Indianapolis Times, Volume 46, Number 113, Indianapolis, Marion County, 20 September 1934 — Page 18

PAGE 18

The Indianapolis Times U nrßirr.now%rd sr.H.*r*rrßi hot w. Howard Pr*i4*nt TALCOTT POWELL Editor SARL D. BAKER ....... Batlnesa Manager Phone Riley ST.M

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THURSDAY BEPT. 20. 1934 THE WISCONSIN PRIMARY TN the Wisconsin primary the new Prognfflfe party did not sweep the state. But the results have not altered earlier predictions of observers there that Senator La Foliette mil be re-elected in November. The final total vote apparently will fall several hundred thousand below the vote two years ago. Indicating only a moderate interest on the part of the electorate. Most of the Interest centered in local rather than national issues. In the gubernatorial race, former Governor Phil La Foliette polled less than the combined Democratic candidates and must develop much more strength within the next two months to capture the election. Though Senator La Foliette also polled few-er votes than his combined Democratic opponents, he has a good chance to gain a portion of those votes in the election. Moreover, the Progressive turnout is expected to oe much larger in November than In the primary. In which young Bob had no opposition for the Progressive nomination. Senator La Foliette. who recently received high praise from President Roosevelt in the Green Bay speech, is recognized generally as one of the most faithful and effective leaders of political liberalism in the country. His return to the senate should be, and probably is. assured. THE PARTISAN GENERAL SINCE sundry' employers’ associations are circularizing the country with copies of General Johnson's attack on the textile strikers, it is necessary’ to look at the record. General Johnson charged: That the strike is in “absolute violation” of the June NRA agreement. That there have been unleashed “forces of riot and rebellion.” which the union can not control. That "when a strike becomes political it has no place in the lexicon of the NRA.” The record refutes General Johnson: The first sentence of the June agreement stated: “Strike order (of June) to be countermanded without prejudice to the right of labor to strike.” Under that agreement the NRA was to make five reports on controversial issues, but General Johnson to this day continues to suppress three of those reports. As for “riot and rebellion.” the newspaper reports and statements by various state officials in the strike areas indicate that in most cases the violence has not been initiated by the strikers. Rebellion niver is attempted by unarmed citizens—the strikers are unarmed. There is not the slightest evidence, either In the union demands or activity, to indicate that the strike is political. On the contrary, the evidence is complete and overwhelming that these half-million citizens are struggling for what they sincerely believe—rightly or wrongly—to be their legal right to collective bargaining and a living wage. General Johnson in New York spoke as an anti-labor partisan, which he had no right to do as a government official in charge of an impartial agency connected with this industrial dispute. Since the general has revealed his partisanship, it is somewhat easier to understand. though not to justity, the failure of NRA machinery to prevent or settle disputes of this kind. It is easier to understand why Provident Roosevelt has looked to other officials than General Johnson for a settlement. It Is easier to understond why the special Winant board has found it necessary to pass over the NRA textile studies and reports and to send labor department investigators into the field to gather authoritative facts and figures Under the circumstances it is fortunate that the partisan general is not representing President Roosevelt in the delicate textile situation. despite intimations in the Johnson New York speech to the contrary. Neither the government nor the public can pass judgment on this dispute until the government ascertains the facts which NRA failed to establish. The only point which is clear and beyond dispute to date is that the union has pledged itself iO binding government arbitration and that the employers unconditionally have rejected every government offer of mediation.and arbitration.

THE OTHER STRIKE HUNDREDS of thousands of men have quit work in one of the biggest strikes in the country's history. The pain and drama of the textile demonstration are so absorbing that they tend to obscure the fact of another and bigger strike that has been going on for nearly a year. This is the strike of American money. During the summer and early fall of 1933 business co-operated under NR A in a recovery program. Under the codes business reduced hours, increased wages and agreed to bargain collectively with the workers. Unemployment was reduced between March and September by about 3.600.000. The new buying power of the new workers reflected itself in industrial profits and dividends. In the first half of this year the workers’ total income was J 2.000.000.000 higher than in the same period of last year. Then the strikes of capital spread. Today the nation's bank vaults are crammed with idle money, yet the only big lender is the United States government. The banks take in more deposits and let out less in loans. According to the American Federation of Labors survey of business, there is a total shortage of private credit of $20,000,000 000. In 192# business men borrowed from the Federal Reserve member banks nearly $12,000,000,000. That year the government borrowed only #4.000 000 000. Today business borrows #5,000,000.000, the government #9,000,000.000. There is plenty of work for idle iiapital to do. Daniel C. Roper, secretary of commefbe.

