St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 1

FINAL 2:30 P.M. New York Stocks Pages 1 IK and 12B VOL 99 NO. 169 CnlNTT.SLUA MONDAY, JUNE 20, 1977 15' whh: Mima A Flick Of The ECnob And It's Hollywood 1 Subscribers Here Turned No Time-Outs For Commercials On Today's Editorial Page HvmVMm Against tights UUmriml Threat Trod eiLo POST i PATCH 0 been assigned to commercial TV stations. A third method of adding to the choices offered on standard channels is cable television, in which TV sets are connected by wire to a transmitting station. The Alton-Wood River area is the only community in metropolitan St.

Louis that has cable service. The cable users there, numbering about 5000, get programs from two independent Chicago stations and the Carbondale, 111., educational station in addition to the product of the St. Louis stations. So, for the moment, any prospective customers for pay-television See TV, Page 4 When Tim and Susan Murphy planned a fish fry at their apartment in west St. Louis County recently, they selected a night when the movie "The Omen" would be on television.

For most of their guests, the scary, big-budget film ranked high, right up there with the tartar sauce in popularity. That's because the movie wasn't your ordinary TV film. It was shown without commercials and without editing, Just the way it had appeared in theaters only a few months ago. The big difference was that the Murphys had to pay to see it at home. The Murphys are subscribers to Showtime, a pay-television service that beams movies and special programs to apartment complexes and hotels in the St.

Louis area using something called Multipoint Distribution System (MDS). This process does not use television broadcasting channels. The system is one that could, because of recent technological advances, lure a substantial share of the nation's television viewers away from commercial, free TV in a year or so. The idea of paid-for, no-commercial television is, at least for some people, cause for celebration: They often arrange parties and invite family or friends to watch. The service, which has been available in St.

Louis for a little more than a year, is only one of several ways that owners of television sets can receive programs other than those shown on standard channels. A Minneapolis-based group, Midwest St. Louis, and Evans Broadcasting, which owns KDNL-TV (Channel 30), both are seeking permission to introduce subscription television to St. Louis. Under subscription TV, programs are telecast over an Ultra High Frequency (UHF) channel and can be seen only on those sets equipped with an unscrambling device, or decoder.

All the Very High Frequency iVHF) channels available for the St. Louis area have already By JOHN J. ARCHIBALD Of the Post-Dispatch Staff This article, a Post-Dispatch "EXTRA," is the first in a series that will appear on Page 1 every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. The series will otter interesting, in-depth articles on a wide variety of subjects. local TOUTED SCULPTURE: The installation of a new sculpture (right) by world-renowned Mark di Suvero has added to the luster of St.

Louis County's Laumeier Park, already one of the two best sculpture parks in the country. Page IB PROPOSAL FOR HANDICAPPED: Children with behavior and learning problems would be integrated into regular classrooms in three St. Louis County school districts if they approve an experiment proposed by the Special School District. Page IB national mm By CURT MATTHEWS A Washington Correspondent of the Post-Dispatch WASHINGTON, June 20 The Supreme Court ruled today that the City of St. Louis can prohibit abortions in city-operated hospitals.

The decision came in one of three cases decided today that together establish a broad authority for state and local governments to restrict the a. "liability of abortions under government-financed programs, such as medicaid, or in fi benefits to children of fathers who are dismissed for misconduct, go on strike or quit work. The court split 6 to 3 in all three of the abortion cases. Associate Justice Harry A. Blackmun, who wrote the court's 1973 decision that granted women a constitutional right to an abortion, dissented in all three of today's cases.

In the St. Louis case, the court's majority said, "We find no constitutional violation by the City of St. Louis in electing, as a policy choice, to provide publicly financed hospital services for James R. Butler way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

And we won," said City Counselor Jack L. Koehr with obvious satisfaction. Conway's order to suspend abortions at city hospitals, in fact affects only City Hospital, because no abortions have ever been performed at Homer G. Phillips. The staff there refused to amend a hospital bylaw saying that abortions could be performed only if the mother's life was in danger.

