Florence Morning News from Florence, South Carolina • 4

jlormt Burning Nfiub John O'Dowd 1887 1970' Richard Moisio General Manager Joe Rickenbaker Managing Editor Dew James Associate Editor James A Rogers Editor Emeritus RIDAY JULY 1 1977 1 MaaaaaMaaBHMaH As a Matter of Tax A poll sponsored by the Advis ory Commission on Inter governmental Relations indi cates that Americans consider local property taxes more un reasonable than federal income tax That seems a little strange in view of the fact that the income tax almost invariably takes a bigger bite out of a taxpayer's re sources than property taxes granger still considering the federal well documented penchant for squan dering tax dollars on limousines Congressional junkets and pork barrel spending projects Local collections in contrast generally serve legitimate needs The pollsters offered no expla nation for this seeming paradox but there are at least two pos sibilities which are worth explor ing irst income taxes are with held from the individual's paycheck The taxpayer quickly grows accustomed to looking only for his "take pay and seldom becomes fully aware of the voracity of Uncle economic appetite If Congress were to follow the local governments' example and send out tax bills once a year the pollsters would no doubt find a different set of statistics awaiting them on their second foray into the hinterlands The outcry in all likelihood would rival that of the American Revolution A second theory considerably more speculative than the first hau to do with what many per ceive as the great American dream: to be left alone In theory at least income taxes may legally be avoided With the right combination of re sources and good fortune a per son can acquire a few acres in a rural area build a house dig a well and septic tank install solar panels in his roof and enough food for himself and his family It would likely be a rather spartan existence but with no need of income he'd be home free literally He would to be sure be subject to a plethora of federal state and local regulations If the county had a zoning ordinance for in stance he'd have to pick a tract zoned "single family residen tial The wiring would have to be inspected The well and septic tank would have to meet health department standards and so on But he wouldn't have to pay in come tax because he'd have no income Not so with ad valorem prop erty taxes Each year this hypothetical hermit would have to shell out a few dollars for the privilege of owning and using the property he'd worked so hard to acquire Maybe a flaw in our sys tem of government and 'maybe it's merely a consequence of liv ing in a world with finite re sources and neighbors whose need for government services of tentimes infringes on our right to bring dreams to life Either way the poll affirms unnecessarily that old saw "Nothing certain but death and Beware of 'Unloaded Guns' rom all indications the shoot ing of a high school student at a Hemingway automobile dealer ship last week by the town's police chief was an accident As recounted by investigators the police chief was "having a lit tle at the expense of some young boys at the dealership when the accident occurred He had been firing blanks and when he reloaded his 22 caliber der ringer he accidentally mixed in a live cartridge When Ronald Cox Jr 16 came through a door the police chief fired at him thinking there were only blanks in the weapon inves tigators said The weapon clicked the first time but the second squeeze of the trigger sent a slug into Cox's stomach from almost point blank range The wound put Cox in the hospi tal where he is reported recover ing satisfactorily The police chief has resigned The incident serves as a fresh reminder that playing around with guns is dangerous and foolish Time and again sup posedly unloaded guns have kil led people because someone learned too late that they were actually loaded The best policy is to treat all guns as if they are loaded Acknowledging the Obvious The US Supreme Court in a move that simply gives official endorsement to common sense has ruled that states may not im pose the death penalty for rape Capital punishment the major ity opinion declared is "grossly disproportionate and excessive and therefore violates the Eighth Amendment's ban on "cruel or unusual punishments" a pity it took the court so long to draw such an obvious conclusion Rape is a serious crime always traumatic for the victim and fre quently leaving emotional scars which heal slowly if at all Rapists deserve to be punished severely but they do not deserve to not at least by contem porary standards Capital punishment is not im posed on the armed robber who beats his victim half to death in juring him severely and perhaps crippling him for life Why then should other forms of assault be 'reated any differently? The Eighth Amendment aside there are two purely pragmatic reasons for not executing rapists irst the practice may well have induced some rapists to kill their victims Having committed one capital offense what did the rapist have to lose by destroying the only witness? He could not after all have been sentenced to die a second time' Second as some members of the movement have noted in recent years juries have been reluctant to convict rapists