Indianapolis Times, Volume 47, Number 258, Indianapolis, Marion County, 6 January 1936 — Page 13

It Seems to Me HEM) BROUN NEW ORLEANS, La., Jan. 6—The tradition of thi town is a silver thread drawn tight as any banjo string. It tinkles and it shines, but almost any year now it may snap asunder. Frankly, New Orleans isn't getting any older. The chain stores have lushed in and the modern skyscraper makes no concession to the balconies and long French windows which distinguished the architecture of the historic French quartier. The restaurants constitute the last line of de-

sense. At this one Thackeray dined, and, though he mentioned Marseille in his ballad of bouilabaisse, he might have had it here. But I mention merely a stripling. Across the street is the old absinthe house which stood on that same site before Thomas Jefferson made his famous purchase. I refer, of course, to territory and not a round of drinks. It was in this very room that shrimps creole first saw the light and only a few blocks away, at a somewhat earlier date, to be sure, Andrew Jackson drove back the British Redcoats. Antoine’s, Ar-

Heywood Broun

naud’s, Galatoire’s and the rest form a redoubt against the onrush of the rotarians. The anecdote endures concerning the reply which Jules Alciatore made to the rich oil man who ordered a dinner for himself and 11 friends. In deference to local custom it wa; ordered several hours ahead and the time was set for 7, but the host was incautious enough to say to the proprietor, “Remember, now, we want everything promptly, because we've got to catch a train back to New York at 9:30.’’ “I am sorry, then," said Jules. “I can not serve you. Antoine’s is a restaurant and not a lunch room.” And he persisted in his refusal. n n tt Just Like Main Street BUT by and large, New Orleans is like your main street and mine. That blue arch just beyond the filling station marks the spot where once the slave market stood. It covered the entire lot. Up to a few years ago the other half was used as a Tom Thumb golf course. But that’s gone, too. Miniature golf and slavery have both yielded to economic pressure. I might have seen the old French market where the fish and vegetables are sold, but the man who was running the party said we would miss the 2 o’clock floor show at Pete Merrman’s if we didn’ f hurry. Aside from the fact that the master of ieremonies began the proceedings by singing Huey Long's “Every Man a King,” the performance was about the same as you see at Zimmerman's in Akron, Casey's in Scranton, the Nashville Nut Club, or half a hundred places in New York. As yet, T have had no time to take a close lock at the duelling oak in the center of the park. We did not wish to miss the first race at the Fair Grounds and lose a chance to get a bet down on one of Charlie Stevenson's mounts. Only the other day he sooted home four horses and Big Torch was 20 to 1. a it a Once in n Lifetime OPPORTUNITIES like that come only once in a lifetime. Those dim battles of the past beneath the giant oak can wait to be exhumed. As a matter of fact, the oak seemed to be coming back into its own a few days ago when it was reported that Judge Richard W. Leche, running in the primary for Governor, which means election, had challenged his opponent, Rep. Dear, to shoot it out. The judge, who is the candidate of the Long adherents, denies the story. He told me he based his refusal on an old Lincoln story. “Os course, I don't want to duel,” said the judge. “It wouldn't be fair. Dear is only half my size. He’d have twice as much to shoot at.” (Copyright, 1936) Morgan No 'Villain/ Probe Will Show BY RAYMOND CLAPPER WASHINGTON, Jan. 6.—Undoubtedly many expect that J. P. Morgan is to be cast in the role of heavy villain when the Nye committee questions him and his associates about their financing of the allies in the World War. Such persons are likely to be disappointed if they expect the Senate committee to produce documents showing that Morgan sent out orders directing his agents to put the United States into the

war to save the firm's loans. No such crude malevolent plot is expected to be revealed by the evidence. But if the committee is successful, it will show something far more significant than any personal culpability could possibly be. It will show the devastating power of the economic forces for which the Morgans, because they were strong bankers with good connections in London and Paris, happened to be the instruments in the last war.

