Indianapolis Times, Volume 44, Number 254, Indianapolis, Marion County, 3 March 1933 — Page 12
PAGE 12
The Indianapolis Times <A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER) rot W. HOWARD Present vu r-OTT POWELL „ Editor XAKL D. BAKER . . Butlnesi Manager
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t < */1 HOWaa Oil Light and the People Will find 7 heir Own Way
FRIDAY. MARCH 3. 1933.
THERE IS A CURE Restore buying power. This is the one cure for the depression upon which all agree. On the other reforms necessary, and they are many, opinions conflict. But every one, from the banker and the industrialist down to the humblest laborer, favors an increase in purchasing power. There is only one direct and quick way to get It. That is through wages. Somehow, pay rolls must be increased so that money will flow again from the worker to the merchant to the manufacturer to the banker, and continue to circulate. The economists understand this. So do enlightened business men. Then why doesn't something happen? Why don't the intelligent business men break this vicious circle of sweatshop wages and layoffs, which is destroying more mass buying power and sucking us deeper into depression? They can not. The intelligent companies are fighting for their lives; they can not break the circle alone. Under the competitive system they are dragged down to the level of their short-sighted and unscrupulous competitors. The longer the process continues, the more factories and stores become sweatshops—or close. For protection of legitimate business, the protection of labor, for protection of the farmer who is dependent on labor as a market, for protection of banks crashing under the general economic strain, for protection of the country, minimum wages should be decreed by law. Governor Lehman, in a special message, has asked the Now York legislature to fix immediate minimum wage standards for women and children. His action follows unanimous recommendations by the official conference of eight eastern states and the United States department of labor. That conference stated: “Unless a bottom level is fixed in competition, by minimum wage laws, the downward spiral of lower wages, low prices and lowered purchasing power may continue until unemployment has wrecked the morale and efficiency of our industrial population.” Tlie movement started by this conference, and now carried forward so forcefully by Governor Lehman, is the most hopeful development of this crisis. But it is not enough. Such protection for women and minors is humane, though it is not adequate to the economic need. The problem engulfs all workers, all business; the solution must include male workers as well. Leave out male workers—the bulk of labor—and purchasing power can not be appreciably raised. Nor is state action enough. It creates unfair competition between advanced and backward employers. Governor Lehman stresses this point: “I have, of course, no doubt that minimum wage laws, as a means of eliminating unfair wage cuttings, should exist throughout the nation ... to the extent that congress has power it should exercise that power.” Only one objection worthy of consideration has been raised against a national minimum wage law. Because of an earlier decision of the United States supreme court, some believe that anew law also would be declared unconstitutional. To this fear Governor Lehman makes the pertinent reply: “I also am advised by competent constitutional authority that present-day conditions are so changed from those prevailing when the original statute was before the court that a mandatory minimum wage law, based not on living standards, but on the minimum value of the services rendered, well might be upheld by the supreme court of the United States.” The supreme court, of course, on other issues has reversed itself in fdee of changed conditions; a necessary and proper course, if the law is to remain a living thing. This is no time for legalistic hair-splitting. Years of rigid .’'Herpretations of the Constitution should not stop congress in its duty to bring relief. America is not made for the Constitution, but the Constitution was made for America—for the protection, not for the enslavement, of America. Purpose of the Constitution is to promote the general welfare of the people. Therefore, in every supreme national emergency in our history the government, under the Constitution, has invoked the power necessary to protect the republic. That was done during the war. It was done last year, when the government resorted to the extreme measure of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. It can be done again. For the protection of capital and labor ana in consultation with both, the Fresident should be given emergency authority by congress to fix for different industries and localities such minimum wages and ma' imum work periods as he deems necessary to restore public buying power and conquer the depression.
