Indianapolis Times, Volume 47, Number 300, Indianapolis, Marion County, 24 February 1936 — Page 9

It Seems to Me IYMMOIIN CHARLES M. SCHWAB, the optimist, sat in his office on his seventy-fourth birthday and surveyed the world. He did not find it altogether good. And yet there was a silver lining. It was not so bad lor Bethlehem. He was asked if it were true that the manufacturers of munitions made wars as well as the weapons with which to fight them. The chairman of Bethlehem bridled at the suggestion. While the accusation had been made frequently, it was, for all

that, both cruel and preposterous. People said such things most unkindly about Sir Basil ZaharofT, formerly the head of Vickers. But Mr. Schwab had known Sir Basil for 40 years. He found him “one of the finest, most estimable, most beloved of men.” Certainly he made guns. So did Skoda, Krupp, Creusot and Midvale. Os the making of guns there is no end in this imperfect world. Avery young reporter spoke of neutrality. The master of the forges knitted his brow. He indicated that the problem was

Heywood Broun

complex, but then he found the way out and explained, “It seems to me if you are manufacturing an article for sale you can’t pick out the people you 'mill sell to.” tt tt tt Little Town of Bethlehem ARMS for the love of Allah. Arms for the glory of God. Arms to make the world safe for demr cracy. Arms for the maw of Mammon. The munitions maker is no better off than a poor flower girl, for he must stand in the middle of the market place and cry out piteously in any sort of weather, “Who'll buy my violets?” But this was not said by Charles M. Schwab. What he did say was, “I think profit ought to be only reasonable —as small as you can make it—but I don’t think you can get people to do all that work enthusiastically and well without something.” So it's turn the lathe and feed the mold. Tomorrow’s death is this day’s gold. And happy is the town of Bethlehem, for it can give the things that all men want. Kings of the Orient and the wise men of the world must come to Bethlehem. Nor does it lie still even under starlight when the clear call comes for service and for duty. It is then that eager eyes are turned to this spot from which rise up a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. Kris Krir.gle comes up these tall chimneys bearing gifts for the furthermost quarters of the world. The wares of Bethlehem are known in village and mountain pass and desert plain. a a a There Is a Santa Claus AND from the shops there rises a hum which will grow and be magnified until it reaches its climax in a shriek as the whole throat of the sky is several above some not to be forgotten field. The work goes forward enthusiastically and well. Bethlehem can show its testimonials in row after row of little wooden crosses. A reporter asked if Mr. Schwab thought it were possible to bring about universal disarmament. “No,” he said, “I don’t think it is a possible thing to proscribe war. “It is impractical.” And so on his seventy-fourth birthday Charles M. Schwab looked out upon the world and did not find it altogether good. And yet his gaze was calm and steady. Somewhere beyond the rim of the horizon there must be a silver lining for Bethlehem. (Copyright, 1936) ‘Desensitized' Tax Program Probable BY RAYMOND CLAPPER WASHINGTON, Feb. 24.—The Administration appears to have decided upon a desensitized tax program. In order to minimize the pangs which always accompany taxes, the program is to rush through a tax bill limited to raising about one-half billion dollars to replace the invalidated AAA processing taxes and sustain the new farm program for the time being. For purposes of political campaign argument, Democrats can deny these are new taxes. They merely replace those thrown out

by the Supreme Court. Senator La Follette is preparing to renew his demand for facing the tax problem and going deeper and more heavily into the middle brackets. This indiscreet boldness is to be frowned down by Administration leaders. Tax raising is to be disposed of before the Administration goes to Congress to ask for relief money at least two billions—to sustain the unemployed after June 30. tt e

