Indianapolis Times, Volume 46, Number 194, Indianapolis, Marion County, 24 December 1934 — Page 4

PAGE 4

The Indianapolis Times <A #CKIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER) ROT W. HOWARD PrexMont TAI-COTT POWELL Editor EARL D. BAKER Buslneai Manager Phone Riley 5581

Gii' l.i'/ht and the People Kill Find Their Own Wop

MONDAY. DECEMBER 24. 1334. STUDY THE TAX SNARL NOW that President Roosevelt has directed Secretary Morgenthau to get to work on the problem of overlapping taxes, something may be accomplished. But it is hard not to be skeptical. This latest move is called a "longrange study" and contemplates a general conference of all taxing agencies next summer. It is a long time until next summer. Last April. Secretary Morgenthau said he intended to do something about conflicting taxes. Nothing came of that good intention. Earlier, he said the Treasury Department would study income and inheritance schedules "next summer" (now, last summer) with the view of presenting a rounded tax program to Congress "next winter" (this winter). Yet, with Congress reconvening, the Treasury apparently has no tax plan. Last spring, the Interstate Commission on Conflicting Taxation made an exhaustive report containing three alternative plans for eliminating conflicts. The report probably has started gathering dust, along with others, in the Treasury files. There is little new about this problem. Year by year, the tax chaos has become worse. Gasoline, tobacco and beverages are taxed in duplicate and triplicate. Some states pile income taxes on top of Federal levies. Eight states have trick laws that enable their citizens to pay less Federal income taxes than are paid by citizens of the other 40 states. Sales, nuisance and occupational taxes —Federal, state and city —have piled up to plague business and pyramid the cost of tax collections. Federal, state and local tax gatherers get in each other's way as they prey on the same taxpayers and commodities. Periodically there is agitation for reform of this intolerable lack of system, and it generally is met by promises of another study. Studies are necessary, for it is a complex problem. But they are hardly worth w'hile unless translated into action. We hope Mr. Morgenthau’s latest fresh start results in an actual overhauling of taxes, in the building of a co-ordinated system, with no duplications, a minimum of levies on trade and a maximum application of the income tax principle of ability to pay. GOOD WILL TOWARD MEN IT being a day for wishing, as well as giving, all oi us will pause on this Christmas to dream of what we should like life to be. Youngsters will dream of a world in which the mountains are made of frosted cake and the trees of candy laden with raisins, nuts and oranges, where all children are happy and well, where every day is Christmas and every father is Santa Claus. The rest of us will dream of that promise the herald angels made on the first starlit Christmas night in Bethlehem. And we will wonder. Must peace on earth remain forever a pious hope of pacifists? Must good will toward men remain only a midwinter dream? Only 17 years ago, after the earth had been bathed in human carnage, we said, never again. Yet today the nations are preparing to enter another race for naval and military supremacy. Abroad are rumors of wars, at home strikes and lockouts, mob terrors, the myriad petty strifes of life that make a jest of peace. Nearly 2,000 years have passed since the ! first Christmas, yet man’s inhumanity to man still makes countless thousands mourn. Democracy is struggling for survival in our own and other lands. Social justice, security, decent living are fought and thwarted by the hardened old forces of greed. These things are the challenge of Christmas to men and women of good will and stout hearts. We can not dream a better world into being. We can struggle for one. As we do, we can stop a moment and above the din of battle hear the angels sing. CHRISTMAS STAR T>LAZING in the Northwestern sky after sunset and the Southeastern sky before } sunrise, there is anew and temporary star exceeding in brilliance all but about a dozen stars of the heavens. "Christmas Star of 1934" this gigantic outburst might be called. "Nova Herculis 1534” it is to the astronomers. Wise men once followed a star to the beginning of Christmas. Perhaps it was just such an astronomical event as we now can watch. Wise men of today, called astronomers, follow this new star with telescope, spectroscope, radiometer, photographic plate and electric and human eye. We know that it is no portent; we feel no fear or exaltation. But out of the studies may come more knowledge of the stars, and therefore a fewmore secrets of the sun. the earth's powerhouse which is itself a star, unusual only because it is close to us. Being enacted in the sky is this great experiment which all may witness. It declares the glory of the heavens. In its better understanding there unfolds again the glory of man's increasing knowledge of nature. A GOOD $23 HOUSE THE late Vice President Thomas R. Marshall once lifted his office temporarily from obscurity by announcing that what the country • needed most was a good flve-cent cigar. Now Writer Mark Granite comes forward in The Nation to remark that what the country needed most was a good 5-cent cigar. That isn't quite as wild a demand as it sounds. What Mr. Granite means is anew, modem, well-built house of five* or six rooms which could be purchased for $25 a month, covering interest charges, taxes, upkeep, and