SENATOR WALSII The death of Senator Thomas J. Walsh of Montana, on the eve of his appointment as attorneygeneral in the new administration, is a national misfortune. He would have been a rock of strength in the Roosevelt official family, as he has been in the United States senate. A great constitutional lawyer, a resolute prosecutor, and a sound statesman, Senator Walsh ranked among this country’s most useful men. In his austere dignity and objectivencss, he resembled the senators of Rome at their best. Few in the national legislature have died with a more honorable record. Senator Walsh was a conservative, rather than a progressive. But his passion for justice led him further in his attacks upon privilege than many of the more theoretical liberals. When, in his prosecutions of the Teapot Dome and Elk Hills oil looters, the scandal trail led up to E. L. Doheny, he was as relentless in the case of his friend as he was in the cases of Albert Fall, Harry Sinclair, and the others. It was this sense of Justice that caused him to fight for confirmation of Justice Brandeis, for women's suffrage, for the child labor amendment, for the Wilsonian foreign policies. For the same JHason. he opposed confirmation of Judge Parker to the (supreme court, fought high tariffs and sales tax,
1 yellow dog contracts, and scores of other antl-sociul I measures. The Democratic party owes much to Senator Walsh. It can repay this debt In no better way than , by selecting for the seats he has vacated in the United States senate and the Roosevelt cabinet, men worthy to be his successor. SPEAKER RAINEY In choosing their present floor leader, Representative Henry T. Rainey of Illinois, as Speaker of the house of representatives in the new congress, the Democrats have taken the best man in the race. He is a veteran of congress who has been a progressive on most issues. He has fought for the rights of labor and against special privileges for the power interests. He favors Russian recognition and a liberal foreign policy. He stands with Mr. Hull, the new secretary of state, as one of the lower tariff leaders of his party. It is of utmost importance to any achievement by the new administration that the Democratic congress move in quick and disciplined ranks in support of the Roosevelt program for national recovery. The Speaker of the house has the most powerful position in congress. Fortunately, the house Democrats have elevated to that place of power a man sympathetic with the policies of their leader, President-Elect Roosevelt.
“EDUCATION” OF WRONG KIND Few American institutions have been hit harder by the depression than the educational system. And their woes are not only those which arise from a shortage of ready cash; they come from a dawning realization that the American college or university has, in too many cases, been off on the wrong track during the past decade. The depression has simply made this fact plain. The editor of The Chakett, official organ of the Phi Chi fraternity, remarks that evidence of this is to be found in the sadly deflated condition of thousands of college graduates today. Looking back at the last few years, he indicts a whole college generation, in words that are worth considering. Recalling the thousands of young men who went to college with no particular desire to get an education and won their degrees without ever really opening their eyes to the real problems of the day, he says: “I doubt if a more superficially minded generation ever came of age. It is indeed not at all unlikely that future historians will say that while the foundations of western society were breaking up, the young men of American universities were watching football games, going to tea dances, and aping the manners of a corrupt plutocracy. “From out of these universities, in my time at least, came thousands of bachelors of arts and sciences who neither knew nor cared what arts and sciences are, whose solitary aim was to link up with a business enterprise in which a lot of money could be quickly made. “They brought nothing with them'save manners, ‘personality’ and acquisitive ambition.” These men, today, are in a sorry fix; and part of the responsibility, at least, must be laid on the universities. The universities, as this fraternity editor remarks, “displayed a greater zeal for plant and equipment than for learning, they paid coaches more than professors, they built stadia instead of libraries, they sought endowments rather than scholars . . . and made it very easy for young men to pass through college, degree in hand, but with minds that had never even been required to think.” Out of the depression, let us hope, there will come a tightening up of the educational system, a return to first principles and a discarding of false ideals, so that such a criticism as this never can be made again. High school seniors who are starting their theses on “We have left the bay, and the ocean lies before us,” might find it a good idea to rig up a breeches buoy with the family larder before casting off all hawsers. Garden pests soon will be putting in their appearance, leaning over the back fence to remind you that you didn’t seem to have very good luck with the tomatoes last year. So far-reaching is the vogue for realism in the theater that there's nothing reserved any more except the seats.