Women seeking abortions at Homer G. Phillips, a spokesman said, were referred either to City Hospital, where abortions were performed one day each week, or to Reproductive Health Serv- See REACTION, Page I 1 jl Conway Orders Halt To Abortions In City AMERICA'S FIRST MALE SAINT: Bishop John Nepomucene Neumann was canonized by Pope Paul VI in Rome yesterday as America's first male saint. Bishop Neumann, affectionately known as "The Little Bishop," died on the streets of Philadelphia 117 years ago, exhausted by his charitable work. Page 2A CIVIL RIGHTS WRONGED: A federal study has concluded that civil rights enforcement suffered a setback under former Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R.

Ford and that poor organization was partly the reason. Page 3B rvn childbirth without providing correspondent services for nontherapeutic abortions." At issue in the case was a policy directive by former Mayor John H. Poelker that prohibited abortions in the city hospitals except when there was a threat of grave injury or death to the mother. The directive by Mayor Poelker was challenged in the courts when a woman whn later became known as Jane Doe See ABORTIONS, Page GSA Seeks Old Post Office Bids ByCHARLENEPROST Of the Post-Dispatch Staff The first steps toward renovation of the Old Post Office were taken today with announcement by the General Services Administration that it would seek bids for the design of new heating, ventilating, air-conditioning, plumbing, fire safety and electrical systems for the building. The estimated cost of the work when complete is between $6,000,000 and GSA officials emphasized, however, that they and the federal Office of Management and Budget were approving only expenditures for the design of the various systems.

Money for construction has not been approved. "This does not constitute formal approval of the prospectus we submitted, although the Office of Management and Budget has approved it in principle," said Howard Whiteley, a spokesman for the GSA's regional office in Kansas City. "But we are delighted that we got this preliminary approval to proceed with the design work. We think it's great for the GSA and for St. Louis." The GSA submitted a thick prospectus for the renovation work to the Office of Management and Budget last October.

The federal agency will decide whether to recommend that Congress approve money for the project. The prospectus has been wrapped in secrecy by federal officials, but it was learned that, essentially, the GSA had See POST OFFICE, Page 4 features Ron Gibson adjusting a microwave antenna to receive pay TV at the Brighton Garden Apartments in north St. Louis County. publicly operated hospitals and clinics. The Supreme Court ruled in effect that neither the Constitution nor the Social Security law required states to finance elective abortiors for medicaid patients.

The decisioi! was a victory for the Federal Government, which has taken the position that the right to an abortion does not also imply a right to free treatment. President Jimmy Carter opposes use of federal funds for abortions. In another decision, court ruled narrowly that stctcs can deny welfare abortions in those cases where the mother's health was clearly in danger if an abortion were not performed, a spokesman for the Mayor's office said. St. Louis County also has been asked to stop providing assistance for indigent women seeking abortions while officials study today's decision.

Councilman James R. Butler Second District, and chairman of the County Council, said that the county's abortion service "ought to be discontinued. "We have been asking people to pay for something they don't agree with. There is no reason the county government should be paying for abortions," Butler said. Butler, a Catholic and stanch opponent of abortion, noted that the council in the past has gone on record against county government-financed abortions.

County Supervisor Gene McNary said no policy change would be made until he could study the decision, but he called the ruling "a good ruling." He said also that the "county government has an obligation to follow the law and it has been (doing so) as handed down by the Court of Appeals." St. Louis city officials were described as elated over news that the United States Supreme Court today reversed a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit here requiring public hospitals, including City and Homer G. Phillips hospitals in St. Louis, to perform abortions on "The city has been a minor party in other cases, but this is the first time that we've taken a case of our own all the news analysis "I think we were surprised at how well they did," he said of the automakers success in watering down the tax although they failed to kill it in the House Ways and Means Committee.

What he had belatedly discovered was the compromise of Room 1015. It was there, in the Longworth House Office Building, that the watering-down had taken place at a closed-door meeting between auto lobbyists and congressional staff members the night before the test vote June 9. When committee chairman Al Ullman Oregon, called the lobbyists and staff members into Room 1015 to talk DEVOTED TO SPACE: Wernher von Braun's Confirmation gift was a telescope and space travel became his life's goal. In between he designed Revenge Weapon Two and had an on-again-off-again relationship with Hitler. Page 2D SIEGE OF TERROR: The murder of eight children and teenagers in Birmingham, has triggered a witch hunt.

