The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Digital Edition > My Day
My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt

      

NEW YORK, Wednesday—Recently, there was a news story to the effect that "Communist technicians," including Poles and Czechs, have been sent, under the United Nations technical assistance programs, to non-Communist nations and paid out of the United States' contribution. As a result of this somewhat misleading impression, the U.N. Technical Assistance Board had to send out information explaining the facts.

They did employ six Yugoslav experts last year but these were not paid out of the U.S. contribution. And seven technical experts whose original nationality was Polish and Czech had been employed, but these were all refugees residing in non-Communist countries, and most of them have either acquired or applied for other citizenship.

I have heard that inaccurate information about Communist technicians was used in the U.S. House of Representatives as an argument against appropriating funds this year for the U.N. technical assistance program. United Nations officials have now informed the State Department, the press, and such influential civic organizations as they can reach, of the true facts but the first misleading impression did the harm.

We do business with Yugoslavia. It is important for us that their technicians be used in different parts of the world. It relieves the drain on American technicians if some from other countries can be used.

And it is also helpful to these experts to work in other countries and see the methods and situations in the countries where they work. International contact is important—important for those who live in Communist countries as well as for those who live in the free countries.

I would like to turn to a problem in New York City—a problem which may have an impact on other cities. Police Commissioner Francis W.H. Adams made an urgent plea a few days ago for more police, asserting that the city's crime problem was acute. This, I think, is a very wise move.

Mayor Robert F. Wagner, Jr., has pledged his support and has promised that the courts also will get help. For if the police are able to round up more criminals, particularly young ones, it is important that the courts get help in handling them. Those employed by the courts—parole officers and so on—should be increased so that we may really have a clean-up of criminals and so that those in the younger age brackets may get the kind of supervision they need for rehabilitation.

E. R.

(WORLD COPYRIGHT, 1954, BY UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE, INC. REPRODUCTION IN WHOLE OR IN PART PROHIBITED.)


Names and Terms Mentioned or Referenced

Persons
  • Adams, Francis William Holbrook, 1904-1990 [ index ]
         American public servant and politician; New York City Police Commissioner; leader of the NY Democratic reform movement
         [ Wikidata | SNAC | NYT ]
  • Wagner, Robert F. (Robert Ferdinand), 1910-1991 [ index ]
         American politician and diplomat; New York City mayor, 1954-1965
         [ LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST | US Nat. Archives | ANB ]
Organizations
Geographic
  • New York (N.Y., United States) [ index ]
Other Terms and Topics


About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, August 5, 1954

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962
[ ERPP bio | LC | VIAF | WorldCat | DPLA | Wikidata | SNAC ]

Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007

  • Brick, Christopher (Editor)
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  • Regenhardt, Christy (Associate Editor)
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  • Black, Allida M. (Editor)
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  • Binker, Mary Jo (Associate Editor)
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  • Alhambra, Christopher C. (Electronic Text Editor)
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Digital edition published 2008, 2017 by
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Available under licence from the Estate of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

Published with permission from the Estate of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

MEP edition publlished on June 30, 2008.

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Transcription created from a photocopy of a UFS wire copy of a My Day column instance archived at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library.
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