Muncie Post-Democrat, Muncie, Delaware County, 5 June 1931 — Page 2

FRIDAY, JUNE 5, 1931.

THE POST-DEMOCRAT A Democratic weekly newspaper representing the Democrats ot Mancie, Delaware County and the 8th Congressional District The only Democratic Newspaper in Delaware County. Entered as second class matter January 16. 1921, at the Postoffioc M Mancie, Indiana, under the Act of March S, 1879.

PRICK • CENTS—$2.00 A YEAR.

223 North Elm Avreet—Telephone 2540 CHARLES H. DALE, Publisher. Geo. R. Dale, Editor.

Muncie, Indiana, Friday, June 5, 1931.

Airways Nose Dive

stantly about high taxes should read the Governor’s boast with tears in their eyes. For when the governor’s tax board sliced the $100,000,000 from the tax duplicates they put that burden on the farmers and small taxpayers in the city. Real estate has a chance for relief every four years, and that’s the bulk of the farmer’s taxes, but the Republican industrialists, utilitarians and big taxpayers get annual relief and this year it certainly was most generous relief and the irony of it is that the relief was granted to the ones least needing it. Laugh that off you Republican farmers and get next to yourself.

lief from excessiv rates expected by the citizens of Indi-

ana.

P. S. This is the first time in years and years that a municipality got a break over a utility.

Continental Airways, Inc., which passed through and over Muncie enroute from Columbus, O., to Chicago, 111., did a nose dive and we henceworth shall miss the two planes a day which gracefully flew the route. Competition was assigned as the reason for the abandonment of the airways between these two important points, one the capitol of Ohio and the other the great metropolis along Lake Michigan. Muncie furnished a few. travelers for the airways, but it seems the air travel was not insufficient volume to justify the continuation of the line. Leading one to the conclusion that aviation hasn’t caught the fancy of the travelers out here in sufficient volume to make any money out of the operation of the ships. Officials of the airways pointed out that a competing line that included Columbus, Dayton in Ohio, Fort Wayne and South Bend in Indiana, and thence up to the loop took away the business between the larger centers and that of course deprived the Continental outfit of its principal

revenue.

Which all goes to show that even a highly developed and expensive airports along the route wouldn’t have helped the Continental passenger lists any. The Continental Airways, Inc., spent nearly $100,000 on hanger and equipment up at Chicago airport alone. Over at Columbus the route used the Columbus airport at a nominal rental basis. Aviation enthusiasts seem to think that the people will become air-minded through big structures, spectacular lighting equipment and the usual array of glitter, but these people will finally realize that it is paying passengers who spell the success or defeat of aviation business. Development of the Johnson-Muncie municipal airport) is being carried on commensurate with the situation. We don’t believe that a million dollar airport at Muncie would have brought the Continental Airways enough business to maintain their route at a profit and likewise we don’t believe that airport facilities here were any factor at all in ' the case for abandoning the airline. No doubt money will be made in aviation, the larger transcontinental companies seem with the aid of air mail to make the grade and scattered over the country are hundreds of one-plane operators engaged in taxi hops, sightseeing ventures and they are making a living at the job, providing their overhead is not too high. Muncie will be host to all All-Indiana air tour on June 19. The planes in the tour will land at the municipal field, according to the present plans, and tank wagons will convey gasoline and oil to the planes and the ships will be staked down for the night. No great amout of equipment is necessary for the conduct of an aviation field although you could sink as much money as is printed in a venture and still not create the desire to ride among the public. We have been fortunate in having Abbott Johnson present the city with the 160-acre airport site which is being developed into a flying field that will be outstanding in this section of the country. The administration feels that no extensive expenditure is warranted until the public takes to flying in greater numbers. ‘ Establishment of the Continental Airways here last January was viewed with much interest for with the equipment on the line and its route it was felt that Muncie people would have ample opportunity to demonstrate their desire for this type of travel. And quite a number of Muncie folks have used the airline, during the first two months there was an average of one passenger each three days out of Muncie. Some of these passengers, however, were trav- • eling men who use planes when available, but it is safe to say that nearly two score Muncie persons used the route. Forty Muncie people can’t be wrong, as the saying goes, but it has been the view of the administration that no great expenditure of public funds should be made when the use would be limited. Under the present tax rate devoted to aviation the Johnson-Muncie Municipal field is being gradually developed so that when the public demand arrives Muncie will be even ahead of it and no opportunity for the city will be lost by this policy. The Johnson-Muncie Municipal airport has been leveled, seeded, the drainage arranged and these important factors have been accomplished with only a comparatively small expenditure. Primarily a good landing field js tjie essential and this development has been done at the airport.

