The Galveston Daily News from Galveston, Texas • Page 7

Our option 'Juneteenth' state holiday 8-A tfetea Monday Morning, June 10. 1980 Why celebrate "Juneteenth?" The celebration of June 19 as a signal date in the struggle of American blacks for independence and equality is a peculiarly Texas tradition. It was on June 19,1865, more than two years after Abraham Lincoln issued his Emancipation Proclamation, that Texas blacks learned about the president's decision. That message was delivered first at Galveston. That first "Juneteenth" was celebrated in churches throughout the Galveston area, with prayer and music.

Camp meetings and parties were held, with black people gathering by the hundreds to welcome their long yearned-for freedom from slavery. Since that time Texans, particularly the black community, have observed "Juneteenth" as a time set aside for celebration and historical reflection. But, during the last session of the Texas Legislature, Rep. Al Edwards sponsored a bill which officially made the 19th of June a state holiday. This week, Galveston residents have worked many hours to plan five days of special events in observance of this occasion, highlighted by a Juneteenth Motorcade Parade at 10 a.m.

Thursday, beginning at the intersection of'41st Street and Ball Avenue ami proceeding east along Ball Avenue to 20th Street. Also planned that day is a food and flea market at Street and Avenue L. The events began Sunday with a youth service at the Market Street Baptist Church. Today's events include a baseball tournament, which starts at 4 p.m. at Shields Field, 33rd Street and Church Avenue, and a banquet, sponsored by the Galveston County Business and Professional Association, at 7 p.m.

at the Holiday Inn. The baseball tournament continues Tuesday, and a basketball and recreational games tournament begins at 4 p.m. that day at Wright Cuney Park, 41st and Ball Avenue. A Miss Juneteenth beauty pageant is planned Wednesday at the new ILA Hall, 2801 Market St. Every major city in Texas will have some type of celebration this week.

It is our sincere hope that Galveston's will be the one of the biggest and the most joyous. Bordelon, managing editor. WE AT FINISH LINE GRUELING PRIMARATMON ANp You g)AW MINUTE oF IT 1 Our opinion We can't let this go by We usually don't comment when "out-of-towners" come to Galveston and criticize our city. We simply consider the source and pass it off with the thought that ignorance is bliss. However, a recent half-page spread in the Baltimore (Md.) Sun, featuring an article written by Elisabeth Stevens, prompts us to violate our usual policy and answer this misguided soul.

The article referred to Galveston as an "island slum" and "a down-at- the-heels resort," although Ms. Stevens did pay a somewhat backhanded compliment to some of our historical landmarks. The article cautioned visitors to expect "scattered garbage along the 32 miles of beaches, where the Gulf is battleship grey" or "brownish pink." Further on, Ms. Stevens describes our motels as overpriced and seedy and "unsafe enough in some cases to be surrounded by barbed wire- topped chain link fence." As to the quality of our food, she advises her readers to bring their own lunches. We would be the last ones to pretend that our island is without resort to paint the entire community with one brush stroke as "seedy and down-at-i; the-heels" is not only unfair but ir-t; responsible.

We could accept such criticism better if it came from San Francisco, San Diego, New Orleans or some other first-class tourist Baltimore, not! I spent a month in Baltimore one weekend, and if America has a national cesspool, this city is surely it. It has no redeeming social values that I am aware of. Speaking of is no ci-i ty in America that resembles a com-; bat zone as much as downtown Baltimore. I would rather run through a mine field blindfolded than walk five- blocks in Baltimore after dark. And another thing, Ms.

Stevensj; you mentioned that Galveston's only "redeeming" feature was some of its architecture. Baltimore doesn't even have this. Daughtry, editor and publisher. Andy Rooney The ultimate in counterfeiting, or who is Calvin Klein, anyway, A news story the other day reported that authorities in Birmingham, had confiscated thousands of pairs of counterfeit blue jeans. This was a surprise to me because I thought ALL blue jeans were counterfeit.