when execution was among the possible sentences In short such laws were well intentioned but poorly thought out The nation is better off with out them and the court's deci sion though late in coming is nonetheless welcome Getting By ormer President Richard Nixon apparently will be able to keep the wolf from the door A Senate subcommittee has ap proved $235000 for the former pension and office expenses during fiscal 1978 And be getting a little in come on the side at least $600000 from the David rost television interviews and much more from his memoirs when they are published You're Lucky I Don't Often Make House Calls1 1977 Los Angeles Time! Youth Camp Control Is States' Business WASHINGTON Let me return if I may to the pending Youth Camp Safety Act The bill came out of the House Edu cation and Labor Committee by a 25 7 vote on May 13 it now rests in House Rules awaiting a green light to send it to the floor The bill is a fundamentally bad bill and the adverb merits emphasis Commentary by James Kilpatrick Our structure of government rests upon two fundamental principles One is the separation of powers which has no bear ing here The other is federalism which is directly at issue This well intentioned but misguided bill would create a new Office of Youth Camp Safety within the Department of Health Education and Welfare The director of this office with the assistance of an ad visory council would promulgate rules and regulations having the force and ef fect of law These rules would be binding upon the estimated 10500 youth camps across the nation The director's authority would include but not be limited to: "personnel qualifi cations for director and staff ratio of staff to campers sanitation and public health personal health first aid and medical services food handling mass feeding and cleanliness water supply and waste disposal water safety includ ing use of lakes and rivers swimming and boating equipment and practices firearms safety vehicle condition and operation building and site design equipment and condition and density of use" The committee report gives lip service but no more than lip service to the thought that these are primarily state re sponsibilities The general idea is that the states are to be encouraged to enact their own laws embodying at least the minimum standards laid down by the fed eral office But (and this is the first catch) any state that failed or refused to enact such legislation would be federally controlled anyhow and this is the second catch) even those states that did comply would remain subject to continuing fed eral jurisdiction and monitoring The bill Includes all the usual trim mings: inspectors reports forms statis tical data fines of $500 to $1000 a day for non compliance rights of appeal in the federal courts and so forth All this elabo rate structure is designed to provide campers with safe and healthful condi tions free from hazards likely to cause vJrx death serious illness or serious accident To return to the main point: The bill falls into a pattern that crops up with ominous frequency in Washington The wrong headed theory behind this pattern is that uniformity is good diversity is bad federal control is superior state regulation is inadequate Congress un derstands the needs of the people the state legislatures do not We see this pattern in pending propos als for a federal no fault insurance law We see it in President Carter's instant re gistration bill We have seen it in such areas as occupational safety clean air standards and in hundreds of programs requiring matching funds for federal grants in aid Through this insidious pro cess the states systematically are re duced to little more than administrative agencies for the exercise of federal power It was never meant to be this way The Tenth Amendment that great key to the house of our fathers sets forth the Ameri can plan in words that are too plain to be misunderstood and too precious to be cor rupted: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the States are reserved to the States respectively or to the people" Surely the power to regulate youth camps could not reasonably be numbered among the powers delegated to Congress by the Constitution Therefore it must be among the powers reserved to the states "respectively" Only six states in the exercise of their own legislative judg ment have seen fit to adopt regulatory laws for youth camps Otherwise a need for bureaucratic control is not perceived A summer camp can be a splendid ex perience for young people In a good camp they learn the old values self reliance for example and individual in itiative It might be helpful metaphori cally speaking to send the sponsors of this bill to a political summer camp They have lost old values or never learned them and need to get back on the trail GRAITI JStMl NayMN 'Y'd 'ie Did Column Cause An Assassination? WASHINGTON Our recent column about the feared Yugoslav secret police may have precipitated a political murder News Analysis dW by Wj 4 Jack jbLdEM Anderson The column was reprinted in the milit ant anti communist Serbian American newspaper Liberty The next night the paper's chief editorial writer Dragisa Kasikovich was brutally battered and stabbed to death in Chicago The 9 year old daughter of his fiancee