Indianapolis Times, Volume 45, Number 235, Indianapolis, Marion County, 9 February 1934 — Page 16

PAGE 16

The Indianapolis Times * (A C*IPPS HOWARD SEW6PAPEEI *OT W. HOWARD Prl<let ImjWELL Editor E-UUi D. BAKER Bailnc** Manager s, I’hon#—Blley 5331 I Member of Cnlted Preee,

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t FRIDAY FFB 9. 1934 THE AGED POOR ffWUT of a vast program of emergency relief and social adventure one measure now before congress stands out as neither costly nor experimental This is the Dill-Cr,nnery bill for federaj aid to old-age pension states. . This bill, approved by a committee ot both hawses last session, can be passed this spring if'the administration adopts it as part of its program. Thu would give hope and security to those whose declining years are haunted by 0 the specters of want and fear. The Dill-Connerv bill allows federal grants to states up to one-third of the total cost of pension systems covering the needy ot sixtyfive years or more. It would standardize pension systems in the twenty-seven states that have adopted pension systems. And it would be infinitely cheaper In dollars than the old poor-house way. It is estimated that when all states reduce their requirements to 65 years there will be 454.000 pensioners. Thi<f would cost $133,000,000 a year, of which the federal share would be about $44,000,000. The United States bureau of labor statistics sets its estimate at $128,000,000 for the total annual bill. This is the Ultimate cast. The immediate annual cost Would be not more than $10,000,000 or $12,000,000 for the next two or three years. Since we have determined to treat ourarives to some civilization we should begin with those who first feel the pinch, the grandfathers and grandmothers of the poor. . r' FORGETTING 12,000,000 iT is not surprising that NR A has not solved -4 the complicated economic and social problems that revolve about the Negro in Amerind. The problems are as old as the nation aiid go to the roots of our thougnt and life. ■ .'Yet conditions today seem to demand that NRA face the Negro problem more frankly than it has so far and give further consideration to the claims of those representing Negro wickers. ; > T RA is committed to the principle of revising business by increasing the purchasing ppwer of those who buy the products of business. There seems no good reason why it should ignore twelve million Negro citizens as potential purchasers and consumers. Yet where Negroes are included at all in NRA cides the wages specified for them are uniformly below those specified for white workers and they are uniformly too low to act as a possible stimulus to business. Many a business m%ht flourish on the trade of these millions of customers if it were given a chance to do so. If NRA does not feel able at this time to decide that Negro workers should be put on an economic basis with white workers, it still could and should see to it that Negro workers receive higher wages than at present under the blue eagle. When code revisions occur next month, definite steps should be taken to build up Negro purchasing power. If the nation ever has courage enough to make it possible for Negroes to live on anything approaching standards of decency, it may find many of its serious social problems disappearing. INFLATION AND RECOVERY PERHAPS the main danger in the current debate over money is'that it makes us forget ’more weighty matters which must claim our attention if we hope to pull definitely out of the slump and to salvage the capitalistic system. The sensible way in which to regard the whole inflation controversy is to recognize that decisive reflation is an incidental, but indispensable item in a broad gauge assault upon rugged individualism and the dominion of the money-changers. . if we wish to reform and preserve capitalism for any considerable period, we must concentrate our efforts upon assuring mass power and upon conserving the in-tok-fets of the consumer. 1 Finance capitalism must be ended. It is tlj<i common enemy of all mankind—even of tite money-changers themselves in the lastafeajysis. Industrial capitalism may be aided apd strengthened, but the new era of capitalism must be one of consumer capitalism. ' if the consumer is not armed with effective apfl adequate purchasing power capitalism must of necessity fold up—and that rather rabidly. The profit system can not function upless goods can be sold, and under capitalism one can not buy goods unless he has cfocey. i To insure adequate mass purchasing power. steps should be taken to prevent the accumulation and transmission of great fortunes, tfie possessors of which can not. and should npt. consume goods in proportion to their respires. I Public works and relief projects will have to be expanded and pushed rapidly, in order tttat we may not collapse while the physician Is working over us. Farm relief and reorganization must be successfully prosecuted, so that some 44 per cent of our population can once again possess the means of purchasing their share of the goods essential to life and happiness. Labor must be allowed to assist in proriding mass purchasing power through complete freedom to organize and bargain collectively. The government need not become a partisan of labor, but it must remove the disabilities and handicaps Imposed upon it by finance capitalism and a subservient Judicial system. The government must enter the labor field at least to the extent of prescribing adequate minimum wages. No conceivable arrangement within a capitalistic system can provide complete stability i at the economic order. There will be consid-