I thought jeans were fake overalls being worn by young people who wanted to look as though they had something to do with work- Ing. The story said that between $10 and $15 million worth of jeans that a designer named Calvin Klein had nothing to do with, were being sold with his name sewn to the back pocket. Well, I'd be pretty sore, too, if someone put my name on the back of their pants, but Calvin was angry for another reason. It seems that ordinary jeans sell for $8 to $17 whereas jeans with his name on them can sell for as high as $70. It only cost a few pennies to sew his name on the cheap jeans, so obviously there was a lot of money in it for someone and authorities announced that they suspect organized crime might be in the ripof f.

I'm really disappointed with organized crime if this is true. When I think of organized crime I think of high-powered getaway cars, sawed-of shotguns and the front being blown off a bar that won't pay protection money to The Godfather. I think of dope sales, prostitution and loan shark operations in which the guy who doesn't pay back his debt to The Mob is found at the bottom of the river with his feet cast in cement. It is disillusioning to be told that organized crime has stooped so low as to try to make a dishonest buck by putting someone else's name on the rear end of a cheap pair of pants. It's quite apparent that organized crime just doesn't take pride in its work anymore.

You can't help wondering what The Mob will try to counterfeit next. There's no money in money anymore, so it isn't profitable for them to print their own $20 bills. Could The Mob get rich selling imitation Skippy Peanut Butter? Bogus BVDs? Would imitation false eyelashes be profitable? Counterfeit Wonder Bread? None of the things we hold dear to The American Way of Life would be safe. The relatively new word "ripoff," that is so popular now, apparently came out of the New York City garment industry. For years they sent representatives to the great Paris fashion shows.

The representatives took notes, sketched and photographed what Paris designers decreed would be "the fashion" for that year and then came back to New York and "ripped them off." It's really sort of a manufacturing term in the clothing business. It's ironic that now a New York designer, Calvin Klein, is being ripped off in the blue jean business in Alabama. The real mystery to me is how it ever got fashionable to wear clothes with the label of the maker on the outside so everyone could read it. The first time I was conscious of this was when someone gave me a "Countess Mara" tie years ago. I didn't happen to know the countess personally, but she had her name all over my new tie.

Pucci was the first dress designer I remember doing it. It got to be a status symbol among women to wear a dress with his name on it. That's as dumb as status symbols get. Now there are people who judge the "in- ness" of their friends on whether their pants read "Yves St. "Bill Blass," "Gloria Vanderbilt" or "Jordache." Personally, I don't want anyone's name on the rear end of my pants.

The less attention clothes call to my anatomy there, the better I like them. Even if I did decide it would look good to have a name sewn on my back pocket, it certainly wouldn't be "Calvin Klein." Not only would I refuse to pay MORE for a pair of pants with his name on them, but if I liked the pants I'd be willing to pay a little extra to have Calvin's name you'll pardon the expression ripped off. If The Mob is stuck with 250,000 pairs of blue jeans, this could be the end of the blue jean fad. The Mob would have to start wearing the jeans themselves, and eventually Hollywood would have to recast their bad guys. Marlon Brando is going to look silly hi The Godfather III bending down to give The Kiss of Death to someone if he's wearing a pair of blue jeans with an imitation "Calvin Klein'- label on his tail.

(C) 1980 BY THE CHICAGO NEWS SYNDICATE, INC. Marquis Childs California is experiencing the aftershock of tax-cut measures SAN FRANCISCO Howard Jarvis is a demagogue who brandishes fiery words as the desperadoes of the Old West used to brandish their six- shooters. Jarvis was the author of 13, which cut property taxes in half and which California's voters adopted two years ago. With Paul Gann, Jarvis was the author of Proposition 9, which would have cut state income taxes roughly in half. Proposition 9 was defeated 3 to 2 in the recent election.