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payment on the principal—a house, in other words, that would cost not more than S2OOO to build, occupying a SSOO lot. Even with these modifications, such a goal looks very distant indeed. Yet with all the recent talk about slum clearance—and some of it has been very fine talk—we are going to have to approach some such figure as this if our slum clearance is to amount to anything. The one outstanding fact about a slum is that people live in it because they can't afford to live anywhere else. The slum is occupied by a low-wage group and in that group $25 a month is just about tops, as far as paying rent is concerned. Several model slum clearance jobs have already been begun. But in most cases the rents will not be down in the brackets which ordinary slum dwellers can touch. We can rebuild our slums until doomsday, but if we don’t replace them with houses which cost no more in rent than the old ones cost, we shall simply be ’a.-ing our tails around in a circle, with new slum? arising automatically, to replace the ones that are destroyed. Unless all signs fail, we are about to pour huge additional sums into public works. The bulk of these will be more or less unproductive, in the sense that new housing is productive; that is, as Mr. Granite says, “a road, a j bridge, a dam, a pile of concrete in a desert pays no taxes, buys no furniture, solves no personal human problems, houses no happy children, kindles no hearth fires, does not warm the hearts of men." Why not pour some of these projected pub- ! lie works billions into low-cost housing? If the money is to be spent anyway, why not put it where it would do the most good? We would then be solving a very great social problem, and at the same time we W’ould be investing in a project from which we had a good chance of getting at least part of our money back. The New Deal is often spoken of as a war on poverty. The slum is poverty’s most hideous front—and its most vulnerable. A really energetic attack there would yield dividends beyond imagining. A NEW DEFINITION ONE of the tragic things about the dreadful kidnaping and murder of 10-year-old Grace Budd, in New York, is the fact that her slayer, Albert Fish, actually fell into the hands of the police several times after the crime had been committed—and was discharged each time. Fish suffered from a warped emotional makeup which drove him to this atrocious crime. This defect was evident to the authorities when he was arrested; yet because he was "able to distinguish right from wrong,” he was not legally insane and they had to turn him loose—although his confession in the Budd case clearly stamps him as a monster who should not be at liberty for a single day. The lesson of this would seem to be that our legal definition of insanity is badly out of date. Horrible crimes of this kind are committed by men who know what is wrong as well as any one does, but who are driven by an emotional urge they can not •or will not master. Obviously, we need anew and more sensible legal definition of mental unbalance. REFORM IS NEEDED THE indictment of two lawyers who defended the Urschel kidnapers on the charge that they participated in the division of the Urschel ransom money is hailed as a first step in the Federal Government’s new campaign against unscrupulous criminal attorneys; and it is to be hoped that the campaign is prosecuted with vigor and intelligence. Every man accused of crime has, of course, the right to hire counsel. But what are we to say to lawyers who lend their advice, month after month, to men they know to be crooked, and accept fees which they know come from illegal enterprises? Where is the dividing line between the services a lawyer may legally render a client, and the kind of work which in effect makes the lawyer a member of the gang? In too many cases that line is altogether lost sight of. The government’s campaign should be a salutary reform. A FAIR PROPOSITION ■pRESIDENT ROOSEVELT’S offer to lend Federal funds to build municipal power plants in cities that can not otherwise escape overcharges for electricity is a practical application of his yardstick rule. It is a challenge that private power companies can not meet by propaganda. Cities like New York, which pay annually millions of dollars for electricity to light their streets and public buildings, now have a chance to overhaul that item in their budgets. Under the President's plan, any city that proves it can manufacture more cheaply than it can buy electricity, may borrow Federal funds to build its own plant. Intelligent private companies will see that this is more than a threat of losing cities as customers. For once a city has its own power plant, it can easily enter into open competition for all of the business of the privately owned utility. Perhaps no other part of the New Deal has been as well planned, nor his as definite objectives, as the program for cheap°r electricity. It is a problem on which Mr. Roosevelt has worked many years. He knows ;hat, with few exceptions, electric rates throughout the country are too high. He intends :c reduce rates. The people are with him. If the power industry wants to survive as a private enterprise, it will have to squeeze the water out of its stocks and get down to a merchandise basis. That is a fair proposition. Thawing weather is reported in Little America, and the shacks are in danger of breaking down as though they were part of a slum clearance project. Report of Increased dividends this year is a big relief to all, except those who are on relief. Teachers of Louisiana stand to be appointed by Huey Long’s henchmen, under anew state law, unless the Federal Government succeeds In sending the henchmen to jail for tax evasion. American industry says it's willing to play ball with President Roosevelt, but the business men should remember that strikes are part of the game. , \

