Editorials
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
In his firm, articulate, thoughtful remarks, General Maxwell Taylor dealt skillfully with questioners, doubters and dissenters on U.S. action and policies in Viet Nam during his campus visit Monday.
A reason to trust
MOST AMERICANS are expressing convictions either for or against the U.S. policies in Viet Nam. Those who trust the administration surely now have tangible evidence that their convictions are not misplaced—that they can trust U.S. foreign policy without having their trust flaunted or misused.
During the afternoon question and answer session, Gen. Taylor fielded loaded questions with expertise and clear knowledge of the Viet Nam war. He did not appear to avoid or fear his questioners, an attribute which left much of the audience with some measure of security because he appeared to be a man whom they could trust.
IN HIS MORNING speech, the former ambassador explored and clarified the critical situation in a manner that left the impression that here was a man who knew his own convictions and reflected the policies of a nation acting cautiously and wisely in a situation where one false move could lead to terrible disaster.
— Karen Lambert
Students skirt law
In recent weeks the Kansan has tried to explore two separate but related social problems present in some degree on this campus. The first was a series of articles on alcohol, alcoholism, and student drinking. Social drinking is a problem at KU, as it is anywhere else in Kansas when people under 21 become involved.
Yet the series of articles skated around the most pressing problem present, only hinting toward the core. The heart of the problem appears to be the fact that all those under 21 drink all their hard liquor illegally.
THESE DRINKERS are not hardened criminals tearing down the walls of justice, but just the same they are disobeying the law. Possibly the Kansas laws should be changed, but until they are these minors and their friends who provide them liquor are breaking the law.
THE MAJORITY OF the students at KU are under 21 years of age, as most freshmen, sophomores, and juniors fall into this category. Yet this does not seem to stop these people from drinking illegally. According to Kansas statutes it is unlawful for anyone under the age 21 to have any liquor in his possession or for anyone to provide it for him.
THE BLATANT DISREGARD for these statutes is witnessed in every barn party held by a residence hall or every formal by a fraternity. It would not take long for any law officer to get an eyeful at these events. Or if he does not have time to wait for a formal function, he can drop in on one of several local night spots any night of the week, and find customers spicing up the evening with drinks from their own bottles.
It is definitely against the law for anyone to sell this form of alcoholic beverage to minors. This ruling does not just apply to the owner of a retail liquor store, but to anyone, including the student over 21 who buys it for a friend. In fact this person is placing himself in greater danger with the law, as he is selling the alcoholic beverage without a license.
KU does have a problem. More than one-fourth its student population are consistent law-breakers.
— Robert Stevens
Books from Berkeley to Bogart
Except for the civil rights story that broke in Mississippi three years ago, no recent event occurring on college campuses has caught the imagination quite like the "free speech movement" at the University of California. The second of two books on the subject is now in paperback. It is far less comprehensive than the other volume, but will be more satisfactory to many readers for that very reason.
The new one is called Revolution at Berkeley (Dell Laurel, 95 cents), edited by Michael V. Miller and Susan Gilmore. "Revolution" is a good word to describe it, and it would be fortunate if the book could be placed on the required reading list of all university administrators throughout the nation. Many of the prime movers in the affair speak here—President Clark Kerr, the celebrated Mario Savio, Hal Draper. Others—Paul Goodman, Sidney Hook, A. H. Raskin among them—analyze what happened.
TWO BOOKS BY the brilliant Erich Fromm are out this month in inexpensive editions—The Sane Society (Premier, 95 cents) and Man for Himself (Premier, 95 cents). Here's a writer who speaks to the condition of modern man and who shakes people up—especially students and conservatives. Fromm seems to doubt it is a sane society.
Fromm is a psychoanalyst who introduces ethical and humanistic concepts into his
Daily Kansan
work. These are the substance of these books. He is an excitingly contemporary writer, even though his quite obvious liberalism is likely to bug some readers.
From these towering works of non-fiction it is quite a slide, but an entertaining one, down to Richard Gehman's Bogart (Gold Medal, 50 cents). The word is out that the publishing woods are full of books on this "existential" actor (hahl) whose movies have become the "In" thing to see at Harvard and such non-benighted centers of culture. "Bogart" lets us in on all the plays and all the movies Bogart made, on his marriages, on the Rat Pack, and on that particular charismatic (love that word) quality
IT IS STILL more of a slide to report on certain other paperback volumes that are brightening the shelves of drugstores, supermarkets and even bookstores.