On election night, as the returns came in, Jarvis swore he would be back in 1982 with a new initiative that would slash from $4 billion to $5 billion in state income taxes and services. Proposition 13 started a nationwide tax revolt, with 21 states adopting tax-cutting measures patterned after it in one form or another. But now, here in California, two years later, the evidence of the meat-ax slash is showing up in painful forms. To the big-business lobbies that backed Proposition 13 and Proposition 9 (measures known as "Jaws and "Jaws II') it may seem that only the frills are being cut away. If public libraries are seen as frills, that may be true.

However, the libraries have suffered, first in San Francisco, with 308 branches closed and main libraries struggling to survive with 1,288 fewer employees. And the public library is an important adjunct of the school system, which also is suffering, with several hundred teachers about to get dismissal notices and with schooldays shortened by from one to two hours. Although libraries are the first to go frills, if you will vital police and fire services are beginning to feel the pinch. San Francisco Mayor Diane Feinstein is struggling to keep Write the News! Materials for the Our Readers Say column may address any topic or area of interest as long as they are not libelous, are not specific consumer complaints against a private business and stay within the bounds of good taste. These items should be restricted to 300 words in length, should be legibly printed or typewritten and should contain the writer's signature, address and telephone number.

Only the writer's name and town of residence will be published. Candid Comments is reserved for particularly well-written, enlighten- ed comments on a topic the editors judge to be of interest to a majority of readers and which has not already been addressed at length for some time. These should be limited to 500 words, should be typewritten and should bear the signature, address and telephone number of the writer. There's a supersupersaver fare at our airport. You get half-price admission to the observation deck from which you can watch the better heeled go bye-bye.

this beautiful city alive on a greatly reduced budget. Reduction of the police force is sure to mean an increase in the crime rate, with consequences for tourism an important source of income for San Francisco and commerce. The major blow of Jaws I which cut $7 billion from the $11 billion collected by California's 58 counties, cities and school districts was cushioned by a bailout of $4.2 billion that the legislature allocated from a state surplus. The surplus had been swollen by sharply increased revenues from the state income tax. Jaws II would have cut revenues by an estimated $4.8 billion and, in all probability, that would be the end of the bailout.

The California initiatives and the running-down of the cities reflect the deep cynicism that corrodes the political process. Crooked custodians of the public trust are held up to scorn almost daily, and rising taxes are part of the curse of inflation. This is a national, as well as a state, issue. In his first run for the presidency, in 1976, Ronald Reagan proposed a $90 billion cut in the federal budget. But he failed to specify where the cuts should be made, and this may have been one reason he lost the New Hampshire primary, in which he offered the $90 billion figure.

During the now-ended primary campaign, Reagan proposed a $30 billion cut, to be spaced out over three years. At the same time, he repeatedly has advocated greatly increased defense spending to make up for what he claims is President Carter's defense failure: letting U.S. defense slump to a level below that of the Soviet Union. So the question inevitably is where the cuts would come that is, what would compensate for additional spending for advanced weapons. It is nonsense to pretend that this cutting could be done in service areas, such as Social Security and aid to the handicapped.

Those services are embedded in a bureaucratic system that would be difficult or impossible to untangle without serious and perhaps even disastrous consequences to society's structure. Surely, one of the urgent needs in the presidential election just ahead is that Reagan, Carter and Anderson get behind the specious generalities, in billions of dollars, and explain how they would achieve a greatly scaled- back government. As the budget- balancers in Congress are discovering, this cannot be done by invoking old formulas out of a past long since vanished. The California initiatives showed that who gets what is supremely important. Proposition 9 would have benefited the upper-bracket taxpayers.

For the millions of Californians who pay little or nothing in taxes, it would have been of no benefit whatsoever. The outcome of Initiative 11 on the state's bedsheet-size ballot showed something of the same balance bet- ween haves and have-nots. This in-; itiative would have imposed a 10 per-' cent surtax on oil companies operating in the state. Big Oil and its conservative allies spent $3 million to defeat that initiative. This was reported to be more than the entire campaign costs of Reagan and Carter, as well as the funds being spent to get Anderson on the ballot in November.

