Indianapolis Times, Volume 46, Number 241, Indianapolis, Marion County, 16 February 1935 — Page 6

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The Indianapolis Times <A SCRIPT A-HO WARD SEITgPAPER) ROT W. HOWARD PreMt TALCOTT POWELL Editoi SAUL D. BAKER ........ Boilocii Manager Phone Riley MBI

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SATURDAY. FEBRUART 16, 193S OIL ANARCHY THIS country rarely has heard as scathing an arraignment as Harold Ickes’ criticism on the petroleum industry. • - I challenge,” he writes in the Saturday Evening Past, “any other present day industry in the United States to show greater waste, inefficiency and mismanagement than seems to be inherent in the oil industry, whether of its own making or because of inadequate laws.” Ours is coming to be largely an oil civilization. It helps to run the Army and Navy, trains, autos, planes and factories. It fights and heats homes, cleans clothes, kills destructive insects. Without cheap and plentiful oil we would become an inferior nation. Yet the man who should know says that at the present rate of consumption “we have but 10 to 15 years of known cheap oil supplies!” Bay that new discoveries may double that period to 30 years, and still it is an alarming situation. The picture he paints of waste in the oil fields is sickening. The daily waste of oil and i,as would give warmth and light to all the 4.500.000 relief families. In the Texas Panhandle alone 365 billion cubic feet of gas —enough energy to supply the Army and Navy for seven years—hisses away annually into the air. In the Oklahoma City area 90 per cent of the 430 billion cubic feet of gas Is annually wasted. Since Jan. 1, 1533, we have consumed two and a half times as much oil as has been discovered in new fields and have drawn on our reserves at the rate of 1,500,000 barrels a day. Nothing short of drastic Federal legislation can halt this prodigality and destruction. State regulation has failed. State treaties will not suffice. If the oil industry is wise it will support adequate Federal legislation to save its own vanishing wealth.

CHEATING THE CHILDREN AN example of the-misinformation being given various state legislators concerning the Child Labor Amendment is the statement of Arthur F. Mullen to Nebraska's lower house. •*I think I know something about how the Roosevelt Administration stands on things, said Mr. Mullen. “And I say this is not an Administration measure.” The fact is that the President and Administration are fighting for ratification. For instance: “In the child labor field the obvious method of maintaining the present gains is through ratification of the Child Labor Amendment. I hope this may be achieved.”— President Roosevelt. “The move for ratification of the Child Labor Amendment must go on.”—Secretary of Labor Perkins. “I favor the amendment without reservation. and strongly urge its ratification." —Secretary of Interior Ickes. “I strongly favor the proposed Child Labor Amendment now being submitted to the states "—Secretary of Agriculture Wallace. “The Child Labor Amendment to the Consituation of the United States should receive the support of all liberal-minded persons interested in social and economic progress.”— Atty. Gen. Cummings. “It is almost incredible to me that there should be any doubt concerning the ratification of the Child Labor Amendment.”— Postmaster General Farley. THE METHODISTS SPEAK A TIMELY warning is issued by the Methodist Federation for Social Service against proposed measures to suppress radicals. Speaking for the federation, Dr. Harry F. Ward said: “If American citizens let these laws pass, they will wake up and find they have lost all the freedom guaranteed them by the Constitution. If the Communists are denied their constitutional rights, we shall soon see the order of events that was followed in Europe. First the Communists are repressed, then the Socialists, then the labor unions, then the others. “If this legislation is passed big business will have the legal machinery to put out of business any organization that opposes capitalism or war or that conducts a strike. It will not be necessary to subsidize Fascist storm troops. They will kill democracy in the name of democracy, and they will trample upon •very sacred principle of Christianity.” To ippreciate the logic of Dr. Ward's statement. Americans have only to recall the tyranny of the federal spy system under Atty. Gens. Palmer and Daugherty. DARK SKIES jnXPLRTS working for the Federal Emergency Relief Administration sat down not long a.to to try to find out just who this forgotten man we have been hearing so much about really is. Examining their records, they came to the surface at last with the following description: He is between 45 and 65 years of age. He makes up about 27 per cent of the “employable" relief population: but there's a catch in the use of that adjective, because his chances of re-entering private industry are almost nil, 45 being accounted a sere and yellow old age in employment offices these days. The forgotten man. further, has little hope of cashing in under any unemployment insurance scheme, and unless he is getting very close to 65 no old-age pensions will do him much good. If the Administration's $4 800,000.000 work relief scheme goes through, it may mean a job for him, but the job will be only teus-

