Page 2
University Daily Kansan
Tuesday, April 28, 1964
10. (     )
No Accident:
The Johnson Success
When President Kennedy was killed, a national healer was needed. Lyndon B. Johnson was that healer ready made.
Somewhere, sometime in the life of the Texas politician, Johnson was struck by a Biblical passage; "Come let us reason together." Perhaps that moment, whenever it was, has historic significance to the United States—for the philosophy is one well-suited to a person thrown into the presidency when the country was badly shaken. Much has been written of Johnson's favorite quotation. His record as Senator and President prove that it is not a hollow one.
In an interview recently, Walter Lippmann observed that Johnson has succeeded in "binding the nation's wounds." A new book of Johnson's major speeches since 1953 indicate that his success has not been an accident.
In one speech, made in 1958, Johnson said: "I am a free man, an American, a United States Senator, and a Democrat, in that order." The statement is hardly dramatic in itself, but it reflects a philosophic base.
IN THIS 1958 SPEECH, Johnson went on to say: "At the heart of my own beliefs is a rebellion against this very process of classifying, labeling, and filing Americans under headings: regional, economic, occupational, religious, racial, or otherwise. . . Our political philosophies, I have found, are the sum of our life's experience. God made no man so simple or his life so sterile that such experience can be summarized in an adjective."
After citing the flexibility of the Constitution as a virtue, Johnson said: "I believe there is always a national answer to each national problem..."
Later, explaining his self-definition: "Some
who equate personal philosophies with popular dogma might inquire, endlessly, as to my 'position' on this issue or some other. Philosophies, as I conceive them at least, are not made of answers to issues, but of approaches more enduring and encompassing...
He expressed his unity theme a different way when he addressed the Senate Democratic Conference in 1953; "We (the Democrat senators) are now in the minority. I have never agreed with the statement that it is 'the business of the opposition to oppose.' I do not believe that the American people have sent us here merely to obstruct.
"I BELIEVE WE are here to fight for a positive program—a program geared not just to opposing the majority, but to serving America."
On November 27 of last year, addressing a joint session of Congress: "I profoundly hope that the tragedy and the torment of these terrible days will bind us together in new fellowship, making us one people..."
This could have been a statement dictated by expediency, coming from some men. After considering some of Johnson's previous speeches, it seems to be anything but a glib pronouncement.
"Let all who speak," he said to the American people on November 28, "and all who teach and all who preach and all who publish and all who broadcast and all who read or listen—let them reflect upon their responsibilities to bind our wounds..."
Johnson's success as President has proved that he, for his part, was ready for the responsibility.
Avoidance of dogma.
Unity through consensus.
"Come let us reason together."
Lyndon B. Johnson, president and healer.
Tom Coffman
The People Say
Demonstration
Editor:
I feel that the civil rights demonstration was a success in all respects, but unfortunately it appears to have been misunderstood. It seems unnecessary to reiterate that the demonstration was not directed against Greek houses—it was not anti-Greek, only anti-segregation in all its forms, including Greek. There were several fraternity and sorority members in the picket line, myself included. The point of a non-violent demonstration as I see it is that we (the picketers) don't want any more than you are willing to give. Force as a weapon has been renounced. But so has so called "moral sassion" been renounced for obvious reasons.
One hundred students out of a body of ten thousand is not a very good percentage, and I feel certain that except for reasons of apathy and social pressure there could have been five to ten times that number. Social pressure and apathy can be fought; last Saturday's demonstration was fighting against this, civil rights demonstrations for years have been fighting this. And there have been victories. Racism as a stand has been taken over by the likes of Commander Rockwell—it is no longer accepted in principle. If a person favors segregation, he keeps his mouth shut. It is not a "fashionable" position, and this is a victory. The picket lines will swell with every demonstration, and there will be more victories, perhaps even some day a
final victory when phrases like "human dignity," and "equal opportunity" take on real meaning.
Lawrence, senior
Steve McNown
Dailij Hansan
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Strange Migrants
HONG KONG—(UPI)—Communist China is encouraging "undesirable aliens" White Russian farmers living in its remote Sinkiang province—to pack up their bags and leave the country.
Sinkiang, in far Northwest China, shares a troubled border with Soviet Kazakhstan.
A group of 125 Russian refugees arrived here after traveling nearly 3,500 miles across mainland China. Most will go to Australia to join relatives.
