Indianapolis Times, Volume 41, Number 118, Indianapolis, Marion County, 26 September 1929 — Page 4

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Se*tpp3 - h a A I>

Shall We Reduce Taxes? A short time before President Hoover assumed offire, a federal deficit of $97,000,000 was in prospect for the current fiscal year. All departments of the government were asked to keep their expenditures at the minimum and congress was warned against excessive appropriations. Now the situation has changed. A surplus of at least $200,000,000 seems assured. This has revived talk of tax reduction. President Hoover has expressed himself as desiring such reduction if the condition of the treasury will permit it and the Republican majority in congress, with a congressional election approaching, naturally is eager to make a showing. All sources of revenue have been yielding larger sums than anticipated. Income and corporation tax collections for the calendar year so far amount to more than $1,900,000,000, which is $271.*00,000 in excess of last year. Ordinary receipts for the fiscal year which started July 1 are $128,000,000 ahead of last year. On Sept. 21 the treasury had a surplus of $41,000,000, as against a deficit of $124,000,000 a year ago. This is a rosy picture, but nevertheless serious doubts remain as to the wisdom of reducing taxes. The increased income tax collections are credited in large part to the profits made in the phenomenal rise in the value of stocks on the New York Exchange. This is a precarious source of revenue at best, and one which conceivably might disappear as rapidly as it appeared. Business and industry have been booming, and their profits have swelled the federal coffers. It generally is believed that prosperity will continue, but it would not take a very great recession to reduce tax payments materially. Further, tax reduction contemplates abandoning th $100,000,000 safety margin which the treasury heretofore has thought it necessary to maintain. A reserve of this size in connection with expenditures approaching the $5,000,000,000 mark does not seem excessive. Question of the public debt must be considered. It has been reduced from its wartime peak of $25,500,000,000 to $16,700,000,000, and it is agreed pretty generally that this process should continue. But if there is tax reduction, and revenues do not reach the expected amounts, debt reduction will be curtailed. Meantime, not only are ordinary expenditures growing, but the government is committed to large future outlays. These include cruiser building, flood control, Boulder dam, inland waterways, farm relief, the public building programs, and other projects. Tax reduction may not be as simple, or as wise, as it sounds. Senate Sensibilities Senator McKellars attack on the proposed naval agreement is a warning that President Hoover faces the same kind of senate minority fight that wrecked Wilson's policy and has turbed foreign relations throughout our history. This is a disagreeable fact which can not be ignored. Past experience shows that the President who faces it in advance accomplishes most in the end. Had President Wilson been somewhat more considerate of senate sensibilities, this country probably would be a member of the League of Nations today. And better co-operation between the two branches of government might have prevented the years of unseemly hickering that has delayed our adherence to the world court. The provision which gives the senate veto power over the executive's foreign policy is basic in our Constitution, and a valuable democratic safeguard. That it often has been abused is no more the fault of the senate than of the White House. Obviously Mr. Hoover even now should be preparing the ground for that senate support without which any carefully negotiated naval agreement will die unratified. Part of that White House-senate co-operation involves inclusion of minority party leaders in informal and formal negotiation of international agreements. When the question at issue is a matter of party policy, such procedure is difficult But it should not be difficult in such a matter as arms limitation, which is as much a Democratic as a Republican policy. The prospective naval treaty fight in the senate will not be a party division, but a cross-party struggle by a small minority. At least it probably will be no more than that if the President has been wise in making the Democratic leaders jointly responsible with the Republican administration for the treaty. Hence the necessity of giving the Democrats some direct representation in the informal departmental deliberations now in process, and in the coming discussions with Premier MacDonald, and on the American delegation at the formal five-power conference. True, this is rather a cumbersome method of getting things done. But democracy itself is more cumbersome than dictatorship. Tire idea is that the.slower method accomplishes more and better results in the long run. That long run in the case of any American treaty means the always difficult senate ratification. None of Our Business Ramsay MacDonald, prime minister of England, soqn will be a guest of the United States. He is coming on a mission of supreme importance—an endeavor to insure the permanence of the century of peace that has existed between the two most powerful nations in the world. Every patriotic American will wish him success. No one with the interests of this country at heart would do anything that might in any way cloud the horizon. And yet—there is already a murmuring in the air: a murmuring that may, if allowed to proceed, mar the cordiality of our welcome and make the British prime minister the center of an undignified, petty and utterly senseless quarrel. To listen to this gradually rising muttering, you would imagine that the great question of the hour is not, “Will America and England reach agreement on naval limitation?’’ but, “Will Ramsay MacDonald drink wine while he is in prohibition America?” While in Washington Mr. MacDonald will stay at the British embassy. Technically, he will be on British eoil. Legally, he will have every right to drink all the wine he cares to. Why, then, should anyoue make a fuss about it? | The question, indeed, would not be worth raising*

