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DAI LY NEWS
Daily Since 1872
Word to students: bundle ud Monday
The temperature in Griffin-Spalding
school buildings will be 65 degrees
Monday. School officials suggested
parents have children take along a light
jacket or sweater to wear in class.
Gene Kierbow of the administration
staff said the thermostats would be set
at 65 degrees in cooperation with an
Atlanta Gas Light conservation
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Quenton Garner repairs fender. Many Grifflnites faced the problem of having
dents repaired following a rash of fender bender accidents in the snow this
week.
Cheers, jeers greet
Carter pardon order
WASHINGTON (AP) - Vietnam-era
draft evaders can stop worrying and
come home, those working for
clemency can quit, and the few in
prison for breaking the draft law can go
free. President Carter has pardoned
them.
On his first full day in the White
House, Carter fulfilled a campaign
promise Friday by issuing a “full,
complete and unconditional” pardon to
all draft evaders who did not commit
acts of violence.
His first order as President affected
more than 10,000 evaders known to the
Justice Department, and possibly thou
sands more who, unknown to the
government, never registered for the
draft.
Some groups claim from 250,000 to 1
million men failed to register and were
not discovered during the Vietnam war
period.
But Carter’s order did not cover the
approximately 100,000 men who
deserted and either received less than
honorable discharges or remain
fugitives. The President ordered the
Department of Defense to study the
possibility of upgrading general
discharges. But the White House said
no further action is contemplated in the
worst cases involving bad conduct or
dishonorable discharges.
Carter’s action stirred the wrath of
veterans’ groups and conservatives on
Capitol Hill. Sen. Barry Goldwater, R-
Ariz., called it “the most disgraceful
thing that a president has ever done.”
Critics of the Vietnam war expressed
joy mixed with concern that the
President did not go far enough.
For Albert Finkley, 24, of Fairhope,
Ala., the pardon meant release from
GRIFFIN
Griffin, Ga., 30223, Saturday Afternoon, January 22,1977
program.
Schools were closed here Wednesday
through Friday in the wake of a snow
and cold wave which hit the Southland.
Schools closed the first day because
snow made some roads too dangerous
for school buses.
They remained closed the rest of the
week because of a natural gas shortage.
the Texarkana, Tex., Federal
Correctional Center, where he was sent
11 months ago for failing to report for
the draft in 1972. Finkley told the
warden he was flabbergasted that he
was released so quickly.
The Justice Department said there
were at least four others in jail for
evading the draft. It is reviewing prison
records to determine if there are more.
A department spokesman said those
affected by the pardon included:
—8,700 who were convicted of draft
violations or pleaded guilty.
—I,BOO who are fugitives, including
about 1,300 in Canada, 300 in other
countries, and 200 whose whereabouts
are unknown.
Carter’s proclamation instructed the
Justice Department to drop charges
against 2,700 men under indictment on
draft charges, including many of the
fugitives.
The pardon applied to all draft
offenses committed between Aug. 4,
1964 — the time of the Tonkin Gulf
incident — and March 28,1973, after the
U.S. pullout and Hanoi’s release of
American POWs.
Carter’s pardon means anyone who
fled the country to avoid the draft can
come home without fear of prosecution.
Those who gave up their citizenship
after fleeing can return, but only under
alien status.
The Justice Department is working
on a system to notify those known to be
pardoned, the spokesman said.
In addition to excluding draft evaders
who engaged in violence, Carter’s
pardon specifically left out any
employes of the Selective Service
System who violated the law by selling
draft deferments or otherwise.
Most of the systems in Georgia
complied with a request from State
School Superintendent Jack Nix that
they close.
Natural gas supplies remain tight,
even though there is expected to be
enough to allow schools to open
Monday.
School officials here were making
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Man washes ice and snow from his car with warm water at commercial car
wash.
Carter’s order said the pardon covers
any draft evaders who were performing
alternative service to qualify for for
mer President Ford’s limited clemency
program. That means they can quit
their jobs,
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WASHINGTON—First Lady Rosalynn Carter stands with her shoes off in the
reception line beside President Carter at a White House reception. The First
Lady hosted the reception for the Georgia Peanut Brigade, a group of people
who worked for Carter during the campaign. (AP)
Vol. 105 No. 18
decisions on openings almost on a day
to day basis.
The extended weather forecast for
this area indicated Griffinites would get
a little relief from subfreezing weather
this weekend.
The forecast said it would be cold
again tonight but that Sunday
temperatures would be in the mid 40s.
People
...and things
Gasoline truck driver taking nap in
shopping center parking lot, his engine
still running.
Boy and girl sweeping sidewalk sand,
put there earlier this week to keep
people from slipping on frozen snow.
Cars, bumper-to-bumper at
commercial car wash Friday
afternoon.
