Reading Period

The State House has finally come out with a sensible approach to this year's glut of bills to curb Communism. The Joint Committee on Rules recently urged the Legislature to defer all this legislation for a year of study. If the House does not push through the Ober Law Bill as the substitute for the Rules Committee's suggestion--the loyalty oath bills, the teacher control bills, and the bill to outlaw Communism will probably die a quite death.

This is all to the good, for a year of serious study would show that these bills, are aimed wrong. Their target is supposedly the bevy of real Communists in the Commonwealth, but all that they would bag after a year or so of impassioned shooting would be a large number of patriotic men with unorthodox political views.

A year of serious study would also disclose that the FBI and other Federal agencies are far better equipped, legally and technically, to take care of the Communist menace. The Committee on Constitutional Law, which would form the study group, will have good opportunity to apply the last rites to these bills. Then maybe the citizens of Massachusetts will get at least a year's rest from the State House's perpetual parade of Communist hunters.