News stories from Saturday December 6, 1975

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

The Senate early this morning voted 57 to 30 for a $2.3 billion federal loan authorization that New York City and state officials said will enable the city to avert default. In a display of bipartisan unity, 16 of the Senate's 38 Republicans joined 47 of the 62 Democrats to approve the measure. The vote followed a prolonged, sometimes bitter debate, during which a filibuster threatened by opposing conservatives was defeated by a vote of 70 to 27. [New York Times] In the first test of strength of liberal Democratic presidential candidates in New York state, Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana won the majority support of the New Democratic Coalition, but missed its endorsement by a hairline. He lost out to supporters of Fred Harris, the former Senator from Oklahoma, who doggedly continued to oppose Mr. Bayh even after Mr. Harris had lost any chance of getting the endorsement. The percentage vote on the sixth and final ballot at the coalition's meeting at Stuyvesant High School at First Avenue and 15th Street was: Senator Bayh, 59.94 percent; Mr. Harris, 30.21 percent, and 9.84 percent for no endorsement. The failure to endorse was interpreted by several politicians as a victory for Governor Carey and the Democratic state chairman, Patrick Cunningham, even though they had no role at the delegate assembly. [New York Times] Federal officials held an urgent inquiry into the second incident in 10 days in which two airliners came to within about 100 feet of a mid-air collision. They sought to determine if it was human error or trouble with traffic control equipment that put Boeing 727 jets in the same airspace as they crossed Lake Michigan Friday on flights to Chicago. The near-crash, following the even closer call of two jumbo jets over the Detroit area on Thanksgiving Eve, spread alarm throughout the industry. [New York Times] Federal agents are investigating suspected manipulation of United States shipping subsidies for shipments of grain in the Food for Peace program, a government source said. The shipping inquiry is a new phase in the current broad federal inquiry into corruption in the grain trade. [New York Times] Bitter fighting broke out between Christians and Moslems in Beirut today, and panic swept across the city as kidnappings and killings shattered a return to normality that had been building for more than a week. As word of the kidnappings spread, residents hurried to the safety of their homes, and some of those who were driving made U-turns or sped in reverse gear to avoid dangerous streets. In the afternoon, the government radio declared all city streets to be unsafe and urged residents to remain at home. The police estimated that more than 200 people had been kidnapped in different quarters of the city. The bodies of at least 44 persons -- believed to have been murdered -- had been dumped on empty streets and in alleys. Some accounts put the day's death toll at as high as 60. [New York Times] President Ford was to head homeward from the Pacific after having agreed with President Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines to discuss new terms for the use of major American air and naval bases there. Following a warm reception by about 100,000 Filipinos in Manila, the President was to stop in Honolulu, completing a 27,000-mile journey to China and along the southern arm of the Pacific. In remarks prepared for delivery in Hawaii, he called his trip a step toward construction of "a safer and saner world." [New York Times] The Dutch, long considered one of Europe's most liberal and self-confident people, are facing a bitter time of reckoning. Four days of kidnapping and killings by young East Asian terrorists have electrified the tight-knit country and raised questions about violence, racism and the colonial past. The terrorists, who seek independence for their South Molucca Islands, hold more than 50 hostages on a train and in the Indonesian consulate in Amsterdam. They increased their demands, and negotiations with authorities were deadlocked. [New York Times] Sweeping aside objections to its strict operating rules, the general assembly of the World Council of Churches elected, for the first lime, women, including an American, and a Russian as president. A last-minute Western attempt to agree on a challenger to the Soviet prelate failed at the assembly's meeting in Nairobi. The two women elected to the council's six-member presidium are an Appeals Court Justice of Ghana, Annie Baeta Jiagge, a Presbyterian, and Dr. Cynthia Wedel, a psychologist, of Alexandria, Va., an Episcopalian and former president of the National Council of Churches. "At last the council is really taking women seriously," Dr. Wedel said at a news conference. The Russian who will join the presidium is Metropolitan Nikodim, Orthodox Archbishop of Leningrad. [New York Times]