Indianapolis Times, Volume 40, Number 249, Indianapolis, Marion County, 7 March 1929 — Page 4

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SCKtPPJ-HOWAAO

The Way Clear With the passage of two laws asked by the special attorneys for the city, the way now should be cleared for the speedy taking over of the gas plant in behalf of the citizens. The trustees of the company, its directors and the city government are agreed that the plant belongs to the city as a whole. Under the farsighted and public-spirited contract and franchise, the city has the light to take over the plant by paying the original purchase price of the stock. Due to the great growth of the city and wise management of the company, the utility is worth many more millions than it was when the franchise was granted. In the meantime the investors in the stock have received a high rate of interest to compensate them for any speculative increases in value. With an apparent agreement as to the right and justice of the situation, there remains only the inevitable contest with the few who have speculated on the off chance that some court may interfere and prevent the people from obtaining what belongs to them. They gambled on the general theory that the people always lose and that courts, jealous of vested interests and private property, will find some undotted i or uncrossed t in the proceedings that will permit them to reap huge profits from their gamble. If there is to be a legal battle, the sooner it begins the better. The rights of the people should be asserted promptly and without delay. An advertisement to the nation that this city is progressive enough to own a utility plant that offers cheap fuel would be the most attractive to industries seeking new locations and to ambitious men who want to live where opportunity beckons loudest.

Laws and Laws "Our whole system of self-government will crumble either if officials elect what laws they will enforce or citizens elect what laws they will support,” President Hoover remarked during his inaugural address. He was discussing prohibition. "The worst evil or disregard for some law is that it destroys respect for all law,” he added. Hoover might have gone on to say that the surest way to increase the disrespect for law among citizens is to permit lawless officers to trample on their rights. Prohibition officers, for instance, "elect” to enforce constitutional prohibition, but in so doing they violate the constitutional guarantees against unwarranted search and seizure and other private rights. They “disregard” one law in their zeal for another. Activities of prohibition officers in Baltimore recently provide an example. They have, according to Swspaper stories, smashed their way into numerous ices suspected of selling liquor, without warrant, when they have been unable to get evidence on which to base warrants. Having entered illegally, they have laid to with axes and smashed the furnishings, wholly without f legal justification. Published pictures show how thoroughly they have wrecked several places. It is small wonder that a citizen of Baltimore, witnessing these episodes, would be inclined to disrespect law. The people of Maryland do not want prohibition, but they have since the beginning been extremely jealous of their private rights—rights just as legal and constitutional as prohibition—and they always have tried to defend them. Hoover is appealing to the public to support law. His appeal will be all the more effective if federal agents themselves are made to do likewise. Comfort for Sluggards Mr. Coolidge has at least one weakness in common with the rest of us, we are pleased to learn. "The greatest thing about not being President is that I do not have to get up at 8 o’clock in the morning and read and dictate all day,” he told the United Press. Those of us who abhor alarm clocks now will feel less guilty. All sluggards, which is most of us, will be grateful to Mr. Coolidge.

President and Press President Hoover, on his first day in office, indicated his purpose to reform that little understood, but most important institution, the White House press conference. The problem of presidential press relations is far greater than the technical interests of newspapers or the publicity interests of the White House. It goes to the heart of informed public opinion, upon which all other democratic institutions depend. The problem is not an easy one. Probably no perfect solution will be found. But it is high time that reforms be attempted. The Coolidge system protected the President at the expense of both press and public. It tended to encourage the President to use the entire press of the country as his personal propaganda media without taking responsibility for that propaganda. And the system was so rigged that the press virtually was forced to forego its customary protection of the public pmd to print at time3 inspired and questionable propaganda on its own responsibility, instead of revealing the real source. Coolidge talked to the correspondents at length in regular semi-weekly conferences, but only at rare intervals were they permitted to quote the President, even indirectly. Finally, Coolidge even prohibited the use of such terms as “the'White House spokesman,” which the correspondents were using in fairness to themselves and to the public, to indicate their authority for the story. That Hoover understands clearly the nature of the difficulty and his responsibility to the public for perfecting a more honest system-is indicated by his statement at his first White House press conference. That statement, by the way, was carried by the press under Hoover quotation marks with his permission, while Coolidge never permitted quotation of what he said on this subject. “I am anxious,” Hoover said, “to clear up thp twilight zone as far as we can between authoritative and quotable material on one hard, and such material as I air able to give from time to time for purely background purposes on the other.” He proposes to work out an improved system in direct consultation with officers of the White House correspondents and of the Washington news bureaus. Certainly that is the fair and effective way to go about it. £ |lf Hoover was responsible for the official regula-

