PAGE SIX
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN, LAWRENCE, KANSAS
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1950
The Editorial Page-
College Recess
During the past week, while engaged in soul-searching conflict over the H-bomb and security in general, the senate found time to approve a proposed constitutional amendment that would spell the end of the electoral college. The vote was 64 to 27.
Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., Republican from Massachusetts, and Representative Ed Gossett, Democrat from Texas, formulated the bill. The senate's confirmation is a personal triumph for Lodge, who as a liberal Republican has been at odds with the conservative members of his party. Lodge influenced nearly half of senate Republicans to break away from Taft leadership and vote "yea" on the bill.
The proposal has yet to be approved in the house, but Gossett predicts there will be more than enough support to get the required two-thirds majority. If it is passed in the house, the amendment must then be ratified by three-fourths of the states within a seven year period to become law.
Passage and ratification of the bill can probably do more than anything else to secure our democracy. Today when local politics take a back seat to political ideologies, the Lodge-Gossett amendment could very well assume the job of reinforcing American democracy.
Results of the amendment, though not certain, would seem to insure a bigger voting public. In the last presidential election only 45 million of an eligible 90 million voters bothered to go to the polls. The amendment could correct that, principally by making it more of a contest in one-party states.
For example, in an election today all of Alabama's 11 electoral votes would go to the Democratic candidate. Under the new system, if the Republican candidate should poll 18 per cent of the popular vote, he would receive two of the state's electoral votes. The remaining nine would go to the Democratic candidate.
The Alabama example not only illustrates the restoration of competition into one-party states, but explains how the amendment will entice more people into voting. The minority groups in one-party states will not feel that it is useless to vote. In the last 50 years only one presidential candidate has felt the need to campaign in Alabama because of this feeling.
The amendment will also relegate the splinter parties to their proportionate strength. Robert Taft, Republican from Ohio, who fought the bill says it will only aid Socialists and Communists in their political designs. His argument came near upsetting the passage of the amendment until a safety clause was tacked on.
So the senate, while digesting the hardships of world affairs, has quietly passed the most significant instrument in shaping those very world affairs. The bolstering of democracy at home is as good a way of bolstering America's role in the world as possible.
The amendment, if made into law, seems to bear only favorable results. One disquieting result, however, might be a G.O.P. presidential candidate from Georgia. —W.F.S.
Weak Moral Code
We do not need to be told by press associations that t Federal Bureau of Investigation is disturbed by the extreme high rate of sex crimes over the nation. We have read many gruesome reports in newspapers all over the country.
The F.B.I. points to an increasing figure that hit the climax in 1947 and remained fairly steady. For the major part of 1949 the number of offenses kept pace with those of 1947. So now that we have the facts, what is the remedy?
We should be concerned, not only with violations of the moral code, but with the type of offenders who may be impelled to commit major sex crimes. In most cases mental unbalance is involved to some degree. The crime defines the graduation of the psychiatric case to the psychopathic. Some of the perpetrators could have been discouraged with proper treatment.
J. Edgar Hoover soundly urges that from the time the law comes in contact with these potentially serious offenders it should insist upon competent psychiatric examinations and treatment.
Family cooperation should come before the law. Frequently unnatural sexual tendencies do make themselves noticeable before the law has to be summoned by the criminal act.
Families are too often deterred by shame. But it would be far better to consult a psychiatrist than to face the eventual results of neglect. Some, but far too few psychiatric cases solve themselves.
Our experts in psychiatry, psychopathy, or human psychology cannot guarantee results. But the damages to our social system are serious enough to warrant trying all possible remedies to curb the nation's sex crimes. —Frankie Waits
'Small Things'
A beauty expert says that 80 out of 100 women have sucumbed to the boyish figure and the mannish hairdo, and the freshman cynic wants to know "on who?"
"Campus Mailman Is Really A Mail-Woman" says a headline, and that will probably stand as the cutest headline of the week.
Navy Develops New Air Rocket
Washington. —(UF)—The navy came up with a "Mighty Mouse" rocket today, the first successful air-to-air weapon developed by the U.S. armed forces.
Small enough to be carried in quantity by jet fighter planes, it nevertheless is fast and powerful enough to destroy any known type of plane if it scores a direct hit.
The navy said the "Mighty Mouse" has been fired successfully by a navy Douglas "Skyraider" at Inykorin, Calif. Impressed by its performance the air force plans to use it as the chief weapon on its newest operational interception planes, the F-86D "Sabre" and the F-94.
The navy said the "Mighty Mouse" been tested against a robot plane. It and the air force plan to continue the tests.
Rear Adm. A. G. Noble, chief of the bureau of ordinance, said the new rocket is a "powerful addition" to the weapons of the fighter aircraft.
"This rocket can be used to attack at greater ranges than aircraft automatic guns and carries a larger explosive charge than a gun projectile," he said. Both of these are important factors in attacking large high speed aircraft."
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