was also killed leaving no witnesses The Chicago Daily News quoting Ser bian sources linked the killings to our June 14 column rom BI documents we had told of the intervention of the Yugoslav secret police in the affairs of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Belgrade back in the 1960s The BI's findings were vehemently denied by the church's bac kers in the United States almost all of whom are anti communist Kasikovich not only published the col umn but added his own strident com ments It is possible his assailants mista kenly believed he had instigated the col umn But apparently he sensed that he had committed his last aggravation against the communists or he re marked to friends: "They're going to get me now I'm the next one" His friends think he was referring to the secret police Later that night he was murdered Investigators told us the mo tive could have been personal or political At this writing the murder is unsolved US intelligence sources meanwhile have told us that the Yugoslav secret police known by the dread initials UDB have stepped up their activities in the Un ited States In the last few years they have tried to kill at least two Yugoslavian exiles in this country the sources say One intended victim was a fiery one armed Serb named Boara Blagojevic who had been mutilated by the Nazis During a 1974 visit to the United States he notified the BI that his life was in danger The BI obtained dramatic confirma tion from Europe when the UDB assassin turned in the gun issued to him to murder Blagojevic The one armed firebrand survived his US stay but was gunned down with a similar pistol in Brussels the following year Belgian authorities were convinced it was a political slaying The second plot was even more bizarre A Yugoslav diplomat and a who probably was a UDB agent confronted the proprietor of a Chicago restaurant with a strange proposition According to the proprietor they asked him to find an as sassin who would knock off an Albanian American who had once lived in Yugos lavia and had become an uncompromis ing opponent of President Tito The unnerved restaurateur reported the incident to the BI which picked up the mysterious "tourist" for questioning The diplomat of course had immunity from interrogation The suspect denied the accusation but the BI was convinced it was true Lack ing the evidence to prosecute him how ever the authorities forced him out of the country on the next available plane Intelligence sources have told us that at least eight prominent anti communist exiles have been slain since 1955 some of them in horrible fashion One was gar roted with his necktie another had his head cleaved a third was blown to bits in his car ootnote: A spokesman for the Yugos lav embassy told us that reports of in creased UDB activity in the United States and of UDB meddling with the Serbian Orthodox Church "are inventions" He said our stories have blown the charges of normal proportions" He was "very surprised" he said to see the stories at a time of such friendly relations between Yugoslavia and the United States Ruffled eathers Many Asian Americans feel that President Carter has slighted them Despite his promise to bring minority citizens into his Administ ration he has appointed no Asian Americans to top posts The only exception is former Rep Patsy Mink Hawaii who has been awarded an obscure barony in the State Dept She has jurisdiction over any dip lomacy that may affect the oceans envi ronment and science We have learned however that the White House is now considering a strik ing young Chinese woman to head the Peace Corps She is Julia Chang Bloch a former Peace Corps volunteer herself who is nowa Senate specialist on human needs Washington Whirl Some 113 years ago the Railway Post Office replaced the pony express and the stagecoach carry ing the mails cross country At one time more than 30000 railway mail clerks sorted the mail as it clicke ty clacked over the rails Today only one run remains Two trains with a combined complement of 75 clerks provide overnight delivery between Washington and New York City Now the Postal Service intends to discon tinue the last of the rolling post offices The excuse: economy The polemics over the drug Laetrile have dominated the headlines But another great cancer controversy is be ginning to boil up in the backrooms Dr Linus Pauling who has won the Nobel prizes for science and peace can't get a federal grant to pursue his cancer re search The eminent researcher has writ ten a scathing private letter charging that "the National Cancer Institute does not know how to carry on research or how to recognize a new idea" My Answer By Billy Qrhm DEAR DR GRAHAM: I am a new Christian and I have discovered not only new life but a new book the Bible I would like to know which translation you use in the pulpit and which you use for your pri vate devotions They may be the same but I would like to know DEAR I use several of theparap hrases and translations for my private reading and study or example Phillips Taylor's Living Letters and the new En glish Bible Our association has published the New Testament in four translations A lot of people have found this to be helpful because they appear side by side in the edition and are easily compared In my