Just Plain Sense BY MRS. WALTER FERGUSON
XT’S about time for spring housecleaning. For the housewife that is a bi.thesome period. Already she secretly plans how s.ie will rearrange the furniture and redecorate the windows. And there's one thing about the housewife. When the time comes for cleaning, she cleans. There has been bred in her from generations of careful and thrifty mothers the knowledge that where housework is concerned, it is not wise to postpone hard tasks. Therefore, procrastination is not a feminine lailing. Nor do women, as a rule, evade the jobs they know must be done. Fcr this reason it might be wise for women to have a little more actual authority in the business of the government. The way men sit around and appoint xommittees and investigate, and confer and go into huddles, vet take it for granted that everything will work out happily one of these days, is enough to make the average housekeeper burst with impatience. a a a • r T'HE politician, '.om all appearance, assumes ■*- that the depression will disappear of its own accord. In assuming this, of course, he first must believe that it had no cause for being—that it just happened—which is the veriest nonsense. Human misbehavior, human stupidity, humfin greed, created the depression, and it never will depart until men and women put forth an effort to remove certain causes responsible for its being. Although in a personal business crisis, no man would fail to act promptly to forestall disaster to himself; where the city,’ the county, the state and the nation are concerned, he sits down and looks blank. In the government's house there never is any spring cleaning. Nor fall cleaning, nor summer conservation, nor winter thrift. There is only, always and forever, reckless expenditure, foolish lack of common sense and silly worship of traditional red tape. We need sure and prompt action, and we get the dilly dallyings and talk. It will not be enough for us to return to the uprightness of our forefathers, we’ve got to get back also to the hard kitchen wisdom of our mothers. .
THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES
A.,. I--
It Seems to Me • . . . by Heywood Broun
THE senate banking committee has won a skirmish by bringing out facts which have led to the resignation of two executives. This will be, however, a trivial triumph if nothing more than a change of personnel occurs. The difficulty goes a great deal deeper than the mere question of individual taste in ethics. Asa matter of fact, the gentlemen who have stepped down are no more than scapegoats of a system. The itch to encourage and to participate in speculation surely was not confined to any one institution. Personally, I think there is no sure ground this side of having the federal government take over in its entirety the business of banking, savings banks and insurance. Even those who still turn a pale green at the thought of “the government in business” must admit that it is already in up to its knees. And it is well to remark that this participation has not been brought about by the demands of radical or liberal economists. If Washington already is kneedeep in banking, that condition has been brought about because of the distress cries of rugged individualists who have been shouting, “Save us or we perish!” u tt Politician in Business IT has been held, of course, that politicians are subject to suspicion and that a great key industry like banking should not be subject to the whims of partisanship. But this argument overlooks the fact that bankers and banks have been engaged heavily in politics ever since the McKm-ley-Bryan campaign in 1896, and even before that time. Moreover, the government has been conducting a very nice little banking business of its own for a number of years, with entire success and without scandal. The postal system has stood up through trying years. We have stringent laws to punish people who circulate false rumors about financial institutions. Runs have occurred here and there without warrant, but when the American banker comes before the public today and cays piteously, “Why don’t you trust me?” he should not be surprised if he is greeted with derisive laughter. The lad who cried, “Wolf!” Wolf!” once too often has gone down into legend as an antisocial person in any community. I think he was less harmful than some of the other lads who have insisted on saying, “Oh, look at the nice poodle dogs!” even as the gray timber pack swept through the streets of the village. tt n Old Friend Psychology IN the early days of the unemployment crisis, a great effort was made to achieve a psychological solution by hushing up the matter as far as possible. In many quarters the same thing is being tried in regard to the banking situation. It seems to me that we need more facts and more criticism, rather than less. After all, a
" i:i 1 DAILY HEALTH SERVICE -- Watch Your Icebox Temperature -- BY DR. MORRIS FISHBEIN