Liberal Viewpoint BY DR. HARRY ELMER BARNES

"Modern Fiction.” By Dorothy Brewster and Angus Burrell. Columbia University Press. $2.75. “Thorstein Veblen and His America." By Joseph Dorfman. The Viking Press. $3.75. "Literature and Dialectical Materialism." By John Strachey. Covici Freide. sl. LITERATURE like other phases of contemporary culture, reflects the social crisis and the class lineup within society. A considerable group of charming stylists writes on pleasant themes for the entertainment or distraction of the leisure class. Little is said about the more seamy and unlovely aspects of the contemporary scene. Then we have another group of descriptive realists, reporters of the actual social situation—who have recalled the struggle which is going on in contemporary society without telling us what should be clone about it all. Perhaps the leader of this group is Sinclair Lewis. Finally, we have an ever growing group of frankly proletarian writers who use literature as the vehicle for expounding the class struggle and the social revolution. Professors Brewster and Burrell devote most of their clear and helpful book to a survey of literature of the first type, though there is a good brief chapter on recent proletarian fiction. But writers like Lewis, Dreiser, Sherwood Anderson and the like are conspicuous by their absence. For the writers who are covered however, notably, Gissing, Conrad, Lawrence, Virginia Wolf and Gide, the volume presents an illuminating and highly interesting analysis. ana DR. ALVIN JOHNSON of the New School for Social Research says of Professor Dorfman's work on Thorstein Veblen that it is “Not only the most adequate biography that was ever written of an American scholar, but a contribution of a very high order to the intellectual history of America.” A reading of the volume is likely to convince one that this high praise is thoroughly merited. Veblen’s life constitutes a most valuable illuminating cross-section of the social, intellectual and academic history of the United States. He passed from a Western frontier farm to the idolatry of intellectuals in the metropolis of America. His educational experience encompassed evangelical colleges, distinguished centers of learnng in the East, the Universty of Chicago, the University of Missouri and Stanford University. He was, during his lifetime, the foremost critic of conventional and respectable academic economic theory. He did more than any other American to transform the study of economics in this country from sterile pecuniary logic to a fruitful examination of actual economic life and institutions. Ir his later life, he allied himself with the revolt against conventional universities which was embodied in the establishment of the New School for Social Research in New York City. While there he developed a line of thought which made him the intellectual godfather of the recent technocracy movement. nan AN almost morbidly retiring and self-effacing personality, he became a towering figure in American social and economic thought. Sheer admiration for his ability led scholars, many of whom were personal strangers, to secure his election as president of the American Economic Association, an honor which Veblen with characteristic diffidence declined. He was by both race and achievement a true Viking in the intellectual life of the United States. Mr. Dorfman has done full justice to the unique personality whose life he has chronicled. Mr. Strachey, well known as one of the outstanding intellectuals in contemporary Communism, presents a brief argument in behalf of the thesis that the only vital literature of the future must be that which is motivated primarily by a devotion to the class struggle and the social revolution. He devotes himself chiefly to recent American writers, criticising those who minister to the leisure class or are too timid in their Marxism. He finds most to his liking the important work of Granville Hicks on the “Great Tradition,” a resolute and intelligent appraisal of recent American literature based upon a full and uncompromising apprehension of the reality of the class struggle.

