Dropouts A Problem

HELLO FOLKS — Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil: Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; Beareth all things, believeth all things, h o p e t h all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth. —Corinthians, Ch. 13.

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I HAD PLANNED for the next few columns another topic. Then it occurred to me that there is a much more important subject that needs to be taken care of before I delve into this other.

The one that I am going to dwell on now is the subject of school dropouts.

In every one of our communities there are young citizens who get discouraged with school, then by quitting it doom themselves, for the most part, to a life of mediocrity and low income.

By quitting at that age they often become discouraged with themselves. They they get a poor outlook on life in general. This affects the community and eventually the nation as a whole.

We cannot afford such an attitude. The very reason we have people on relief rolls and on unemployment is because we haven't developed the attitude of continuous education and re-evaluation.

There is a lot of talk about the Gross National Product and how we can increase it. Here is the only sure way: Get every boy and girl back into school, get them to realize the value of proper attitudes and training. Get them to realize that there are millions of people depending on them to direct the future of society. There are a lot of things each of can do to contribute to solving this problem. Parents are of course most directly concerned and too often we do not give the problem the attention it deserves. As parents we should be constantly on the alert to see that our children are working up to their capacity; that their attitudes toward learning are good and that they respect their teachers and school.

For each one of us we can take an interest in the youth of our community by getting better acquainted with them, by encouraging them to better deeds and let them know that we are expecting great things from them.

We have a lot of senior citizens who could help out with loans to students at low interest rates. The satisfaction derived from such projects would give more real joy than a lot of things the money could be used for. This could give a number of young people the courage to go on to higher learning.

Next week I am going to tell you about three young fellows who could have ended with the ranks of discouraged youth but who by their own efforts practically lifted themselves out of the ruts and are on the way to being real successes.

I am inviting others of you who know of someone in your community, who has picked himself up from mediocrity and gone on to success, to tell about it in this column.

Do We Owe People Living?

HELLO FOLKS — I think we will all agree that we live in a pretty topsy-turvy world. At least it seems that way at times.

Take the case of employment. I think we will all agree that we as a nation owe everyone the opportunity to make a living. I think we also will agree that it is destructive of everything good to hand out a living to anyone and everyone just because he or she doesn't have quite as full a stomach as the rest of us. And while some of us have more work than we can readily do there are many who want to work and can't find jobs.

We have plenty of work to do. Things that need to be done and aren't being done. Take the case of the Albert Lea lake. It is a pity that it has not been cleaned up, or is not being cleaned up. I believe there are people on relief rolls who can work for what they get, who could be given jobs now and create an atmosphere for future employment growth in the future, such as the tourist trade.

Certainly the welfare officials are to be complimented for their conscientious work in giving such people the opportunity to be self-sustaining. But the job is much bigger than for one organization to do alone. It takes the cooperation of all.

What we need is a reserve of funds to use when such a project is needed and a list of jobs that need to be done whenever there is anyone in need of a job.

There are of course many contributing factors that lead to unemployment. We can price ourselves out of jobs, such as has been done in the auto and other industries. Sometimes it is the need of capital.

Whatever the cause we need to get to the root of it and create a better world, one that gives all the chance, plus the impetus, to become respectable self-sustaining citizens.

Speaking again of this topsy-turvy world, we are putting out millions of dollars to retire land and bolster prices. Then we spend millions (or I should say billions) more to feed people on relief. Many of these people on relief could be given land to put in a garden and the supervision to do it right so they in turn could almost feed themselves. And in this garden spot of the U.S. there is much food going to waste that could be gleaned to feed practically all the needy.

In biblical days the farmers were commanded to leave the edges and corners of the fields that the needy could glean for themselves. Thus all the citizens could be self sustaining, except of course the indigent.

A closer attention to such a program would make better citizens out of many who need the aid.

We go astray in this free world of ours but we gradually seeem to find the way back sooner or later and I think we will someday consider it a major error to dole food and clothing and just as great an error to not have plenty of projects to take care of all the unemployed and the where with all to do it.

Boiling it down to simple terms we owe everyone the right to earn an honest living, but we owe no able bodied man the living itself.

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Easy but glamorous: serve vanilla ice cream with green creme de menthe, chocolate ice cream with white creme de menthe.

Why Cut Federal Lunch Program?

HELLO FOLKS — I don't know the President's thinking behind his desire to cut federal costs on the school lunch program. However, from this view it seems very unwise to seem to be interested in the health of the underprivileged on the one hand and then place in jeopardy the very program that should give many of the nation's needy some of the nutrition they need.

I do think that in the past the federal government has footed too much of the cost of the school lunch program. It is certainly wise for the state governments to share substantially in the costs; just as it is well for the local governments to share. This way there is not apt to be waste in the project. With local participation there will be more local control and local citizens own funds used unwisely if they can help it.