porary and it won’t pay him any very princely sum. All In all. he is plodding along under a pretty dark sky, and there is little indication that his sky is going to get much lighter. And his existence under such circumstances is one of the most telling indictments imaginable against our whole social system. The man who has passed 45 ought to be Just entering the age in which he can enjoy the fruits of the society in which he fives. The experience he has gained in his work ought to make him a valuable man in his Job; his years of living ought to have ripened his wisdom so that he could get more human values out of his life than ever before. Instead, in all too many cases, passing on into middle age is apt to take him over the deadline beyond which there is no secure place for him. We seem to have arranged things so that we have no use for him. If he has a Job, he must worry about losing it; if he loses it, he is pitched into a situation from which it is constantly becoming more difficult for him to extricate himself by his own exertions. There IS something both heartless and silly about such a state of affairs. One of the prime features of any proper “New Deal” ought to be the discovery of some workable way to remedy it. CRITICS ARE BLUSHING WHEN a genius sets out to have a little joke, the Joke is apt to be so profound that no one but its perpetrator even knows about it. Consider the Joke of Fritz Kreisler, famous violinist. For 30 years Mr. Kreisler has been playing compositions supposed to have been written by various old-time masters in the world of music. His programs credited them to such composers as Vivaldi, Couperin and others and gave Mr. Kreisler credit merely for arranging them. Learned critics occasionally remarked that Mr. Kreisler, in editing these pieces, did not follow the original as well as he might have; others complimented him for interpreting the true spirit of the composer. But now it develops that Mr. Kreisler wrote them all himself! For 30 years he has had a joke on the critics—and no one would have known it if he had not, at last, admitted it himself. FEWER DEATHS UNDER STRESS ONE of the oddest things about the depression is the fact that the death rate has been falling. When people are going hungry and are unable to pay for medical care, you would expect more of them to die; on the contrary, in such a representative state as New York, the death rate has dropped from 12.4 for each 1000 inhabitants in 1929 to 11.1 in 1934. The chief explanation, according to D. J. V. de Porie of the New York State Health Department, is fairly simple. It is, he says, “the fact that state and Federal governments have assumed ever greater responsibility for maintaining of life among the millions of unemployed and their families.” A sharp commentary on American society, when you stop to think of it—the fact that so many people get better attention when they are broke than they do when they are self-supporting.

OUR DIRIGIBLES NUMEROUS as the talents of the American people undoubtedly are, it is beginning to look as though the knack of building and piloting huge dirigibles successfully is a talent which they lack. The Macons plunge into the Pacific differs from our earlier airship tragedies principally in that it was not accompanied by large loss of life. In other respects it is dismayingly similar to them. A line squall destroyed the Shenandoah. Wind and weather sent the Akron down into the Atlantic. Just what wrecked the Macon is not yet clear, but the probable cause seems to have been the big ship's collapse in a kind of weather which both airplanes and surface ships combat without much difficulty. In addition, of course, there may have been some structural fault which has not been made public. All this, to a public which was originally stirred to great enthusiasm by these gleaming silver airships, is exceedingly disturbing. And as the naval and congressional committees get to work to find out the cause of this latest disaster, it would be good if they could find out definitely whether the fault in this string of accidents lies with ourselves or is something inherent in all big airships. So far, the weight of the evidence seems to lay most of the blame on the dirigibles. These ships are big, graceful, marvels of design and construction —and, apparently, a little too frail. It may be that it simply is not possible to put into these light and airy creations sufficient sturdiness to withstand the heavy strains and stresses of aerial travel. In other words, it may be that we now have enough evidence to Justify the conclusion that the dirigible is not and can not be made practical. Before we leap to this conclusion, however we need to do a little more digging. For on the other side of the Atlantic the Germans have shown an amazing ability to handle these airships without disaster. The tragedies that mark dirigible history over here are not duplicated in Germany. And that leads us to our second consideration: Is the fault with ourselves? Are we just a shade less capable in the matters of design and building than the Germans? Is our method of training airship crews defective? Is there some skill which the Germans have and which we lack, the possession of which makes the dirigible a safe and dependable craft? We should not answer these questions offhand. The most thorough kind of investigation is needed—not merely to show why the Macon went dawn, but to shew why all our airships go down; to show whether the airship experiment is worth continuing or not. Since the Japanese have made such success selling beer in Germany, they might next try watches in Switzerland and coal in Newcastle. Now that we've told the world how great we are as a nation, can t we stop scientists from discovering how insignificant we are in the universe?