All of which, while possibly regrettable from the point of view of good government, is to be expected in a campaign year. While such strategy will aid in anesthetizing the public to the stark fact that some day the New Deal bill must be paid, it will not entirely smother the fact that we still have upward of 10.000,000 unemployed who must be supported. That problem hasn't had the attention and discussion It deserves. Government officials are mainly concerned with getting the money to carry relief from year to year. a a a YET Harry Hopkins and all others in contact with the unemployment situation recognize the prospect of supporting 5.000,000 or more indefinitely. The simple Republican remedy of scrapping the New Deal and going back to the free-for-all grab which ruled before 1933 won't solve the problem. Debate later in this session over relief can be rescued from the status of a mere ill-tempered squawk over the cost if Senators and Representatives will take thai opportunity to discuss the underlying problem and stimulate public thought as to what might be done. Burning of midnight oil now, reflected in floor debate later, would pay dividends in, national good. The alternatives have not yet 'reen' sufficiently impressed upon the mind of the business world. We face two possible courses: 1. Private industry must absorb existing unemployment. 2. Or else the government must support the unemployed and send the tax bill to industry. a a a MERELY returning to normal business activity. or even to 1929 levels, wouldn't solve the problem That would still, according to the best estimates. leave at least 5,000,000 unemployed. Even in 1929 seven out of ten families received let's than $2500 a year—or less than the amount necessary for a decent living. There is a tendency to blame this surplus of labor on increased mechanization. Those who have studied the problem dismiss that complaint except as it applies to temporary dislocations. After a study of this question, the National Industrial Conference Board reports that the enormous increases of the individual worker's output made possible by modern machinery have produced a higher standard of living which would not otherwise have been possible. • The answer to the problem of unemployment does not lie in placing restrictions on the use of machniery, but in increasing the volume of production, which would increase the purchasing power of the people and lead to full re-employment," the board states. It la the means for increasing production and mass purchasing power which needs thorough discussion now, both in Washington and among industrialists. There is reason to believe we shall soon he hearing it, <

FLOGGED TO DEATH—FOR POLITICS

This if the last of a series of dispatches on the origins and consequences of Tampa’s brutal floggings and murder. tt tt tt u tt tt BY DAVID E. SMILEY (Editor of the Tampa Daily Times) Fla., Feb. 24.—A few days before the explosive charge of Judges Parks and Sandler to the Hillsborough County Grand Jury, the Junior Chamber of Commerce wrote to Mayor Chancey, Sheriff McLeod and other officials that gambling in Tampa had assumed such proportions that it had “materially affected the commercial and economic life of the city.” The letter declared that members of the Junior Chamber had visited and observed not fewer than 100 gambling establishments openly operating in the city. It gave the addresses of 78 of these places, calling upon the authorities to suppress them. Commenting on this letter, Judges Parks and Sandler said, in the same charge to the Gn>nd Jury: “We continue to read from the press that apparently no machinery has been set in motion to ascertain the truth and correctness of the statements made in these communications, nor to eliminate the asserted evils. If such conditions exist, and these charges be true to a material degree, you are justified in inquiring of these officials what

may be expected, for if nothing is done we may expect to recur just such incidents as that which resulted in the maltreatment and death of Shoemaker.” Under the vigor of these instructions the grand jury was ready to act. On Dec. 18 Sheriff McLeod arrested Sergt. Brown and Policemen Robert Chappell, C. W. Carlisle, Sam E. Crosby, John Bridges and F. W. Switzer, charging them with the murder of Joseph A. Shoemaker and felonious assaults on Eugene F. Poulnot and Sam D. Rogers. a a tt qpHE next day Robert Cargell, a St. Petersburg attorney, picked Switzer out of a line-up of 20 prisoners in the county jail and identified him as a member of a gang which had seized him on the streets of the neighboring city, carried him out into the country and mutilated him on March 20 last. A few days later Sheriff McLeod arrested on similar charges Arlie Gillian, an orange grove caretaker; Ed Spivey, a typewriter repairman, and James Dean, an electrician, all of Orlando and all said by the sheriff to have admitted being Ku-Klux Klansmen. Gillian and Spivey were reported to have served among the 1124 special city policemen imported by Chief Tittsworth and paid $lO a day each on the occasion of the September primary. Incidentally, among the other special policemen that day was a well known Klan leader of Orlando, Fred Bass, who was said to have been accompanied to Tampa by some 70 other men, most of them klansmen. Bass is a political leader in Orlando. tt tt a ON Dec. 24 the grand jury, after long sessions and hearing many witnesses summoned by Sheriff McLeod and State Attorney Farrior, found true bills of indictment for murder in the second degree, assault and other charges growing out of the kidnaping and flogging. On Jan. 8 former Chief Tittsworth appeared before the grand jury at his own request. It is understood he entered a general denial of knowledge of a conspiracy in the Police Department to punish Shoemaker, Poulnot and Rogers for their political activities. Nevertheless, on Jan. 23 the grand jury, after listening to his story, returned indictments against him charging him with being an accessory after the fact to the murder of Shoemaker and to the kidnaping of the three men at the City Hall that fatal Saturday night. The next day—Jan. 24—there was another sensation when it was discovered that Robert P. Fariss, a Tampa business man, who had been secretly questioned several times by the authorities regarding his connection with the flogging, was found dead in his closed sedan parked in his own garage. Officials said he had committed suicide. A garden hose had been attached to the exhaust of his motor and run through an opening the floor boards, with the open end lying beside him on a pillow. a a s IT was revealed that Fariss was one of two signers for an application for a post office box mentioned in a dodger passed out in the name of the Ku Klux Klan as the place to address applications for membership. Fariss lived across the street from Tittsworth. The latest development is the indictment —making a total of 11 —of Maurice A. Mer.edez, Tittsworth's clerk. Immediately after Tittsworth, Brown and the other defendants were arrested the Whitaker brothers appeared as attorneys for all the Tampa men involved, and arranged for their release on bail.