erable fluctuations In our collective well-being —alternations of prosperity and depression. To reduce these to a minimum we shall have to assure a continuance of mass purchasing power even In periods of relative slackening of cur economic tempo. This can be done in efficient and civilized fashion only through the establishment of federal social Insurance—unemployment, health and old age Insurance. All of this will require ample public funds. Those who absorbed an unearned and unjustifiable portion of our social income in the past have reduced mass purchasing power and have brought us to our present lamentable condition. They must turn back part of their bounties to aid in the desperate battle. Higher Income taxes in the upper brackets, and a great Increase in inheritance and estate taxes are essential at once. If necessary', a capital levy may be resorted to. This is In the interest even of those from whom the capital may be taken. Half a hog Is better than none. If prosperity is not restored, and that very promptly, there will be no capital left to anybody. CARTOONIST TELLS ’EM “TT is time the art element took the offen- * sive.” Whereupon Will Dyson, famous English cartoonist, uses his pen for words instead of pictures and there results “Artists Among the Bankers” <Dutton>, one of the best sustained pieces of invective to roll off the presses in months. The bankers and the business men, to put it in something less than Dyson's language, are the cause of it all. He leaves his drawing board for the typewriter with the obvious hesitation. “Let me say,” he says, “that I do not write as one ambitious of writing—it is not my calling ... I am a simple artist—one earning an honorable pittance by defaming the great.” Like this: “The melancholy truth is that there is not —nor was there ever in our world—a marvel that sprang from the business brain. That brain is one of the noncreative things of the world. It is a sterile brain. It has neither pride of ancestry nor hope of posterity—its functions are the functions of the mule. “If we rely on Business Man in this crisis, we are lost. The Business Man is not, never was, yid never will he be, aught but a cipher in the realities of the world. Historically he is a liberated slave keeping the accounts of mankind, and keeping them wrong. To leave our salvation to him is to invite him to exhibit his incompetence and cruelly to lead us further and further wrong.” But Dyson doesn't leave his drawing board merely to crack dotfn on bankers and business men. He has a purpose. And that is to preach the recovery doctrine of Major C. H. Douglas, author of the social credit plan. “Business is a weak sister. She is dying in her failure to assist herself. Being no business man, I claim a doctor’s mandate in this connection. . . . There is only one thing that can save it. That salvation can only come through the sale of our surplus goods, as damnation is coming through the nonsale of them.” It is a question of price with Douglas and Dyson. The latter asserts that the bankers and business men do not permit the circulation of enough money to permit the purchase of the things business creates. He states two laws that he says now exist: That more money shall be returned to business than they have to return or distribute in finance; and that business and banking shall be the sole distributor of finance at large. These, Dyson says, make neither “sense nor arithmetic.” The answer, apparently in Dyson's mind, is to finance consumption. Whatever one might think of the DvsonDouglas doctrine, whatever one may think of his sizzling indictment of bankers and business men, there can be no quarrel with the statement that Dyson the artist is very effective. His book he illustrates himself. THE SUGAR MESSAGE / T'HE sugar problem is one of those on which wise men disagree and every suggested solution seems subject to some legitimate criticism. The Roosevelt proposal sent to congress yesterday may be as good a theoretic compromise as is possible. But we are not at all certain that it would work as the President hopes. There is danger that it will hurt the consumer without helping the farmer. Since such a hazard exists, the President is properly cautious in putting the crop restriction and processing tax provisions and the quotas in experimental form. To protect the American beet sugar grow’er, the President would provide a quota of 1,450,000 short tons and then would bring sugar under the agricultural adjustment act to provide a processing tax of Vi cent a pound to compensate farmers holding down production to that quota level. To save consumers from carrying this tax he would protide that the tax rate should not exceed the amount of tariff reduction. A quota of 1.844.000 short tons w’ould be given Cuba, 1.037,000 to the Philippines 935,000 to Hawaii and £21,000 to Puerto Rico. And in negotiating anew Cuban treaty, “favorable consideration will be given to an increase in the existing preferential on Cuban sugar to an extent compatible with the joint interests of the two countries.” It is questionable whether this arrangement would go far enough, either in reviving Cuba economically as a market for our products or In protecting the American sugar consumer. To classify sugar as ‘“a bqsic agricultural commodity” under the AAA when only about 21* per cent of our farmers are growers, and when that product accounts for less than 1 per cent of the total farm income, appears rather far-fetched. The history of this American industry is that large corporations get the profits, rather than the poorly paid farmers and worse paid field hands, including children. In any event. It is hard to justify tariff protection and processing tax subsidies for 2 l * per cent of the farmer* at the expense of all city consumers and more than 97 per cent of the farmers. The President, in all fairness, states that the arguments of opponents of such protection and resulting high sugar prices as follows: “The annual gross value of the sugai crop to American beet and cane growers is approximately (60,000.000. Those who believe ein the free importation of sugar say that 2 cents a pound tariff is levied mostly to protect this