Clapper

Whether these bankers were reluctant or eager instruments does not matter much. The ratal thing is that such dangerous forces should stand outside government control. It is doubtful if any one thing ever caused an important war. Certainly our own entrance into the World War resulted from a number of factors. But, the financial stake which the United States had acquired In the allied cause by 1917 was a major factor, although a subtle one. ana SENATE committee investigators have been studying the Morgan files for months. They often encountered resistance from the firm's lawyers who refused to permit them to examine documents except ones called for by specific identification. Yet, in spitq of these difficulties, the committee has woven together the financial story of Americas involvement in the war. It is full of figures, and memoranda regarding credits and loans. Much of it is not exciting. But it will be well worth studying by every one who wants to keep out of another war. The story begins on Aug. 15, 1914, when William •I Bryan, whose record as Secretary of State grows more impressive even- year, warned the Morgans that loans by American bankers to any belligerent were inconsistent with the true spirit of neutrality. But by November the late Henry P. Davidson, Morgan partner, was on the way to England to arrange the deal by which his house became the allied purchasing agents. A few weeks before. J. P. Morgan had written President Wilson that the war, by cutting down the trade of other countries, had furnished a tremendous opportunity for America. Prom then on the forces were at work. Just one year later, Wilson was insisting that a Morgan loan to the British was necessary to maintain international exchanges whose breakdown would be “absolutely disastrous" to the United States. K tt U BY March 5. 1917, Ambassador Page at London was writing Secretary of State Lansing that we should go to war with Germany in order to be able to extend heavier credit to the allies. “The pressure of this approaching crisis,’’ he wrote, “has gone beyond the ability of the Morgan financial agency for the British and French governments. Perhaps our going to war is the only way in which our present pre-eminent trade position can be maintained and a panic averted.” And so, a month later, we did. Fortunately Morgan's testimony is timed with consideration of neutrality legislation. Because keeping out of war is not a matter of suppressing human villainy but of controlling those seemingly harmless business transactions which, as the questioning of Morgan doubtless will show, weave their web as tirelessly as the spider, and finally entrap a nation requiring the blood of its youth to extricate it.

Ftill Loapod Wire Service of he I nlted Pres* Association

7fa World roMORJtmA

By DAVID DIETZ {First of a series by the Sci ipvs-Howard Science Editor) is pouring out of the tall stacks once more as 1936 begins. The boilers are being fired. The engines are being tuned up. Once again, the clouds hanging over the river valleys where the steel plants are reflect the glow of red. Freight trains are longer and there are more of them puffing along the gleaming rails. Everywhere in the industrial world the tempo is quickening. The signals are set for full speed ahead and industry is swinging out of the depression. Not only out of the depression, but into anew world. A world of taller buildings, longer bridges, swifter trains, safer aircraft, finer homes. A world of greater beauty, deeper comfort, smoother efficiency. Recovery means an entrance into this new world

rather than a mere resumption of old activities because there never was a depression in scientific research. The. wheels of industry slowed down, even stopped in some places. The furnace fires flickered lower end lover. Rust gathered on lathes and drill presses. But in the laboratories the Bunsen 1 urners were kept going. No dust gathered on test tubes and retorts. The microscopes, the galvanometers, the testing machinery of all sorts, were kept brightly polistjed and in perfect working order. nan WISELY, the leading industrial concerns of the nation kept their research laboratories going full blast throughout the depression. They were looking ahead to the days of recovery. Many smaller concerns did the same. This is not to say that there were not research men whose salaries were cut or even research men who lost their jobs through the failure of the concern employing them or through the adoption of a short-sighted policy. But by and large research men were kept on the job through the years of the depression. In addition, engineers and chemists and other technically trained men who found their usual activities curtailed or terminated began to turn to research in those depression years as ‘the way to solve their personal problems. tt tt a AS a result, the volume of research work went up as business activity went down, and now that recovery is manifesting itself the nation stands ready to profit by the research boom that went on during the economic depression. The new world is going to be built out of stronger steels, tougher allots, better aluminum products, more useful plastics, harder abrasives, more powerful machine tools, more ingenious automatic controls, new chemical compounds and new chemical processes. New things and better ways of making old things are the foundations of this more glorious future. Along with these products has come anew appreciation of beauty, anew interest in design. The smooth gleam of stainless steel, the inviting luster of aluminum, the infinite possibilities of the new plastics have inspired industrialists and engineers to call famous artists into consultation, to become artists themselves. Not only is streamlining, first learned in the air and then applied to the automobile being carried to the railroad locomotive and the auto bus because it means increased efficiency, but because it means increased beauty. And the clean attractiveness of streamlining is being carried to many household appliances, where there is no question of wind resistance. tt tt a '"INHERE is a question, however, A of beauty, modern beauty that reflects* the new world of progress. You may ask: What is the sense of streamlining a washing machine or a carpet sweeper? The carpet sweeper is never going to move at a speed where wind revsistance is important and the washing machine stands still. The answer is that the streamlining is symbolic. Washing machines. carpet sweepers and many other household articles are being made of new materials which not only increase their efficiency and lengthen their lives, but which are capable of expressing beauty. Modem beauty is most appropriate to them. They are machines. and so it is appropriate that their beauty should be the proud beauty of the machine at its best. Modern furniture is a good example of what is happening in the world of design. The first wild excesses of modernistic design have given way to a synthesis of the old and the new. New fab-

