Vietnam War

Each Monday, we turn to a day in the newspaper's history for a look at what the Editorial Board found worth commenting on. We will preserve the punctuation and capitalization of the original editorial column.

Here is what we were saying in an editorial from April 30, 1975:

Vietnam and our future

We have ended our commitment to South Vietnam. We have washed our hands of the whole bloody mess.

Now, what about the future. We can be too simplistic in two directions. One is to assume that the Vietnamese fiasco will now make every ally of ours doubt whether it can believe in promises of our support. The point is that Indochina never was as important to us as some other parts of the world.

The other extreme is to assume that the Indochina shambles will have no effect on our allies around the globe. Of course there will be an effect, because American credibility has been tested and found wanting.

Make no mistake, this could be a dangerous period in international relations. Our tough post-World War II police has avoided a serious world conflict for 30 years, but we have been tortured by several disastrous brushfire wars. Our policy was simple for us to understand, and simple for our potential enemies.

But what now? Which allies will we protect? Certain no American, not even President Ford, knows the answer. With the mood that Congress is in, we have no assurance where we would draw the line against all-out, naked aggression. (...)

Maybe an indefinite foreign policy may be helpful. But we can't help wondering if it isn't an engraved invitation for the forces of tyranny to test our willpower and our commitment to the cause of free people.

"Self-determination" has been a key word of our secretaries of state for three decades. We won't be hearing it so much in the future.

But where will we draw the line? Our "South Vietnamese" problems may be just beginning.

Put editors on the ballot?

Legislatures everywhere get close to interfering with freedom of the press in almost every session these days. The Florida legislature probably wins the award for the most asinine proposal in the press freedom field for 1975.

On April 22, the Florida House killed a bill, 64-31, which would have forced managing editors of newspapers to get approval from the voters to remain on the job.

A supporter of the measure explained that newspapers often publish unfair editorials on public officials and candidates, with some candidates getting an advantage. Under the proposal, the managing editor's name would appear on every general election ballot with the sole question, "Is he doing a competent job?"

Of all the ridiculous proposals interfering with free press, this one putting editors on every ballot is probably the most ridiculous. Yet it won the support of 31 legislators in Florida!