Capital Capers BY DAVID DIETZ REP. HAM FISH of New York has just been decorated by the Cuban Government with the order of Carlos Manuel de Cespedes. From the island republic filter interesting stories of Ham’s reception in Havana, his arrival on a plane from Miami, his jokes, his banquet by President Mendieta. Ham impressed the Cubans by his nonchalant air. He appeared at the presidential dinner in Havana wearing a soft white shirt. When President Mendieta placed the azure ribbon of the decoration around Ham’s neck, he was forced to stand on tip-toe. Awed by their American visitor’s dignified manner, Cubans referred to him as “Senator Fish.” The Chief of Protocol who met him at the plane found that he spoke good Spanish. However, they conversed together in English. “Senator,” said the Chief of Protocol, “you like our city?” “Okay,” replied Senator Fish. NOTE—Of significance is the fact that the grandfather of Rep. Ham Fish, when Secretary of State in 1868, showed much sympathy with the revolutionary cause sponsored by Carlos Manuel de Cespedes in Cuba. The decoration is named after that Cespedes. a a a Diplomatic failure in Washington may have serious consequences. Yesterday, Masano Hanihara, former Japanese Ambassador to the United States, died in Tokio. Friends said he died of a broken heart because of non-suc-cess in his diplomatic mission here. Hanihara- is widely recalled in the Captal as a charmng and suave envoy, whose courtesy caused him to be nicknamed the “Lord Chesterfield of Japan.” He was Ambassador here at the time Congress passed the immigration law which excluded Japanese from the United States. A note which Hanihara sent to Secretary of ; State Charles Evans Hughes mentioning “grave consequences.” resulted in a congressional furore. Following this misunderstanding, the envoy returned to Japan. He insisted that he had never intended any uncomplimetary meaning in his message. a a a MRS. LAWRENCE TOWNSEND’S morning musicales (the most select and frequently the most musical affairs of the Washington social season) opened the other morning at the Mayflower Hotel, with eclat and diplomatic applause. Gilt chairs creaked as fashionably plump women sat down to hear a concert by Metropolitan Opera stars. There were the usual bustle and hustle, some excellent music, some beautiful furs, much hand-kissing and a great many compliments for Mrs. Townsend. Mrs. Roosevelt intended to be present, but failed to arrive owing to the death the preceding night of her friend, Mrs. Mary Rumsey. Diplomats appeared in droves. Axel Leonard Astrom, Minister of Finland, bowed and smiled like a Metropolitan star as friends congratulated him on the fact that Finland paid her December war debt installment to the United States. Any one might have supposed that Astrom had personally reached in his pocket for the money. Rubio Vivot, the Argentine Beau Brummel, was present, and not wearing riding breeches. When Rubio appears sans riding breeches it is as if Senator Copeland of New York failed to wear his daily red carnation. Plump Arthur Bradley Campbell, son of the Marchioness of Huntley, appeared with a lorgnet.

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

TVin A/locon rfo Ganfor [ 1 w,w,hj disa PP rove °f v:httt you smj and wia ] X lit/ IVI V>t/llLt/l I defend to the death your right to say it. — Voltaire. J