The leader of the refugee group, Gregori Michenko, said he was surprised when a local Communist official told the Russians in late February that those who wished to leave the country could apply for exit permits.
There are about 1,200 White Russians living in Yining, which is about 100 miles from Russia. They fled their homes when Stalin began rural collectivization.
UNTIL THE COMMUNISTS seized power in 1949, they were farmers in the fertile Yining Valley. At first, they rented land at a negligible fee from the provincial warlord government. The Nationalists, then in power, had only nominal control over such governments.
When the Communists came to power, they seized Sinkiang. Then in 1558, Peking embarked on its ambitious "Great Leap Forward." The Communists attempted to persuade the Russians in Sinkiang to join communes.
The Russians, who had challenged Stalin's collectivization program thirty years ago, refused to join, gave up their land, and moved to the town of Yining. The Communist authorities were displeased.
NOW, SIX YEARS LATER, the anti-Chinese incidents in Yining, allegedly instigated by the Soviet Union, have become a part of the feud between the two Communist countries. Peking is more worried about this province than any other part of China.
Most of the newly arrived Russian refugees in Hong Kong will be sailing to Australia in a month to join their relatives. They will travel under the auspices of the United Nations Commission for Refugees, and the World Council of Churches.
The remaining Russians in Sinkiang, some 1,000, are expected to cross China in the near future.
Khrushchev
By Phil Newsom
A guessing game already popular in world capitals and likely to spread is the name of the man who will succeed Nikita Khrushchev.
Giving it current impetus have been two events.
One is the fact that last week the bouncy Khrushchev oberved his 70th birthday, not generally recognized as retirement age for world leaders but a reminder that Khrushchev no longer is young.
The other was the false report a few days earlier of Khrushchev's death.
One student of Soviet affairs once remarked that there is no such thing as a Soviet expert, only varying degrees of ignorance.
The same comment must be made now in any attempt to name the man who finally will emerge after Khrushchev, and after surviving the dog-eat-dog politics of the Kremlin hierarchy.
Within the Soviet political structure there is no provision for an orderly ascent to the power which Krushchev now holds and which Stalin and Lenin held before him.
After Stalin's death in 1953, it took Khrushchev four more years to consolidate his present position wherein he is at the same time first secretary of the Communist party and Premier, placing him at the top of both government and party apparatus, and a member
of the Party Presidium, the small, select group which makes basic Soviet policy decisions.
Almost certainly the new man also will represent something new in top Soviet leadership. That is, he will not be one who played an important role in the Bolshevik revolution.
Wyacheslav Molotov, who might have played such a role, is in disgrace as one of the anti-party men who sought to remove Khrushchev and seemingly is out of the party picture.
Anastas Mikoyan, who might also qualify, has not been well and his relationship with Khrushevheli also is said to have cooled.
Frol R. Kozlov, one-time heir-apparent, also is ill and Mikhail A. Suslov seems to have eliminated himself by opposing certain of Khrushchev's internal policies.
BY A PROCESS of elimination, most of the experts seem to have centered on Leonid I. Brezhnev, who occupies a post which might be called the Presidency of the Soviet Union and also is a member of the Presidium.
He is respected within the party and also is popular among the experts and technicians who do not think in ideological terms but who occupy an increasingly important role in Soviet decisions. He also is regarded as one most likely to continue the so-called liberal approach favored by Khrushchev.
NO, IM NOT VIOLENT AND WHERE HAS IT GOTTEN ME? ITS GOTTEN ME TO BE SWEET KIND AND GOOD! WANT TO 'GET HIT AGAIN?'
ILL TELL YOU WHAT'S WRONG-IM BEING SWALLOWED ALIVE! I AM THE SLAVE OF MY SWEETNESS, MY KINDNESS AND MY GOODNESS! BOO DO I FEEL LIKE SMACKING YOU!
WHAT DOES SOLVING Solve?
NOTHING SOLVES NOTHING SO
WHAT'S WRONG WITH HITTING!
THAT'S MY PHILOSOPHY, STAND
STILL-I THINK I PUNCH YOU
VIOLENCE,
SOMEHOW I
FEEL CLEANER
THAN I HAVE
IN MONTHS.
WOLENCEHOW MUCH BETTER THAN HURT-ING YOU WITH WORDS