Economy or Show?

Harmonious G. 0. P., Oh Yeah! Manalcus Lankford, one of those rare birds, a Republican Congressman from Virginia, appealed over the radio the other day, to the South to come into the Republican party. The basis of his argument was two-fold. First, that it was highly advisable in the interest of democracy that there should be two strong parties everywhere in the United States, in order that merit of policies rather than sectional prejudices should influence elections. Naturally he made no reference to his ideal condition in respect to such States as Maine, Vermont and Iowa, for example. The second string to his lyre was that by joining the Republican party the Southerners would come into a happy family, one destitute of such disturbing controversies as, according to Mr. Lankford, divide the Democratic party. The touching harmony illustrated by the revolt of a third of the Republican delegation in the Senate against the administration, to say nothing of the surreptitious efforts by Robert H. Lucas, the Executive Director of the Republican National Committee, to prevent the return of Norris as Senator from Nebraska, must have occurred to everybody who heard the appeal. Of course, the conflict over prohibition was the particular thing at which Representative Lankford adroitly hinted. Of course, the wet East and the dry South are not in accord on this issue, but it is a curious idea that this division in sentiment is confined to the Democrats. Republican Pennsylvania and the dry Northwest, equally Republican, are as far apart on it as Democratic Massachusetts and Democratic Georgia. The New York Republicans are as vociferously wet as the Kansas Republicans are dry. The only difference between the two parties in regard to this controversy in that there is some movement among the Democrats to get an expression of opinion on the subject and to have a majority of the party fix its policy, while on the Republican side the whole strategy is to make their party appear wet in wet States and dry in dry States. On the economic side of things,, the Republicans suffer a division that has no parallel in the minority party. The farm revolt is based in a preponderant degree on the resentment of the agricultural sections of the country against the tariff policy which gives them nothing that adds to the return for their products while imposing extortionate exactions on everything they have to buy. The only harmony observable in the G. O. P. is their hope of retaining the government and their fear that they cannot do it with Mr. Hoover as their candidate in the face of the explosion of the issue based on the hypothesis that prosperity and a Republican administration always go hand

in hand.

Still Chuckling, Too!

When the people of Indiana swept the Democratic mayors into office two years ago they merely started the job of clean up the state to get some relief from the intolerable situation. Sly, slick Republican state gang politicians only chuckled for they had an ace in the hole and they began to use it this year. Next year the ace will be doubled, and redoubled and then again redoubled. For despite the loss of city governmental units the state Republican gang still had the vital spots in the state house the governor’s office, and the various subservient boards and commissions appointed by the chief executive. No wonder the state gang chuckled for what they had in mind has just been revealed by the Governor himself for he recently stated that the state tax board had lopped off $100,000,000 from the tax duplicates. In other words, through the state tax board the Republican state gang was able to slice the valuations of the utilities, batiks, corporations and large Republican tax payers to the tune of $100,000,000. Lopping off this $100,000,000 sounds fine. It sounds like economy, and boy it is economy for the Republican gang friends. For it means that on state tax alone these utilities, corporations and big taxpayers will save nearly S3 000,000 and taking it for all their taxes the sum would likely be up around the 815,000,000 to $20,000,000 mark. That’s some saving, we’d say if it went to the small taxpayer, but unfortunately it doesn’t and they must assume the burden of replacing this amount for the governmental expense. So you can see why the state Republican gang is still chuckling for they have reduced the tax valuation of every city in the state by at least a $1,00,000 or more per county and caused the Democratic city governments the necessity for unwarranted curtailment of city activities because of reduction of funds which will be available the coming year and for 1933 we can predict the results will be even more d^ohou^cbcL " ^ Hide bound Republican farmers who are crying con- 1