(60 000,000 crop and that it costs our consuming public every year more than $20,000,000 to afford this protection.” He adds: “I do not at this time recommend placing sugar on the free list. I feet that we ought first to try out a svstem of quotas.” If that is an inference that the President will favor duty-free sugar if this experiment fails, it is the most hopeful part of his message. LADIES OF THE ENSEMBLE 'T'HE chorus girl of fiction—Rolls-Royces and ermine--and the chorus girl of fact —flve-shows-a-day in the movie house at $25 to (35 a week and too tired at night to step out —both are appealing characters. The latter makes the stronger bid for sympathy,'however, because she seems to need it. Fortunately she has eloquent defenders in Eddie Cantor, who is a member of the Amusement Code Authority of the NRA. and Mrs. Dorothy Bryant, secretary of the Chorus Equity Association. . These two have just sounded the alarm in behalf of the movie chorus girl, “the hardest working, lowest paid person in the theater," according to Mrs. Bryant. The theatrical producers and exhibitors are preparing amendments to the NRA code for chorus girls, and according to the alarm, these will ask that the wage scale do not apply to those of less than two years’ experience, that the scale be reduced, that the requirement of $3 a day during lay-offs be discontinued and that tryouts be restored at less than full pay. Lay-offs occur on the road when engagements are not booked consecutively. Before the code they were made at the expense of the girls, no salary being paid during waits. Tryouts before the code were paid for at half rate, and old timers recall acts which ran for months and still were called tryouts. As for the two-year apprenticeship before full pay starts, a chorus girl's first two years often represent her highest value. Thus argue the defenders of chdrus rights. We know the theatrical men have their troubles. Show business isn't what it used to be, if it ever was. Tickets sell for less, and union scales for stage hands look high. Still we hope the chorus girls won’t have to carry the burden of box office deficiencies. We hope the exhibitors can find a way to preserve the modest advantages in the chorus girls’ code. They rehearse long hours, work hard, don't earn much and do a lot to make the theater a fresh and charming place. Winthrop Rockefeller, grandson of John D„ has quit Yale to become a Standard Oil truck driver, and may be president by the time you read this.

