sacsee

Victoria Library Board defies

public protest, fires Marshall

et

-

Ee il LEA iA

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1954

Continued

TRADE

Trade Minister C. D. Howe welcomed the proposal and other government spokesmen said the Soviet ambassador’s statement contained “tempting offers.”

Chuvahin stressed that the USSR is especially interested in buying Canadian freighters and machin- ery.

“We'd be glad to build ships for the Soviet Union, or for any country willing to trade with Can- ada,” said Jack Lawson, business agent for Marine Workers and Boilermakers Union here. “Since the war the bottom has fallen out of the shipbuilding industry, and we have hundreds of unemployed members at the present time. I see where businessmen in the Old Country are taking advantage of the Soviet Union’s desire to ex- tend trade (recently a billion dol- lar trade agreement was conclud- ed in Moscow with Britain) and I think we should get in on a good thing.”

Interviewed this week by the Pacific Tribune, Mrs. Florence Dorland, secretary of the Cana- dian-Soviet Friendship Society’s local branch, welcomed the pro- posals for trade and said that British Columbia would benefit greatly from such agreements.

“This province’s great ports, ice-free and. open to all-year ship- ping could be greatly stimulated by the transportation of goods from here to the various ports of the USSR,” said Mrs. Dorland. “An order for freighters would revive our languishing shipbuild- img industry. Shipping compan- ies, manufacturing firms and workers in these plants and in- dustries would all benefit.”

Mrs. Dorland said that when she :

visited the Soviet Union recently as a member of a Canadian dele- gation the question of trade be- tween our countries came up for discussion many times.

“For example, I learned in dis- cussions that British Columbia could certainly trade in pulp with

the Soviet Union,” she said. “I~ : had the pleasure of making a tour °

of the Pravda printing plant. Now Pravda is the official organ of the Communist Party of the So- viet Union and has a tremendous circulation.

“Vast numbers of books, pam- phlets and magazines are also printed. The hunger of the So- viet people for reading is very evident. Printing plants are springing up in every republic. Even in Soviet Uzbekistan, which 30 years ago was a province of illiterate people, great printing plants have been built. I myself visited one which employed 750 workers. ne

“What does this mean? A vast market for pulp and book paper, both of which Canada produces in abundance. The editor of Pravda told me he felt sure B.C. repre- sentatives would receive a very

‘friendly hearing if they visited

the USSR to discuss trade in pulp.”

Even before Soviet Ambassador Chuvahin’s statement, said Mrs. Dorland, she had received assur- ances in a letter from the embassy

Jobs? They’re ‘subversive’

y

The Soviet Union is prepared to place orders for Canadian- build ships. An inspired story in the Vancouver Sun this week tried to misrepresent Soviet trade offers as a “Communist plot” be- cause shipyard union leaders were in the national capital demanding the government provide jobs for unemployed shipyard workers.

ee te Ue ee

in Ottawa that “the Soviet Union could buy from your province some fish and meat products” and that “if trade is started there will be quite a variety of goods to be bought and sold.”

“February has been designated:

as Canadian-Soviet Friendship Month,” Mrs. Dorland concluded.

“Because trade benefits each par- ty to a contract, trade with the USSR would undoubtedly contri- bute to a feeling of mutual good will. Negotiations would develop understanding, and, understand- ing is always the beginning of friendship. Let’s trade, by all means.”

‘The feeling of the great majority of Victoria citizens is that the liberal traditions of: their city have been sullied by the action of the Greater Victoria Library Board this week in confirming the dismissal of John Marshall as bookmobile director, officially for unstated reasons, actually for past left-wing’ association. Their resentment at having the pattern of Yankee McCarthyism imposed upon them may well upset the plans of

those who want to close the book on the entire case.

nt Gt it ii} OTD Eh it Ut EA TE Ee TE

' Continued

THIS WEEK

gime and the former Liberal ad- ministration.

In the Throne Speech the gov- ernment has shown a remarkable dexterity in the proposals it brings forward to placate popular opinion, while at the same time actually doing a bare minimum. Where big, bold strides are re- quired e administration pro- poses to take the first tiny steps.

It is notable that the Throne Speech gave first place to the major question of federal-provin- cial cooperation in the economic development of B.C.; that the im- portance of British markets re- ceived mention with the state- ment that “orders have been plac- ed in the United Kingdom for 50 miles of new steel” for the PGE, and “to make purchases of basic British Columbia commodities such as lumber, fish and fruit.” But, it is deplorable that these excellent small beginnings are not accompanied by proposals to press Ottawa for action on this key question. :

Canada, more than any other country except perhaps Britain depends on trade, and particular- ly our own province of B.C. Trade is the difference between prosperi- ty and depression for us right now and the legislature has a duty to speak up for our vital interests and compel action by Ottawa to regain lost markets and expand foreign trade. If limited orders for steel and the new exchange deal for B.C. salmon mean any- thing, how much more could be achieved through similar changes in overall national policies?

Official notice of anticipated changes in the Rolston School Finance Plan and redistribution of provincial electoral constitu- encies did not materialize. The committee on redistribution will continue meetings during the ses- sions. And despite the fact that B.C. must spend $61 million on new schools in the next three to five years, the government has apparently decided to lay both pieces of legislation over for fur- ther consideration and study.