The Indianapolis Times (A SCRII*PS-HO\V AKI NEW SPAPER) Owned and published daily (except Sunday) by The Indianapolis Times Publishing Cos., 214-220 W Maryland Street, Indianapolis, ind Price in Marion County 2 ■ f-nts a copy: elsewhere. 3 cents—delivered by carrier. 12 cents a week. BOYD GUR KEY ROY \V. HOWARD. • FRANK G MORRISON, editor. President Business Manager i'IIONE—U luTTmJ THURSDAY, SEPT. 26. 1929. ~ Member of Doited Press, Scrippa-Howard Newspaper Alliance, Newspaper Enterprise Association. Newspaper Information Service and Audit Bureau of Circulations. “Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way”

except for the fact that a great many well-meaning people seem to be bothered about it. To some people, evidently, it appears that American prohibition will in some way be mocked if the British prime minister fails to bind himself by its limitation while he is in Washington. That attitude is not only mistaken; it is stupid and rude. To begin with, it is none of our business. The British embassy in Washington is not prohibition territory. Mr. MacDonald may do as he likes there; it is no concern of ours. In addition, we ought to realize that there is no sort of moral obligation resting on the premier to abide by our prohibition law. When our ambassador to England, General Dawes, reached London, he proceeded very quickly to make it plain that he was not going to observe one of the oldest customs of the British court. He refused, quite bluntly, to wear the knee breeches that years of usage have made the correct garb for formal affairs at court. Instead, he followed the custom of his own country and wore ordinary evening dress. Similarly, Mr. MacDonald has every right to bring his own customs with him when he visits us; and if those customs include the serving of wine at his meals—well, that is Mr. MacDonald's affair. The whole business is hardly worth mentioning, if it were not so evident that some ardent prohibitionists seem to feel that a great wrong will be done if Mr. MacDonald does not go “dry” during his stay in Washington. Such an attitude is utterly senseless, not to say asinine. It simply is not any of our concern. Enlightened Selfishness There was a time when business of all kinds, big and little, was practically united in favor of high tariff legislation. Business men were a band of brothers, all in favor of more protection for themselves and willing to let the other fellow have his. That time is past. In connection with the present tariff bill, it would seem that almost as much of the business world is lined up against the bill's sweeping increases as is for it. The big auto men of the country rejected the idea that they need a tariff wall to protect them against the world. They are selling yearly, instead, half a billion dollars worth of autos to the world. The National City bank, the country’s biggest financial institution, is fighting as hard against the raise in the sugar tariff as progressive senators. Other banks and big corporations engaged in international trade apparently would be glad to see the bill defeated. Now the organized dry goods retailers, speaking through their national association, charge nat the higher rates so will unsettle business that they may destroy our prosperity, and that the measure violates the Republican campaign pledge to equalize conditions for agriculture. Os course, all these protests against the bill are selfiish in their nature, perhaps almost as selfish as the pleas in favor of it. The protests, however, are the result of more enlightened selfishness. Those who make them realize that the prosperity of all of us is more to be desired than that a few great corporations shall pile up further profits, and that a world-trading nation, such as the United States has become, is more dependent for continued prosperity upon its trade relations with the world than upon higher and still higher tariff walls.