BENNY

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The Indianapolis Times

rics, new materials and new colors are used with courage, but also with a restraint born of a knowledge of the past. New effects are being achieved without abandoning the lessons previously learned. tt tt tt IT is possible to see the trend of development in many fields. But in many ways developments will be accelerated or will take new turns as new inventions are launched. These will be launched with increasing rapidity as the flow of capital becomes easier, Mr. John Hoffhein, well-known consulting engineer of New York, believes. "There are enough new inventions floating around New York to absorb $500,000,000 of capital,” Mr. Hoffhein says. In an effort to learn the trends of industry, I have spent the last few weeks talking with many important industrialists and engineers, among them Dr. S. M. Kintner, vice president in charge of engineering of the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Cos.; Mr. Safford K. Colby, vice president in charges of sales of the Aluminum Cos. of America; Mr. T. M, Girdler, chairman of the board and president of the Republic Steel Corp.; Dr. Edward R. Weidlein, director, and Dr. William A. Hamor, assistant director of the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research; Mr. C. J. Stilwell, vice president of the Warner & Swasey Cos., and others. tt tt u TWO things impressed me in these conversations. One w r as the tremendous number of new things and new ways of doing things now going into use. The other was the still greater promise for the day after tomororw. “Scientific discovery is still in its infancy because even the most common things around us are not yet fully understood,” Dr. Weidlein of the Mellon Institute says. “Unless civilization utterly fails us and removes from the followers of science the means whereby research can be carried on, we may confidently anticipate a continual and rapid increase of our scientific knowledge and with that knowledge a growth of man’s power.” Progress today, Dr. Weidlein points out, represents the result of teamwork between the pure

TTTASHINGTON, Jan. 6. Though the fundamental difference between the President’s neutrality bill and that proposed by members of the Senate Munitions Committee centers around one word, that one word promises to cause one of the most important battles of the session. The word in question is “may.” It gives the President discretionary powers to impose arms embargoes against belligerents. This is what the Administration favors. Various Senators and Congressmen oppose this. They want to change “may” to “shall”; make it mandatory on the President to impose embargoes. Furthermore, they would have Congress define the embargoes specifically and make them applicable against all belligerents. This, according to arguments put by the President to Congressional leaders, would tie his hands, prevent United States co-opera-tion for peace. In case war spread to Europe and Asia, the United States would have to ban shipments to Great Britain, despite the tacit United States-British agreement regarding the Far East. This .'s the big undercover reason whispered by State Department officials trying to win converts for discretionary neutrality powers for the President. Leaders of the munitions bloc opposed to discretionary powers are Senators Nye, Clark, Bone; and Congressmen Sisson (N. Y.), and Maverick (Texas).

science research worker, the industrial scientist and the industrialist. But in the face of the tremendous strides which have been made in the chemical industry.

Washington Merry-Go-Round BY DREW PEARSON and ROBERT S. ALLEN

'TWO items in the “Senate Munitions Committee” neutrality bill indicate its drastic nature. One is a penalty of SIO,OOO or five years imprisonment or both for traveling on a belligerent vessel. The other is the establishment of export quotas for essential war materials, by which a belligerent country could not buy from the United States any more than its latest five-year average. In putting this into effect, however, the President, would be allowed discretionary power. tt tt tt Serious Business / T , O President Roosevelt his annual budget message is no ordinary chore. He considers it among his most important state papers; devotes much time, gives great care to its preparation. Actual work on this session's message began more than a month ago at Warm Springs. Ga., where between daily dips in the pool, the President talked with Secretary Morgenthau, Budget Director Bell, Chairman Buchanan of the House Appropriations Committee, and Under Secretary of Interior West. As he discussed the various phases of the proposed message he jotted down notes on ideas, phrases, figures. When he returned to thc<White House early in December, the serious work of wanting the message began. From his sheaf of penciled memos the President dictated a first rough draft to his