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Tampa Making Great Battle to Regain Its Self-Respect

BENNY

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The Indianapolis Times

The date of the trial is uncertain. A number of moves for delay on technical grounds are anticipiated by the prosecuting officials. Whatever the outcome may be, it is now certain that public opinion in Tampa is determined to clear up the revolting mess ■ revealed and dramatized in the last few months. Every civic organization is backing the efforts of the Junior Chamber’s election committe, which has done excellent work in exposing the gambling alliance with politics. tt tt SHERIFF M'LEOD has arrested scores of gambling house keepers and bolita peddlers, requiring them to enter cash bail for hearing before judges in the Criminal Court. Out of 80 or 90 cases made by the sheriff to date, not one defendant has appeared for a hearing and the cash bail bonds, ranging each case from S2OO to S3OO, have been forfeited.. Thus the gambling business is becoming unprofitable for the first time in years. During their investigation the Junior Chamber committee said a minimum of $1,000,000 a month was being taken out of the channels of normal trade by the gamblers. The figure is conservative. On the day the special grand jury was called in session and the judges delivered their vigorous charge, many of the “protected” houses, which had been operating unmolested for years, put away their roulette wheels and faro layouts and closed their doors on orders from that mysterious source referred to as “the front.” tt tt tt WHAT is the fair conclusion to be drawn from the facts reviewed in these articles? Those who have watched the day-by-day developments are not in doubt. Neither the Ku Klux Klan nor opposition to radicalism as such was primarily responsible for the Tampa floggings and murder, although attempts have been made in the last few weeks thus to attribute the cause. But this is obviously inspired to divert attention from the local political aspect of the case. For example, small handbills were scattered on the downtown streets of Tampa on Jan. 29 inviting citizens to listen to an hour's broadcast from a radio station at Clearwater during which it was promised that “a forceful speaker” would explain how the two Tampa newspapers were suppressing important facts. This “forceful speaker” turned out to be A. L. Henson, who was introduced as an important officer in the American Legion and Veterans’ Service Officer for Georgia, The announcer declared that it was “a paid political broadcast” and announced the title as “Americanism.” Afterward *it turned out that Henson was a political appointee of Gov. Talma dge and connected with the Georgia state government. tt tt tt HENSON devoted his entire speech to an attack on Norman Thomas and the American Civil Liberties Union, rehearsing and rehashing testimony taken by the Lusk and Fish “red” investigating committees of several years years ago. While Henson did not mention the flogging case, it was palpable that he was trying to build up sympathy for the defendants in the flogging case by inferring that anything Thomas suggested should be fought by “true Americans.” Since Thomas had only a few days before addressed a mass meeting in Tampa, denouncing the floggers, and the American Civil Liberties Union had shown an active interest in bringing them to justice, there could be no other interpretation than tlr t Henson