Liberal Viewpoint ' Bv DR. HARRY ELMER BARNES =. ONE of the most valiant workers for anew deal long before the days of Mr. Roosevelt was Charles Edward Russell. Os late, he has lost much of his old Socialist fire. But he has iost none of his power as a trenchant and fascinating writer. He has now written his auto-' biography (Bare Hands and Stone Walls. Some Recollections of a Side-Line Reformer. By Charles Edward Russell. Charles Scribner’s Sons. $3.00). Purely personal items are subordinated to the economic, social and political movements in which he took part. Asa glimpse of the history of contemporary American social politics, it compares with the autobiographies of Lincoln Steffens and Clarence Darrow. The book is marred chiefly by the naive attempt of Mr. Russell to justify his utterly mistaken position in the World war. He quotes Clarence Darrow’s speech during the war as a vindication of his own stand, neglecting to point out that Darrow has long since honestly repudiated his war-time position. The new deal came upon us with such a rush that few textbook publishers had any opportunity to revise their books and include an adequate summary of the staggeringly comprehensive new deal. Therefore, one may feel deeply grateful to Messrs. Hamm and Dambrow, teachers in New York City schools, for their splendid summary of recent American history (Current Problems in American History. By William A. Hamm and Oscar Dambrow. College Entrance Book Company. 75 cents). While this little work of some 185 pages is intended primarily for teachers of history and the social studies, it should be on the library table of every American citizen who pretends to read a newspaper. tt tt tt IT was inevitable that the colorful first year of Mr Roosevelt’s rule would stimulate the writing of histories of his administration. Mr. Looker’s book (The American Way: Franklin Roosevelt in Action. By Earle Looker. John Day Company. $2.50) is a readable and reliable journalistic summary of Mr. Roosevelt’s term to date, with considerable material on his life and political career prior to March 4, 1933. The opinions of the author are dogmatic and outspoken. but add color to the work. It is frankly sympathetic and at times eulogistic, but it is certainly a highly useful and generally reliable summary of what the new deal has accomplished and of the personality and methods which dominate it. Mr. Benson Y. Landis sees the new deal in the guise of a third American Revolution: The first American Revolution—l77s to 1783 —was a struggle between an association of agricultural colonies and the metropolis of London. The second American Revolution—lß6l to 1865—was a conflict for control of the national government between planters of the south on the one hand and an alliance of eastern industrialists with middle —estern farmers on the other. The third American Revolution—that of 1933—began largely as a clash of the south and west against the industrial and financial east. This book attempts an interpretation of certain aspects of the third revolution.” tt tt a BY getting down to fundamentals in this fashion. Mr. Landis’ book (The Third American Revolution: An Interpretation. By Benson Y. Landis. Association Press. $1) is less superficial and episodical than the journalistic summaries of Roosevelt’s activities. It is perhaps the most successful attempt to date to place the Roosevelt experiment in its proper historical perspective. It deserves to be taken over by some well-known publishing house. Professor Holcombe gets away from the traditional textbook treatment of political parties and attempts to envisage their nature and significance in terms of the new world order of 1934. tThe New Party Politics, by A. W. Holcombe, W. W. Norton <te Cos., Inc., $1.75>. He holds that the old party system, founded on sectionalism, is on its way out. to be replaced by parties based upon economic groups and social classes. Professor Holcombe aligns himself with the middle class and concludes his book with the summary statement of a well thought-out program for this economic group. Mr. Samuel Crowther sets forth, with his well known literary power, a forceful case for American economic nationalism. He contends with vigor that the future prosperity of the United States depends upon our capacity to turn away from Europe and the Far East and to develop our economic life with primary consideration for the American market. While Mr. Crowther goes to the opposite extreme, his book '(America Self Contained, by Samuel Crowther, Doubleday, Doran & Cos., Inc., $3) is a desirable antidote for the dogmas of our professional internal localises and investment bankers, ■—

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

SUFFER LITTLE CHILDREN—TMi Cd(N)STfITUTII6N

The Message Center

(Timet readers are invited to express their views in these columns. Make your letters short, so all can have a chance. Limit them to {SO words or. less.) tt o tt THE VETERANS’ ISSUE TOLD IN VERSE By Joseph B. Adler In congress there has been so much talk About the pensions to be paid hereafter; No one desires from a just case to balk. But no one wants to feed a big grafter. One senator is making this a big fight, Trying to give away many more millions; But we’re not so sure that he’s right, And the expense now runs into billions. The President says he wants to be just, And the right men should get their pay; But he is opposed to a grafter’s trust. And that’s exactly what the people say. Men who answered their country’s call. And perfectly ready to face enemy’s gun, Were further willing to give their all, So went into the fight and did not run. The men who fought and now suffer pain, Who were injured in some particular way. Should be paid, although it is a drain, And none object to that, this very day. There were a milionn who did not fight. And many who did not leave this shore: If not injured it would not be right to give them millions and get people sore. Those who were injured in a just cause, Are entitled to everything of the best; For their welfare we should never pause To pay them, and set their minds at rest. The President says he wants to be fair, And if left to him. will do what’s right; In proper cases he will give a good care To see there’s no occasion for any fight. tt tt tt TRAVELING GOVERNOR’ SCORED BY READER By R. D. What is the trouble with the Republicans; are they dead? "This question was asked in your paper recently. Ia ma Roosevelt Democrat. Please print this. The Republicans are not dead. They are just sitting back laughing about our Indiana traveling Governor and our statehouse governor. Grenlee, and our play-boy-scout chief of police of the city police force. The record of everything they have done was, and is. enough to elect the Republicans next time from the bottom to the top of the Republican. ticket. We can’t elect a Democrat in the next fifty years in Indiana. But, once every twelve or sixteen years, as usual, we get in a short time—then out—but why just the si me as we did this time. The sum