INDIANAPOLIS, MONDAY, JANUARY 6, 1936

m i 1 B i JB B B if - * 11 1,-1 i fa ii *V**€f: >jL I raHp ' IpllPr I Out of flic research lahnrri- pMI J lory—out of researches carried §K on daring the depression —.<? coming the glorious world of to - Mmm „ BMpfflffljpKipiil morrow. MpT

the automotive industry, the telephone, and the like, he adds: “In no branch of industry is scientific research at the peak of its powders.” A great deal of advancement

personal stenographer, Miss Grace Tulley. Only three copies were made of this draft. The President handed it personally to the advisers he wanted, for suggestions and to check errors. With their written comments before him he then “read copy” on the original document. tt a x Off the Record AS he read, he made marginal -*■ notes in pencil for eliminatious and insertions. These inserts the President tagged “A,” “B,” “C,” etc. Miss Tulley made a few copies, eliminating the noted deletions and inserting the new material. Only one copy was made for this revised draft. This, in turn, the President read to his inner circle of aids at a secret conference. With a few last-minute changes, it was then sent to the government printing office. Yesterday afternoon the President held his yearly special press conference on the budget—an innovation of his regime. Reporters assembled in the White House and, under pledge of secrecy, were given printed copies. Then for nearly two hours, the President discussed questions on item after item—all off-the-rec-ord. Thus the third Roosevelt budget wai bom. (Copyrieht. 1936. by United Feature Syndicate. Inc.c

comes from the extension and orderly exploitation of previously discovered facts, Dr. Weidlein points out. “A good example is ir. metallurgical research,” he says, “where great advances have been made in many directions. This condition has come about through the logical and orderly development or exploitation of the fundamentally new ideas which had emerged more than 10 years ago. “Recent research has consisted mainly in the refinement of the old and the application of new physical methods to the continued exploration of numerous fields of work that had been opened up eariier ” tt tt tt BUT all research is not of that kind. A bigger development for the day after tomorrow is foreseen by Dr. Weidlein. “We are on the eve of events entirely different from the mere extension, refinement and development of cur present-day scientific knowledge,” he cont nues. “It is not what we krow that is so important. It is what we do not know. Most of what we know can be found in libraries, in the minds of peoplp, and in processes as they exist today. “But we have no conception of what a small percentage this knowledge is of what there is yet to know. “There may be revealed at any time basic information that will keep us industrially busy for a great many years to come. The very fact that we have a great deal of trouble is the best indication of this lack of understanding. “Any group of scientists and engineers can sit down and write a long list of what can doubtless be accomplished in the future. When these new products are available and if the people accept them, they then become the beginning of new industries which will absorb a great many of our unemployed.” TOMOR ROW The Stainless Prince of Stee’s.

By J. Carver Pusey

Second Section

*Cntr*d a* Sc<v>nd-rUs Matter at. Post office, Indianjtpnti*. Ind.

Fair Enough WESKOOH Jan. 6.—“ Noisy Bill” Shearer, the battleship lobbyist, tossed his satchel aboard a boat the other day, grabbed his missus by the arm and with a yell of“ Let's get out of this, mama,” tore for heme. He wants to be in Washington for this session of Congress and I think his racket this time is to start a great scare about the shortage of American merchant ships and the necessity for a big government subsidy. Then, of course, if the subsidy goes through, the boys around downtown New York

will get busy and organize some paper companies to steal the subsidies, as usual, and, if it's absolutely unavoidable, to build a few skiffs to show when the inevitable senatorial investigation begins three or four years hence. But Shearer himself, as I got the plan. Is strictly the promoter, lobbyist and press agent and reckons on getting his from the shipbuilders It’s hard to figure out just what Shearer's angle is, and you can't learn by asking him. “Just who is it that makes you so passionate about a big merchant