The Indianapolis Times (A SCKII'I’S- HO VV AKD NEWSFAI'EK) Owned aud published dally (except Sunday> by The Indlarapolls Times Publishing Cos 214-220 W Maryland Street. Indianapolis. Ind Price In Marion County " 2 cents—lo cents a week: elsewhere. 3 cents—l 2 cents a week. BOYD GURLEY. BOY W HOWARD. B’KANK G. MORRISON. Editor. President Business Manager. PHONE— RILEY 555 L THURSDAY. MARCH 7. 1929. Member of United Press, Scripps Howard Newspaper Alliance, Newspaper Enterprise Association. Newspaper Information Service and Audit Bureau of Circulations. “Give Light and the People Will B'ind Their Own Way.”

tion of news dispatches by his subordinates aboard ship during his recent i-atin-American tour, his latest statement to the White House correspondents is welcome evidence that past mistakes are not to be repeated. A:id that is to the interest of Hoover, as well a' to the public served by the press. Mexican Rebellion The Mexican revolt r; a serious blow to the hopes and plans of liberal leaders in that country for a peaceful and permanent transition from military to popular government. It is a disappointment to the friends of Mexico in the United States and elsewhere, who dared believe that the sou-hern republic was emerging from the vicious circle of “personal” revolutions. Former President Calles has filled, apparently, in his heroic and unselfish efforts to lead his land toward the peace and prosperity of civilian government. Last September he renounced another presidential term, which was within his grasp, with the admonition that the time had come for Mexico to stop relying on “strong men” and begin relying on herself. With Obregon assassinated and Calles in retirement, the civilian Gil took office as provisional president for one year pending general elections. That transfer of power was peaceful and the world lr joiced with Mexico over this progress. But the old method of attaining power by bullets instead of ballots has been resorted to again. Half a dozen generals in as many states aip leading the revolt, which so far is distinctly a military rebellion, rather than a revolution of he people. Though some of the rebel generals are reported trying to take advantage of the Catholic opposition to the laws and constitutional provisions regulating churches and clergy, this does not appear to be a socalled religious revolution. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the Mexican situation may be, and whatever the outcome of this latest revolution, it has increased the probability of disguised or open dictatorship as the method of government in that country for another decade, and it has postponed the economic and financial reconstruction so sorely needed. Under the circumstances Mex io is fortunate in being able to fall back upon a leader of the proved ability and unselfishness of Calles, who has been summoned out of retirement by Gil to command the federal armies and restore order. And both Mexico and the United States are fortunate that there is today a Morrow rather than a Sheffield in the American embassy in Mexico City. Within the last year the United States has demonstrated its friendship for the Mexican government. There is every reason to believe that this enlightened policy will be continued in Mexico’s hour of need. That in itself will do much to discourage the Mexican counter-revolutions, who too often in the past have received financial aid from American business interests and moral aid from American officials. The use of mechanical men as waiters is predicted. What a blow to the f allow who has learned through correspondence school to talk to the waiter in French! In “Dynamo,” one of the new plays in New York, a young man makes electricity his god. But most of the big butter and egg mtn from the west, will want something a little more shocking than that. During the trial of the $500,000 lawsuit against Sir Joseph Duveen on charges of slandering the painting, “La Belle Ferronniere,” the subject was placed under the X-ray. Probably it will be decided she’ll have to have her tonsils out. An important bulletin from Harvard college observatory just reaches us, treating of the Coma Virgo Galaxies. It doesn’t say anything about scenery by Urban, so it mustn’t be a Ziegfeld show.