TV/fOST people now know that the keeping of food at a proper temperature and under proper conditions of cleanliness is highly important for prevention of disease. As Miss E. M. Geraghty, formerly dietitian of the great hospital in Cleveland, points out in a recent issue of Hygeia. the price paid for food at the grocery is much increased if the material is lost because of bad care in the home after the food arrives. Cereals, bread, crackers, cookies and cake always should be kept in tightly covered containers in a cool place. Otherwise, they are subject to drying and to infestation with vermin. Butter must be kept at a temperature of from 60 degrees F. to 10 degrees F.; certainly not much higher, or it will become rancid and may be a source of infection. O t course, this temperature may
‘Halleluja — I’m a Bum’
bank holiday can not be made a secret rite. To be sure, we are all jittery—and that includes the bankers. The other day a friend of mine took her 3-year-old son into a bank where she purposed to deposit some money and as she stood before the teller’s window the child struck up his favorite song, which happens to be “Let’s Put Out the Lights and Go to Sleep.” “No more money in the bank,” he piped in his childish treble, and a vice-president came rushing out from behind his desk. “Little man,” he said, “we’d much rather you didn’t sing that song around here.” And some of the radio stations have barred “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?’ from the air, on the ground that it is too depressing. I gravely doubt that it matters very much whether we whistle gay tunes or sad. Asa matter of fact, I think a little less whistling all around and more study and discussion will be to our advantage. Nor do I think that a lively belief in the necessity of a complete reorganization of our bank-
Every Day Religion — BY DR. JOSEPH FORT NEWTON -
WHAT is wrong with our times? Many things, all will agree; almost everything, some say. The question may be answered in various ways, but one thing is plain to all: People do not think. They only “thob,” as someone has put it, taking their ideas ready-made and at second hand, if they have any ideas at all. “The only people with real convictions today are in jail,” said a wag the otner day. Too many of us believe what we are told to believe by the man with the loudest voice. Our ideas are mere echoes of the book last read, or the patter or propagandists who play upon out putty-mindedness. Or, rather, we have been fooled so much that we do not believe in anything, not even in ourselves. Os one thing we may be sure —when everybody is saying the same thing, nobody is doing any thinking. Human minds, if they are made to work, do not turn out thoughts all of one pattern. Nor do men who think go on doing the same thing in face of new facts, new situations, in a changing world. They devise new ways of meeting new demands, “lest one good custom should corrupt the world,” not because it is good, but because it is irferely a custom and has no life in it. tt an SAID grim old Carlyle, “The greatest enemy of the Prince of Darkness is a thinking man”; but he is rare. “Look out,” said Emerson, “when the Lord God lets loose a thinker in the world.” He is sure to turn things upside down. What we need today is some hard, honest thinking soft
Editor Joarnal of the American Medical Association and of Hyreia, the Health Marazine. be below that of the usual refrigerator, but is the very best temperature. The usual refrigerator temperature may be anywhere from 40 degrees F. to 50 degress F. A good ice refrigerator should maintain a temperature of from 45 degrees F. in the milk compartment to 50 degrees F. in the food compartment. Certain foods should be bought fairly frequently to get the maximum of flavor and aroma out of them. These include, for example, cereals and coffee. a a a OF course, fresh fruits of various types should be kept in the refriger∨ fats and oils should not be. put in the refrigerator, however, because they will
ing system justified the folly of those who sew dollar bills in their mattresses or bury small hoards of gold. When a horse trips on a hurdle and goes down, no rider is going to find it possible to remain suspended in midair. tt a One System of Barter T IKE everybody else, I have wondered just how I would get along if I found myself in the middle of a bank holiday with 9 cents in my pocket. I have wondered whether it would be possible for me to approach a taxi driver and say, “Will you please take me to 61% East Fifty-first street and accept as fare a slightly soiled first edition of -The Boy Grew Older?’ ” And I am still cogitating whether I could get as far as the corner. And, of course, I have gone further in my fantasy and included a day in which I didn’t ride in taxis at all. That would be hard for me, but, if that goes for all the rest, I’ll call it a fair bargain. (Copyright. J 933. by The Times)
thinking will not do in hard times; we have too much of it as it is. We must find the facts, get down to cases and put on our thinking caps. As it is, superstition runs rife. New cults grow up like mushrooms in the night, promising people old magic and the moon. In Germany the followers of Hitler have gone wild about astrology, as if the stars will show the way out of the bog. No, God gave us minds to think, to face the facts and find His way and His will for the life of man. If people will not use their heads, they only can learn through their hides. (Copyright. 1933. by United Features Syndicate. Inc.)
