ustxtxb_obs_1963_12_27_50_00002-00000_000.pdf

nu, 3.ith? From this perspective, President Johnson has made a good start. The late President will be remembered most of all as a civil rights president. President Johnson called for the enactment of the pending civil rights bill, and has set about to induce representatives to order a House committee to release its clutch on it. \(Texans whose congressmen have not yet signed the petition to let the House vote on the bill could usefully send a letter or two Johnson alSo asked Congress to pass the tax cut bill. In this, as in the civil rights issue, he and Congress will be judged by the final content of the legislation. As the cut was proposed, it would give substantial relief to lower income citizens. Liberalism and economy in government have never been logical opposites; to the contrary, economy of means is sound practice for anyone \(as, to sound, a mundane hope Johnson keeps worrying the huge government into economizing. It is true, however, that the less the government spends, the less money-energy pumps through the economy, and that the fewer people the government employs, the more people may be unemployed. Of all the good reasons for economy, this is the first and best one, that the money and the energy saved can be put to work for additional useful projects that could not otherwise be done. We trust and assume, from his long commitment to public works, that this, not niggardliness of programs, is President Johnson’s purpose in economy. Incorporating the State Observer and the East Texas Democrat, which in turn incorporated the State Week and Austin ForumAdvocate. We will serve no group or patty but will hew hard to the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. We are dedicated to the whole truth, to human values above all interests, to the rights of man as the foundation of democracy; we will take orders from none but our own conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent the truth to serve the interests of the powerful or cater to the ignoble in the human spirit. Editor and General Manager, Ronnie Dugger. Partner, Mrs. R. D. Randolph. Business Manager, Sarah Payne. Contributing Editors, J. Frank Dobie, Larry Goodwyn, Franklin Jones, Lyman Jones, Willie Morris, Charles Ramsdell, Roger Shattuck, Dan Strawn, Tom Sutherland, Charles Alan Wright. Staff Artist, Charles Erickson. Contributing Photographer, Russell Lee. Subscription Representatives: Austin, Mrs. Helen C. Spear, 2615 Pecos, HO 5-1805; Dallas, Mrs. Cordye Hall, 5835 Ellsworth, TA 1-1205; Fort Worth, Mrs. Jesse Baker, 3212 Greene St.. WA 7-2959; Houston, Mrs. Shirley Jay, 10306 Cliffwood Dr., PA 3-8682; Lubbock, Doris Blaisdell, 2515 24th St.; Midland, Eva Dennis, 4306 Douglas, OX 4-2825; Rio Grande Valley, Mrs. Jack Butler, 601 Houston, McAllen, MU 6-5675; Indeed, it is within this area that the new President is presented his most vital challenge to come forward with new programs. Automation, that fierce and voracious rap-dog of efficiency, forces the United States to re-evaluate the very concept of efficiency. As the economy has evolved, wtih profit the first motive, business has pursued the efficiency of all its means; but as the levels of unemployment are now evolving, it becomes clear that we must abandon the logic of the cheapest mode of production and conceive and ‘construct a new one, the most intelligent employment of persons, so that all shall have something to do, and none shall hunger. The retraining of displaced workers, for which Kennedy fought, is a worthy program, and all right, but it is too slow, and it is like trying to restore cars after they have crashed. The remedy must be organic to the system, must include new conceptions of useful work and of everyone’s right to a minimum share of the productivity, and is a radical challenge to us all. We are gratified, and not surprised, that President Johnson has recommitted the United States to the United Nations and to the pursuit of the achievement of peace. His presentation of the Fermi Award to Although the Observer will carry reports from Washington when they contribute to the understandings available from the na San Antonio, Mrs. Mae B. Tuggle, 531 Elmhurst, TA 2-7154; Tyler, Mrs. Erik Thomsen, 1209 So. Broadway, LY 4-4862. The editor has exclusive control over the editorial policies and contents of the Observer. None of the other people who are associated with the enterprise shares this responsibility with him. Writers .are responsible for their own work, but not for anything they have not themselves written, and in publishing them the editor does not necessarily imply that he agrees with them, because this is a journal of free voices. The Observer solicits articles, essays, and creative work of the shorter forms having to do in various ways with this area. The pay depends; at present it is token. Please enclose return postage. Unsigned articles are the editor’s. The Observer is published by Texas Observer Co., Ltd., biweekly from Austin, Texas. Entered as second-class matter April 26, 1937, at the Post Office at Austin, Texas, under the Act of March 3, 1879. Second class postage paid at Austin, Texas. Delivered postage prepaid $5.00 a year. Foreign rates on request. Single copies 25c; prices for ten or more for students, or bulk orders, on request. Editorial and Business Offices: The Texas Observer, 504 West 24th St., Austin 5, Texas. Telephone GR 7-0746. Change of Address: Please give old and new addresses E%nd allow three weeks. Oppenheimer was a good omen that he may be able to overcome his contempt for intellectuals, which was grounded in an insecurity that would not be worthy of a President; and we hope this omen extends to mean that he will listen to the reason of those who warn that the world must turn back, and turn finally away, from nuclear weapons, or will surely blow itself to hell. The note in his UN speech that the challenge now in the world is like unto the challenge in the nation in the time of Roosevelt, while a general note, could become an exceedingly important one, and we hope that it will. Johnson always admired Roosevelt. The crises now are subtler, and the challenge to humanitarianism is not national, nearly as much as it is international. We hope that Lyndon Johnson, the most powerful man in the country, and perhaps in the world, at long last, will stand true now to his sentiments of liberalism, and will not sell them, and himself, and the human person of the’ great, world-wide mass of personswill not sell them short, to put a good show on things, or accommodate his critics, who will not be appeased. If his is a New Faith that concern for the person must be-international, let him carry this faith not only to the Congress, let him carry it also to the people of the country, and appeal to the best in them, and never assume that the least in them will be the strongest. tional media, we shall not regard ourselves as responsible to publish a continuity of accounts on the Presidency. Like all politically concerned people, we shall be reading along in national and world events; Texas politics are now intimately subordinate to, but also intimately relevant to, national politics. But we assume, as our readers surely do also, that Washington is the place to report Washington. As the editor sees it, the Observer’s role now is not different from what it has been, although it may have become more important. We shall keep our watch on Texas affairs and report subjects and events, backgrounds and investigations, that bear on Texas affairs or on their import, in turn, in the national life. Needless, we trust, to add, the Observer continues to be independent of every group and party, and of all politicianscontinues “never afraid to attack wrong.” In fact, we are moved, by the new situation, to dredge up, from the old masthead of the Observer, our first statement of principle, and to restore it now to the masthead we publish every issue: 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. We are dedicated to the whole truth, to human values above all interests, to the rights of man as the foundation of democracy; we will take orders from none but our own conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent the truth to serve the interests of the powerful or cater to the ignoble in the human spirit. E] THE TEXAS OBSERVER A Journal of Free Voices A Window to the South 57th YEAR ESTABLISHED 1906 Vol. 55, No. 28 74WIDpaRgEnt December 27, 1963 Reitatement