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1936

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was brought to Tampa to speak on behalf of the indicted policemen. Henson’s harangue brought a prompt disavowal from local American Legionnaires. Members of the U. S. S. Tampa Post No. 5, at their meeting on Feb. 6, unanimously adopted a resolution denouncing the broadcast and urging vigorous prosecution of the floggers. tt tt AS for the Ku-Klux Klan angle, there seems to be little evidence that would prove the flogging a Klan activity, even though Klansmen may have taken part in the torturing of the three victims. To indicate how Tampa’s civic organizations feel, it is only necessary to point out thkt in Febru-

Washington Merry-Go-Round

WASHINGTON, Feb. 24.—How desperate is the game of tit-tat-toe going on between Germany, France, Great Britain and Russia is indicated in confidential dispatches cabled here. It would be amusing if it were not so packed with dynamite. The one question uppermost in the chancellories of Europe is: “How long will Hitler wait?” It is chalked up as a dead certainty that when Hitler is ready he will strike. Latest French worry is alleged German armament in the demilitarized Rhineland. The French first pointed to large brick plants and cement works in the Rhineland which looked suspiciously like disguised fortresses. The Germans replied that they had a right to make bricks even in a demilitarized zone, but added that they had perfected a secret brick process which they did not want inspected. The French then pointed to Germany’s underground airdromes in the Rhineland, capable of housing thousands of planes. The Germans replied that there was nothing in the Treaty of Versailles to prevent them from housing commercial planes underground. Finally, the French pointed to 40,000 German troops in the Rhineland. To this the Germans replied: “Tha,t is a mistake. We have 80,000 troops. But they are Brown Shirts, and we need them to maintain order. r tt tt tt F. D. R. Jr. THE visit of Harold A. Wolff, czar of the Harvard cramschool, to the White House recently has disclosed a secret scholastic skeleton in the Roosevelt family closet. Wolff runs the tutoring bureau just outside the Harvard Yard, to which studenjts in difficulty flock to prepare for examinations. Alleged reason for his pilgrimage to Washington was to confer with the President regarding the Democratic campaign organization in New England. But this was not the real reason. It was really far simpler than that. Franklin Delano Roosevelt Jr., Harvard junior, made the Dean's List at mid-year examinations this year, a feat almost comparable to balancing the New Deal budget. The Dean’s List is a periodic honor roll of students ranking high in scholastic marks. At one point in his collegiate career, Franklin’s standing was so poor that he disappeared from college for about a month, going into seclusion at the White House to catch up with his work. Harvard authorities were in an embarrassing spot. There was some talk that he might have to be dropped. But Harold Wolff saved the day. So last week Wolff trekked

V. W, Switzer

C. A.. Brown

J. E. Bridge*

C. W. Carlisle

ary the Junior Chamber of Commerce, again with the backing of the Presidents’ Round Table, launched a public movement which, if successful, would oust the Chancey administration from office and adopt the commission form of government. The organization unanimously voted a public commendation of Sheriff McLeod “for the results he has obtained in closing gambling in this county.” Tampa is making a good fight to regain its own self-respect in politics. Perhaps, since the horror of Shoemaker’s murder has been potently instrumental in arousing the people, the agonizing sacrifice of his life will not have been in vain. THE END.

BY DREW PEARSON and ROBERT S. ALLEN

down to the White House, with his wife and even the secretary of his tutoring bureau. tt tt tt White House Music WHILE music seldom emanates from the second floor of the White House, there is a phonograph in the hallway, a baby grand piano in the sitting room adjoining the President’s study, and an old-time upright, phonograph in the sun room. The sun room machine stands silent under the weight of two Chinese cloisonne vases and an all-glass picture frame bearing the engraved letters “F. D. R.” The photograph is of the President in business suit, white shirt and four-in-hand. No radio is visible, or audible, which might indicate that the President does not listen to A1 Smith. tt tt tt Shadow Boxing ON the docket of the United States Court of Claims are 53 suits, constituting about the most unusual legal action seen in the capital for five years. They are an outgrowth of the Administration’s dollar devaluation policy and are scheduled for argument next month. The 53 claimants seek $8,000,000 damages from the government, on

Dozen New Deal Cases Still to Come Before High Court BY HERBERT LITTLE WASHINGTON, Feb. 24.—A dozen New Deal cases are scheduled to come before the Supreme Court for judgment before the nine justices adjourn late in May for the summer.