So They Say
If prohibition is repealed, it will only be a few years until the people will restore it.—Dr. Howard H. Russell, 77, who founded the AntiSaloon league forty years ago. The economic system in America is in no danger of breaking down, but on the contrary has such inherent strength that it continues to function efficiently in the face of the greatest maladjustment the world ever has seen. —Andrew W. Mellon, United States ambassador to Great Britain, speaking in London. Freedom of thought and freedom of speech in every country are necessary before the people of one land can understand the ideals and ambitions of their neighbors. —Dr. Thomas S. Baker, president of Carnegie Institute of Technology, speaking in Berlin.
absorb strong odors and flavors from other food substances. Miss Geraghty points out that asparagus, corn and peas do not keep well anywhere and should be used as soon £s possible after picking. The refrigerator is used to store more than half of the frequent purchases in the daily diet and many of the occasional ones. Miss Geraghty advises particularly that the refrigerator be not crowded, because crowding interferes with circulation of air and lowers efficiency of the refrigerator. Room always should be left in the refrigerator for salads and deserts, because many of the cases of food infection come from food preparations of this character. Germs require moisture for their development, and also warmth in most cases* It is well to bear this fact in mind in the care of foods in the home.
M.E. Tracy Says: *• —-—— + WE DODGE DEPRESSIOX IDEAS
WE are passing through a period of selfexamination in this country, which is good as far as it goes, but which will be of little value unless we make it much more searching than we hAve, or than our efforts up to this time indicate. While ready to abandon bureaucracy and centralized control with regard to liquor, we are flirting with the identical idea in some other directions.
When it comes to methods of high finance and taxation, we are similarly careless and illogical. What we want is some quick remedy to ease the present situation, but we shy at studies or reforms that go very’ deep. We are shocked at disclosures in connection with the Insull bubble, but hardly to such extent as promises through-going action. The Insull case is not exceptional, save that circumstances have revealed the inside story. Asa matter of common knowledge, this corporation, with its subsidiaiies, sub-subsidiaries, and sub-sub-subsidiaries, is quite typical of the prevailing method, and presents that disposition to evade responsibility and prey on a sucker public which characterizes the newer school of big business. tt a tt System Too Complicated for Experts NOW that the bubble has exploded, experts like Owen D. Young admit that the system back of it was too complicated for them to understand and that the public was hoodwinked hopelessly. That, of course, calls for a revision of the system, but are we prepared to go much further than humiliate and perhaps punish those caught in this particular trap? With regard to taxation, we have uncovered some very raw spots of injustice and discrimination, but for the moment we seem to be far more interested in finding new and easily available sources of revenue than in making permanent corrections. No commodity of common use has been subjected to a greater tax than gasoline, but because of the case with which that tax can be levied and collected, we seem obsessed with the idea of increasing it, with little regard to its effect on the automobile industry or the burden imposed on automobile owners. Though well aware that real estate is bearing too heavy a share of public expense, with small hemes particularly hard hit, it is doubtful whether we shall do more than grant temporary' relief. tt u We Dodge Away From Real Issue TO sum it all up, we still are temporizing, still depending on some easy makeshift to pull us out of the hole, still shying away from the problems and issues which the depression has revealed and which we know can not be dodged indefinitely. Even after three years of such distress as this country never knew before, we still hesitate to admit the obvious defects of a system which was obviously responsible. That good old alibi that we were caught in a world-wide calamity, and that our own follies are not to blame, still intrigues us. Many people are quite content to see the addlepated boom return and put their money in enterprises just as hollow as that of the Insulls. What is even more inconceivable, they are ready to perpetuate a tax system and an extravagance in government which are unnecessary and unreasonable, in spite of all they have learned ancl all they have suffered.
