have been peaceful although there has been some jeering by non-sympathizers in front of the theater and in passing cars. AUSTIN University of Texas officials this week released what is probably the most comprehensive appraisal made in recent years of the extent to which the federal government now directs Texas college and university faculties through financial support. The appraisal underscores the fact that the federal government is not only the most important “angel” of basic and applied research in the sciences but will continue to fill that role for an indefinite time, with its financial aid expected to increase by a steady 20 per cent a year. Indications are it will also soon heavily increase its support of social science research. UT President Harry Ransom said the steadily rising flood of money into college and university work “is the history of U.S. education for the past 15 years,” that federal sponsorship “is unavoidable,” and that “although shoestring research was done in Texas for four generations, with admirable results, shoestring research is no longer possible.” He said: “Our genetics progtram was built on private funds but it now merits federal support and indeed it could not get along without federal assistance.” In only a decade federal funds recei*ed on the main university campus increased five-fold, from slightly over $1 million to nearly $5 million. The shaping power of the federal money is made plain enough by this statement from Dr. C. P. Boner, executive director of the UT Office of Government Sponsored Research, an office set up 11 years ago to serve as a clearing house for government contracts and faculty applications for U.S. aid. Says Dr. Boner: “The money obtained ‘from the federal government in the form of research contracts and grants is by far the major support for research in the. Main UniVersity. “It not only pays salaries for part-time research employment of faiculty members in the long sessiOn, and up to full-time for them in the summer, but it currently provides jobs for 243 undergraduates and 253 graduate students and employs experimental machinists, statisticians, clerks, secretaries, and other helpers to conserve the time of the faculty. Equipment to which the university acquired title through government sponsored programs during 1958-1959 is valued at well over $100,000.” But subsequent federal generosity has already eclipsed that figure, for the University only recently accepted a $400,000 grant to equip its new computation center. Students participating denied that any single organization is sponsoring t h e demonstrations and that there is any single leader. It was understood, however, that members of the newly-formed “Direct Action Committee,” of which Chandler Davidson is chairman, have played key roles in the planning. Two English instructors at the University have participated in the demonstrations. They are Sandra Cason, who is chairman of an integration committee in student government, and Claude Allen, both graduate students as well as instructors. The students on each occasion have formed two lines moving constantly toward the box office. Each time the ticket seller, Mrs. Ludwema Werchan, explains Negroes are iicet allowed, the students move to the back of a The University’s financial report for 1958-1959 \(the last year for which a complete breakdown of the $48,109,581 total operating income for the university system, $7,289,223, or something over onesixth,’ represented federal funds. On the main campus, the operating income total of $22,277,915 included $4,739,127 in federal money. At the medical branch the ratio was $11,706,682 and $904,069; at the dental branch $1,853,514 and $106,493; at the M. D. Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute, $6,276,335 and $426,382; at Southwestern Medical School, $3,363,509 and $679,412; at the postgraduate school of medicine, $58,875 and $3,797; and at Texas Western $2,213,347 total operating income with $429,940 from the government These federal aid totals do not include grants toward buildings and do not include student aid , Of the nearly $5 million appropriated to the main campus, the bulk was spent on research \($3,dribbling into the support of such and the Armed Forces Institute This year, research is expected to absorb $5 million on its own, and though this is big money in Texas research, it is small compared to what is being spent by the government through other large universities, said Jans cobsen, assistant to Dr. Boner in the OGSR. “When you consider the government contracts for about $60 million in research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which is about three times the total annual operating budget of that school, you see where Texas ranks,” said Jacobsen. The federal. budget for the University of Chicago’s Argonne Laboratory, which employs 3,400 scientists and aides, runs into the millions of dollars,. he said, yet is only a fraction of the government outlay at that school. The University of California, Cal Tech, Carnegie Tech, Columbia, ‘Cornell, Harvard, the University of Illinois, Illinois Tech, NYU, Princeton, Stanford and the University of Minnesota are among other schools which not only make Texas-size research look like so many peanuts but which must instill correspondingly greater horror in the breasts of those who -oppose all \\federal aid to education. Not that the University of Texas couldn’t be taking in larger grants if it wished. line and start the procedure again. In ‘the first demonstration Friday night a member of the Texas House of Representatives, watch. ing the moving lines, exclaimed: “This is the best thing since the San Francisco riots.” He asked that he not be named, as he wishes to become a member of the state Senate, he said. Masters set up another ticket booth just inside the lobby and warned the demonstrators not to come inside. They complied. Customers to the movie moved through the lines to use the separate booth, although numbers of people have either refused to go into the movie while the demonstrations were taking place or actively joined the students in front of the theater. A variation on the sit-in technique for integrating restaurants “But we have tried to pursue a cautious and deliberate approach to federally-supported research,” said President Ransom. “Again and again we have refused to apply for a federal contract because we did not think the work suited us or agreed with our philosophy. “We refuse to get involved with ‘busy’ work. And we prefer research that contributes to an increase in basic knowledge rather than research that is of the problem-solving nature. In any case, we seek government support only if the work is academically significant or nationally significant. By nationally significant, I mean the day is past when a university that is really of the first rank can avoid its part in the nation’s defense work.” While the swelling federal largesse makes practically everyone on the faculty happy, here and there one hears the voiced worry that government work is primarily “team research” and team research stifles the imagination of the scientist who works best as a maverick. But Boner seems to think this wally is unfounded, pointing out that small “one-man” projects have increased greatly at UT during the last couple of years. Ransom takes even a more flexible view, seeing team research as the natural product of the nuclear age. Jacobsen adds: “Research these days must be coordinated. Scientific efforts are so varied