(Times readers are invited to express their views in these columns. Make your letters short, so all can have a chance, himit them to £SO words or less.) a a a MOCKERY IS OFFER OF RESPECTABLE CITIZENS By H. H. With compassion mingled with contempt, I listened to Judge Fred G. Bale at the Y. M. C. A. meeting. He is representative of millions of our more respectable church members. He is disgusted with the way the profit system has cursed our homes and all that is sacred in our lives; but he is not sick enough of it to give it up. Like the dog in the Bible, he goes back to that which made him sick. Openly he condemned our profit system, but he would not abolish it by voting for social justice. He believes that if all of the American people, in some mysterious way, suddenly became saints, all would be fine. If he could climb the Utopian ladder by taking just one step and landing on the top round, he would be satisfied; but he shies off from second and third rounds which are gained by honest voting. He doesn’t like the devil’s meat, but he wishes to save his broth. Let me tell him that he can't have the devil’s broth without his meat. He wishes others to give up their racket, but he wishes to keep his own. He and his kind still believe that some of their grandchildren will become a John D. Rockefeler. Intellectually he knows that money is the root of all evil, but he does not have enough faith in the Bible to vote accordingly. What a shame that such respectable citizens have nothing better to offer us than the mockery of prohibition. How pitiful is their anguish of heart and soul, their shallow thinking prejudice and hyprocrisy! a a a WEALTHY CLASSES CONTROL FINANCES FOR THEIR SAKE By Patient. Congratulations! Your editorial, "War Profits and Bonus,” in your issue of Dec. 19, strikes painfully at the opposition to payment of the World War adjusted service certificates, and to this writer reveals either a softening of the heart toward the veterans, or an unrevealed motive. This writer, a veteran of the World War, entered the employ of one of the “industrial soldiers” not too long after the ending of the World War, and one of his first assignments was to bring old costs on manufactured articles .up-to-date. This duty involved delving into files covering the World War period. Some of the figures encountered were so complex as to be unbelievable. The sales manager was consulted, and he verified all of them, but explained that costs were usually doubled, and sometimes redoubled in estimating prices during the war period, then “yes. we added 100 per cent profit to the cost to be safe.” One instance revealed an estimate showing that the costs had been doubled, then redoubled, 100 per cent profit added and when the good old War Department had been too slow to act the order was refused. The sales manager explained that some cream business had been booked in the meantime. The War

THE YULE LOG!

Double Wages Now

By T. N. T. Now that the election is over and the President and his party have had a second indorsement would it not be wise to consider whether the approval is for things done or is it rather a hope of the millions of underfed, poorly housed, and scantily clothed who still have faith that the forgotten man of a former promise might yet be served? I am fully convinced that the registered hope of the destitute formed a major part of the approval. There is no denying that the Administration has done a great deal for the good of all among which are the clearing up and stabilizing of the banking situation so that the poor have reasonable security for their funds. The tearing of the veil of fraud from the gold standard was a forward step but the senseless borrowing of money for tne payment of public and made work is a reflection on forward thinking and should be stopped. Why should the United States borrow money when the Constitution says Congress shall have the power to coin and regulate the value of same? Not long since we were asked by our President, "Are you better off now than a year ago?” The answer is yes and no. Yes, we have increased to a noticeable extent the number of millionaires in this country. No, for the hungry mother or child for, though, they were hungry on both dates the present pangs would be with us while those of a year ago would have be-

Department insisted on a quotation, so the "industrial soldier" doubled the price formerly quoted, and extended the shipping promise several months. The War Department was not to be outdone, the order was sent in at the doubled, redoubled, then doubled again price, but it did insist that delivery be in accordance with the original promise. This order represented what had been before the war a normal year’s business, and few times since the World War has the single order figure been approached by that concern. It was for hundreds of thousands of dollars. That same company paid to its employes bonuses up to SSOO to office clerks (records of bonuses to officers not available), then ruthlessly thinned out the clerks after the war. Buildings and machinery were added to avoid payment of excess profit taxes to the liberal Government that had lifted it out of stagnation it had been in for twenty-five years. Practically every war veteran knows of similar circumstances, and many others know more of such. Then what chance has the Economy League, American Liberty League or any other group to convince the World War veterans that the adjusted pay certificates should not be paid, and paid now when our Government is seeking means for redistribution of wealth? Is not the veteran’s Government bond as good as the bonds held by bankers who collect interest on the bonds yet issue new currency up to their full value to be loaned, or used as the banker sees fit? The situation simply exemplifies once again the absolute power of our wealthy class to control the functions of our Government for their benefit mostly.