Wednesday, December 8. 1965
— John Ballantine Gough
that the late actor reportedly had—and has.
Some tough — and some sweet—mysteries, for example. Mark McShane made himself known to a number of readers with "Seance on a Wet Afternoon," which was turned into a taut and stylish movie. Untimely Ripped (Crest, 40 cents) is in the Jack-the-Riper mood, though better than it sounds, all about a vicious killer in a little English town. A gruesome way to spend an evening (reading the book, to clarify that phrase).
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We were thinking...
What is a minority? The chosen heroes of this earth have been in a minority. There is not a social, political, or religious privilege that you enjoy today that was not bought for you by the blood and tears and patient suffering of the minority. It is the minority that have stood in the van of every moral conflict, and achieved all that is noble in the history of the world.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY
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EXECUTIVE STAFF
MANAGING EDITOR Judy Farrell
BUSINESS MANAGER Ed Vaughn
EDITORIAL EDITORS Janet Hamilton, Karen Lambert
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS by Dick Bibler
COURSE COURSE GO TOUCH — IDC GOT A STRAIT
USE FOR THIS STUDIO COURSE!
Crime rate misleading
"Crime in the streets" is, next to "conventional nuclear weapons," one of Barry Goldwater's catchier phrases. And to support Goldwater's claims of increasing lawlessness any good conservative can cite all the impressive FBI statistics showing that crime is one American business that is really booming.
In 1963, for example, crime increased 10 per cent over the 1980-62 average and urban crime was up a booming 22.7 per cent. The only things that dropped in relation to population were murder and forcible rape, and they aren't too common anyway.
BUT, UNFORTUNATELY, there is a flaw in all the FBI's statistics. Not all the crimes that are committed get included. As Donald A. Cressey of UCLA once wrote, "Many, perhaps most, crimes are not discovered, or not reported, or not recorded. Hence, any record of crimes, such as crimes known to the police ... is at best an "index" of crimes committed." For example, in Chicago from 1928-31 robberies jumped from 1,263 to 14,544 and burglaries from 879 to 18,684. But there wasn't really a crime wave—police merely changed their reporting techniques. Likewise, Chicago was hit by another statistical crime wave in 1959-60 when a new superintendent changed reporting procedures and saw reported crimes go up 100 per cent.
Not only do increased statistics show improved recording, but also improved police protection. An editorial in the New York Tribune in 1872 was headlined, "Banish the Roughs, Concert Saloons and Gambling Cells Must Be Driven to the Slums."
FINALLY, THERE ARE those who prefer to maximize the statistical crime increase—politicians, lawmen, and journalists. For politicians, crime is a safe target—everyone is against it—and the bigger crime becomes, the better campaign target it is. For law enforcement agencies, increased crime is a handy thing to have around when it becomes time to ask increased appropriations. After all, the police can't fight this year's crime on last year's budget. And for journalists, crime is an easy way to sell newspapers. In San Francisco a few years ago, the competing morning papers began reporting a terrible crime wave in the city. But crime didn't increase—only newspaper coverage and sensational treatment did.
RATHER THAN ATTEMPT to enforce laws throughout cities, the past practice was to restrict lawlessness to areas where it would not disturb the respectable parts of society. In the urban North, laws were not fully enforced in the slums; in the rural South they were not fully enforced in Negro areas. Nor frequently would those areas report crimes to the police.
So the proportion of crimes committed to crimes recorded is constantly changing. Cressey wrote, "We measure the extent of crime with an elastic ruler whose units of measurements are unknown." Part of the yearly increase in crimes must be because of increased police efficiency in discovering and reporting crimes, but how great a part is impossible to tell.
ALSO, FIGURES SHOWING crime increases per 100.000 population must be handled carefully. For example, auto theft increased 11 per cent over 1963, 10 per cent per 100.000 population. But thefts, per 100,000 automobiles, a sine qua non of crime, increased only six per cent. As the increase in automobiles is reflected in higher numbers of automobile thefts, so increasing influence is reflected in more cases of grand larceny, which with auto theft accounted for over half of the increase in crimes from 1952 to 1963. The bare statistics mean very little.
Crime statistics do have value, but only as indicators. It is unfortunate, but true, as Daniel Bell writes, "Crime statistics are as reliable, as a woman giving her 'correct' age."
Justin Beck