The road ahead for the slash-and- cut economizers promises to be a rough one. For all his bluster, Howard Jarvis can hardly expect to put over Jaws III, having failed with Jaws II. The fact that the voters must legislate through the initiative is a confession of failure. Copyright, 1980, United Feature Syndicate, Inc. Looking backward (ialtost on U.S.P.S.

213400 Published every morning by Galveston Newspapers, 8522 Teichman P.O. Box B2B, Galveston, Texas 77553. Second Class Postage Paid at Galveston, Texas. United Press International is entitled exclusively to the use or republication of all the local news of spontaneous origin printed in this newspaper. SUBSCRIPTION RATES BY CARRIER, $5.25 per month, BY MAIL, $60.00 per year in U.S., $120.00 Outside U.S.

Readers are encouraged to submit their statements or opinions on local matters for publication on this page. Letters to the editor, also are always welcome. MANAGEMENT TEAM LES DAUGHTRY Editor end Publisher ANNBORDELN Managing Editor RICHARD FOGALEY City Editor WADE J. PARKER Business Manager DAVIDLYONS Advertising Director RONALD B. SCHULTZ Retail Advertising Manager GARY GENGOZIAN Classified Advertising Manager BILLY TUMA Circulation Manager ROBERT LEYVA Mail Room Foreman DALE THOMPSON Production Manager BILL COCHRANE Composing Room Foreman CECIL DILL Press Room Foreman By SALLY REEDY 25 YEARS AGO June 16, Broy, Galveston correspondent for the Houston Chronicle, was named secretary to Mayor George Roy dough.

A.H. Wilson presented a formal request to end segregation in the Galveston public schools to school trustees. Walter Shook was elected as a director of the Texas Motor Transportation Association. New Junior High School teachers in Galveston are: Gay Yeager, Mrs. Florence Schraub, Mrs.

Mary Shupe and new Elementary teachers are: Cora Lee Arsdale and Emma Lou Wilson. John Parker, Ben Levy and Harold Rich attended the Chamber of Com- DOONESBURY merce barbeque in League City. Bryan F. Williams Jr. has joined the law firm of Royston Bayzor.

Sgt. Guadalupe W. Afaro, Pfc. Gerald E. Cahal, Pvt.

Samuel C. Boyd and Ernest Silva are at Camp Pendleton, California, for their annual two weeks training for the Marine Corps reserves. Johnny Cuccia, Bob Hurley and Chucky Stafford landed 290 red snappers about 22 miles off Galveston. 25 YEARS AGO June 16, three days deliberation, the National Boxing Commission announced it definitely had decided to recognize Max Schmelling as the victor over Jack Sharkey as the world heavyweight boxing champion. Stock prices on the New York exchange weakened today.

Capt. and Mrs. H.L. Babcock and sister, Mrs. D.E.

Beall have returned from a week's motor trip to San Antonio. A formation of attack planes under the command of Lt. T. Landon will leave Fort Crockett for Langley Field, Virginia, for the purpose of giving instruction to the graduates of West Point Military Academy. A crowd of 600 attended the barbeque given by the Red and Grocery Stores.

A talk was made by Homer Thompson and he presented handsome pen and pencil sets to O.F. Schumm and J.A. Hansen. H.R. Dean was the master of ceremonies.

The day of the vagabond cow and the ambulating mule is over in Galveston County. Saturday's election gave the county a law requiring livestock be kept under fence. by Garry Trudeau FOUNDED N1846 TEXAS' OLDEST NEWSPAPER Dedicated to the Growth and Progress of Galveston and Galveston County PHONE 744-3811 PR. MAHPAVI! NOTIFY THE NBWORK5? KNOW1 UASGO- ING TO see THE HOSTAGES UNTIL FIVE BUT i A MOB TO MEerusmte!.