Liberal Viewpoint BY DR. HARRY ELMER BARNES

“World Politics and Personal Security,” by Harold D. Lasswell (Whittlesey House McGrawHill Book Cos.) “Since 1914,” by J. H. Landman (Barnes & Noble). “The Study of International Relations in the United States,” edited by Edith E. Ware (Columbia University Press). • • • PROF. LANDMAN has procured an extremely clear and concise history of the world since the outbreak of the European war In 1914. It is printed in a form designed to ipake it especially clear and usable for the general reader and for rapid reference. It is well supplied with maps and illustrated with particularly illuminating and cogent cartoons. The failure to realize anew era as a result of the World War is brought out with real force: “Twenty years have elapsed since Princip fired the first shots of the World War on June 28 at Sarajevo which killed Archduke Francis Ferdinand and enveloped mankind in history’s most devastating war. These two decades constitute the painful period of gestation of the new era. The first decade was characterized by unabating hatred between the Central and Entente powers—an odium provoked by the war. “Beginning with the year 1924 the pains were for a time eased. Conciliation was the palliative. The Allied troops withdrew from the Ruhr; the Dawes and Young plans were adopted; Germany entered the League of Nations; the Kellogg pact was designed; the Allies evacuated the Rhineland; world economics improved; and the Spirit of Locarno made for greater assurance of peace in western Europe. tt tt tt “QINCE the year 1930 mankind has been exthe pains of labor attending the birth of the new' era. The stock market crash of late 1929 had its repercussions throughout the world. Banks closed; unemployment increased; Japan seized Manchuria; Hitler made himself ruthless dictator of Germany; the Disarmament Conference failed; dictatorships controlled onehalf of Europe, and Communism threatened. The new era is not yet born.” Prof. Lasswell of the University of Chicago has written the most original book on world politics which has appeared in a decade. He indicates how our present system of international anarchy moves in a vicious circle. Threats of wars, fears and economic insecurity, which grow out of international anarchy, render the individual nervous, supersensitive and prone to emotional explosions. The mass of individuals thus motivated tend to make international relations all the more difficult and unstable as the result of collective jitters. And so the system moves on like a snowball. It should be the purpose of the realist in world politics to make clear these facts and thus to promote a greater feeling of security and confiidence: “Wars and revolutions are avenues of discharge for collective insecurities and stand in competition with every alternative means of dissipating mass tension. The reduction of violence in world politics means strengthening the competitive power of activities w r hose human costs ire less. The special province of political psychiatrists who seek to develop and to practice the politics of prevention is devising ingenious expedients capable of discharging accumulated anxieties as harmlessly as possible. a tt tt THIS age of the ‘revolt of the masses’ or the era of world wars and revolution’ puts ;he emotions of the masses in the foreground of political events. Sound measures for the removal of unfavorable objective conditions of discontent require mass support; and cherished social values require mass support, or mass deflection, if they are to survive. “The politics of prevention calls for a continuing audit of the world level of insecurity. The political psychiatrist, assuming the desirability of enabling human activities to evolve at a minimum of human cost, approaches the problem of ivar and reolution as one detail of the whole task of mastering the sources and mitigating the consequences of human insecurity in our unstable world.” Dr. Ware has compiled a most thorough and painstaking prospectus and summary of every type of activity and organization in the United States designed to promote the study of international relations in every area of the world. In scope, the exhibit is extremely impressive, but Prof. Lasswell's volume makes it very clear why the activities chronicled are so futile, namely, because most of them fail to go to the roots of international insecurity in either an economic or psychological sense. They remain chiefly superficial pleasantries on the surface. This is due in no small degree to the fact that those who finance such research and activities are themselves in part responsible for the very conditions which create and perDetuate ill-wili and insecurity in the contemporary world.