Approving of “the fact that President Hoover has seized upon the subject of economy and begun to exploit it in his public pronouncements, M the Baltimore Sun says: “The need, however, is for real and positive reduction and not for mere gestures that will impress the public without affecting the government’s balance sheet. It is seriously to be feared that the President, with an eye for the unfortunate effects of a tax increase on the eve of a national election, is more concerned with the gesture than he is with the actual figures. But # is possible that the great clouds of economy smoke that have been rising from the White House conceal a real flame of enthusiasm and determination. If so, Mr. Hoover has cut out for himself a task of surpassing difficulty and one that promises to put his now declining reputation as an organizer to a superlative test. “The accomplishment of this purpose,’’ the Sun says, “would be equivalent to the reorganization of the governmental departments for which President Hoover was formerly said to have so much aptitude. . . . “His whole record in dealing with big problems tends, on the contrary, to create the impression that he approaches them with a flourish far more spectacular than effective. Will he do better in his widely trumpted campaign for economy? A public, grown skeptical with repeated disappointments but still willing to be convinced, will await the answer to this question with a concern heightened by the pecuniary stake which it involves.”

it as a confession that he has abandoned hope for a Hoover second term.

Tax Increase Fiasco

Indianapolis Wins

When the United States Supreme Court very recently refused to review an appealed case designed to prevent the City of Indianapolis from taking possession of the Citizens Gas Company under provisions of a franchise granted twen-ty-five years ago this victory was looked upon as an opening that might nullify the indeterminate franchise law of the state and restore utility control to the municipalities. The back ground of the case is that twenty-five years ago in a fight against excessive rates a group of citizens in Indianapolis organized the Citizens Gas Company and obtained a franchise to supply gas in competition v/ith the old Indianapolis Gas Company which was in business at that time. In obtaining the franchise the public spirited citizens included a clause that the property of the Citizens Gas Company would pass onto the city after a period of twenty-five years and the city would pay the outstanding indebtedness and take possession. Last year the twenty-five year period ended and the City of Indianapolis began proceedings to acquire the gas property under terms of the franchise. Owners of stock of the gas company, however, went into court and protested the acquisition claiming that with the passage of the indeterminate franchise law about fifteen years ago the Citizens Gas Company franchise was surrendered, to the public service commission in exchange for the indeterminate franchise. Surrender of the franchise, was viewed by the present owmers as precluding the original franchise requirement, hence the City of Indianapolis could not acquire the gas property under the original franchise terms. The property in the twenty-five years had become exceedingly valuable and the present stockholders w T ere anxious to retain this gold mine for themselves, instead of passing on the benefits to all the citizens of Indianapolis. Three Federal Court judges hearing the case decided in favor of the City of Indianapolis and their ruling indicated that the original franchise was not superceded by the indeterminate franchise law of the state of Indiana. IJt was this finding that the stockholders appealed to the f nited States Supreme Court and the refusal of the court t(J Review the case in effect sustains the finding of the Fedo*** 1 Court. Likewise the refusal has in effect the interpretation that original franchises were not superceded by the state indeterminate franchise law. Municipal legal authorities are studying the case in view toward possible litigation that w’ould restore municipal control of utilities instead of state control as expressed in the public service commission. Utilities several years ago were able to get written on the statute books of Indiana the law which permitted the surrender of local franchises in exchange for an indeterminate franchise from the public service commission. This move relieved the municipalities from rate control and placed that function with the public service commission. History of the operation of that law has been the everincreasing utility rates to the peak point of the present which in a time of depression permitted the utilities of the state to charge rates that earned excessive dividends, as high as thirty-two percent in the case of the Muncie Water Company in 1930. Other utilities shared the good fortune and figures recently released showed that utilities dividends were increasing year by year despite the hard times that had reduced earnings of manufacturers and commercial enterP Restoration ^ rate con t ro l to the municipalities would undoubtedly be followed by rate reductions so that utilities would not be permitted to charge rates which provided excessive earnings. When this home rule was taken from the people they sacrificed their control of the local utilities and s'ince that time there has ben considrabl dissatisfaction over state public service commission control which has resulted in ever-increasing rates insteal of re-

Two Red Scares

The red scares confront the Hoover administration. One is the ever-constant harping on the wicked old Soviets trying to decapitalize the nation. And the other is the Andy Mellon deficit of already al-

most a billion dollars.