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Continued warmer weather was due :
Monday, the extended forecast
indicated. Rain is likely in the early '
part of the week then the freezing
weather probably will return by I
midweek, the National Weather Service I
predicted.
Meantime, Atlanta Gas Light was
keeping close checks on businesses to
Flu spread
at Vanderbilt
ATLANTA (AP) - The Center for
Disease Control says this winter’s first
outbreak of influenza in the United
States is underway at Vanderbilt
University in Nashville, Tenn.
Epidemiologist Dr. Richard O’Brien
of the CDC said Friday there have been
60 to 70 patients daily at the university
complaining of sysmpt ms similar to
those associated with the B-Hong Kong
flu of several years ago.
He added the center had received
scattered reports of the B-Hong Kong
influenza strain from Pennsylvania and
other portions of Tennessee, but the
cases at Vanderbilt constitute the first
large-scale outbreak.
Meanwhile, O’Brien said, there have
been only scattered reports of A-
Victoria and A-New Jersey—or swine
flu — strains.
He said Influenza A and Influenza B
exhibit similar symptoms —
headaches, body aches and rising
temperature—and the differences can
be told only after laboratory research.
O’Brien said outbreaks of Influenza
B, which strikes mostly children and
young adults, occur about every third
year, and the mortality rate is much
lower than that of Influenza A.
Last month, federal physicians
halted a nationwide flu inoculation
porgram because of concern over a
possible link between flu vaccine and
the Guillain-Barre symdrome.
But a week ago, federal health of
ficials recommended that the vaccine be
made available to adults-requesting it.
The Department of Health,
Education and Welfare has not ruled on
the recommendation.
Ironically, OBrien said, the recent
cold snap that has closed schools and
public gathering spots around the
nation may help keep flu viruses from
spreading.
“Schools are not in session, people
Georgia Power
says it’s clean
ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia Power
Co. says its investigation into claims
that the utility suppressed findings of
theft, payroll fraud and kickbacks
shows the accusations are groundless.
A former Georgia Power security
supervisor, William Lovin of Macon,
told a legislative conunitte last month
that the utility suppressed such findings
to avoid publicity that would embarrass
the company and damage chances of
getting a rate increase.
Georgia Power denied the report at
the time.
Loving said also that substandard
material may have been used in the
construction of Plant Hatch, the
utility’s nuclear plant near Baxley, Ga.
A Georgia Power committee, headed
by James H. Miller Jr., executive vice
president, said the utility’s in
vestigation shows that the safety of the
Hatch plant “has not been com
promised by any alleged activities or
alleged conflicts of interest.”
Loving told a Senate subcommittee
reviewing public utilities that Georgia
Power officials stopped an in
vestigation into fraud.
Miller’s committee said in its report
that an investigation based on Lovin’s
field work resulted in the recovery from
contractors and individuals of more
Fishing report
The Georgia Department of Natural Resources’ fishing
forecast for the week of Jan. 23-29 includes:
HIGH FALLS: Normal, stained. No activity.
JACKSON: Normal, stained. No activity.
SINCLAIR: Full, stained. Fishing slow for all species.
see that they maintained temperatures
which the company required during the
emergency.
Business firms using natural gas got
personal calls from Atlanta Gas Light
people telling them what must be done.
Gas company people were making
checks to be sure their instructions
were being followed.
are not gathering in theaters and other
places because of the cold weather,” he
said, “and it suggests that this is
keeping down the influenza.
Dundee Mills
way ahead
on saving
Dundee Mills has been in a fuel
conservation program more than two
years preparing for emergencies such
as the cold which hit this week.
Special equipment at Lowell
Bleachery recovers heat from the
water used in processing, a company
spokesman pointed out. This enables
the company to reduce natural gas use.
For a number of years, Dundee has
been switching in cold weather to an
alternate source of fuel for heat and
processing which is a low grade fuel oil.
This cuts natural gas use to a small
quantity, the company spokesman said.
than $170,000 and that an additional
$149,000 is being recovered from a
contract as a result of a related in
vestigation.
“At no time during any phase of the
investigation was Mr. Lovin or any
other employe in the Security Depart
ment stopped from investigating
Georgia Power Co. employes or any
other individuals,” the committee
report said.
Georgia Power said it found in
stances of wrongdoing on the part of
some company employes, all of whom
had been “teriminated, demoted, or
reprimanded and ordered to make
compensatory payments.”
The report said the committee is
convinced that “none of the activities of
the employes ... in any way affected
the quality or quantity of materials or
the quality of workmanship in Plant
Hatch.”
Lovin, a 47-year-old former in
vestigator for the U.S. Army Military
Police, said he was fired last November
after two and one-half years with the
utility because he did not “prevent one
of my men from monitoring of a
management person.”
Also fired as a security officer was
Charles Goodroe of Macon.
The Country Parson
by Frank Clark
m.iw It
“Most of us get by with being
ignorant by learning when not
to show it.”