News stories from Thursday June 16, 1977
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- The House approved, 225 to 157, legislation designed to block the administration's new policy on busing for school desegregation. The measure would prohibit the government from withholding funds from school districts that refused to merge or consolidate black and white schools to facilitate desegregation, if the plan required that pupils be bused to a new school. [New York Times]
- Five years after the break-in at the Democratic Party's headquarters in Washington's Watergate complex, the Justice Department is operating under more outside scrutiny and tighter controls than at any time in the recent past. Attorney General Griffin Bell believes this may be a hidden blessing of Watergate. [New York Times]
- The Commerce Department issued what it said was "another very encouraging month for housing." Housing starts increased 1.6 percent in May over April, which, a department economist said, suggests "construction may well be a major contributor to the economy this year." [New York Times]
- A brisk rise in natural gas stocks helped the market overcome an early weakness and finish with a moderate recovery. The Dow Jones .industrial average, which had been losing as much as 4½ points, closed up 2.88 points to 920.45. Natural gas issues gained quickly after an announcement that a federal court upheld the Federal Power Commission's sharp increase in the price of gas sold interstate. [New York Times]
- Ending a five-year legal battle, United States Steel agreed to halt by 1980 the dumping of toxic pollutants from its huge Gary, Ind., plant into Lake Michigan and the Grand Calumet River. The company also agreed to pay $3.5 million in fines for failing to meet air and water pollution standards of the Environmental Protection Agency. [New York Times]
- Extradition papers were being prepared for Anthony Conrad, former chairman and president of the RCA Corporation, according to Moses Weintraub, Assistant Attorney General of New York state. Mr. Conrad, who lives in Maryland, resigned from RCA last September after acknowledging that he did not file federal, state or local income tax returns for a five-year period through 1975. A warrant for his arrest also was issued in Manhattan Criminal Court. [New York Times]
- An increase in uranium's world price and, to a limited extent, a 53 percent rise in the price of uranium in the United States was brought about by cooperation between the Gulf Oil Corporation and an international cartel. Gulf's chairman and another senior Gulf official acknowledged that Gulf had cooperated with the cartel. [New York Times]
- Prime Minister Adolfo Suarez's Union of the Democratic Center swept to victory in Spain's first free elections in 41 years, apparently winning close to half the seats in the lower house and being assured of firm control of the less powerful Senate. The distribution of Wednesday's heavy voting and a peculiar electoral law seemed to have provided the possible beginning of a two-party system. [New York Times]
- Leonid Brezhnev, the Communist Party chief, was elected president of the Soviet Union at the start of a two-day session of the Supreme Soviet, the nominal parliament. He is the first Soviet leader to combine both jobs. His elevation to the presidency was expected following the removal last month of the former President, Nikolai Podgorny. [New York Times]
- The Moscow correspondent of the Los Angeles Times who had undergone 13 hours of questioning about his sources for his science stories, was told by the authorities that he could leave the country. Robert Toth was near the end of a three-year assignment. He had been charged with gathering secret information. The White House and the State Department had intervened on his behalf. [New York Times]
- At least 11 blacks were wounded in the Johannesburg area when the police opened fire during disturbances that followed a demonstration in memory of the blacks killed and injured in rioting in Soweto a year ago. Before opening fire, the police had extensively been using tear gas. Soweto's police commissioner said the police had been forced to use their guns when they attempted to remove roadblocks in their way and were struck by stones. [New York Times]
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Stock Market Report
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 920.45 (+2.88, +0.31%)
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* |
| June 15, 1977 | 917.57 | 99.62 | 22.64 |
| June 14, 1977 | 922.57 | 99.86 | 25.39 |
| June 13, 1977 | 912.40 | 98.74 | 20.25 |
| June 10, 1977 | 910.79 | 98.46 | 20.63 |
| June 9, 1977 | 909.85 | 98.14 | 19.94 |
| June 8, 1977 | 912.99 | 98.20 | 22.20 |
| June 7, 1977 | 908.67 | 97.73 | 21.11 |
| June 6, 1977 | 903.07 | 97.23 | 18.93 |
| June 3, 1977 | 912.23 | 97.69 | 20.33 |
| June 2, 1977 | 903.15 | 96.74 | 18.62 |