Surprise moves projected in the Throne Speech were the increased bonuses for pensioners and social welfare rec‘pients, and several minor tax reductions. What these bonus increases and tax cuts will amount to is known only behind the sealed doors of government caucus rooms. However, judging by past experience, there is one thing we can be sure of—the pen- sion and welfare boosts will be too small, and the taxation cuts will be too little.

Conspicuously absent was any mention of extension of the prin- ciple adopted last session of taxa- tion of industries using up the province’s resources—a lucrative source of revenue to the govern- ment which could lay the basis for wiping out the Sales Tax en- tirely and providing urgently needed pension and welfare al- lowances.

Widespread public pressure is what is needed to make this and other advances a reality.

Only Professor Robert Wallace opposed the motion made by Ald. Brent Murdoch and seconded by Mrs. Doris Lougheed. Capt. D. J. Proudfoot, former Liberal MLA and newly-appointed member of the board, “abstained,” thus of course, recording his vote in fav- or of the motion.

The board rejected a sugges- tion by Reeve Joseph Casey of Saanich, a non-voting member, that an arbitration board be set up and refused to hear any “‘out- siders,’ thus barring Marshall’s lawyer and Ronald Ley, head of the B.C. Library Association.

Of 22 letters read to the Board on the Marshall case, all support- ed him except three, one of them from the Junior Chamber of Commerce.

The resignation of Miss Thressa Pollock, head librarian, was turn- ed over to the board’s personnel committee. It was indicated that the committee would attempt to have her reconsider her ultima- tum that either board chairman James Neely, Ald. Murdoch and Mrs. Lougheed resign or she would.

During the past few weeks the controversy in the board has shap- ed up more and more as a feud between two wings of the Liberal and Socred parties. It is now apparent that main bodies of both parties, alarmed by the storm of public protest against witch-hunt- ing and censorship, are joining to put the lid on the whole affair as soon as possible. ;

The Liberals especially are aware that increasing opposition to McCarthyism in any form heightens public protest against anti-democratic sections of the St. Laurent government’s own Bill 7 tc amend the Criminal Code. It

‘Grave concern’ felt by United Church

VICTORIA, B.C.

Protests against the firing of John Marshall as bookmobile dir- ector continued to pour in on Greater Victoria Library Board this week, including one from the Victoria Presbytery of the United Church. :

At its meeting in Nanaimo last week, the presbytery passed this resolution:

“We view with grave concern

the action of the Victoria Library

Board in dismissing Mr. John

Marshall from his position on the

Giovando agrees with LPP trade proposals

NANAIMO, B.C.

“Trade and the expansion of secondary industry at home is the only solution to the unemployed problem,” Dr. Larry Giovando, MLA (PC, Nanaimo-The Islands) told a Labor-Progressive party delegation which visited him last Saturday to discuss the jobless crisis.

Dr. Giovando agreed with LPP proposals for trade and jobs and promised to speak on the subject in the legislature. ‘In Nanaimo there are 3,000 unemployed at the present time,” he commented.

The delegation, led by Mrs.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — FEBRUARY 19, 1954 — PAGE 12

GR Shee ie a ae TP COL Bae oe

. hunting members of the library

VICTORIA, B.C.

is significant that the Victoria Liberal machine in the person of one of its chief spokesmen, Proud- foot, has failed to back the sup- port given to Marshall by two other Liberals, Wallace and Casey.

Proudfoot was backed for ap- pointment to the board by a 5-2 vote of Victoria City Council, win- ning out over former Mayor Percy George. George was the nominee of Ald. Robert Macmillan who previously succeeded in getting Wallace on the board.

The strategy has been to delay the consideration of Marshall’s dismissal until the public furore over book-burning abated in an attempt to separate the two ques- tions in the public mind, then to launch a concerted attempt to smear as “Reds” or “Communist fronters” anyone who might feel inclined to speak out on Marshall’s behalf.

The local papers are cooperat- ing in this attempt to get back to “witch-hunting as usual.” Each printed a lengthy red-baiting at- tack on Marshall by the Jaycees timed to appear when the library board confirmed his dismissal and designed to choke off any protest or to smear those opposed.

At the height of the uproar on book-burning, the Jaycees had of- ficially denied any connection with the Marshall case. But their statement consisted of an elabor- ate documentation of the very charges which had leaked out at the time of Marshall’s dismissal.

It was later revealed that the_ alleged information on Marshall came originally from the RCMP. The Jaycees latest statement leaves no room for doubt that theirs was the unnamed organ- ization which was instrumental in having ,it passed along to the 1953 library board.

library staff without first laying any specific charge against him or producing any evidence of his wrongdoing.”

In the capital, a member of the Oak Bay Social Credit Associa- tion, Ray Flaming, called on the president of the Victoria Social Credit Constituency Association to take steps to have two witch-

board, Ald. Brent Murdoch and Mrs. Doris Lougheed, purged from the B.C. Social Credit League.

Grace Tickson, LPP candidate for Nanaimo- The Islands in the last province election, put for- ward proposals calling for prov- incial government action to com- pel Ottawa to restore Common- wealth markets; implementation of a federal-provincial low-cost housing program; extension of the PGE on both ends; continua- tion of unemployment insurance benefits until work is found.

The delegation also proposed dispatch of a trade mission t0 China, but Dr. Giovando contend- ed this was a federal matter.