REASON

WE like the poem Mrs. Coolidge wrote about her son on the fifth anniversary of his death and its philosophy is the same which has sustained the world throughout the ages. Even if immortality be nothing but a dream, that dream is worth more to humanity than all of its realities. tt tt tt This is the thought which makes one regard the professional atheist as the most obnoxious of pests, for in a land where there is liberty of conscience, there is no occasion for one to thrust his unbelief upon the contented minds of others. Think wTiat you will, but let other people alone. tt St tt This is where the Russian government made a mistake. Just because the czars prostituted religion to strengthen their tyranny, the bolsheviki would uproot it entirely from the hearts of the peasants, a thing they learn they can not do. Had they been good politicians, they would have put bolshevik clothes on the saints and let the masses of the people keep their faith, thereby strengthening the new' order. tt tt tt WE are against any bunch that goes forth, spraying the flowers of hope with concentrated lye, whether that bunch be a boisterous group of the unwashed in some great city or whether it be a nation, for to put out your own hopes is as foolish as to put out. your own eyes and to put out the hopes of others is to become the lowest order of animal life. a tt a Secretary of the Treasury Mellon states that the chances of a young man’s making good in business are ten times better today than when he was a boy, which will cause people generally to believe the charge that the secretary keeps something in his cellar. a tt a ♦ It did not take great heroism for Bishop Edgar Blake of Indianapolis to denounce the twelve disciples as a “tough lot of Galilean fishermen,” for there is very little probability that any of them will sue him for slander at this late day. a a tt THE President has talked with several Governors about law enforcement, but the two big things about the proposition are to get the lawyers to consent to let the laws be enforced and then get the Governors to consent to let the guilty stay in after they’ve been sent up. • If while this ship lobbyist is being investigated at Washington, all the other lobbyists could be rounded up, it would simplify greatly the task of taking the national census. t; tt a Senator Brattan of New Mexico is right in his insistence that all aviation should be under the control of the United States government, for that would provide every possible safeguard in a very hazardous business. True, under our form of government, the nation has no legal right to control flying that is # entirely within a state, but public opinion soon would force every pilot to qualify for a federal license, and the flier who could not show a card with Uncle Sam’s a k. would go without passengers.

„ FREDERICK hy LANDIS

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

M. E. Tracy SAYS:

We Can Not Hope to Stop Lobbying; the Evil Goes With a Republic and Is an Inescapable Weakness of Democracy. Lieutenant james h. dooLITTLE climbs into the darkS ened cockpit of an airplane, takes ; off flies around a triangular course ; off, flies around a triangular course j he started, without once looking at 1 anything but his instrument board j The feat is made possible by thp ; reaction of delicate indicators to a I radio beam, and is described rightly as epochal. It liberates aviation from the perils of night and fog, and represents one of the very greatest achievements in the interest of safety. Those in charge of the Guggenheim fund, which financed the preliminary work, are to be congratulated. They have made a worthwhile contribution to the science of flying. bub It remains for science to produce some kind of a device which will enable business men to tell whether they are hiring an “observer,” or plain propagandist. Testimony in the Shearer case ! leaves little doubt that ordinary human faculties are unequal to the task. To let them tell it, half a dozen high-powered executives never suspected that they were helping to break up a naval conference at Geneva or pass a cruiser bill at Washington, though their “observer” kept them constantly informed of the “shots” he was firing. There are fogs and fogs. tt tt tt Tariff More Important IT is not to be presumed for one moment that the Shearer case is an isolated incident. That other publicity experts have not sold themselves in like manner, or that three shipbuilding companies, were the only ones to fall for the idea of lobbying through printers’ ink. Asa matter of common sense, the tariff is of far greater concern to American business than a naval conference, or cruiser bill, while manufactured propaganda has become too much of a fad for anyone to doubt its use on every possible occasion. If one “observer,” was considered necessary by shipbuilders at Geneva, how many would the various interests affected think desirable at Washington in connection with a tariff bill? U tt tt We can not hope to stop lobbying, of course, whether by high-priced lawyers, publicity hounds, or vamps. The evil goes with a republic and is an inescapable weakness of democracy. The thing can bt identified, however, and labeled according to the food and drug act, which would go far to destroy its pernicious influence. The danger of a third house at Washington consists mainly of what it can do in the dark. Turn on the light, and it ceases to be much of a menace. a tt tt He'll Open His Eyes IT is natural to suppose that the mayor of Berlin comes to New York, with the expectation of seeing not only a bigger, but a better town, and of learning something which he can take back home with advantage to his own community. So far as engineering goes, he will probably not be disappointed. Not pausing to enumerate her seven wonders, over the identity of which there seems to be some controversy, New York certainly contains institutions that are peerless, but when it comes to politics tt a tt As the New York World points out, the mayor of Berlin arrives just in time to enjoy the chatter which goes with the performance of electing anew city government. It probably will strike him as novel, if not enlightening, and lest he should make the mistake of supposing it is due to local, rather than national, habit, he ought to go to Washington and listen in on congress, especially when prohibition is up for debate. To hear senators twit each other about not knowing what'is going on, or knowing too much, certainly represents anew, if not a higher, brand of statesmanship. B a o Brookhart Out in Open SENATOR HOWELL, who created something of a sensation the other day by declaring that Washington was wet and that the President could make it dry, thinks the latter “a little unfair,” in demanding specific instances. He spoke not from personal experience, he says, but from what was “common knowledge” around the Capitol. Senator Brookhart is not so shy, but tells specifically of a dinner at which senators were present and liquor was available. Not only that, but he tells who gave the dinner, and leaves the impression that it might have had something to do with financial legislation. since a Wall Street man was host.