fleet? Are you just an amateur patriot?” “Patriot, yes, Mr. Shearer said, “but no amateur.” nan He's a Monet/ Talker ■you can't even tell whether he has a job or is just out touring. He may be in the money, and again he may not have a quarter. Like Tex Rickard, he talks in great big figures which look like a score by innings. But Tex used to talk that way when he didn’t have eating money. In another way Shearer is a reminder of the late David Lamar, “The Wolf of Wall Street,” because he rattles off big names as easily as you can say “Joe Dokes” or “Mike Swift.” “They have investigated me for everything,” he said, “but nobody ever got anything on me. I was supposed to be a German spy, a Bolshevik and Basil Zaharoff's man. And all the time I have been just an American patriot, but, as I say, no amateur. After all isn't a patriot entitled to eat?” I met him first in Rome. There were about a dozen people in the room, all trying to strut their importance and tell their favorite stories, but just as I came in there was a booming noise and a big voice said: “Yes, you know I’m the man who wrecked the Geneva Naval Conference. And I said to Senator Nye . . A few days before the Italians had shoved out a story for America announcing that the Rockefellers’ Standard Oil was dickering for a 30-year monopoly on the Italian oil and gasoline market. They figured that it would toss a scare into the Rumanians who ordinarily sell a lot of oil to Italy and make them pull out of the oil sanction. a a a Duce Gives Boys the Bounce TNSIDE of 24 hours the Ambassador and some other A hotels in Rome were positively crawling with hustlers from all of the big European and American oil interests trying to head off the Standard Oil and get a piece of the business for themselves. So Ricket dropped out of the fog from London in a big private plane and who was with him, just taking a little cruise for pleasure in the worst possible weather? Who but “Big Ben” Smith, the famous New York bear who broke Herbert Hoover’s heart by chalking up millions in the market by selling when Mr. Hoover was telling the people that prosperity was only around the comer. Both Mr. Ricket and Mr. Smith tried in vain to see Mussolini, but he turned cool and gave them the old hard eye. They went away pretty badly bruised up from bouncing off the Duce’s door. Then the oil crowd skinned out and one morning Signor Rota whispered to me in the lobby, “Do you know who’s in the hotel?” “Who, the Negus?” “No,” Mr. Rota said, “Mr. Shearer. You know him?” (To Be Continued)

A Liberal Viewpoint BY. DR. HARRY ELMEF BARNES

WHATEVER its lack of logic or timeliness, the “Back to the Constitution” ballyhoo seems to be for the moment the most popular rallying point of the Republican war horses. But the defenders of the Constitution quite wisely neglect all matters of discriminating detail. They fail to tell us whether they mean by the Constitution the document originally formulated by the Fathers in 1787, including the first 10 amendments, or the original Constitution plus all later changes through amendment, interpretation and usage. This consideration is forcefully brought out by Ralph Adams Cram in an article on “Back to What Constitution?” in the American Mercury. nan THE Constitution of 1787 brought into being an aristocratic republic. The majority of the framers were actually more fearful of any thorough-going democracy than they were of a king or a house of lords. Yet the political evolution of our constitutional system has been distinctly in the direction of extreme democracy from 1800 to our own day. “It is therefore quite logical to demand of those who are clamoring for a return to the Constitution just what document they refer to. -Back to the Constitution’ is a sound principle if it refers to the original one as it stood prior to the nineteenth-century amendments. “Os course, it could not serve in all respects to meet a revolutionized society and state; the process of amendment would have to be begun over again, but with the later amendments out of the way, it might be possible to effect the desired purpose more sanely and successfully than has actually been the case.”

Gen. Johnson Says—

OKMULGEE, Okla., Jan. 6.—ln 1933 a captain of industry, trembling, long-distanced me from a booth, afraid to use his own phone. He wanted me to intercede to have a certain G-man sent to his city. Its gold-coast was in panic. There is no such helpless terror as the fear inspired by kidnapers among the rich and powerful. You can understand the Lindberghs leaving. But has either ever said that they left because they didn’t dare longer to live in their own country? I doubt if they either said or thought that. England is more efficient against crime in general but not against kidnaping. My friend's telephone call was two years ago. If this Administration had no other jewels in its crown, its war on crime since then is a Kohinoor—especially against kidnaping. What kidnaper has gotten away with it In the past years? The big gangs are gone—mostly shot to pieces. Scotland Yard has nothing on our Department of Justice. London has no better police than New York or Chicago. All they needed was riean, strong mayors. The police are as good as their backing. It isn’t fun any more to cruise around Chicago after midnight in a police squad car. Nothing ever happens. Two years ago it was a sure-fire Umli. Our next objective is racketeers. More insidious than any other form of extortion, rackets are more deeply covered. Their cost to the public runs into billions. They are a form of government in defiance of government.

Westbrook Pegler