Stop Those Lynchings!

By Beniamin A. Osborne Another anti-lynching bill has been intrduced before the congress of the Unietd States. Similar bills have been introduced in nearly every session of congress, but for some inexplicable reason died for lack of support. America is still the laid of dual culture —that of a highly developed civilization and that of barbarity. We have more churches in the United States than any other country of the world. We have more laws than nearly all tthe other countries of the world put togeher. Taken by this standard, it ought to be the most advanced country culturally, but unfortunatey there is another side to American life, and that is the barbarism of certain sections where men are lynched for the amusement it affords the mob. In the first four weeks of the year there is a record of three lynchings. The last one has taken place in Florida, a state along with Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama and Texas very famous for this kind of amusement. It is true that each state of the American union has its own sovereign rights, but the federal government ought to be able to do something to restrain the bar-

we put in with the Republicans help run everything in the ground The reason your paper’s subscriptions are gaining, for one thing, is that when people looked inside of the other two papers of our city they saw the traveling Governor’s and Morrissey’s picture so often it made them sick at their stomachs, so they had to quit taking them and took The Times. tt tt tt PRESS DEBATE ON SOCIALISM NOW IS CONCLUDED By H. H. Kimmerling I wish to correct a partial error by Forest Rogers in Feb. 2 issue. After a silly letter appeared in The Times relative to Professor G. Bromley Oxnam of De Pauw university, I directed tw T o or three letters to Mr. Maddox after consulting the Indianapolis directory, but without results. Consequently I challenged him through the Message Center for debate on the relation of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and scientific Sociai-

A Woman’s Viewpoint Bv MRS. WALTER FERGUSON

WITH the world in its present unhappy state occasional queries appearing in the column of Mrs. Emily Post, high priestess of propriety, come as a distinct shock. The prize one last week came from a woman who was distressed about the proper procedure for getting into her church pew. She didn't know whether to take the usher's arm or to follow him down the aisle with her husband or to have the three go in single file. Mrs. Post replied with her usual urbane wisdom, but one wonders whether it night not have been just as well for the lady to stay at home since it was so evident she was more concerned as to her behavior before men than with her state of divine grace. B B B * ILIKE the much ridiculed religion of the lowly and ignorant better than a good deal of the sort we so often find in fashionable churches. It has, at least, the virtue of sincerity* It concerns itself

1 wholly disapprove of what you say and will [ defend to the death your right to say it — Voltaire.

barious practice of lynching that oges on, particularly in the south. Feople outside the Unted States can not very well understand how a country, dotted with universities and collleges and having so many cutural institutions, can perpetrate such a horrible thing like lynching without taking definite steps to protect the reputation of the nation. It must be admitted that while America is a great country, it is now the most barbarious section of our civilization. When one meets an American abroad, he has good reason to be afraid of him, because he may be tempted to be as brutal outside his country as he is within. To roast men and hang them to the limbs of trees aand then dissect them piece by piece, surely can not be counted as good behavior within any civilization. i The American is a contrast. He is civilized, yet he is a savage. The stories that come out of the south prove tthis ,and the rest of the nation ought to be ashamed to allow this indictment to stand because it doesn't mean well for the whte American people. Every citizen should urge congress to pass the Costigan-Wag-ner anti-lynching bill.