gays we need 5.000.000 new homes, yet last year we built only 50,000. We need 11.000,000 new automobiles, yet up to June we produced only 2.135000 this year. We are short on many billions of dollars' worth of necessities and luxuries. The reported desire of conservative capital to wreck the New Deal is only a partial explanation. The administration's failure to adopt a definite monetary policy, to reorganize NRA. to stand by its labor laws, contribute to the general uncertainty which in part causes the disastrous capital strike. TVA PAYS CHARGES that the government’s Tennessee Valley Authority project is a pork barrel are refuted by the record of five months operation of the Tupelo iMiss.) electric system. Under a financial set-up outlined by the TVA. Tupelo has paid all operating expenses. It paid the city 8.2 per cent of its $23,708 revenues for taxes. It paid interest and redemption on outstanding bonds and notes. It paid the city 7.6 per cent of revenues as a fair return on equity in the plant. It set aside 15.6 per cent of revenues for depreciation, new construction and contingencies. And it still had 13.6 per cent of revenues to add to surplus. TVA, in its ov.*n financial plan, has provided for the eventual retirement of the government's advances to it and for the liquidation of the investment of the people of the United States in the long-idle Muscle Shoals power plant. Tupelo is demonstrating that the TVA formula—a formula of low electric rates and sound financial operation—will work. GOOD GOVERNMENT A GOOD many years ago, when the French economist de Tocqueville came over to see what sort of country the American people were making for themselves, he reported that the best thing about it was the fact that the states could serve as laboratories for experiments in government, which the nation as a whole was not yet ready to try. Growing centralization of authority,* coupled with an increasing standardization of manners and customs, has kept the states from doing very much of this laboratory work of late years. Now, however, it looks as if we were about ready to give it a try. Ducking one's head to avoid stray bricks, one can begin by mentioning the possibility of Upton Sinclair's election in California. Whatever fears his complicated scheme for handling unemployment may arouse, it is at least pretty obvious that it is far better to have anew and possibly impractical stunt like that tested within the confines of one state than throughout the nation as a whole. Then there is Oklahoma, where E. W. Marland —once an oil king, now a progressive experimenter—expects to become Governor in January and to try out a vast SIOO,000,000 subsistence homestead project with an auxiliary program for the use of many small manufacturing plants to relieve urban unemployment. Programs like these of Mr. Sinclair and Mr. Marland, may rank with the most wildly impractical ideas that the human race ever conceived. That, at this moment, is not the point. The point is that our unemployment situation is rapidly becoming one of those progressively developing puzzles like the unbalanced budget which plagued Louis XVI of France. Louis, you may recall, fiddled around with this puzzle until it got out of hand, and he wound up under Dr. Guillotine's knife. Since this problem is becoming so great, a number of people are clamoring for anew method of approach to its solution. Such clamor inevitably leads to experimentation. And we are extremely fortunate that our political setup permits us to experiment by states—to experiment, that is, on a small scale, without involving the nation as a whole. The ability of the individual states to try out new methods of government may yet prove our salvation in this crisis.

