Daily Hansan
61st Year, No. 79
Lawrence, Kansas
Monday. Feb. 10. 1964
—Photo by Dave Spaw
PICKETERS FROM the Kansas City area caused a stir in front of the Union Friday afternoon. The sign reads "A MARXIST KILLED OUR PRES-
IDENT." The sign to the far right says "WOE UNTO THEM THAT CALL EVIL GOOD AND GOOD EVIL."
Czech Theologian Picketed; Birchers Provoke Ridicule
Four middle-aged persons, claiming to be John Birch Society members from Kansas City, picketed a Czechoslovakian theologian from noon to 2:45 p.m. Friday, in front of the Kansas Union.
While Milan Opocensky of the University of Prague spoke to the KU Religious Advisers and the KU-Y Faculty Forum about "Marxist Atheism and Christian Faith," the picketers outside held signs in the air reading: "A Marxist Killed Our President," Opocensky is a Marxist" and "Marxist Opocensky—Master of Deceit."
Students blocked the sidewalk, gathered in groups around each picket and argued, questioned and ridiculed statements made by them. One of the picketers was a woman.
ONE MAN, WHO identified himself as Jim Kernodle, operator of a recreation center at Grandview, Mo., said they came to protest the idea of allowing a Marxist to speak to young people under the guise of religion.
SHE SAID Opocensky was a communist and that the communists are trying to persuade the students and young people that peaceful co-existence is possible. Co-existence is not possible, she said. "We should defend the Monroe Doctrine because we are already outnumbered."
The woman, who identified herself as Mrs. A. B. Cooper of Kansas City, mother of three children, carried a Bible under her arm, wore a "Gold-water for President" button and held a sign that read, "Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil," a quotation from the Book of Isaiah.
Opocensky, who is touring the U.S. under sponsorship of the National Student Christian Federation, said he has been picketed almost every place he has spoken.
"When Khrushchev says he will bury us. I'm against him (Opocensky) coming here to talk to students who can be brainwashed," said another man.
When told that the picketers claimed he was on a brainwashing mission, Opocensky replied: "I think they must be brainwashed."
Student signs reading: "An American Killed Our President" and "Marines—Communist Training Camp" mimicked statements made by the pickets. Two student signs joked: "Man Cannot Live On Birch Alone" and "Protect the American Wav of Life, Help Stamp Out Freedom."
ONE MAN, who identified himself as Rev. Bob Hatch of the First Bible Presbyterian Church, Kansas City, said about integration: "We can't legislate love for one another."
Another man, who declined to identify himself, said: "When the communists get ready for a takeover, they will instigate mass violence between the Negroes and the whites.
The pickets left around 3 o'clock in a black Cadillac, with a miniature U.S. flag attached to the radio antenna and a "Goldwater for 1964" hat in the back window.
Marxists Error, Theologian Says
"I may be a socialist, but I am against Marxist atheism," the Rev. Milan Opocensky, senior lecturer of systemic theology at Comenius Faculty of Protestant Theology, University of Prague, said here Friday in the Kansas Union as picketers marched outside.
The Czechoslovakian spoke to KU religious advisers and students on "Marxist Atheism and the Christian Faith."
"THE MARXIST believes that Christians are living in an illusion, and that the Christian faith is enslaving them," Opocensky said. "But it is the Marxist who is living in an illusion. We must confront them and prove to them that they are in the wrong."
Rev. Opocensky said the church has been challenged since the socialist revolution. But instead of withering away, the church has become stronger and more unified, he said.
"The adults who come to church are not coming because of tradition, but because they believe."
"Many people had made up their minds about me before I ever started speaking," Rev. Opocensky said.
"The church has a challenge to try to communicate to these narrow minded people. These people think that they are fighting the enemy, but they are playing right into the hands of the enemy they are fighting by using the same type of tactics."
Rev. Opocensky said there are a lot of people who have never been confronted by the "real gospel."
Attorneys Argue Ruby Trial Site
DALLAS—(UPI)—The chief defense and prosecuting attorneys clashed repeatedly today at the start of a hearing to determine whether jittery Jack Ruby's murder trial should be transferred to another Texas city.
Chief defense lawyer Melvin Belli of San Francisco lost a tactical maneuver as the slayer of accused presidential assassin Lee Harvey Oswald sat staring in the heavily-guarded courtroom.
Belli asked Judge Joe B. Brown to order a change of venue on his own authority, rather than on the request of the defense. Brown summarily refused.
When the flamboyant Belli tried to read lengthy news clippings into the record as part of his campaign to prove Dallas could not give Ruby a fair trial, District Attorney Henry Wade objected, and asked that they simply be inserted in the court record.
"If we have to listen to you read all the articles that have appeared in the press about this case, we'll be here 25 years," the judge said in upholding Wade.