ism, giving my name, city and street address, believing that if he were sincere he would communicate with me. Now it seems that the question involved took Socialism and the Constitution from an entirely different angle heretofore thought of and proved to be the rock upon which their old-time cut and dried logic foundered. Mr. Maddox again appeared in The Times with a 700word article in which he said everything and proved nothing, to which I replied, stating my reasons for not wanting to conduct - the debate through the press. (This letter, after several weeks’ delay, is as yet unpublished), and here let me add that I was a paid contributor to the Scripps-Mcßae publications long before The Times was thought of, and if one can not get the same consideration as another I readily can guess the reason. It was not for Mr. Maddox’s | benefit I had in mind but he is a j perfect type to stand up before an | audience and overwhelm him with

with the problems of life rather than with manners. The hill-billy Holy Roller, indulging in his orgy of emotional ecstasy, is more pleasing, it would seem to me, in the sight of the most intellectual of gods, than any pseudo-refined individual who postures for the delectation of men before some brightly lighted altar. A religion without zest is a religion without meaning. I wish we could close up our great churches for a while. Nail them shut with iron bolts and take ourselves for worship to the hovels in our cities where dwell the poor, neglected and miserable. Our prayers would have a sweeter savor if they were said upon the frozen earth where walk the feet of shoeless children. For our rituals are dead. They have served their purpose and there can never be a real revival of Christianity unMl that good day when we understand at last that religion must consist of social methods as well as ideas.

.FEB. 9, 1934

an avalanche of incontrovertible*, facts which only a well informed; socialist is able to do. Furthermore,’ I had analyzed Mr. Maddox as a prototype of one who would stab a man in the dark and hide behind a church for protection, and I am beginning to believe as does Mr. Rogers, that he is using a fictitious name to avoid getting trapped. In conclusion I will say to Mr. Bailey Maddox or whatever your name happens to be, that after we j have disposed of the first question involved, I again challenge you on the subject: “Resolved that the church has delayed the march of progress a. thousand years.” In that I will take., history from Pharaoh to Hoover.*) from Socrates to John Dewy, from ' Aristotle, Strabo, Pliny and Ptolmey'f to Dr. Einstein, from Columbus to 1 Byrd, and from Dr, Harvey to the most advanced physicians of today, and if you are afraid to come out in the open in defense of your antiquated ideas then keep your nonsensical drivel out of the press as it is beginning to mean the loss of a number of subscribers to The Times in this city. Editor’s Note—This is the end of j the Maddox Socialism controversy. •< ON THE SIDE OF THE LITTLE FELLOW By James R. Helfon. I notice in your paper that some one did not like the idea of \Y. A. Benedict in regard to this auto license extension. As usual, instead of his name being known, it was, by a reader. Now, Mr. Reader, I suppose you hav a job, and the chances are that you have had through these hard times. Now, by your having a job, you are big. And these people who are out, or have been out, of work for some time are little. But that is because they would like to see li their licenses extended. As you said, you are upholding - the law with Mr. Feeney. For that li they should give you a medal or a ' job at the statehouse. I’ll see Nutt for you and work, you in. Mr. McNutt needs a man like you. Now, Mr. Reader, because you have a job and a machine with 1934 license and the chances are a little money saved, don’t think you are the only one in this large world, and the only one with new license. I have a job and I do not have ;; any machine, only I am for the people who are looking forward to' I better times so they can get new’; licenses as yours. B B B LIFE ISN’T ALL IN A COFFEE SACK By Dovie L. League. It’s just as I expected. Just when we get everything done by machinery and there is no need to work, every one says, “This relief is nice, but I want to work.” Life is not all in a coffee sack. It might be empty. Reminiscent BY CHRISTIE RUDOLPH Because of your arrogance You have swept me back Into the grim green shade. Garland in red and assembled in black You skimmed o’er the mirrored lake Where laughter and song were lost In the young grey dawn, I was awake To every living atom perfect and subdued, By the flow of ripples and the puipling grass. I was aware of ominous color of variable hue. I viewed Across the surface of my land* To kiss the dim shadow of your faltering hands. Most crude desire to peer into my soul, Your memory has left me, but partly whole.