IT'S WANTON MURDER

[Music] [Applause] [Music] standby 10 seconds 6:45 time for another session with America's foremost commentator on the world scene and now here is Lowell Thomas good evening everybody tonight I would like to take a few minutes from the news to read you a letter for although it tells of the personal experience of one person it describes a very frequent experience of many many others it's from the wife of a veteran who was discharged from the Army just three months ago dear mr. Thomas four years ago my husband wanted in the army all at once the newspaper headlines came to life the war from a thousand battlefront was tongue-twisting names put its foot inside my door or this was my husband the father of my child going off to fight be brave keep your chin up just words all I knew was the sheer agony of parting from the dearest thing in my life [Music] he went into the infantry of foot soldier like millions of others marching home by way of the rest of the world he was at Salerno were men who were his friends died men with children just as dear to them as our little girl is to him men who loved the Frankfurter at the ball game just as much as he men whose mothers and wives pray just as fervently as I they die but God was with him and he lived yes they died and he came through alive and song he was a casino where real flesh-and-blood men not just statistics traded their lives would have gone too small to hold their bodies and yet program and bullet and bayonet vied for the honor of killing him once again he came through four years of this four long years of this grim Cook's tour with every advance offering death still another chance all through those long 50 holidays and hundred a month I live in fear of hearing the doorbell rings reading that telegram the start a war department or grant but no the telegram never came the war ended and my husband was still alive almost before the impact of this miracle had dawned upon me he was home safe in my arms misery and the longing and the worry and the danger were all behind him he was home and he was safe there is nothing in this world that I wouldn't give or do mr. Thomas if this letter could end here a simple heartwarming story of happiness regain but life unfortunately has not always liked the movies and happy endings often turn out to be not endings at all but beginnings beginnings of sorrow and misery three months after my husband was discharged life was beginning to return to normal he had his old job back with the promise of even better things to come the baby who had become a little girl during his absence learn to love the man who was the photo on the piano come to life and I well I felt as though I had begun to live again as I look back now I can't remember just what I was thinking about that morning what to have for dinner all to have to be invitation to the class party but it doesn't matter where every plan and dream ended that morning at an intersection on the way to town my husband was in his car waiting for a light to change I'll never know whether he saw the man in the big sedan but even if he had there was no time to rest for this man speeded up to beat the light try to make a sharp right turn and crashed into it this man who killed my husband was trying to make a life trying to save one minutes worth of time imagine all the years of devotion and happiness together that we deserved and would have had all sacrificed and for what if during the war he had died fighting on some foreign sphere I might have found some consolation knowing he had helped achieve something he believed in but how can I feel realizing his life was traded for just 60 seconds of time it seems incomprehensible to me that a nation like ours which rose as one person to beat off the murderous attacks of fanatical madmen can allow this double-headed enemy of carelessness and criminal selfishness to continue its reckless destruction of lives and homes we can't sit idly by and say it was just an accident for it's not that at all mr. Thomas it's wanton murder during the four years that America was fighting for its life two hundred and twelve thousand men an average of fifty three thousand a year lost their lives now that the war is ended we think that terrible waste is over ah but that's an illusion the horrible slaughter continues this year alone traffic accidents will kill more than 40,000 living breathing human being imagine the entire population of Joplin Missouri or st. Petersburg Florida or Joliet Illinois wiped off the map then you have some idea of what this Holocaust means hundreds and hundreds of thousands of other healthy men women and children will be named cripples have their lives ruined because someone decided to take a chance or tried to save a minute [Music] accident statistics may seem small compared to the millions and billions that are lightly tossed around these days but remember these statistics mean lives lost people people who lived and loved and whose passing has left a void in the hearts of their dear ones that empty place at the dining room table the empty seat in the classroom the vacant desk in the office these things are just criminal waste for by far the largest number of our traffic accidents that takes such a heavy toll of our citizens are avoidable completely avoidable with just a little more care a little more consideration for the other fellow a little more common sense on the part of pedestrians as well as motorists and we could keep thousands of people healthy and well let's fight this menace with every ounce of our strength let's keep our loved ones at the dining room table let's keep those smiling faces at their school room desk let's allow our citizens to go on living useful healthy lives unless we all do our part a million and a half people one out of every hundred in this country will be killed or hurt this year remember accidents are not just things that happen to other people you may be next