Capital Capers BY GEORGE ABELL—

WASHINGTON’S corps of foreign ambassadors (to say nothing of minor diplomats) is shifting every day. New faces are bobbing up so quickly above the conference tables and the tea tables that it’s hard to remember who’s who. The newest arrival comes from France, the latest envoy to be appointed to this country— Senor Dr. Francisco Castillo Najera, new ambassador of Mexico. Najera is six feet tall, dark complexioned, with black hair showing traces of white around the ears. He is only 49 years old, used to be a surgeon and still is fond of medicine. He speaks perfect French and knows some English. Clean-shaven, serious looking and intellectual, he appreciates a good joke and is noted for his story telling. Americans who met Najera in Paris (where he was minister), found him entertaining and hospitable. Literary men discovered he was not only a good surgeon but an excellent poet. Besides numerous medical themes, he has written on literary subjects. One of his best books was “A Century of Belgian Poetry,” which he published in 1931. With the new ambassador comes his talented wife, who is noted for her painting, and four children. He holds liberal views on education and is a recognized expert on South American diplomatic problems. His distinguished diplomatic career is too well known to need recounting. tt tt tt \riCE PRESIDENT JACK GARNER is extremely fond of squirrel stew, and Mrs. Garner has sent the Democratic Digest, official orgf nos the Women’s National Democratic Club, the recipe for that dish. The story goes that a few days ago some one asked Garner what beverage should accompany a plate of squirrel stew. “I always take branch water with it,” replied Jack, “unless my host is serving something better.” V tt tt OUTSIDE of the Chinese legation and colony jn Washington, only a handful of persons speak Chinese. One of the experts in that language is jolly, affable George Hanson, until recently American consul general in Moscow. The State Department ruling abolishing the consulate general there temporarily put George out of a job. His nomination as charge d’affaires at Addis Ababa, Abyssinia, where war now threatens, is expected to be postponed shortly. Washington diplomatic parties have taken on an added fillip of interest since George’s advent. At one dinner, George arrived in a magnificently embroidered mandarin coat laced with gold dragons. He wears black ties at afternoon teas and white ties at midnight. He exudes good nature. 4 “George.” remarked a friend the other day, after laughing at one of Hanson’s jokes, “you are worth your w eight la gold.” “If that is true,’ commented George’s hostess as she surveyed his plump figure. “Mr. Hanson must be worth at least $10,000,000.” A Russian surgeon stretched the height of a midget six inches but the Japanese will not be frightened by these medieval threats.

