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University Daily Kansan Monday, March 23,1953 Letters
ASC Rates Thanks For Union Rallies
With all the discussion, on whether or not to abolish the All Student Council, we were glad to see an ASC committee do the school a good turn.
We think that the ASC pep committee is to be commended for the fine job they did conducting the rallies at the Union building. It seems that between the Union operating committee and the ASC a solution has been found to the stored up energy of KU fans.
We think that it would be a fine idea if these committees could develop some more parties for the student body that would enable students to really enjoy themselves and the Union. We wonder if we could have something along the line of a movie party; showing the films that are shown in Hoch in the ballroom, and have that followed by an all-school dance on Friday night would really be a service.
—Don Moser.
U.S. Bigotry Detracts From World Prestige
"The United States today inevitably is living in a goldfish bowl, with everything we do being watched by the rest of the world," Dr. Ralph Bunche, UN director of trusteeships and 1950 Nobel peace prize winner, said Tuesday at an all-student convocation.
The goldfish bowl comparison can be carried further.
Our missteps, manifested particularly in our racial and religious bigotry, and our Communist witch hunts, serve as grist for the Communist propaganda mill, and thus reduce our strength of leadership and national prestige in the eyes of the rest of the world.
Life in a narrow goldfish bowl doesn't allow Americans much space to back off and gain self-perspective. Sometimes the glass of the bowl which surrounds us is tinted by Reds or is like a House of Fun mirror—it magnifies and distorts, making our smallest defects glaringly evident.
So that we may look out and see the rest of the world objectively, we must keep our side of the glass clean. Our superior military strength has cracked the glass in one place. Smaller nations under the influence of Communist propaganda look at the crack with fear, expecting attack any time after hearing propaganda about U.S. ruthlessness.
Brightening the glass on either side of the crack seems the best way to detract from the famous (or infamous) buildup given our military power, possibly by showing our sincerity of purpose and cooperative actions. This will have to be done on both sides of the glass—at home and abroad—by such world help projects as UNESCO, the Marshall plan, Point IV programs, and others.
Through cooperation with other nations in the UN we can reach our goals of peace and freedom. A concerted international glass-polishing to make all our nations look their best will require infinite courage, wisdom, and patience.
"We are living in critical, but not hopeless, times," Dr. Bunche said. —Mary Betz
A recent news feature disclosed that Abraham Lincoln still has $201.80 on deposit in a Washington bank which no one—individual or bank—can use. It's a nice historical item, but doesn't the thought sort of frustrate you?
POGO
To the Editor of the Daily Kansan:
Students See ASC Pro
This letter is to express my extreme regret in regards to the manner in which certain persons have been attempting to kill student government.
These individuals have shown very clearly, by their actions, just how simple and small they are. Any one can print up a number of stickers and paste them on parked cars during the middle of the night. If, as Mr. Brownlee believes, a great number of students favor abolishment of student government, why weren't the stickers offered to car owners so that they might accept or reject them? Also, why are those persons who are supporting this campaign afraid to publicly make known their names?
As for Mr. Brownlee and his cohorts, I have but this to say—If you gentlemen (?) have a sincere desire to campaign for something (which you obviously do have) why don't you attempt something constructive such as a plan of reorganization for student government?
It is my sincerе hope that the students of KU will think long and hard before throwing out student government. Admittedly, it has not been perfect, but it is the privilege and responsibility of every student on this campus to make student government work.
Con
Dana K. Anderson
A.S.C. Treasurer
* * *
To the Editor of the Daily Kansan:
I wish first to praise the recent action by the Campus Crusade for Better Government toward voting out the ASC. Splendid idea!
The cry of the above Crusade of "Take it away, Franklin" should be changed to "Take them away, Franklin" and applied to several other campus nuisances. In my opinion and in the unvoiced opinion of many others the following steps be taken. Immediately after abolishing the ASC and setting up another in harmony with the needs and wishes of the students themselves, women's closing hours, compulsory class attendance, many smoking regulations and the student court be booted out of their respective ruts by an all campus vote preceded by inter-intra-house discussion and investigation of the matter.
After this refreshing removal humane and flexible rules can be made by us students according to our needs and in respect to our position as maturing adults, eventually placing responsibility for our conduct in our own hands.
Take it or leave it, this is where I stand and I invite comment. I believe this is the time for a change, and I believe that the change should come from action by us students. And remember conservatives the old saw that needs sharpening, "Give us an inch and we will take a mile."
Bob Kennedy college senio'
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by Dick Bibler
"I'll continue now, if there are no further irrelevant questions."
Saar Issue Thorn to France and Germany
Editor's note: Kreuter is a doctor of economics from the University of Paris. He is a member of the Society of Economic Sciences. This is the second in a series of letters on foreign life by visiting scholars.
With periodical constancy, Western Europe is concerned with the problem of the Saar. Effectively, every time France and Germany make an attempt to reach any agreement, the Saar is at least one, if not the only factor, rendering a favorable conclusion more difficult.
This was true for the Schumann-Plan and this is actually true for the realization of the European Defense Community.
Now, what is the reason, that this little country of one million inhabitants and of about the size of Rhode Island is the object of so much controversy?
The facts can rapidly be outlined as follows: Politically the Saar-Basin was, except during 15 years after the first World War, a part of Germany. In 1947, however, it was after a favorable vote of the inhabitants and the consent of England and the United States, separated from Germany, to become an independent country and to be joined economically to France.
This operation immediately provided disagreements between France and Germany.
That the Saar is in all respects to be considered a part of Germany and that there is not the slightest reason to separate it from Germany, is Germany's position.
The French reply is an essentially economic one: The Saar-Basin with its rich coal mines and its heavy industry is the natural compliment of the French industrial area of Lorraine, just across the border on which the Saar depends entirely for its industrial as well as its agricultural supply. A separation of the Saar industry from France's Lorraine by a border would appear to be an economic monstrosity and would prevent both parts from working at their full efficiency. As a matter of fact Saar and Lorraine were, during the past 80 years, only separated for five years, before the second World War. The rest of the time they were joined either under French or German control.
In order to find a possible solution, the Saar problem has to be stated in more general terms, in which it appears only as the result of a much larger problem.
This is nothing else but the fact that the present political structure of Europe corresponds in no way to the economic requirements. The Industrial Revolution of Europe was not followed by an adequate political revolution, which would have established an harmonic equilibrium of the continent. The result is, that the present political borders of Europe disturb greatly the economic exchange and collaboration. Unless therefore a political unification of Europe, leading to any form of European Union, is carried through, the actual contradictions between political organization and economic requirements with all their detrimental effects, will persist.
This is the real scope, in which the controversy about the Saar should be considered today. Here this controversy is reduced to nothing else but a symptom of Europe's maladjustment. Only by curing the latter can a stable and constructive solution of the Saar problem—as well as most other Western European problems—be reached.
With this idea in mind, the population of the Saar went to the polls four months ago, not to demonstrate any approval or disapproval of France or Germany, but to maintain the status which they consider to be the best immediate solution.
The final objective is a Europe in which the German and French interests and feelings become identical in a greater community.
—Gunther H. Kreuter