A CITY WITHOUT PAPERS T)UBLICATION of Sunday newspapers in Havana wag prohibited by a recent law. Consequently, the Morro Castle disaster found scores of Havana citizens distraught and frenzied as they waited to hear the fate of their friends on the ship. For us in America the spectacle is a reminder of the routine, dependable, every day public service rendered by the press, which is never realized until it is missed. The same kind of wound is inflicted upon the public by the Hitlers and Mussolinis of the world who limit the press not in time but in fact and opinion. It is worth while to contemplate this picture of a newspaperless city—for a lesson by contrast. A GOOD INVESTMENT TIMING his announcement with the opening of the fall school term. Harold L. Ickes. secretary of the interior, reports that PWa is helping to finance more than 5210.000.000 worth of new school buildings. A lot of money? Yes, but in view of the crisis in education little enough. The localities are hard-pressed for hunger relief and impoverished by low taxing power. Hundreds of thousands of youths who can not get jobs during depression are demanding education. For five years there has been scarcely any replacement of the nation’s $6,000,000,000 school plant. Had the government not helped, very few schools now would be under construction. As every one knows, this democracy can not survive without enlightened citizens. If not “self-liquidating.” schools are sociallyliquidating as few other institutions. In prosperous times we did not spend nearly enough of the national wealth for schools and teachers. And in 1930 only 3.35 per cent of the nation's income went for public education. Less than 2.25 per cent of its wealth was in school property. Emergency help from the government is necessary now. but communities must not get the habit of looking to Washington for easy money to build and run their schools. They can adopt the county or state school administrative unit, encourage the growth of the consolidated schools, build cheaper schools better fitted to community needs, widen the schoolhouse's function into that of a social and recreational center. They can Approve

the type of education now offered In most communities. Communities can increase the efficiency of their schools without increasing the tax burden. And. under Just tax systems, they could spend much more on education. Present and future generations of children should not have to pay for their elders’ sms of omission. Liberal Viewpoint BY DR. HARRY ELMER BARNES CONSTITUTION DAY has enabled reactionary publicists and spell-binders to proclaim once more the peril to the nation residing in the subversive deeds of the Roosevelt administration and the deeper plots of the brain trust. They warn us that American institutions in general and the Constitution in particular are in grave danger. The Constitution is not merely a collection of printed prescriptions as to governmental procedure. There is such a thing as the spirit of the Constitution as well as the letter. Those who clamor most persistently about the observance of the letter of the Constitution are the very ones who, consciously or not, violate its spirit most flagrantly. In its spirit, the Constitution was nothing timid or conservative. It was the bold and daring effort of a group of men who recently had carried through one of the major revolutions of early modern times. One of the most conservative of them had even declared that the best test of the fitness of a people for self-govern-ment is their ability to execute a successful revolution. Such was the generation which made the Constitution. It was not a group of eighteenth century James Montgomery Becks or Mark Sullivans or Harry Atwoods. The Constitution was an effort to bring order out of chaos. The condition which confronted the framers was not markedly different in principle from that which challenged the ingenuity of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933. If the makers of the Constitution were alive today we certainly were warranted in believing that they would sympathize warmly with the efforts of our President to adapt our political institutions to the needs imposed by a crisis. tt tt tt THEY themselves were not too sensitive on matters of constitutionality, for the constitutional convention exceeded its own constitutional powers. It was only authorized to revise the Articles of Confederation. It ended up by making anew Constitution. The fathers approached the Constitution in a purely experimental way. There was nothing reverential about their attitude. Even Hamilton, its chief apologist and protagonist, would go no further than to say that it was the best compromise which could be obtained at the time, and that it was better than what existed before the convention. He and the other framers expected and wished that it would be overhauled thoroughly in the light of more governmental experience and in the face of changed social conditions. Therefore, the reactionary Constitutionmongers of our day are those who really repudiate the spirit of the Constitution, while Roosevelt and his Brain Trust respect its spirit and operate in accordance with it, Tliere is, moreover, no proof that the New Deal is contrary even to the letter of the Constitution. The supreme court in the past has not hesitated to interpret its literal statements very broadly and to stretch them to meet their theories of government. tt a tt MARSHALL went the limit to make the Constitution justify nationalism. Tawney stretched it to vindicate slavery. Chase adapted it to the needs of the Republican reconstruction policies. Waite brought business corporations under its protection. Fuller made it the bulwark of private property interests. White interpreted in it such fashion as to make lawful great economic consolidations. Taft harmonized it with Harding “normalcy.” There is no good reason why Hughes can not make it adaptable to the requirements of social justice. Indeed, there is every reason why he should do so, since only thereby can he save the economic system to which he is committed. Even if the New Deal were slightly unconstitutional, it need worry nobody. Our mode of electing Presidents since the days of John Adams clearly has been in defiance of the prescriptions of the Constitution. The electoral college has been no more than an empty sham. Likewise, the failure to penalize the south for disfranchisement of the Negro violates the reconstruction amendments. If the Constitution has been modified freely and adapted in the past to suit the whims of special economic or political interests, there is no good reason why it can not be so interpreted today in the interest of the whole people of the United States.