Belli apologized for remarks he made in New York about Dallas—and not Ruby—being on trial.
"Dallas is a great American city and entitled to hold its head high," he said.
"I hope I may be a little taller when I leave Texas," he said. "And hope what I leave behind me will make Texas a little broader." Wade leaped to his feet and objected. Brown unheld him.
It was the first direct clash between the two chief legal opponents. At the previous bail bond hearings, Wade and Belli let their assistants hold the floor.
District Judge Joe B. Brown has scheduled Ruby's trial to begin in Dallas Feb. 17 if the change of venue request is denied.
Ruby's six-man defense battery, led by San Francisco "King of Torts" Melvin Belli, has called more than 175 witnesses for the hearing, including Dallas Mayor J. Erik Jonsson, Police Chief Jesse Curry and Texas Atty. Gen. Waggoner Carr.
The rest of the list reads like a "Who's Who in Dallas" and includes civic leaders and newsmen.
A spokesman for the defense said yesterday he was "definitely confident" the trial can be forced out of Dallas and into another Texas city.
Wade, who has said he will seek the electric chair for Ruby, said he believed the former striptease night-club operator could get a fair trial in Dallas.
"We are convinced that in a county of 950,000 people with 425,000 qualified jurors and a jury panel of some 900 people selected by lot, he can get a fair trial," Assistant Dist, Atty, William R. Alexander said.
"We think the people of Dallas County are just as fair as they are anywhere else and there was no more publicity in Dallas than anywhere else."
In a brief filed by Ruby's lawyers, they contended that the Dallas community has been blamed for the presidential assassination and this would mean that the Dallas community, not Jack Ruby, would be on trial.
"Representatives of the Dallas community have expressed self-recrimination feelings," the brief said.
Ruby's lip quivered and he was obviously nervous as he entered the criminal district courtroom. But he chatted amiably with newsmen.
He was slipped into the court from his maximum security cell in the county courthouse, well before the hearing began.
Ruby entered the heavily guarded court singing the praises of Dallas County Sheriff Bill Decker and one-time prizefighter Barney Ross, He said he has taken up reading the Bible with the assistance of a Rabbi and a man he identified as a protestant.
They "translate" the Bible for him, he said. He apparently meant they interpret it for him.
The 53-year-old striptease nightclub operator was neatly dressed, but far from his flashy old self, in a midnight blue suit, white shirt and patterned gray tie.
Once portly, he appeared to have lost weight. His lip quivered and he was jittery for the last legal prelude to his trial on charges of murder.
Washington Writer Criticizes U.S. Press
A Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington correspondent said today the nation's press is failing in its responsibility to maintain the "lifeline of democracy" and that there are "disturbing signs that the press does not recognize its failures."
Clark R. Mollenhoff, correspondent in the Washington bureau of Cowles Publications. Charged in a prepared address that "many 'watchdogs of democracy' have been transformed into lap dogs of the pentagon political appointees."
Mollenhoff's lecture was prepared for the 15th annual William Allen White lecture at 3:30 p.m. today in the Forum Room of the Kansas Union as part of the William Allen White Foundation's observance of the 96th birthday anniversary of the famed Emporia Gazette editor.
AT A LUNCHON in the Kansas Union, Whitley Austin, editor of the Salina Journal and a former reporter for William Allen White's Gazette, received the foundation's annual award for journalistic merit from Rolla A. Clymer, editor of the El Dorado Times.
The foundation's board held its annual meeting at 9:30 a.m. in Flint hall. Byron E. Guise, president of the foundation and editor of the Marysville Advocate, presided. Burton W. Marvin, dean of the KU
Weather
Skies will remain partly cloudy tonight and tomorrow with temperatures remaining mild. Tonight's temperatures will be in the upper 20's; tomorrow's high temperature will be in the lower to middle 50's.
School of Journalism, presented his annual report.
MOLLENIOFF'S lecture also charged that too many beat reporters covering government agencies "... have become propaganda officers, seeking to build the image of political figures" in their eagerness to maintain friendly relations and control of press contacts with agency personnel.
"Steps to deal with the problem of bigness have resulted in unhealthy developments," he said. Specialists have been assigned to governmental agencies to provide more knowledgeable coverage. In too many cases these specialists have been converted into propagandists for the agencies they cover."
Fee Payments Due This Week
Student enrollment fees are due this week. They may be paid according to the following schedule between 8 a.m. and 4:45 p.m. at the business office in Strong Hall.
Students whose last namess begin with T-Z, Tuesday; A-H, Wednesday; I-N, Thursday; O-S, Friday.
Students whose fees will be paid by someone other than themselves, must pick up their fee cards in the basement of Strong hall and take them to the business office to make arrangements for billing.
All fees must be paid by noon Saturday, Feb. 15, and the enrollment of any student whose fees are unpaid by Monday, Feb. 17 will be cancelled.