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

The Message Center

(Timet readers are invited to express their views in these oolumr.s. Alak-* your letters short, so all can have a chance. Limit them to 250 words or less. Your letter must be signed, but names will be withheld at request 0] the letter writer.) tt tt a THE TIMES GIVEN CONGRATULATIONS By A. A. A heap of congratulations, three cheers and a crown with stars in for your stand on child labor, temperance and the prisoner feeding bill. A newspaper with a conscience is a great asset to any state. Rightmindedness is preferable to riches. tt tt tt ANOTHER PLAN FOR PENSIONING AGED By J. A. Endicoti. As there have been a number of noted writers giving their plans for a pension for the old people, I thought it would be in order for me to suggest one, too. I have in mind to start them off with something worth while. Give them enough so that they can prepare to live. They must have a home and its furnishings. If you allow them sls or $25 a month, it will only appease the hunger and keep them just one step ahead of where they are. The government should give those 60 years or older for the first six months S2OO a month, to be spent in 30 days, and the next six months SSO a month to be spent the same as the other and a maximum amount of S3O a month for the balance of their lives. I don’t think there is any one who w r ill consider such a pension as a gift or an act of charity—it is a bona fide debt we owe them. They are the ones who made the United States what it is today—the richest country in the world. I was here when tree molasses and corn cakes were a great feast. I was born June 9, 1856, and if I live to see my next birthday, June 19, 1935, I will be 79 years old. I remember very well some of* the panics and depressions we had in the past, but the depression of 1929 is far more destructive to all classes than were all of the panics of the past. tt tt tt ADD THIS TO TEST OF DEPRESSION CURES By T. M. G. There have been so many schemes and plans to end the depression that one more won’t hurt. How is this for an idea? Take the money that Mr. Roosevelt is about to spend for relief and place it in suitable, centrally located government institutions such as the postoffice or a Federal bank, then make It possible for responsible heads of families, who are unemployed or who are earning less than SISOO a year to borrow it on a long term note with a low rate of interest, as follows: The borrower would present a list of all his debts, together with the names and addresses of his creditors. Also a list of the things of which he is most lin need, like clothes, furniture, j medical attention, house repairs I and groceries. Instead of giving him the money to pay his debts ' _ie government would send checks to all his creditors, thus positively canceling this debt. Loan him enough money to purchase the commodities he needs and force him,, under strict regu-

GET HIM, TOO!

Real Pension Study Needed

By L. 1. Hopkins. According to an article in The Times of Feb. 11 Otto Deluse is quoted as saying that the Townsend old-age revolving pension plan is fantastic and utterly impossible to administer. He gives Mr. Townsend and the “thousands” (he should have said millions) of subscribers to the Townsend plan credit for “humanitarian motives and acting m good faith.” It may be a coincidence, but it sounds like a parrot repetition of the objections which have been raised by many others who knew nothing about the plan and who, after a thorough study, have given it their hearty indorsement and support. I am going to hazard a guess that Dr. Deluse has not studied the Townsend plan from any authoritative source of information and that if, and when he does, he will do as thousands of other intelligent persons who thought of it just as he does (including myself, if I may claim intelligence), at first glance, after thinking it out have indorsed it.

lations, to produce receipts for all his purchases, to show that the money was spent wisely. By the time that 40 per cent of the people had paid their debts, the other 60 per cent would be able to pay their own way. They talk about putting money in circulation and starting the ball rolling. If this plan won’t do it, what will? Not only will it do that, but it will release us poor devils from the heckling and pestering of a lot of modern shylccks. The total indebtedness to the government would not be personal, but a family debt. The average man, free from his small debts, would be able to insure himself for enough to pay this debt to the government, bury him decently, and have enough to keep his family for a reasonable length of time after he passed away, in case he did so before his note came due. a a o OBJECTS TO TAX AND OLEO BILLS IN ASSEMBLY By Ross James. In reading The Indianapolis Times I see some of the proposed laws for the state include an oleomargarine tax. Why take the butter from a poor man's child to help a man who can have real butter on his table? A poor man can’t afford creamery butter or hardly any meat now. Next is the proposed mining law. Being a miner of 18 years experience in different mines of the state, I see no laws that will help any of us. They will only hurt the mining industry of the state. It if bad e*iough now. It is 'he same old story—the big mine operator trying to run the small one out of business. I thought that it was unconstitutional to pass class legislation. If they can tax oleo for the farmers, why can’t they tax natural gas and fuel oil so people can’t use them? They will have to use coal and that will help the miner. a tt tt PRIMARY SYSTEM CALLED POLITICIANS’ TOOL By Thom im D. McGee. Whatever virtues and excellencies may be imputed to the primary system by theorists and unsophisticates it is, alas, lamentably true that the primary election law as administered in these latter days is