Two important housing cases, four combined cases on the Guffey Coal Act, from one to three securities regulation cases, the Bankruptcy and Railroad Retirement Acts, a major test of the Administration’s power policy and perhaps one of the injunction suits brought to stop the Wagner Labor Board before it acts, are on the list. The court may dismiss some of them on jurisdictional grounds instead of ruling on their merits, but all of the cases which reach the stage of oral arguments probably will be decided before the summer recess, as in past years. This will clear up a large segment of the New Deal as far as the election campaign is concerned—the court adjournment precedes the Democratic convention by about two weeks. it tt tt PWA’S land condemnation case from Louisville is the first, and will be argued the week of March 2, with the Administration apparently prepared for the court to deliver another blow. The Circuit Court of Appeals held housing to be not a public purpose, and invalidated the Federal condemnation proceedings.

R. Chappell

8. E. Crosby

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James Dean

Mayor R. E. Lee Chancey

the ground that they lost this amount by the government's gold policy forbidding them to cash their gold notes for gold. Government attorneys assert that even if the claimants should win a verdict in the Court of Claims, they could not collect in as much as Congress has barred the door to appropriations for paying damage claims arising from such suits. Real motive behind the 53 suits is to' maneuver anew review of the dollar devaluation act by the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court had denied claims to damages by the plaintiffs on the ground that they had not proved any losses. The pending suits are attempts to substantiate such claims. If successful the way will then be open to bring the whole issue again before the Supreme Court. Several foreign firms are among the 53 claimants. One of the suits revolves around a $lO gold note; John M. Perry, the plaintiff, claims the government owes him $1912.50 in interest accrued since the date the Treasury refused to redeem his note in gold. The test case is expected to be the one brought by Robert A. Taft, son of the late chief justice. It is No. 1 on the docket, as it covers all the points involved. (Copyright, 1936, by United Feature Syndicate. Inc.)

PWA, which carried on housing operations under Title II of the Recovery Act, which accepted the ruling at once by limiting its building to sites where the land could be obtained without litigation. The case probably will not affect the present PWA policy of making loans and grants to local and state authorities, in whose name the project is carried forward under Federal specifications. The four Guffey act cases, two from the District of Columbia courts and two from Kentucky, are to be argued the week of March 9. Here also there is a strong chance for a New Deal defeat, although the Kentucky court upheld the vrtiole act, and the District of Columbia court knocked out wage, hour and collective bargaining provisions, but upheld the rest of the law as a valid regulation of commerce. The part of the Schechter decision which knocked out hour and wage provisions of the codes as beyond Federal power, and the AAA ruling’ that farm production is a state and not a Federal question, are the principal menaces to the Guffey Act.

By J. Carver Pusey

Second Section

Washington rodneylutcher (Batting for Westbrook Pegler) WASHINGTON. Feb. 24—Republicans are hailing with glee the fact that they have been provided with some more ammunition to shoot at their Democratic rivals, with Secretary of Commerce Dan Roper again the donor. It all comes out of the safety at sea and the safety in the air probes, with resulting penalizations of officials who “talked out of turn”

and drew down the wrath of superiors. Bombshells have burst under the Commerce Department during Roper’s regime almost as frequently as officials have departed —voluntarily or otherwise. That the more unpleasant episodes have had to do with shipping doubtless is due to the oftdemonstrated fact that the shipoperating industry has produced a more “choice” lot of promoters and lobbyists than have other industries. But the latest affair is a little

