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News stories from Sunday July 20, 1980
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- The Iranian Parliament took over legislative power from the Revolutionary Council and elected a conservative Islamic clergyman as speaker, completing seven weeks of organizational work. The parliamentary leader is Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, who had represented Teheran on the Council. Members of Ayatollah Rafsanjani's organization, the hard-line Islamic Republican Party, have said they favor putting the American hostages on trial for spying. The party is the largest in Parliament. [New York Times]
- Draft registration begins tomorrow amid questions about the law's constitutionality and signs of widespread resistance that could hamper the government's enforcement efforts. Federal officials moved ahead with plans to register about four million young men after Associate Justice William Brennan of the Supreme Court stayed an order by a federal court that barred the government from carrying out registration on the ground that it was unconstitutional because it excluded women. The stay was issued pending a decision by the full Supreme Court. Despite the uncertainty, most of the men born in 1960 and 1961 were expected to register. [New York Times]
- More than 1,100 people have died in the Southwest's heat wave, including 23 today in Kansas City alone. Many of the dead are the poor and elderly, those who cannot afford air conditioning. In Houston, the difference between those who have air conditioning and those who have not is stark. On the West Side is middle-class comfort. On the East, poverty and misery.
A record temperature of 101 degrees for July 20 was set in the New York metropolitan region, breaking the previous record of 99 degrees in 1923. There was no power shortage, and none is expected tomorrow, but water pressure declined mainly because of open hydrants. The Fire Department said insufficient water pressure was serious in Brooklyn, and New York City's Department of Evironmental Protection issued a water alert. [New York Times]
- Detroit's production of small cars is regarded as the key to the American auto industry's survival. Its big cars appear to be headed for oblivion. Manufacturers are preparing plans for fuel-efficient cars that will be half the weight of their models of the 1970's, stressing technical sophistication rather than size and weight. Many of the new cars will have front wheel drive and four cylinder engines. [New York Times]
- Allen smuggling is replacing drugs as the contraband of choice as refuge in the United States is being eagerly sought by Mexicans and Central and South Americans. Official figures indicate that in recent years traffic in smuggled aliens has more than tripled, and it is now so lucrative that it rivals the smuggling of narcotics in profitability. The largest alien smuggling rings reportedly make $1 million or more a month. [New York Times]
- Cleveland's public schools are open in midsummer because of the 15-week teachers' strike that ended early in January. The system's 92,000 students will not be released until Wednesday. The school year was extended past its usual June 13 closing date to make up for lost time. An expected drastic drop in attendance did not not occur, but the truancy rate increased. [New York Times]
- Fighting in Bolivia broke out between troops of the new military junta, which last week took over the government, and workers of the zinc mining district of Santa Ma, about 400 miles southwest of La Paz, the capital, according to broadcasts by an anti-junta group, which reported "many casualties." The Democratic Solidarity Radio Network formed by five union-controlled radio stations after Thursday's coup said the workers had "resisted the advance" of the troops. [New York Times]
- An alleged Soviet spy in China was sentenced to seven years in prison, and a Chinese who confessed to being a Soviet agent was ordered executed, according to the official New China News Agency. Another Chinese who also confessed spying received a suspended death sentence and was instead "given the chance to reform himself through labor," the press agency said. The agency identified the Soviet national as Nikolai Petrovich Zhang, 36 years old. It said that he had been arrested in 1974 but did not explain why his trial had been delayed so long. [New York Times]
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