Daily Thought

Not for that we have dominion over your faith, but are helpers of your job; for by faith we stand. —II Corinthians 1:24. a a tt FAITH draws the' poison from every grief, takes the sting from every loss, and quenches the fire of every pain; and only faith can do it. —J. G. Holland. What language is the name of Palatka and what does it mean? It is a Seminole Indian name meaning either “spilled” or “cow ford.” Who wrote the book “This Believing World?” Lewis Browne, a Jewish rabbi of the liberal school, who lives in New York. _ _

Herbert, This Can’t Go on Forever!

§J||)lUi | TT 1 1 j

Medical Care Vital in Paralysis Cure

BY DR. MORRIS FISHJ3EIN Editor Journal of the American Medical Association and of Hygeia, the Health Magazine. NO disease in all the category of human ailments so frightens the mother and father in a family as infantile paralysis. The disease cripples frequently when it does not kill. The crippling is difficult to treat after it occurs. The early symptoms of infantile paralysis are much like those of other acute illnesses and far too frequently, because of an unwillingness to take the condition seriously in the early stages, the results' are worse than they otherwise would be. Paralysis does not always develop early and seems to develop far less frequently if aboslute rest and proper treatment are employed early in the course of the disease. Physicians are convinced that absolute and continuous rest for at least three weeks is necessary, so that the inflamed nerves and the

IT SEEMS TO ME

IT never has been my privilege to meet William B. Shearer, who I understand, is a naval expert. But Shearer happens to live near the Hale Lake section of Stanford and is known by many of my rural neighbors. I asked one of them about the gentleman who has figured so much in the news of late as a conference killer and he thought a long time in an effort to give me an adequate description. Then his face brightened and he said, “Shearer is a man with a loud voice.” Some of the many correspondence schools should improve this opportunity. “Learn to shout by mail,” ought to be a thrilling slogan for many of the plums and rewards in our present economic structure that go to the bellowers. Captains of industry pride themselves that our economic organization is hard-boiled and efficient and yet there is scarcely a job in all the land which can't be had by a lad with lungs and proper resonance. Still, there would be just a bit of fraud in teaching by mail. While it is true that the chesty ones can and do talk themeselves into jobs, there is a catch in this road to success. Asa matter of fact, they always talk themselves out again. Asa recent stockholder in the Bethlehem Steel Company I resent any share of my funds which may have gone to Shearer. At ten minutes’ notice I could have guaranteed to pick for them a naval expert capable of shouting twice as loud for half the money. tt tt Hoover Tells Them PRESIDENT HOOVER gave the ladies of the W. C. T. U. some excellent advice in a letter which was read at their international convention. “Since the adoption of the prohibition amendment,” said the President, “too many people have come to rely wholly on the strong arm of the law to enforce abstinence, forgetting that the cause of temperance has its strong foundations in the conviction of the individual of the personal value of himself of temperance in all things.” I trust that the good ladies will uphold the President by disbanding their organization and going quietly to their homes. After all Hoover says precisely what every intelligent wet has said for the last ten years. As far as I know nobody ever has urged that drinking be made compulsory. “It is high time that you got excited over my spectacular campaign as Socialist candidate for alderman in the Fifteenth District of Manhattan,” writes McAlister Coleman. “As this is one of the few districts in which I never have run for anything. i have had my survey committee make a preliminary survey of