David Dietz on Science —...... „ Last Century’s View - No. 297

SIR ISAAC NEWTON’S law of universal gravitation Was satisfactory for the explanation of motion and other mechanical phenomena. But with the discovery of electrical phenomena, it became apparent that his law. would not apply to them. C. A. Coulomb, who lived from 1736 to 1806, showed that magnetic poles attracted or repelled e'ach other

others. But during the nineteenth century, physicists considered that there was a fundamental difference between matter and electricity. Matter of the ordinary sort was called ponderable matter, that is, matter which possessed mass or weight. Electricity was considered as a sort of imponderable matter, matter which lacked mass or weight. Newton’s law of gravitation was accepted as the explanation for the phenomena of ponderable matter, while Coulomb's law was accepted as the explanation of electrical phenomena. Two things are worth pointing out at this stage, things which made it inevitable that some day a theory like Einstein’s new theory of gravitation would have to be evolved. One was the obvious similarity between gravitational and electrical phenomena insofar as both obeyed the law of inverse squares, that is. decreasing in proportion to the square of the distance. The other was the fact that on the basis of the two sets of laws, there was no satisfactory explanation of the interaction between matter and electrical forces. A third difficulty was soon to arise. It consisted in the nature of light. Incidentally, that difficulty is by no means settled. Newton regarded light as consisting of minute particles or bullets shot through space. These particles were called corpuscles and the theory was known as the corpuscular theory of light. But this introduced a third difficulty. The speed of light is always constant. There was no satisfactory explanation for this. But stil more difficulties were to ensue with the wave theory of light. We will discuss this next. *

M. E. TRACY SAYS: “This Mexican Revolution Is Not a Popullar Uprising in Any Sense of the Word, but a, Military Revolt.”

TJ'L PASO, March 7.—Being here with a Mexican revolt in progress is even better than occupying a ringside seat at the circus. One gets not only a closeup of the performance from in front, but a lot of lowdown as to what is going on backstage, some of it pretty low. Locally, the situation is one of rumor and guess work, with comparatively unimprtant names and places claiming the spotlight. Such and such a town has been captured, or gone over to the rebels, one learns; such and such a general has revolted; such and such a garrison remains loyal; such and such an emissary is trying to negotiate” with such and such a commander. The governor of Chihuahua calls up by long distance telephone to say he has decided to join the rebellion; the commandant at Juarez calls up to sa. that he will stick by Portes Gil; someone else calls up to say that revolutionary agents are in town, and so it goes. tt tt n Military Uprising AS the atmosphere clears, one is able to get something of a line on this latest and most unexpected upheaval. In the first place, it is not a popular uprising in any sense of the word, but a military revolt. Civilians have had no hand in it. It obviously was conceived within the army, and just as obviously has for its aim the establishment of an administration at Mexico City which the army can control. The secrecy with which it was planned, the precision with which it has moved and, above all else, the peculiar kind of strategy it is pursuing, identfy this revolt as born of gold braid and brass buttons. Thus far, no one has called for rebellion, except officers of the regular army, and' few have rallied to the call, except regularly enlisted troops. It quite commonly is believed that the revolutionary leaders would restore the church and throttle organized labor if victorious, but that they would do this to gain popular favor, rather than as a well considered policy., tt tt tt Rubio for President W' HATEVER else may be thought of it General Jesus M. Aguirre’s statement, as given the United Press, leaves little doubt as to what is really back of the commotion. “The reasons for it,” he says, “are the open and insulting methods by which Plutarco Elias Calles and Emilio Portes Gil are trying to impose Pascual Ortiz Rubio ont he people as president.” In this connection it will be remembered that Portes Gil is serving as ad interim president in place of General Alvaro Obregon, who was assasinateci just after being elected, and vl at he was chosen to act as such fc/ the Mexican congress. It also will be remembered that a convention of the revolutionary party recently was held for the purpose of nominating a presidential candidate, that Rubio and Aaron Saenz were the chief contenders, and that Saenz bolted because as he claimed, delegates favoring his opponent had illegaly been enrolled!