Capital Capers

BY GEORGE ABELL

ERNEST GRUENING, newly appointed chief of the bureau of ihsular affairs, is following the current fashion in Washington at this season. He's house hunting. Between the search for suitable quarters and organization of his department, the former edi-' tor of The Nation finds plenty to do. Affable, quiet, possessed of a keen sense of ironical humor which he slyly reveals from time to time, he is also busily consolidating his numerous Latin American friendships. The other day, Chief Gruening was engaged in a conference with some Puerto Ricans, when blithe, debonair Representative James J. Lanzetta of New York, entered. Politely, the conference was switched from Spanish (which Gruening speaks as fluently as his own tongue) to English. “You know,” observed the insular affairs chief, regarding Lanzetta approvingly, “I think you've done one of the finest things ever seen in congress.” Lanzetta beamed. “Yes,” continued Gruening. “You defeated Fiorella LaGuardia as representative from the Twentieth district.” Lanzetta beamed still more. “Thus enabling him,” concluded Gruening, “to accept the nomination and become mayor of New York.” Lanzetta stopped beaming. NOTE: Comparable to Gruening's bon mot is one attributed to Alexandre Dumas (pere), who wrote in the guest book of a delighted physician: “Since my good friend, Dr. B has come to town, they have torn down the hospital.” The physician rubbed his hands with joy. But Dumas continued to write, “and in its place they have erected a cemetery.” a a a ÜBIQUITOUS, peace-loving Frank Kellogg. former secretary of state, who pops up at all sorts of places throughout the world whenever any one mentions peace treaties, is now in St. Paul. But he is expected to pass through Washington shortly en route to The Hague and the World Court. Some weeks ago. Mr. Kellogg, in the course of his peaceful meanderings, found himself one morning pacing up and down a station platform at Rochester. Minn. President Roosevelt’s train, speeding back from the west coast, stood beside the platform. Pacific Mr. Kellogg was waiting for the President to get up and receive him. Suddenly, out of the President's car emerged the familiar bulk of Senator Henrik Shipstead of Minnesota. Kellogg stopped pacing and glared. (Shipstead once defeated him for the senate). There was no situation. Each man brushed silently past the other and went his way. The Kellogg peace treaty evidently does not embrace senatorial rivalries. ""' ‘ This textile strike seems to be a sorrowful enough affair, but the Ohio onion strike actually moves one to tears. A Scotch golf star boasts that he has drunk nothing but ale for years, Probably no one ever offered to buy a whisky.