DAILY HEALTH SERVICE.

weakened muscles may have a chance to come nearer to normal conditions before active manipulative treatment is attempted. At this stage of the disease the advice of a competent man is more important than at any other. Far too frequently attempts are made to use home remedies. The tissues are rubbed with all sorts of liniments or lotions; cultists or quacks of one type or another attempt manipulations or vibrations and the result is more harm to the patient. Only after all tenderness and pain have left the affected tissues must any manipulation be undertaken. At that time exercise prescribed by those familiar with the condition and with the tissues and with the patient may be undertaken very cautiously. The swimming pool method, whereby the tissues are given support while undergoing exercise, has been accepted generally as a worth-

HEYWOOD y BROUN

the district. My district is called ‘The Silk Stocking District’ in honor of the time when the swells wore them before Woolworth put them in. o tt a Cares for Camel “'T'HE proletariat in this district JL is represented by doormen, janitors and the man who takes care of the camel in the zoo. I intend to agitate this man, as any person who walks as many miles as he must should have time and a half for overtime. “I would like to agitate the doormen, but I imagine this would be difficult. I should think that anyone who had to stand around in a trick uniform tipping his hat to diabetic old gentlemen would be naturally agitated. Especially considering that he only gets SIOO a month. “But doormen seem to be singularly complacent, considering that they have nothing to lose but their dispatch-boxes. It may be, of course, that bowing to an old gent who is paying $12,000 a year rent gives you an air of vicarious prosperity, which is about all the prosperity most workers get anyhow.

Times Readers Voice Views

Editor Times—Driving out into the country last Sunday, southeast of the city, I noticed that one farmer already had sown a good-sized field of wheat, and I stand ready to guarantee that he is not going to reap any worth while crop from that field on account of the pest known as Hessian fly. Not a grain of wheat should be sovn in Marion county before Oct. 5, or 10, better yet. In the latitude of Seymour, Oct. 5, to 16 are the earliest dates that are “fly safe.” It is a crying shame that farmers will not heed the advice of Purdue university and of experienced wheat growers. They have been warned year after year, but to no purpose. E. M’CASLIN, 5801 Dewey street. Editor Times—The person who suggested having literature dropped from an airplane advertising safety first failed to realize this is a hazard for the children. A youngster, seeing something falling from an airplane in the street, unhesitatingly will go after it, darting from behind a parked automobile, only to have his life snatched away, or crippled for life, which could have been avoided, if only those who are supposed to know better, would have used “a little forethought.” Let Lieutenant Owens give this person his views regarding the above. F. SCOUTMASTER.

while measure, and is now employed in many cities. One of the most significant of the early symptoms of infantile paralysis is pain and discomfort in the muscles and joints out of all proportion to the fever, which seldom goes above 102 degrees. Pains in the neck, back and limbs with weakness of the limbs and difficulty of movement are particularly important as early signs. For years the medical profession has been attempting to find a specific serum or vaccine that would control infantile paralysis. Thus far there are se*fral measures available but all are in what is called an experimental stage. The measure most commonly accepted as useful is the injection of a serum taken from a patient who has recovered from the disease, with the idea that he will have developed in his blood, due to the attack and recovery from the disease, a substance which aids in fighting the malady.

Ideals and opinions expressed in this column are those of one of America’s most interesting writers, and are presented without regard to thetr agreement or disagreement with the editorial attitude of this paper.—The Editor.