Recall Huerta Fate LAST November, and while Calles was still president, so the story goes, seven generals called on him with the demand that he have Perez Trevino, also a general, named as his successor. Os those seven generals at least five are taking prominent parts in the rebellion, while one, Escobar, is its accepted shies. Rubio, whom Aguirre says the rebellion is designed to prevent from becoming president, is an engineer, a former ambassador to Germany and Brazil and a recognized leader of the Liberal party, but not a military man. Putting two and two together, the conclusion seems inescapable that this is not only a military revolt, but one which has military rule for its immediate objective. One naturally recalls the unhappy fate of Victoriano Huerta, whom the late President Wilson drove from power on the ground that he represented military rule and that the United States would not stand for military rule in Mexico. #OO Was Wilson Right? WAS Wilson right? For one, I never have thought so, have never considered this government’s business, or duty, to boss Mexican* politics. But the present situation involves more than that. After Wilson and Huerta came Coolidge and Calles, with the development of a policy intended to assist the regularly constituted government of Mexico and discourage revolution. Now as between a military faction which goes forth to dominate politics by force of arms and a provisional president elected by congress, according to provisions of the Constitution, which comes nearer the type of government we favor? Putting that aside, which promises more for the liberal, progressive movement in Mexico? The fact that this revolt has assumed formidable proportions should have little to do with our attitude. Principles deserve consideration, as well as strength. DAILY THOUGHTS When pride cometh, then cometh shame; bat with the lowly is wisdom. —Prov. 11:2. "ITTHEN pride and presumption VV walk before, shame and loss follow very closely.—Louis XL

with forces which were inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. Other developments in the understanding of magnetism and electricity were made by a group of experimenters who were contemporary with Coulomb or lived shortly after him. The group included Gaus, Volta, Ampere and

THE XXDIANAPOLIS TIMES

WE see where the prince of Wales has sold all his horses, and we don’t bame him, after all they have done to him, for he’s been thrown more frequently than Bryan ever was as a presidential candidate. But what we started to say is that we wish the prince might have known a real horse, the one we used to have. tt tt m He had more vinegar than all the horses that ever loafed in all the royal stables of Europe, and we feel quite confident he would have impressed his individuality upon the prince. He surpassed Mary Garden in temperament and he could run like Hoover. He worked when he felt like it, but coaid not be derricked out of moments of profound meditation. tt tt tt If ve could bring this horse back from equestrian paradise and bring the prince to our beloved land, we would give our note for SSO to see him endeavor to entice a journey de luxe out of that stern individualist when he had dedicated the moment to reverie. For he was no respecter of of persons! u u tt He was a great admirer of Thomas Jefferson and held firmly

BY DR. MORRIS FISHBEIN Editor Journal of the American Medical Association and of Hygeia, the Health Magazine. MAN does not live by any single article of diet alone. If he is wise, he eats a variety of substances. He knows that the fundamentals of a wholesome diet include fresh

fruits and vegetables and that a well balanced diet contains proteins, carbohydrates and mineral salts. Such things can be had in meats, eggs, milk, cereals, sugars, butter, oils and many other food substances.

“ idOAVi-IB THe“ /Will VUCUMIV i AN AMERICAN DEFEAT March 7 TODAY is the anniversary of a disastrous naval battle of the Revolution. It was fought just 152 years ago today in West Indian waters, between the 64-gun Yarmouth of the British navy and the comparatively puny 32-gun American frigate Randolph, one of the thirteen frigates built by the continental congress. The battle lasted just an hour. It came to a tragic end when a shot from the Yarmouth exploded in the Randolph’s powder magazine and blew her to fragment-;. Only four of the frigate’s crew of 315 men were found alive. British casualties were slight. The engagement was discouraging to the American cause, particularly because it was only one of a series of crushing defeats which the British navy was inflicting upon American ships. The one cause for satisfaction at the time was John Paul Jones' accomplishments in British waters. With the Ranger, the first American ship to fly the Stars and Stripes, Jones was circling the British isles and winning a large part of his reputation as a skillful and intrepid seaman.

After All, He's the One Who’ll Use ’Em!

. w/apiL— l msso*

Reason

Find ’No Relationship of Diet to Cancer

Q. —Does excess fat tend to make a person less efficient? A.—Yes. Excess fat represents just so much extra burden to be carried about and so much extra tissue involved in the human metabolism.

