MILWAUKEE—Authorities of the United Arab Republic certainly don't seem to be carrying out their original projection of allowing all ships of all nations to pass through the Suez Canal. For not long ago they stopped a second ship within a month which they suspected of carrying an Israeli cargo.

It is a pity that they apparently have a feeling that Israel must be prevented from access to foreign trade through the canal. Such action will make many people doubtful of the wisdom of allowing one nation to control any waterway built for international navigation.

Many thinking people will begin to wonder whether all such waterways should not be controlled by the United Nations and belong to the people of the world and not to any one nation.

I think it should be drawn to the attention of women in New York City that they are now being offered an active role in helping to end housing discrimination. The city's Committee on Intergroup Relations, which administers the nation's first fair housing practices law—prohibiting discrimination in private housing—is being joined by a large segment of the city's "woman power" in a unique "action study" project, called "Women View the Open City."

The commission, through this project, has attracted women from many different groups. The reason for this is simple, for the basic role of women is running their homes. They are interested in looking at the living environment of all the families in their city.

In almost every organized group there are women who will join in a project of this kind. You find civic groups, professional groups, those interested in civil rights, representatives from religious organizations, sororities, and even social clubs taking part through certain of their members who are interested in any project touching on how people live in their city.

Even groups that have national membership, such as the National Council of Women of the U.S. and the National Council of Negro Women, will have among their members people who will be interested in New York City. This interest also is high in other areas where fair housing practices laws along the same lines of those in New York State and New York City are being enacted. In Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts and Oregon and in the city of Pittsburgh such legislation already has been passed.

The Open City Project offers a variety of activities. Some women will meet in private homes to learn about the law and discuss it and find out what part they can play. Some will use questionnaires at regular meetings of their organizations. Others will become channels for passing along information they have acquired while still others, which become really informed groups, will visit landlords and inform them that they wish to live in buildings where there will be no discrimination based on race, creed or color.