U.S. SURVEY: IV SOME BLACK AND WEAK SPOTS IN GREAT, GENEROUS NATION

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30738, 30 April 1965, Page 10

U.S. SURVEY: IV SOME BLACK AND WEAK SPOTS IN GREAT, GENEROUS NATION

(The last of four articles by

SIR LESLIE MUNRO,

M P-, who recently visited the United States

What is the present picture of the tinted States. Bv and large the nation has great wealth, great resources and abounding eneigt hi all cities of any consequence construction of commercial and industrial buildings is being carried on quickly and on a huge scale. Thus in the two years since 1 was last in the United States, the expansion of Washington, D.C., across the Potomac into Virginia.through new highways, new housing schemes, new blocks of oflice buildings and new light industries and research institutions is astounding.

The expansion takes place while well over half of the Government’s taxation receipts is spent on defence and space research and exploration.

It is a mistake to assume that Americans are lightly taxed. Far from it. In the great majority of cases they are paying both Federal and State taxes. The taxpayer is liable to a capital gains tax. With medicare and the costly schemes for the abolition of poverty, he will be paying still more to Uncle Sam. Where he is better off than we are is in the latest of the allowances against tax. Generous Aid Most Americans are as careful over expenditure as New Zealanders. If they can save a dollar they will devote to the task as much energy and ingenuity as a Scotsman. At the same time they are a most generous people, generous to their guests and generous over the years in foreign aid to the extent of thousands of millions. It is too often forgotten that this foreign aid. unparalleled in history, has been paid for by the American taxpayer. Some of the recipient countries have misused the funds granted to them and aid is now considerably reduced.

But the burden on American finances for military and economic help to countries like Southern Korea, South Vietnam and Thailand is likely to increase. Such are the responsibilities of power. With all its wealth, the United States has poverty and unemployment. There are bad slums in every great city. West Virginia is notorious for its depression and impelled President Johnson and Congress to act. Conditions in other parts of the Deep South, especially among the Negroes, cry for improvement.

On the eve of the election Mr Johnson spoke eloquently at Pittsburgh. “So here’s the great society. It’s the time—and it’s going to be soon—when nobody in this country is poor.

“It’s the time and there’s no point in waiting—when every boy or girl can have all the education that boy or girl can put to good use.

“It’s the time when there is a job for everybody who wants to work.

“It’s the time when every slum is gone from every city in America and America is beautiful. “It’s the time when man gain fulls domination under God over his own destiny. “It’s the time of peace on

earth and good will among men.” These are brave words and there is no doubt the President is doing his best to implement them. There is no doubt he will make progress. But he knows that there is no peace in Asia and unlikely to be for some years to come.

He knows that even with a co-operative Congress—and it may not always be so co-operative—the war on poverty and slums will be protracted. A great virtue of the American people is idealism and enthusiasm for a cause. 1 have been much struck, both in my recent visit and before by the desire of university youth to serve and not merely to make money. This is the reason why the Peace Corps had done so well. The President, in his message to Congress on March 8. on law enforcement and administration of justice said that in America’s increasingly complex society it is becoming harder to perceive and maintain clear moral values.

“But the great majority of our young people lead lawabiding creative lives,” he said. “We need only look to the spirit which characterises our youth today—the spirit of the Peace Corps, of commitment to the well-being and welfare of society. While crime by young people in our society is of very serious concern, it involves only a small proportion of our youth.” Mr Johnson is profoundly concerned over the malignant development of crime in the United States. Since 1940, the crime rate has doubled. It has increased five times as fast as the population since 1958. For this the administration of justice and the gaol system have a responsibility. The administration of justice has long been a weak part of American Government. The Federal Courts, with Judges appointed by the Administration are reasonably good. The Supreme Court has come in for violent criticism, generally from the Deep South, on account of the determination of the Court to eliminate segregation. Intemperate Criticism The intemperance of this criticism would in our country lead to prosecutions for contempt of Court. The Judges, probably wisely, ignore charges that they are traitors to the Constitution. The principal criticism of some Federal Courts and of

many State Courts is over tl-.c delay in hearing trials, both in criminal and civil cases

In the States, with the sole exception 1 think of Massa chusetts, the Judges are elected. I remember one prominent lawyer in a western State telling me that he thoroughly approved of this, because if a Judge took a wrong approach to the local sales tax, he wanted the opportunity of getting rid of him.

Photographs of those running for judical office appear freely on election posters and canvassing is the rule. In some States, once a Judge is elected he enjoys a limited security of tenure. In his message the President said that local criminal Courts are so overloaded that their effectiveness is weakened—rather an understatement, I should have thought Accused persons not on bail, including thousands of youths, are left in prison in crowded conditions for months awaiting trial. Mr Johnson declared: “We cannot tolerate an endless self-defeating cycle of imprisonment. release and reimprisonment, which fails to alter undesirable attitudes and behaviour. We must find ways to help the first offender avoid a continuing career of crime.” The trouble is that tolera tion has existed so long of certain gaols, of which perhaps the most notorious is the women’s House of Correction in New York. Here the overcrowding is a city disgrace. Appeal Delays Lately a young woman demonstrating outside the United Nations was arrested, apparently wrongly, and confined in the House of Correction, which is thronged with prostitutes. She managed to write of her plight to Governor Rockefeller. The resulting publicity shocked the people of New York but, although the conditions in the gaol have been known for many years, nothing has been done to rectify the evil.

Delays in appeals, including those against the death sentence, are long. Some prisoners, through the ingenuity of their lawyers and sometimes of themselves, launch a multiplicity of appeals. Thus Chessman escaped the execution of the death sentence for many months. Unquestionably, an increasing use of narcotics and of the psychotoxic drugs, such as barbiturates, is stimulating crime. Drug addicts are in general treated as criminals. But the President's advisory commission on narcotics and drug abuse recommended enactment of a Federal civil commitment statute to provide an alternative means of dealing with those narcotic and marijuana users likely to respond to treatment and achieve rehabilitation. To deal with the whole subject and to report to him by 1966 the President is appointing a commission of distinguished men and women who may make interim recommendations. I would not end these articles without saying that the heart of the American people is sound and the overwhelming majority law abiding. It is the malignant cancer of the small minority which must be removed. (Concluded).