*Sb& Taj#' '

m m By Frederick LANDIS

to the doctrine of absolute equality; in fact, his turbulent dissent led one to th 6 conclusion that he regarded a creature with only two legs as but half as important as one with four. He resented harness at all times and had he lived in Wisconsin would have been an ardent champion of La Foliette. tt tt tt It was impossible to saddle him without the most delicate negotiations and when he reconsidered after one had mounted him, it was an event long to be remembered. He looped the loop, went into nose dives and tall spins, until he stood once more unhampered, unfettered. it tt tt If you stood before his* manger and laughed at him, his bristles rose like a porcupine and in his eye flashed imperial wrath. But when you made suitable apology and came with incense he relented. We are sure the prince would have

DAILY HEALTH SERVICE

One of the ideas most promoted by food faddists of one type or another is the notion that the eating of any special food substances may be the cause of cancer and that abstinence from some single article of diet will prevent cancer. In Great Britain research has been undertaken during the last year to find out whether there was any connection between cancer and deficiencies in the diet. A number of well controlled experiments were made with the feeding of vitamins A and B and with diets deficient in these vitamins. However, cancer did not develop in any of the rats used in these experiments. Dr. J. A. Murray, directpr of the imperial cancer research fund, concludes that there exists no trustworthy evidence, experimental, clinical or statistical, of a casual rela- | tionship between cancer and the absence or presence of excess of any j particular constituent of the human j diet.

Times Readers Voice Views

The soldiers’ bonus bill having been killed in the legislature, no further letters on this subject will be printed at this time. Editor Times—l have been a standholder at city market for more than thirty-five years and have trea- ed customers fair and square. It makes no difference where I am put or where I have my stand, my customers hunt me up. Life is not very pleasant, when one has to work on the outside in all kinds of weather, but if a person makes a living he is satisfied. This is true in my case and with hundreds of others who stand on the outside of the city market. The public is in favor of us standing there because they can buy cheaper from us than the; can near home. I have stood on Delaware street for years and years. Even the business men on Delaware street and vicinity would like to have us back again. We have at the present time one of the best market masters we ever have had, Harry Springsteen. Other cities of our size, and bigger, have markets on city streets and in the heart of the business districts. As everyone knows there is much unemployment now, so why not let us make a living in an honest way? As we all know, there are a few undesirables who staifd on the city

WE WISH THE PRINCE m a COULD HAVE KNOWN THAT HORSE OF OURS

found in him at such times a remarkable likeness to an ordinary debate in the house of commons. tt He could kick like Jim Reed. We recall that far-off day when we went to Deer Creek to attend a birthday party, driving this horse and the old mare, our motive power being co-educational. We hitched the mare between two strange horses and they at once assumed the aggressive, whereupon we took her out and inserted old Hotstuff. In, fifteen seconds he had kicked the liver, lights and gizzard out of the opposition and for his peroration kicked all the boards loose. tt tt tt His love of home was most pronounced when you tried to drive him to the buggy; you had to beat him to start him; his carburetor seemed to be flooded with gas, but when you turned round and started toward home he put his ears down and you couldn’t hold him any more than you could bridle a cyclone! But once back at his old fireside he would chew his fodder fine and be as silent as Coolidge. Yes, we are sorry the prince never met that horse.

It has been shown that the absence of (ertain vitamins from the diet will result in the appearance of various alarming symptoms and that vast overdoses of some vitamins may have toxic or poisoning effects. However, the poisonous doses are apparently far beyond any quantity that one might get in an ordinary diet. Hardly enough has yet been learned to make positive statements or to give definite advice as to the quantities of vitamins to be taken by different persons under different circumstances. Enough is known to say that no definite relationship has been established between vitamin intake and cancer. This announcement will not, however, affect in any way the claims of the food fanatics or food culturists. They are not interested in facts; they are salesmen of propaganda.

market who should be weeded out, but on account of these few undesirables all of us should not be condemned. I really think that the public should take a hand in this and I know that I could get thousands of names of customers who patronize our market to continue standing along Delaware street, as has been the custom for years. Our city administration is wonderful for the first time in years. I hope this will be looked into by our honorable mayor, I. Ert Slack, and our county commissioners and a few who have our interest at heart, especially the public. MARKET’S FAT MAN. Editor Times—l see in your paper that the assessors are very much worried about assessing the poor dog, because the taxes are so high. I, for one, think it is a shame to put such a high tax on dogs. / ost everyone loves a dog. and many small boys and girls will be forced to give up their best friends just because it is tax-paying time. Many poor dogs will be beaten and driven away from good homes because the owners cannot afiord to pay taxes for them. It seems to me some adjustment in dog taxes should be made. E. A.