Equal Sharing

It seems to me that the program should call for about equal sharing between federal, state and local.

Even in our own communities, where there is hardly reason for poverty to exist, there are children who are not getting the proper nutrition. The reasons for this lies with the parents. Perhaps a drinking father or mother or both; indifferences as to what constitutes good nutrition; laziness when it comes to providing or the offspring and working mothers, more interested in earning money than to develop the citizens of tomorrow.

For many of these unfortunate children school lunches are the chief source of good nutrition. It does not seem good sense to put these lunches in jeopardy just to provide the proposed "pie-in-the-sky programs" into action.

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DOES THE GROUCH get richer quicker than the friendly sort of man? Can the grumbler labor better than the cheerful fellow can? Is the mean and churlish neighbor any cleverer than the one who shouts a glad "good morning", and then smiling passes on?

Just to stop and think about it. Have you ever known or seen a mean man who succeeded, just because he was so mean?

When you find a grouch with honors and with money in his pouch, you can bet he didn't win them just because he was a grouch.

Oh, you'll not be any poorer if you smile along your way, and your lot will not be harder for the kindly things you say. Don't imagine you are wasting time for others that you spend: You can rise to wealth and glory and still pause to be a friend.
– Edgar A. Guest.

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SPEAKING OF being friendly, I just finished making the rounds on one of the numerous charity drives that take place this time of year. I wasn't turned down once and when I went to one home which had already given they gave again. Not only did they all give but they did it gladly. Not a grumble, not a grudge.

I don't know what this all indicates, whether it is because there is more money around or it is because people are getting more charitable. But one thing I believe it is all for the better.

Biblical Examples

HELLO FOLKS — The problem of public welfare is ageless. We can go back in history and take some mighty good lessons from it to determine what is the best program to follow.

One of the first recorded incidents of mass public welfare is during the time of the rule of Joseph of Egypt over the Egyptians.

Joseph had provided for the seven lean years. When the people had no food they bought the stored food. When that was gone and they had no money he took their cattle as security. Later they had to seel him their land for enough food to survive.

Did they hate Joseph for taking away their properties? No, they thanked and praised him for having foresight enough to provide for their lives.

Had he given the food to them outright without string attached they would have had no encouragement to do for themselves the things they should do. Later they were given the opportunity to redeem their property. No wonder they became such a great nation. He taught the people self reliance.

The other prime example of general welfare is among the Israelites themselves after the exodus.

The farmers were required to leave the corners of the fields and the edges for the poor that they might have the opportunity to help themselves. Had they had the welfare doled out to them Israel would never have become a great people. It is charity of the highest order to give the needy the gleanings, because it nourishes and strengthens the body while if feeds and builds the character.

When we compare these examples with what has happened to great nations that have fallen we find that the way they cared for the people was generally the reason for their decay. In others words, teach them to provide for themselves and you build a civilization. Hand out their every needs ot them and you destroy the very thing needed to generate society, namely, character.

Each week, Americans open and use about 400 millions cans of food.

A Look at the American Indian

By EDWIN B. PETERSEN

HELLO FOLKS! — If the leaders of the so called "Poor Peoples March" are sincere about doing something constructive for their constituents they will take a few trips to the areas where people have been living off federal paternalism for a long time. I mean the American Indian.

I visited the Rosebut Indian Reservation, recently. These people have been receiving government checks for 50 years. We drove them off the land they possessed, which should never have been done; but let's not get the idea that they owned the land. They didn't. For the most part all they ever did with the land was to live off it. When game became scarce they moved and drove other tribes off where they wanted to settle, if they could.

As I started to say, if the people who are agitating for greater government aid would take a hard look at what has happened to the ones who have been receiving such aid for many years they would suddenly change courses of action. To one who has known these Indians for a long time and seeing what has happened to them, it is really disheartening.

I first talked to a former rancher who had given up ranching and turned to truck driving. I asked him why he gave up ranching. He explained that he was unable to get help. He nearly killed himself working trying to take care of 800 cows. Decided it wasn't worth it.

This man had his ranch in the Nebraska Sand Hills which is right next to the "Rosebud," where there are thousands of Indians supposedly unemployed. Basically it is because they don't have to work and is has become such a way of life to look to someone else for sustenance that they havent developed the talent of doing something for themselves.

If these people had not been dependent on government aid they could have taken jobs with ranchers and learned valuable trades. To put it bluntly, they would have been forced to do so or starve.

Instead they exist from day to day doing nothing constructive for the most part. Now that it is legal by them to buy liquor many of them have become alcoholics.

It is a pitiful situation really. These people need help, but the kind of help the government gives them does more harm than good. If government would get out of the picture and let them and people around them take care of the situation so many more of them would live useful lives and become assets to themselves and the community.