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

(Times renders are invited to express their views in these columns. Make your letters sho*t, so all can have a chance. 1 limit them to 25 0 words or less.) BELIEVES VETERANS WILL SUPPORT ROBINSON By John Samulnwitz. On Aug. 28, on the front page of The Times appeared an article, “State Legion ‘For’ Minton for United States Senator at the State Convention at Gary.” Would you mind printing another article which would read “Rank and File of the Legion for Robinson?” I wasn’t in Gary but I am a legionnaire and belong to the rank and file that will do the saying in November as to who will be the senator. You can be assured that it won’t be Mr. Minton although Mr. Minton is, no doubt, a real gentleman. The reason he can not win is that the Democratic party has from time to time, proved itself to be unfair to veterans. Twenty-five years from now, you may be able to put over what you are trying to get away with, but not now. There are too many veterans. Os course, I, as a legionnaire, realize that you will do all in your power to elect Mr. Minton, if possible, regardless of who would run on the Republican side. The election of Mr. Robinson will mean the defeat of the plan you undertook about two years ago and the plan of the Economy League begun about a year and a half ago, discriminating against the veterans which, of course, would spread more communism, if successful in this country, than Russia could ever hope to send over here. Your efforts, in your game, would not stop at nothing. This is proved in your article when you put the Catholic priest “on the spot” for what he should have said in his speech. The stirring up of religious hatred among the soldiers, if it were in your power, I am sure you would not hesitate to do; however, all the soldiers are Americans and are far to broad minded to stoop to anything of that kind. I am confident that no Catholic priest or any minister would come to any of our conventions and stoop to such a stupidness that by his utterances an unjust stigma would be thrown upon the men who have so nobly defended this country. Nothing less than injustice could come from such utterances, because it has been proved from time to time that at least 10 per cent of the disabled veterans of the last war never have received any consideration whatever. The priest who would stoop to that, regardless of how many college degree he possesses, would be a hypocrite. Now don't get me wrong. I served both branches of the regular military service of the United States, the army and navy. I was in the front line trenches for one year and I draw no compensation. I was a Democrat and I am a Roman Catholic. OFFERS BIBLE TO RIGHT WORLD Bt American Mother. We have read about, eaten and slept with the present depression now for about five years, and why place the blame for our present condition on any one or anything, but where it justly belongs— on every family in our country? Wall Street, the stock markets, rich men, politicians, banks or the World War are not to blame. Fvsry lather and mother, each individual

j -U.OKRCi-

The Message Center

‘I SHOT AN ARROW-’

Hoover's Past and Liberty Plea Compared

By a Reformed Republican. S. O. S., let me tell you what I think of whenever I hear the name of Hoover, the greatest purveyor of platitudes since Cal Coolidge. I think of the character of that great man who pretended he was doing something for the millions of freezing and starving people of the U. S. A. while he basked in the warmth of a cheerful log fire in the White House, ostensibly working out his relief plan with a group of billionaires, whose attitude has always been “The poor are always with us, let them take care of themselves.” And didn’t the poor take care of the poor until Roosevelt was elected? Yes, and I think of the pettymindedness of this great protector of the Constitution, when, because his police dog was enjoying the company of a White House guard and refused to respond to his whistle, in an uncontrollable rage he went directly to his office and dictated instructions to all “help” that they were in nowise to speak to, touch, play, or have anything to do with White

of the United States is in part to blame. Let me tell you why! We ignore God as the supreme man, the one being who can keep us out of these perilous conditions. I am not a religious fanatic. In fact, I do not even go to church very often, but, I do know God controls all of us if we let Him. I read the Bible every day and I believe in it. It is the greatest authority on any subject if you will search it out. What is the present day church? Either a bunch of narrow-minded, bigoted men and v/omen, or a form based on dollars and cents and publicity. Where can we find the man or woman of today who truthfully lives up to one of God s commandments? They are few. “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” Today it is love what thy neighbor has and covet it for thy own. “Honor thy father and thy mother.” Today it is, “Mother and father honor thy children lest they become angry with thee.” The holy men of God who stand in the pulpit today—two-thirds of them are there for the easy living they acquire—not because God has put a desire in their hearts to teach their fellowmen the love of God. Some are in the service for the publicity they love, some for narrow mindedness, to press upon their audiences their own ideas and fanaticisms. If every father and mother of our country would start studying the Bible and teach it to their children, make it an interesting game each day, I say our next generation would outshine any nation in this world. We would have fewer criminals. less closed banks and fewer corrupt politicians than ever In history. It is up to the fathers and mothers of this country to see that our country goes marching on! Any child who is taught early in life the value of brotherly love, truthfulness, honesty and forbearance. which is the main theme of God's book, will not grow up to be a gangster, a dirty politician or an educated fool. SUGGESTS DEFINITION OF RECENT PHRASES By B. t. Cody. For the benefit of Times readers. I ask you to please publish in the . proper column the meaning of much used terms in different articles on