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

I also have given quite a little study to old-age pensions from information received from Washington and other sources including insurance statistics and find most of them utterly inadequate and apparently just a salve to our conscience instead of the kind of annuity we would want for our friends, our relatives and ourselves. The Golden Rule is the ony ethical or Christian premise on which to base a “fair and reasonable” pension or annuity. In conclusion I would like to ask Mr. Deluse what (in present purchasing power) he would consider a “fair and reasonable” pension for those who have worked 40 to 45 years and built our country up to what it is today and now find themselves destitute and denied a chance to work if it was available because of their age. And I also ask him to think of the Townsend '‘plan as a recovery plan. The pension part of it is merely incidental as he will discover if he really studies the plan.

a disgrace not only to our political parties, but to our government itself. Instead of being an instrument for expressing the will of the people, the law has been perverted into an evil contrivance for stifling and throttling the will of the electorate. It has given additional impetus to the worst tyranny that ever afflicted a free' people—the tyranny of the political bosses—the ruthless and brutal domination of the political machine —0 ft e n euphemistically designated by its apologists as “the organization.” So easily does the primary lend itself to the manipulation of the machine leaders, that it has come to pass that no person irrespective of his deserts or ability can hope to be nominated, unless the bosses underwrite his candidacy. And, as a condition precedent to the support of the bosses, it is required that the primary aspirant pledge his allegiance to them. And thus the vicious circle is formed, out of which come all the mischiefs and evils of bad government. The resentment of the voters in both parties against these evils inherent, or at least attendant on primary elections, forced both parties to pledge themselves solemnly to the repeal of the primary law, in their last party platforms. For either party to fail to live up to this promise is a scandalous breach of a public obligation. If platform promises made before the election are to be boldly repudiated after election, or construed in a Pickwickian sense to the confusion of the voters, then there is no such thing as party responsibility. Speaking as a party man, I can think of no breach of faith so reprehensible and indefensible as that of a great political party repudiating its platform covenants. Still speaking as a party man, I

Daily Thought

Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer.—l Corinthians, x, 10. TRUTH is not exciting enough to those who depend on the characters and lives of ther neighbors for all their amusement.—Bancroft.

FEB. 16, 1935

can think of nothing so fatal to its own self respect, or so destructive of public confidence and good will, as for the party of Jefferson to ignore solemn party covenants made and entered into with the people. tt tt a WORLD WAR VETERAN REPLIES TO JUNIOR By Wm. H. McClary. I served in the army during the World War and believe me I can give The Times readers a few facts regarding the type of man who wrote Junior’s letter. He says he is 30 years old. Os course he means he has lived 30 years, but he hasn’t gotten his growth. He says he is neither pacifist nor radical. Os course he isn’t—it takes men of intelligence to be either one. He says he was 14 years old during the war. Praise the Lord he wasn’t old enough to be drafted; I might have had him in my outfit, and I know that all officers in the next war will pray that he is too old to be drafted. This man really should be ignored, but I thought it would be a good idea to let him know what real men think of his type. Os course, he would yell about his taxes. I wonder if he has paid his last year's poll tax?

So They Say

The League (of Nation’s) success is greatly beneficial to our own Interests, because trade thrives on confidence. —Miss Sarah Wambaugh, U S. adviser in Saar plebiscite. I prefer to take risks—Premier Flandin of France. We are not aiming at a select and limited understanding, but at peace and well-being for all.—Sir John Simon, British foreign secretary. What I saw during my brief spell of death has made me regret that I ever came back.—John Puckering, British gardener who was brought back to life. The old gold standard, worked from London, is no test of what in# new standard would be, worked from several cepters.—Sir Josiah Stamp, British economist. We are ready for any emergency; we are always ready for an emergency—Atty. Gen. Homer Cummings. Be born in a country where your materials for your work lie.—Pearl Buck, famous author, in advice to authors.

CREATION

BY HARRIET SCOTT OLINICK Wrapped in a glowing symphony Os cool, dark green and silent gray I ask the god of poetry Whatever he may wish to say. My thoughts are rivers, running clear. I am as ceaseless as the sea. Let flame descend; let ice destroy, And still I shall not cease to be. I am a still chameleon, Come trooping, words. Oh through me fly! Bring to me silver nets of stars. Obliterate eternal II ,