come at most an unpleasant memory. Great credit should be given to the powers that temporarily set aside child labor, that is a blessing but cursed be he who set sl3 and sl4 a week as a minimum wage for working men and women. It absolutely at best is only onehalf enough to buy the plain comforts of life. And as for public charity, why should we feed deserving but unfortunate persons with a spoon as though they were children? Remember, Mr. President and Congressmen, that you made an earnest appeal for their votes not long since. Did you mean it or were you passing the buck? I regret exceedingly that our deserving poor have not the character to throw your public charity (not with love) in your faces and demand the right to earn and enjoy the wealth created by hand and brain. I am entirely convinced that a greater earning power must be granted to low wage earners or we will have to do again as we did recently bring into use the flaming sword and deadly bullet. This is not a threat but to me a sound philosophy. If you ask me, let me say that the present parade is on for glorification of the paraders rather than for the throng along the way. Let’s forget the necessity of braintrusters and supermen and do things easily and simpfy and plainly. Double the wages of the poor man though it may ruffle the feelings of the cotton syndicate and steel trust.

DECLARES GOODS FORM ONLY REAL WEALTH By a Times Reader. When the primary objective of production is profit, the quality cf the goods and services must necessarily be of a low standard. When profit goes to non-producers, It becomes a charge and burden on the actual producers. Wealth is not represented by money, or gold. Real wealth is measured in service that goods bring to consumers. We could have a mountain of gold, as we have in the vaults of the Federal Reserve, and yet be poor if goods were not available to meet our needs. The gold in these vaults has no value to the 21 million persons on relief rolls. As far as they are concerned, that gold might just as well be at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. No other country has such a staggering poverty as ours in the midst of natural and potential wealth. If we could live on dollar profits instead of material profits, we could restore prosperity by a stock market bull movement. The effort of the Government has been directed toward money prosperity. This money fetish has hung like a

Daily Thought

Even as I have seen, they that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness, reap the same.—Job. IV:VIII. 'T'O see and listen to the wicked A is already the beginning of wickedness. —Confucius.

DEC. 24, 1934

millstone around the neck of the people, while we permit a shutdown on production and distribution of real wealth. tt tt tt FEW WORKERS AID IN LAW MAKING By H. S. In a few weeks the Legislature of Indiana will meet again to consider the wenare of the people. Do the people of Indiana know to whom they entrusted the making of the laws? It seems that 37 lawyers will be among them; also 27 business men and 23 farmers. Than there are four bankers and a few medical men and editors an* one housewife. Also four workers. How can the laboring man expect any consideration from an assembly in which he is so poorly represented? Does he believe that the lawyers and business men and farmers will go out of their way to consider his interest? Is it not about time that the great mass of producers and consumers organize and see to it that laws are made for their benefit?

So They Say

It is just as important for Congress to prevent evil legislation as to enact good legislation. United States Senator Carter Glass. I am not opposed to work. I think it is fine for other people. I couldn't get along at all unless someone worked.—T. S. Stribling, Pulitzer prize novelist. We signed a contract. We promised to pay. It’s the only honest thing to do—Risto Ryti, governor of the Bank of Finland, on payment of United States war debt. A fellow coming in from the country has to be careful these days. He's like a jackrabbit when the dogs get after him.—Vice-President John N. Garner. Unquestionably the liquor traffic is Public Enemy No. 1 and must, therefore, be destroyed.—Mrs. Ella A. Bdble, President of the World W. C. T. U. For German people nowadays it is very difficult to make plans, and also for an artist who must travel all the time and work so hard.— Lily Pons, famous singer. Society can not endure on the basis of buying power concentrate 1 : in the hands of the few.—United States Senator Robert M. La Follette.

POWER

BY EUGENIE RICHART Go built a house, however small, Os stone—and build a garden wall. Experiment with strange rare bloom; Hang bright mad pictures in your room. Here you will find, when most alone, An essence singularly your own. Some cynic you have loved may wait Impatiently outside your gate. But never be misled by this. Or by his worldly sophistries. Your mission is to grow a flower Which will be dead within the hour— Or to dream dreams no cynic can Attribute to the realm of man.