j SCIENCE" Mars Closer to Earth ■ ■ BY DAVID DIETZ -■
NIGHT by night, the planet Mars has been growing redder and brighter in the eastern sky. When this happened in ancient times, people regarded the planet with awe, fearing that it was a portend of war or trouble. Perhaps there are some today who would draw a connection between the planet’s behavior and the war clouds in the far east. That number, however, does not include the modern astronomer. The astronomer knows that Mars is growing brighter because it is swinging closer and closer to the earth. On March 1, the earth and Mars will be in opposition. That is a straight line drawn from the sun to Mars will pass through the earth. However, due to slight irregularities in the orbits of the two planets they will not be at their closest on March 1, but two nights later. On March 3, the distance between the earth and Mars will be 61,000,000 miles. Mars revolves about the sun in an orbit just beyond that of the earth. (The earth is 93,000,000 miles from the sun; Mars.is 141,000.000 miles). The two planets move with different speeds and so an opposition occurs once every two years and two months. n tt ft Distance Varies Due to the fact that the orbits of both the earth and Mars are flattened circles or ellipses, the exact distance between the two deoends upon where they are in their orbits at the time of opposition. In August, 1924, an extremely, favorable opposition occurred. The earth was then approximately at its farthest from the sun and so the distance between the two planets was only 35,000,000 miles. The present opposition takes place when the earth is approximately at its closest to the sun and so the distance between the two planets is 61,000,000 miles. Asa result, Mars is not so bright in the heavens this time as it was in 1924 and does not provide the astronomer with quite so good an object of study. Dr. J. J. Nassau, director of Case Warner & Swasey Observatory of Case School of Applied Science, reports that the northern polar cap now is seen quite easily with a moderate-sized telescope. The equatorial markings, which many observers believe to be caused by vegetation, are also easily seen. Mars is a difficult object to study. It is photographed with success only by a few observatories which combine the advantages of large telescopes with the advantages of clear air at high altitudes, such as ooservatories in California and Arizona. No one ever has photographed the fine structure on the planet’s disK which constitutes the socalled canals. This fine structure can be seen only momentarily, when the “seeing” is particularly good. tt * m * Life on Mars THE question frequently asked most about Mars is the one which astronomers can not answer with any positiveness. That is the question of whether there is any life on Mars. As already mentioned, many astronomers think the dark markings are caused by vegetation. And, of course, if there is plant life on Mars, there also may be animal life. Novelists like to speculate upon the nature of life on Mars. It frequently is stated that because Mars is only about half the diameter of the earth, it may have cooled off and solidified much faster than did the earth. Life, therefore, may be milliqfris of years older on Mars than it is on the earth. This has given rise
MARCH 3,1933
TRACT
to the notion that the supposed inhabitants of Mars are much wiser than those of the earth. H. G. Wells pictured evolution as having gone so far upon Mars that the Martian is practically all brain. In one of his novels, he pictures these creatures as living inside of steel cylinders and manipulating great steel tentacles and legs by mechanical means. The astronomer, however, can go no further than to say that the polar caps on Mars grow larger in winter and smaller in summer, a behavior suggesting that the cap 6 are composed of ice. The markings on the planet change their color with the season as vegetation would be expected to do. Thermocouple measurements indicate that the temperature on the planet may be comfortable at noon, but that it is far below the freezing point at night, perhaps as low as 40 below zero.
Daily Thought
Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh.—St. Luke 6:21. tt tt a THE world more frequently recompenses the appearance of merit, than merit itself.—Rochefoucauld. Times Readers Voice Views... Editor Times—l am writing this letter to Governor McNutt. Were I to send it to him direct, he never would see it. For I am one of those whom he regards as of no consequence, a citizen, a widow, alone with a young child. We have a small house which we must keep out of money left by one who worked hard for it. I pay taxes. The child must eat. She must have things, somewhat even as his child has them. He has no right to take from us. What is the name of this Governor of ours? Mussolini McNutt? What is tried among us here? These changes are not changes to bring bread to the hungry, but to bring cake to the politician. Watch this man McNutt. He kills himself and his party. LOUISE WOOD. 2502 North Alabama street.
Questions and Answers Q.—Are tfte Marx brothers Jews? A.—Yes. Q.—How many Presidents have been lawyers? A.—Twenty. q—Was the moving picture “20,000 Years in Sing Sing” filmed in that prison? A—Most of it wa made in Hollywood, but Warden Lawes of Sing Sing co-operated to the extent of permitting cameras within the prison for actual scenes, including those of prisoners in the mob scenes. Q —When and where is the Frontier Ttys celebration held each year? A—At Cheyenne, Wyo., for five days each summer, about the last week in July. Q—Do American Indians have the right to suffrage? A—All Indians were given American citizenship by a special act of congress and are entitled to vote, if otherwise qualified by rate laws. _