Page 3D Mayor Jim Conway has ordered the city's two general hospitals, City and Homer G. Phillips, to suspend most abortions for the next two or three days while the city law department studies today's ruling by the United States Supreme Court saying that public hospitals do not have to perform abortions on demand. The hospitals will continue to perform 2 Shoot At Amin; Dictator I Missing NAIROBI, Kenya, June 20 (UPI) -Two men tried to assassinate Ugandan President Idi Amin over the weekend and the burly dictator has since disappeared, the Kenyan newspaper The Nation said today. Police erected roadblocks around the capital of Kampala and a Ugandan government official said by telephone, "We do not know where the President is. "I haven't seen him since Friday," the official said at Amin's state house in Entebbe.

"There are a lot of Muslim troops outside the state house, and Christians inside." "If you find him, please contact Uganda immediately," The Nation quoted Ugandan Vice President Mustafa Adrisi assaying. "sometnuif atmears to nave nao- pened," diplomatic sources said in con-See AMIN, Page 4 business SELLING ST. LOUIS: Is the slow growth or no growth of St. Louis in recent years a result of ineffective development organizations such as the Regional Commerce Growth Association? No, says an article examining the RCGA. Page 10B BALANCED GROWTH: The U.S.

economy will continue to show balanced, healthy growth through this year, a new study indicates. Page 10B sports PRESSURE PERFORMANCE: Hubert Green, who said he might have "choked down tht stretch" in yesterday's United States Open golf championship, held on despite a death threat to win the prestigious title by one stroke over Lou Graham. Page 9A. OUCH! The Cardinals lost their fourth straight yesterday, this time to a rookie lefthander, 6-2. Bob Owchinko has exactly two major league victories both of which have come at the expense of the Redbirds.

Page 9A Secret Lobby Did It The Case Of The Guzzled Gas Tax inside 36 Pages I8LLART TOR DIALING PNT-OWMTCM WIATH MUD M. W. MY. W9. Few bills in the history of Congress have been subjected to more diverse and intense lobbying than was President Jimmy Carter's energy bill.

This is the second of four articles examining that lobbying effort and what effects it may have on the nation's energy program. By E.F.PORTER JR. and ROBERT ADAMS Of the Post-Dispatch Staff WASHINGTON, June 20 A shell-shocked White House energy staff member, two days after the fact, was sitting in his office trying to analyze how the automobile lobby had sandbagged President Jimmy Carter's proposed gas-guzzler tax. energy bill a defect the White House is now trying desperately to remedy. For weeks, Ways and Means members had complained that their calls and letters got no answers.

Representative Richard A. Gephardt St. Louis, a member of the panel who wound up voting for Carter's stiff gas-guzzler taxes, sent a letter in May to the White. House asking for information to rebut critic. The White House said the letter got lost.

"They haven't made any deposits around here, so they can't make any withdrawals," said Representative Wil-liam M. Brodhead Michigan, a Detroit member of the panel who fought the tax. What led to Room 1015 was an intense See LOSSY, Page 7 Business 1H2B Classified Advertising MB Editorials Everyday I-8D Leisure 5J News Analysis JB Obituaries JB People SA Reviews 4D St. Louis IB Sports M2A TV-Radio ID about a gas-guzzler tax compromise, only one Administration official, from the Treasury Department, was there. Caught off guard, the White House didn't learn about the meeting until the next morning the day of the vote.

One thing the episode shows is the power of the auto lobby especially when combined, as in this case, with the auto dealers' lobby and the auto workers' lobby. It was their efforts that caused Ullman to look for a compromise in the first place a compromise that may well determine whether you pay a gas-guzzler tax on your next car, and if so, how large it will be. But it also shows what Carter's admirers and foes alike consider the astonishing ineptitude of the White House's efforts to lobby for a key part of its own.