News stories from Saturday April 26, 1975

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

Tens of thousands of labor union members marched and rallied in Washington to urge government action to provide more jobs, but their speeches were disrupted just as they were getting under way in the Robert F. Kennedy Stadium. Crowds of young demonstrators broke through police lines and rushed out on the field in front of the speakers' stand carrying signs and shouting, "jobs now" and obscenities. Senator Hubert Humphrey, among others, tried to speak, and labor leaders made vain attempts to quiet the crowds on the field. A labor official suggested that the demonstrators represented radical groups rather than labor unions. [New York Times] The Central Intelligence Agency is exerting "extensive pressure" on the Securities and Exchange Commission to conduct its investigation of the company that was involved in a project to recover a sunken Soviet submarine in total secrecy to keep the findings from the public, responsible sources have disclosed. If the S.E.C. were to agree to total secrecy it would have the effect of limiting its investigation and would abrogate the Securities and Exchange Act, the source said. [New York Times] President Ford and Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet leader, have agreed to delay until this fall their summit meeting in Washington that had originally been scheduled for late June or early July. High administration officials said the delay had not been caused by any sudden or critical problem. There were a number of reasons, they said. One of these was that the Washington meeting would clash with the anticipated meeting of 35 nations at the end of the European Security Conference in July. [New York Times] South Vietnam's National Assembly today adopted a resolution empowering President Tran Van Huong to "select a man to replace him" in seeking "ways and means to restore peace in South Vietnam" on the basis of Paris peace agreement of January, 1973. The resolution followed a day of hectic debate under enormous pressure from both the Communist military threat and diplomatic peacemakers. It overcame constitutional obstacles to allow Gen. Duong Van Minh to take over the Saigon government and negotiate with the Communists. Meanwhile, Communist forces began what was described as "massive attack" on Phuoc Le, a town 37 miles southeast of Saigon, as if to emphasize their threat to destroy Saigon. [New York Times] Hundreds of American soldiers, sailors, Seabees, marines and civilian volunteers on Guam struggled to quickly build an entire city for South Vietnamese refugees -- on what had been 50 acres of dense jungle. They were erecting a vast array of tent compounds complete with street designations and numbers. About 20,000 South Vietnamese are already on Guam and most of the existing 10 camps were crowded beyond capacity. To temporarily relieve pressure there, the refugee airlift from Saigon was diverted for a day to Wake Island, 1,334 miles from Guam. [New York Times] Portugal's Communist party ran a poor third behind the Socialists in the election of a constituent assembly, getting less than 13 percent of the total vote, nearly complete returns indicated. The Socialists emerged as the country's leading party, with 38 percent of the vote, and the centrist Popular Democrats followed in a strong runner-up position with 26 percent. It was an overwhelming victory for the parties that had campaigned on a platform of public freedoms and had become identified as strong opponents of both communism and military dictatorship. [New York Times] Britain's Labor party voted against continued membership in the Common Market despite pleas by Prime Minister Harold Wilson and others in favor of staying in the economic community. Party members, at a special conference called to discuss the matter, overwhelmingly voted to urge the British people to say "no" in a referendum on June 5. The antimarket margin of victory was 2 to 1. [New York Times]