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

House pets. These infinitesimal trifles, S. O. S-, took up the time and thought of your national “hero” when the country, starved and half frozen to death, was practically in the throes of a revolution. And then Hoover writes of liberty. Listen, S. O. S., don't prate of patriotic utterances from a man who permitted “Oggie” Mills to sell him on declaring a moratorium on Germany's war debts to the U. S. A. while the “golden eagle” boys were developing callouses on their thumbs from clipping coupons, redeemable in gold, on their own privately loaned war bonds to Germany. Among economists, Hoover’s German moratorium is known as the biggest piece of largesse put over on the American public since Abe Lincoln turned over the development cf the west to Jay Cooke, Jim Fox and J. Pierpont Morgan Sr. If Hoover be the stuff heroes are made of, then I’ll string along with the rats and the snakes and the rest of the anti-social fungi.

national affairs appearing in your paper and, in fact, all newspapers. A great many readers will only scan these terms because they can not recall their actual meaning, thereby losing the real importance of the news. I w'ould suggest the column be so headed that it would serve when clipped out as a pocket memo. I refer to the following terms: The Versailles treaty. London conference, Geneva arms conference, League of Nations, disarmament conference, American arms delegation, debt conference at London, President Wilson's fourteen points, Locarno delegation, the different peace pacts, and collective bargaining. It will only be necessary to give a general definition of each term, including members, dates and city first held, and purpose. It you can do this, I certainly will appreciate j your kindness. a a a CONSTITUTION DEFENSE AND VOTING PUBLIC By F. H. Wolfe. A few days ago I listened to an address by ex-United States Senator James A. Reed of Missouri, delivered before an audience of 8,000 at A Century of Progress exposition and over the radio to an audience of j probably several millions. The occasion for the address was celebra- , tion of Constitution day at the fair. Mr. Reed, who made an enviable : record for himself in the United ! States senate as a brilliant orator ; and a dangerous foe. was at his best ! in his latest effort. He tore into the administration with his usual sting- | ing sarcasm because of its attitude \ toward the Constitution, until the ears of all official Washington must have needed refrigeration. In his ; habitually fearless manner he : named President Roosevelt and Sec- ! retary Wallace right out in meeting. Daily Thought And who is he that will harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good?—I Peter, 3:13. HOW far that little candle throws its beams! So shines a good deed in a naughty world.—JShake-

.SEPT. 20, 1931

My reaction to his charges and accusations ranged from nervous shock to alarm and finally to near panic. I could feel the Constitution slipping right out from under me with no power at hand to save it; not even a straw upon which to load my personal liberties so I could tote them out of reach of the blasphemers who were about to rob me of them. It was a terrible feeling! Here I was, the great grandson of a pioneer who had sweat blood that I might have life and have it more abundantly, and now to think that all my liberties were being taken from me! O temporal O mores! Then, suddenly, I remembered the supreme court of the United States. Here was surely a dependable bulwark that would save me. But did Mr. Reed say anything about the supreme court? Yes, he did mention the court and its functions casually, but only casually. Possibly he forgot that the court stands between us and the despoilers of our liberties, that even he could render null and void any action of Mr. Roosevelt and others of official Washington by convincing a majority of the members of the supreme court that such action was in violation of the Constitution. Then I wondered why he and other campaign orators who are so worried about the Constitution, take their appeal to the people, who have no voice in interpreting the Constitution. since that power is lodged irrevocably in the supreme court. Then I remembered that the people do vote, and remembered that Cain was at no loss for a weapon when he wished to slay his brother. a a a CALLS FOR DEFEAT OF ROBINSON Br a Reader. Communists. Socialists, Fascists, and all foreign born, are you going to help defeat your arch enemy, Senator Robinson? Vote for Sherman Minton if you resent Senator Robinson’s unjust and unbrotherly attitude toward humanity. Do not permit him to disgrace this noble nation. Certainly a United States senator, after many years of public sendee, could rely and depend upon his own record, if it were commendable. RETURN BY TERRY I remember dear, When you came back to me; I remember the touch of your hand. And my own trembling expectancy. You smiled, and I Wondered or fancied You smiled so differently. I looked into your eyes: Two soft blue pools That reflected Calm and cool. You glanced downward Into mine Just as one who is fond. Expecting me In the same manner To respond. My heart was calling Softly dear, My voice re-echoed Through the void. Again and again I called you But not once had you heard.