preaching I usually use the King James version The reason is obvious: it is familiar to more people than is any other translation because it has been around longer I realize that the and "thous' sound a bit archaic But can you imagine Shakespeare's works with out the beautiful archaic words and They simply would not be the same if they were paraphrased into mod em language But the important thing about reading and studying the Bible is not the transla tion In my private devotions I like to let the Word of God speak to me As I read I breathe a prayer which goes something like this: "Lord You gave this portion of Your Word for the instruction and reproof of mankind Apply to my heart as I read the truths of this Scripture the portion intended for my life" As the apostle Paul wrote to Timothy: "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction and for instruction in righteousness" (II Timothy 3:16) Diai a devotion 669 3273 Carter Provided Ball Congress Ran With It WASHINGTON President Carter says it has been "surprising" to him that the Soviet Union has shown such an "ad verse reaction to our stand on human rights" He also finds it distressing that Congress has tied his hands by attaching so many restrictive amendments on foreign aid to countries with authorita rian regimes Commentary by DavidS' Broder What he has not yet noted in his public comments is that these are linked phenomena two sides of a resurgent nationalism that is infecting Washington as much as it is Moscow Jingoism is climbing faster than the summer temp eratures in the two capitals In its early naive days the Carter Ad ministration argued that there would be no "linkage" between human rights and other issues notably strategic arms talks on the Soviet American agenda As it develops there is "linkage" ga lore not just in Moscow but in Washington The President's foreign pol icy initiatives from SALT to Indochina to Cuba are being tangled in the barbed wire of the issue he himself put at the center of American foreign policy What he did not foresee but should have was that Congress was likely to take the human rights issue and run away with it Before there was Carter there were members of Congress prodding the State Department to crack down on gov ernments violating human rights the original human rights manifestos are found not in Carter speeches but in the Congressional Record Without deprecating anyone's motives it is a fact that human rights is a domestic political issue of limitless potency a real flag waver if ever there was one If Jimmy Carter decided it was a good thing for him then many members of Congress had to believe it would be even better for them Any distance the President was pre pared to go on the issue Congress pre dictably would go three steps farther even if that meant marching over the cliff i And that is precisely what has been happening The House and Senate some times singly and sometimes jointly have written into legislation a variety of bans and restrictions on the use of interna tional aid funds for countries which do not meet American standards for protection of civil liberties This is doubie dip moralism a sort of total immersion in ethnocentric pride Not only does the United States declare who is worthy of receiving its own be nefactions it says we will not dirty our hands in any international pool of funds for nations which does not meet our exact ing principles Human rights amendments have been attached to the foreign aid bills mainly by conservatives like Sen Bob Dole (R Kan who are plainly delighted to use the weapon Carter has placed in their hands against programs they never much liked anyway But the game is equally available and appealing to liberals When Sen Hubert Humphrey (D Minn) was trying to preserve language that gave the ad ministration a degree of flexibility in handling the human rights issue on inter nationally financed foreign aid he was rebuked by two leading Senate liberals "There is no rationale that I can think of or that anybody has offered me that would militate for giving the administration what they claim in flexibility to negotiate with these countries about their human rights said Sen James Abourezk (D SD) Sen MarkO Hatfield (H Ore) derided those who say "we have a President who l)as made a lot of speeches about human tights "Well said Hatfield "speeches are one thing but action is another I have observed this same President has been selective in his application of the doctrine of human rights" What Carter is discovering is that a lit tle bit of righteousness can be a dangerous thing It can upset the Russians and excite the Congress arousing in both a nationalistic pride that knows no limits There's a reason why previous presi dents have been cautious about removing the cap from that particular bottle It is very heady stuff LORENCE MORNING NEWS WIIM Dally and Sanday 141 Iry St Member of the Associated Press Audit Bureau of Circulation Southern Newspaper Publishers Associa tion The Associated Press is entitled exclusively to the use for publication of all local news In this newspaper The lorence Morning News desires to be notified promptly of errors In any of Its reports The lorence Morning News will not be responsible for 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