Box 19, Folder 17, Document 117

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THE NEW YORK TI).





Che New York Cimes.

AvoLru S. OcHSs, Publisher 1896-1935
Orvi, E. Drrroos, Publisher 1961-1963

PUBLISHED EVERY DAY IN THE TEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES COMPANT

ARTHUR HAYS SULZHERGER, Chairman of the Board
ARTHUR OCHS SuLzBercer, President and Publisher

HARoING F, BANcRorz, Vice President and Secretary

Down to Earth in Space

There is nothing out of this world about
the task facing Dr. George E. Mueller,
who has been chosen to succeed D. Brain-
erd Holmes as head of the National Aero-
nautics and Space Administration’s
manned space program. His first assign-
ment should be a realistic, down-to-earth
re-examination of the cost and potential
value of the flight to the moon, Beyond
that, there is need for a thorough review
of all the activities and outlays carried
on by NASA.

This would not be necessary if Con-
gress had been exercising ordinary super-
vision over our space efforts. But, goaded
by Mr. Kennedy’s determination to beat
the Soviet Union in the race to the moon,
Congress has permitted NASA to lead a
charmed life, providing what amounted
almost to a blank check for its operations
and a free hand to its managers. NASA,
it seemed, could do no wrong.

Congress is now rectifying its mistake.
As a result of its belated probing, it has
cut NASA’s mushrooming budget. The
reduction includes shelving of plans for a
$50 million research center that NASA
had sought for the President's home state,

NASA still has to exert a greater degree
of self-discipline. Its important achieve-
ments have oceasionally been marred by
sloppy practices, including a wavering
ethical attitude to the commercialization
of the astronauts. Despite Mr. Kennedy’s
position on the moon race, the wisdom
of the current “crash program” to that

end — with its accompanying massive
diversion of human and economic re-
sources — is highly questionable.

There is no doubt that false starts and
dead ends are inevitable in exploring the
unknown frontiers of space. But NASA's

_effectiveness will be enhanced by tighter

controls over spending and greater co-
ordination of its activities, including a
yaore sober evaluation than we have: yet
had from it of the entire moon shot
program. The space agency needs a solid
foundation on earth.

_and in Science

The vastness of the Government's re-
search activities has prompted a demand
by members of the House Rules Com-
mittee for a broad inquiry into the char-
acter, eost and conduct! of federally
financed nroerams in everv vese rch: field,

Francis A, Cox, Treasurer



mier Adoula to speed urgently necessary
fiscal and economic reforms.

The Congo has made progress and it is
still making progress; certainly there is
no promising alternative to the Adoula
Government. But the country faces disas-
ter unless that Government curbs the in-
tolerable budget deficit, stops printing
money to cover it and stems the soaring
inflation that is making people idle and
hungry and imperils economic recovery.
Premier Adoula is fully aware of the need
for reforms.

The United Nations cannot undertake to
cope with new Congos. Neither can the
African states, whose efforts to force a
premature independence on the unready
Portuguese colonies are endangering the
United Nations itself.

Atlanta’s Mayor Speaks

On rare occasions the oratorical fog on
Capitol Hill is pierced by a voice resonant
with courage and dignity. Such a voice
was heard when Mayor Ivan Allen Jr. of
Atlanta testified before the Senate Com-
merece Committee in support of President
Kennedy's bill to prohibit racial discrimin-
ation in stores, restaurants and other pub-
lic accommodations.

On the basis of the very substantial ac-
complishments that his city of a half-

-million, the largest in the Southeast,

has made in desegregating publicly owned
and privately owned facilities, he might
have come as a champion of “states’
rights” and of the ability of localities
to banish discrimination without Federal
law. Certainly, he would have had much
more warrant to espouse that view than
the Barretts, the Wallaces and the other
arch-segregationists who raise the specter
of Federal “usurpation” as a device for
keeping Southern Negroes in subjection,

But Mr. Allen was not in Washington to
boast. He was there to warn that even in
cities like Atlanta the progress that had
been made might be wiped out if Congress
turned its back on the Kennedy proposal
and thus gave implied endorsement to the
concept that private businesses were free
to finish the job started with the Emanci-
pation Proclamation a centry ago: “Now
the elimination of segregation, which is
slavery’s stepchild, is a challenge to all
of us to make every American free in
fact as well as in theory—and again to
establish our nation as the true champion
of the free world.”

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