News stories from Tuesday March 1, 1977
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- Uganda's President Idi Amin dropped his demand that all Americans in the country remain there until they meet with him. The Carter administration said in Washington that it was satisfied with its handling of its first international crisis. Officials were careful not to gloat as they welcomed President Amin's indefinite postponement of the meeting and his lifting of the travel restriction on the approximately 200 Americans. [New York Times]
- Twelve major American companies with plants in South Africa have agreed to support a set of principles aimed at ending segregation and promoting fair employment practices in them. The Rev. Leon Sullivan, a prominent black clergyman who is a director of General Motors, made the announcement at his church in North Philadelphia. He said he was accompanied by the chairmen of G.M. and International Business Machines when he presented the statement to the South African Ambassador in Washington. [New York Times]
- President Carter sent Congress his plan for a new Department of Energy, combining all or part of at least nine existing agencies and abolishing the Federal Energy Administration, the Energy Research and Development Administration and the Federal Power Commission. His proposal would divide responsibility for leasing and managing offshore oil and natural gas areas between the new department and the Department of Interior. Tip O'Neill, the Speaker of the House who was among Congressmen briefed on the plan by Mr. Carter, said it was enthusiastically received. [New York Times]
- Stock prices advanced on a broad front, with Dow Jones industrials posting a gain of 8.31 points -- the biggest in more than two months - -to close at 944.73. A bond issue of $96 million from New York state was sold in a rush at a yield of as much as 6½ percent. [New York Times]
- Visiting the Pentagon, President Carter said he expected to name a commission to study ways of curbing the rising costs of military pensions and other manpower costs in the defense establishment. He told workers massed in the inner courtyard that he had no present intention of reinstituting the military draft system. If it ever became obvious that the all-volunteer system got too few recruits, he added, he would recommend a conscription system without college deferments. [New York Times]
- President Carter said he would favor extending the federal loan program for New York City for five or six years after its June 30, 1975, expiration date. He also remarked that there would be no federal help to solve the city's immediate problem of bankruptcy. He said the administration would be willing to extend temporary loans as long as the city could assure the government of repayment on time. [New York Times]
- A three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals in Washington voided a Federal Communications Commission rule allowing newspapers to own broadcasting stations in the same cities where they are published. The court ruled that free dissemination of information should take precedence over arguments of economic convenience of joint ownership. Chief Judge David Bazelon told the commission to order newspapers to divest themselves of such television and radio stations except where there was clear evidence that cross-ownership was in the public interest. [New York Times]
- The Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the 1974 New York state redistricting plan that drew some districts to include at least 63 percent blacks to insure black representation. It held setting a quota was permissible if the purpose was to insure voting rights of non-whites. The plan had been challenged by the Brooklyn Hasidic community. It was the court's first explicit approval of race conscious remedies in voting rights cases. [New York Times]
- Catholic bishops of Nicaragua have accused government forces of widespread torture, rape and summary executions of civilians in their battle against leftist guerrillas. Church documents list hundreds of peasants who have been killed or have disappeared in northern areas of the Central American republic in the last two years, Church sources say 29 children ware among 86 civilians killed in mass executions. [New York Times]
- Vladimir Bukovsky, the outspoken Soviet dissident, met President Carter at the White House and heard the President call his administration's commitment to human rights permanent, adding that he did not plan to be timid in his public statements and positions. Apparently trying to minimize Soviet unhappiness about their meeting, Mr. Carter barred news pictures of it. [New York Times]
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Stock Market Report
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 944.73 (+8.31, +0.89%)
Arms Index is the ratio of volume per declining issue to volume per advancing issue; a figure below 1.0 is bullish. | |||||||||||||||
| Market Index Trends | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Date | DJIA | S&P | Volume* |
| February 28, 1977 | 936.42 | 99.82 | 16.22 |
| February 25, 1977 | 933.43 | 99.48 | 17.61 |
| February 24, 1977 | 932.60 | 99.60 | 19.73 |
| February 23, 1977 | 938.25 | 100.19 | 18.24 |
| February 22, 1977 | 939.91 | 100.49 | 17.73 |
| February 18, 1977 | 940.24 | 100.49 | 18.04 |
| February 17, 1977 | 943.73 | 100.92 | 19.04 |
| February 16, 1977 | 948.30 | 101.50 | 23.43 |
| February 15, 1977 | 944.32 | 101.04 | 21.62 |
| February 14, 1977 | 938.33 | 100.74 | 19.23 |