’ “No doubt when the doorman gets home to his flat he says to his wife; ‘Percy Vonderbilt spoke to me today,’ and goes around poking out his chest. a a Needs Rhymes “T AM working on a campaign J. song now, but I haven’t thought up any very good rhymes for my last name and baluster seems to be the only word that rhymes with my first. In this respect, Norman Thomas is almost as badly off as I am. “My colors are orange and blue, the colors of my old school, Collegiate school, which used to beat you Horace Mann bums regularly at bar' tball. ‘Hunah for the orange and blue, to Collegiate we’ll ever be true, she gives us the knowledge that she sends us to college, hurrah for the orange and blue.’ “When you stagger into the polling place next November, you can be sure of voting for me if you pull down all the levers under the Socialist emblem, the arm and torch. Don’t try to scratch your ticket. You will only find that you have voted for someone like Jimmy Walker and, with Thomas running, that would be a pretty kettle of fish.” (Copyright. 1929, by The Times)

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j SCIENCE | ■ BY DAVID DIETZ £ The Story of the Asteroids Forms One of the Most Interesting Chapters In the History of Astronotny. THE results of a three-year survey of one of the mo6t fascinating problems of astronomy are to be published in a few months. The research concerns the asteroids or “little planets.” which, according to one theory, are the remnants of a planet like our own earth which exploded. Final revision of the manuscript is being made by Prof A. O. Leuschner. Dr. H. Thiele and Mrs. M. W. Wakemson, who. at request of the National Research council, undertook the study three years ago. What Professor Leusehner and his* associates have done is to assemble all the important work done upon the motions of the definitely known 1,091 asteroids or minor planets as they are sometimes called. To do this, they were forced to review all the literature dealing with the asteroids from the time of the discovery of the first one more than a century ago. a a a Police THE story of the asteroids is the story of the “astronomical detective police,” the story of a hunt for a missing planet which ended with surprising results. In 1772 Johann Elert Bode pointed out that the distance between planets increased in an orderly progression with the exception that there was an unusually large gap between Mars and Jupiter. This progression became known as Bode’s law. but received no particular attention until Sir William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus in 1871. The distance of Uranus from the sun was approximately that called for by Bode's law. So in 1800 Baron Franz Von Zach, director of the observatory at Gotha, Germany, organized twentyfour astronomers into what he jokingly called the astronomical detective police. They divided up the sky between them and began a telescopic search for the missing planet, which, according to Bode's law, should be between Mars and Jupiter. They worked all year with no success, but on the night of Jan. 1, 1801, the first night of the nineteenth century, an Italian astronomer, Guiseppe Piazzi at Paleriho, Sicily, discovered a tiny planet in the gap. He named it Ceres, after the traditional goddess of the island. Astronomers were surprised by its tiny size. But other surprises were to come. A second tiny planet was discovered in the same gap in 1802, a third in 1804 and a fifth in 1807. No more were discovered until 1845, but since that day about 1,000 have been discovered. No two revolve in exactly the same orbit. a a a Hooveria ASTEROIDS, as the tiny planets were named, are frequently discovered and then lost track of. Occasionally old ones are mistaken for new ones. Accordingly, astronomers constituted the Recheninstitut at Berlin as a clearing house for asteroids. When the discovery of anew one is verified, the institute gives it an official number, while the discoverer is permitted to name it. The first ones were named after mythological gods and personages. They since have been named after nations, cities, colleges, friends of the discoverers and even steamboats and pet dogs. Shortly after the World war, a Belgian astronomer named one “Hooveria,” in grateful recollection of Presdent Hoover’s work in Belgium. The asteroids are extremely small. The largest, Ceres, has a diameter of 480 miles. Some have diameters of less than ten miles. They have been called “mountains broken loose.” One of the most interesting is Eros. This has so flattened an orbit that periodically it approaches closer to the earth than any astronomical body except the moon. It then is 13,840,000 miles from the earth to Eros. Eros is about fifteen miles in diameter. Two theories have been advanced to account for the origin of the asteroids. One is that they originally constituted a great planet which exploded in some gigantic cataclysm. The other theory is that they ar material which was prevented from collecting into a planet at the time when the solar system came into existence. It is thought, perhaps, that the gravitational pull of Jupiter, the largest of all planets, may have had something to do with this.

SEPT. 26.1929