.MARCH 7.1929

IT SEEMS TO ME tt a By HEYWOOD BROUN

Idea* an cipinion* C 1 • oreued ID this column a r those of one of A m erica's most loterestIni writer and are oresell ted w H hout retard to their atreeroent with the editorial attitude of this caper. The Editor.

“'T'HE fifteenth amendment of i the United States Constitution: "1: The right of the citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. “2: The congress shall have power to enforce the provision of this article by appropriate legislation." It is interesting, and perhaps a little ironic, to note that the first citizen to be tried under the Jones bill is a Negro. A Ne§ro must face the possibility of five years in jail because he is accused of violating the eighteenth amendment. If convicted, the court will endeavor to show him that the Constitution of the United States means precisely what it says and must be enforced. And yet, even if he does serve five years in jail, ruminating all the while, I wonder if he will not have the right when he gets out to remain a trifle puzzled. And I wonder if President Hoover had each and every constitutional provision ip mind when he said in his inaugural address: “Our whole system of self-government will crumble either if officials elect what laws they will enforce or citizens elect what laws they will support.” tt tt a Why Doesn't It? WHY doesn’t it crumble? Again and again the assertion has been various public men that civilization will crumble unless there is complete and literal enforcement of all the laws. But Hoover is a man of scientific training and when he makes such an assertion, he should back it up with competent evidence. There is no lack of laboratory data. The question need not rest upon a mere matter of opinion. Specifically the congress is making at the present time no effort whatsoever to enforce the provisions of the fifteenth amendment. To some extent, the disfranchisement of the Negro in the South has been accomplished by tricky legalisms, but Hoover is a man of too broad a mind to deny that at the very least the spirit of the Constitution has been violated. I do not expect to find Hoover asking congress to force the south against its will. Ido not even want to see him take any such action. And, by coincidence, he will do no such thing. But this poor columnist is at least logical, wherfc the great scientist and humanitarian who sits in the White House sits out on a limb with no friendly branch of reason which he can grasp for support. I think it is an evil thing that millions of American citizens should be deprived of the franchise because they are black. tt tt tt Mistake F)OLITICAL equality between A whites and blacks in the south can come only after a long period of education. I mean education for both races. The fifteenth amendment represented a common mistake of all self-governing communities. It was an endeavor to right a wrong by making a law, or to be more precise, a constitutional provision. But evils are never righted merely through the legerdemain of law.

Reforms come ultimately out of the heart of man. No dragon ever has been slain with a golden pen. And so the law should walk slowly and never parade beside the bandwagon at the head of the procession. Even a well-established majority has no right to tramp with hobnails over the beliefs ql the minority. Certainly there are millions of Americans who do not believe that it is a sin to drink. No nation ever succeeded in making an act a sin merely by setting it down as a crime. Let Hoover look into the history of all nations and he will find that he got both feet off all available evidence in his inaugural address. "Our whole system of self-govern-ment will crumble either if officials elect what laws they will enforce or citizens elect what laws they will support.” Who says so? What is Hoover’s authority for that? There never has been a civilized people which did not pick and choose its favorite provisions among the statutes under which it lived.

Easier Way 'T'HERE is logic in saying that if a commun’ty dislikes its laws it should repeal them, but there is a curious carelessness in human kind which seems to make this impossible. It is so much easier to forget a bad law than to go to all the trouble of rubbing it out. This process, which might be termed the hip-pocket veto, certainly did not originate in America. Self-governing nations In both ancient and modern times have constantly exposed laws to the erosion of custom which is, and should be, stronger than any state. It is Inevitable that officials shouid elect what laws they will enforce. How many cases were brought under the Sherman law during the last administration? Would Hoover or anybody else seriously suggest that the Mann act should be enforced with vigor and additional millions? United States attorneys know by now that it is a ridiculous provision and never make a move except in the most flagrant cases. Judges, too, are, in addition to everything else, human beings. Each one has his pet crime which he delights to honor with the imposition of long sentences. Even in the Administration of law there is no getting away from the human equation and who wants to see Televox in the seats of the mighty passing judgment? (Cop;r4At. 1339, for The Tiaww