The latter, just now, seems to bother the administration more than anything else and Hoover’s week-ends have been spent recently in trying to get Andy out of the RED before the coming elections next year. Slashing right and left, the national administration seems determined to in a few months gain back what it has taken several years to accumulate. Much interest is being created in the Hoover administration’s attempt to reduce

the latest RED SCARE.

Andy has ceased his predicting and estimating and is hoping for the best, although not so long ago he announced that near $200,000,000 was available for tax refunds to corporations and big taxpayers. Congress, it seems, appropriated near $100,000,000 to reimburse the big boys at the recent session and a similar amount had accumulated from various operations of this sort so the echoes of 1926-28 will be heard by the corporations as this two hundred million

mellon is prepared for the feast.

Taxing the corporations and big tax payers seems so much guess work that these unfortunates are usually called upon to divulge more dough than is later decided was needed by the government, so the overdraft then is refunded much to the glee of the politicians who can help their friends and the corporations and big tax payers who get the mil lions returned to them. • * Each succeeding year, it appears, a new officer interprets the revenue laws different than his predecessor and consequently the money obtained in the boom and inflated period must be returned. And it is highly appreciated by the corporations and big tax payers who are recipients of these favors. Then, too, the politicians get an opportunity to do their daily good turn for the corporations and rich

citizens by getting back some of the dough.

So everyone seems pleaed. That is, everyone who participated in it. To the average man it would seem good policy to appl ythis surplus on the present deficit rather than hand it back to just a few persons and corporations who don’t particularly have to miss a meal if they don t get the dough. But alos, Republican administration leaders are not thinking in that line. q.™

Stimulation of business as exemplified m the $500,

000 000 swag for the big farmers through the Federal farm board and the recent hundreds of millions advanced to World war service men brought the principal part of the billion dollar deficit without the expected relief to agriculture as a whole and business in general. The Republican party’s attempts to create business seems to have dismally faile don all fronts and we must expect to pay the cost.

Doubts and Indecisions

Politically, no less than in his governmental habit of mind, President Hoover appears to be beset by doubts and plagued by indecision. - J , Commentators on politics have been devoting a good deal of their attention to the question of who will be Mr Hoover’s running mate in 1932. Of course, the choice will be entirely in accordance with Mr. Hoover’s desires, as nearly as the Republican Convention is able to ascertain them or to gratify them. In such an election as that of the next year reluctance on the part of high cailbre men to take the second place on the Republican ticket will be a factor. Indeed, the dubiousness of the prospects of the Republican ticket next year is equally an element in Mr. Hoover’s uncertainty and the statements attributed to Vice President Curtis that his mind is not made up yet as to whether he cares to be a candidate for a second term in the highly orn-

amental office he now occupies.

Should Mr. Curtis run again, an appalling fate for a gentleman who for forty-six years has occupied public office. He took no risk of this sort when he ran with Mr. Hoover in 1928, for he was still United States Senator and, if that election had been lost he would have gone on being a Senator until 1933. It is doubtful if the Vice Presidency is not just as attractive to him now as it was when he was Senator and the presumption is inevitable that, if he thought the Republican national prospects were promising, he would be glad to continue where he is. The alternative he is represented as considering is to again run for the Senatorship from Kansas, on the theory that the prospects are better there. Even Kansas is no longer a certainty, for a Democrat now occupies the seat Mr. Curtis vacated the day before he was inaugurated as Vice President. However, it is probably true that Mr. Curtis would have a better chance of election as Senator from Kansas than Mr. Hoover has for re-election as President. When as cold-nosed a politician as our Vice President is revolving in his own mind such a question as this, few people will doubt that this decision will be based on the consideration of which course is best for Charles Curtis. Moreover, the significance of his dilemma must be apparent to everybody inclined to place faith in an expert’s prophecy of a political trend. The circumstance that Mr. Curtis is weighing the question is in itself definite evidence that even in the heart of this stalwart Republican there is not much hope of the G. O. P. winning the next Presidential election. Should he definitely decide to go after the Senatorship again, the country generally will interpret

Commenting upon the question of whether or not there will be an administration proposal for tax increases in the next Congress, the Baltimore Sun finds in the speeches of Secretary Mellon and Under-Secretary Mills “what appears to be a growing divergence of opinion between these gentlemen and President Hoover.” Pointing out that neither of the Treasury spokesmen made it clear whether the Treasury is actively considering the question of a tax increase to meet the deficit, the Sun adds: “But if the Treasury is really studying the advisability of a tax increase, it is running counter to the public professions of President Hoover.”

The Sun continues:

“No longer ago than March 31 he (the President) authorized the announcement that there would be no increase in taxes unless the next Congress appropriated more money than the Administration recommends in the annual budget estimate. This Presidential statement was flat and unequivocal. It seemed then and it seems now to indicate that Mr. Hoover is against any increase in Federal levies before the elections of 1932. Is it possible that Mr. Mellon and Mr. Mills see a different picture from the one at which the President looked in reaching his decision of March 31 ? And is it possible that they are preparing to urged a course at variance with the one upon which the President so con-

fidently embarked two months ago?

“The friend of the Administration who undertakes to harmonize these apparent differences between the “best minds” ought also to put a bug in Mr. Mellon’s ear about the practicability of a Gederal gasoline levy. In even allowing it to be known that such a tax is being considered, the Treasury Department shows a degree of political and fiscal inepitude not at all in keeping with the supposed ability of “the greatest Secretary of the Treasury since Hamilton.’ The States have already appropriated the gasoline tax to their own uses, and their primary responsibilities in the matter of road building bring the levy peculiarly and definitely with-

in their province.”

The Sun therefore concludes that “it would be inexpedient from the standpoint of public policy and dismally stupid from the standpoint of political strategy for the Federal Government to attempt to invade this field.”

Where Farmers Sing There’s at least one group of American farmers who still can sing, “A farmer’s life for mine!” This cheerful fact is recalled by receipt of a $600,000 check by the United States reclamation service from its first and most successful project, the Salt River valley project in Arizona. These 7,500 Arizona farmers owe Uncle Sam $3,000,000, which will be paid off in twenty years. Then, unless unforseen things happen, they will own outright the great Roosevelt dam, four other power dams, canals, pumping plants and their own 235,000 acres of citrus and winter vegetable land. In twenty years they not only will have free water and power, but they will get their monthly dividend checks from the sale of surplus power to nearby towns and mines. Salt River valley is typical of the twenty-seven reclamation service settlements. From the sale of public lands, the government started this great pioneering movement in 1910. The only money ever appropriated by congress for this purpose has been returned—$20,000,000. And in one generation there have been added taxable values to the nation of a half bilfion dollars, 2,000,000 acres of wealth-producing land where once was desert, fifty power plants earning $1,000,000 a year, cities, towns, prosperity and contentment. These projects are paying up their debts in spite of depression and overproduction. Of course, it’s all paternalistic. It’s the very opposite of Mr. Hoover’s “rugged individualism.” It is governmental encouragement to public ownership of power. But it works. And it is to be noted that, apparently with the President’s consent, the latest, biggest and most sensational of these governmental power dams has been christened by Secretary Wilbur “the Hoover dam.”

MANY GIVEN AID

Jeffersonville Ind.—(UP)— Relief workers during the last 25 weeks have given aid to an average of 500 persons weekly, a report issued here revealed. Five thousand bushels of food were distributed, 4,000 tons of wood given poor families. The work cost $13,112.25, of which $11,184.42 was collected on pledges.

CLYDE MONEY GIVES BOND

Clyde Money has appeared in

sum of $500 in connection with an indictment returned by the recent grand jury. He Is alleged to have sold intoxicating liquor. Sureties on the bond were his wife, Edith Money and Rollo Betz.

KILLS LARGEST RATTLER

open court and given bond in the‘ed 30 pounds

Clarsdale, Miss., (U.P.) — The largest rattlesnake killed here in several years was found on the farm of Henry Fontaine. It measured six feet long, four inches around, had Ift rattles and weigh-

EHEY’RE AT IT AGAIN! Those two cockeyed Marines . . . fighting, chiseling for each other’s dames! East, West, North, South, they love them all—and show you a new kind of “art!” Victor McLaglen AND Edmund Lowe

“WOMEN OF ALL NATIONS’’

WITH

El Brendel Greta Nissen RIV0LI

SUNDAY Mon. - Toes.