A. F Gillian

family squabble in which outsiders might not seem to be affected, save that public interest once more appears to be the goat. Tragic smoke of the Morro Castle and Mohawk disasters overhangs suspension of the second and third ranking officers of Roper's Bureau of Navigation and Steamship Inspection—Commander H. McCoy Jones, sepior navigating officer, and Chief Investigator Frederick L. Adams—because they were suspected of letting leak a report revealing the dangers to which Americans are exposed at sea as a result of inadequate inspection and regulation, tt a tt Insubordination Is Charged THE incident closely paralleled that in which J. A. Mount, former superintendent of maintenance for Roper’s Bureau of Air Commerce, was dismissed after he had reported that the plane crash in which Senator Bronson Cutting was killed was due to the bureau’s inefficiency and violation of regulations, and that Federal negligence was endangering human lives over great stretches of the commercial airways. Jones and Adams were charged with insubordination. They had been accused of allowing to become public a sensational protest by the navigation bureau’s board of supervising inspectors in which these men, directly responsible for safety at sea, unanimously had admitted their job wasn’t being done as long, they said, as Roper and other of their superiors made no genuine effort for an efficient service. Meanwhile, the inspectors held, American lives wouldn't be safe at sea. They warned of “very serious” conditions, and urged action “before any more major disasters occur on American flag ships.” a tt tt Jobs Likely to Be Saved AFTER this report leaked out—apparently through someone on the National Committee for Safety at Sea—Assistant Secretary of Commerce J. M. Johnson and Malcolm Kerlin, executive assistant to Roper, moved against Jones and Adams. Charges have been made that Johnson and Kerlin were among the officials who had blocked reform efforts by Jones, Adams, and Bureau Director Joseph B. Weaver. When Jones and Adams refused to answer questions until Weaver, their superior, returned, they were suspended with 24 hours’ notice to show why they shouldn’t be dismissed. Both denied “leaking” the inspectors’ report. Their jobs probably will be saved through Weaver’s insistence and active intervention of the National Committee on Safety at Sea, which committee originated from a conference called by Roper while the nation was still excited about the Morro Castle disaster. But campaign ammunition for Republicans has been piled up by the incident, adding to Roper’s other contributions. (Copyright. 1936, by NEA Service, Inc.)

NEW YORK, Feb. 24.—“ Chaos! Revolution!’* Frequent use of these catastrophic words must make the public pale. In many minds there is definite purpose to deprive the Supreme Court of power to pass on the constitutionality of acts of Congress. A speech I made against this idea was generally headlined: “Loss of this power would be revolution.” I didn’t say that. Abraham Lincoln did. I only quoted him. The proponents of that scheme quote Andrew Jackson as saying: “John Marshall has made his decision—now let him enforce it”; and Lincoln as threatening to resist that power in the court. If Andrew Jackson ever said that, it concerned resistance by Georgia to a decision invalidating a state statute. At the very same time Andy was threatening armed force against an act of South Carolina which annulled a Federal tariff act, toasting “Our Federal Union; it must be preserved,” and urging a force bill” to implement this power in Federal courts. Those words were not quoted until Horace Greeley invented them in 1861—nearly 30 years laterl ana TTERE is what Abraham Lincoln actually said: -IX “We believe as much as Judge Douglas (perhaps more) in obedience to and respect for the judicial department of government. We think its decisions on constitutional questions, when fully settled, should control not only the particular cases decided but the general policy of the country, subject to be disturbed only by amendments to the Constitution as provided m that instrument itself. More than that would be revolution.” Senator Norris read a part of that speech in the Senate in an effort to show that Lincoln was against the court. But he didn’t read the last sentence just quoted. If that isn’t hitting below the belt by the President’s proposed “Senator for life!”

T*? mUrder ° f Carl Taylor - the Hoosier writer. r> o r l if be ? aUS *u he delved into the secrets of the Pemtentes, the Southwestern religious sect which practices self-flagellation, is brought sharply to mind in Anna Robeson Burr’s latest story, which oddly enough, uses the Penitentes for a major role m her story. Her book, "The Golden Quicksand" <D. Apple-ton-Century, New York; $2), is a delightful story ft nta - he 4011011 taking place in 1846 just before the acquisition of New Mexico by the United States. Peter Stockett leaves his native Philadelphia on an apparent wild goose chase to find his brother Louis who had left for the then mysterious Southwest 15 years before. After considerable hardship, Peter arrives at Fort Leavenworth and is sent to Santa Fe as a special United States agent by Col. Kearnv to contact Armijo, the despotic governor of Santa Fe He also is under the impression that if his brother is alive the logical place to look is Santa Fe. While on the trail, Peter's help saves the life of Felipe, a young Italian, whose friendship is instrumental later in getting Peter out of several tight places. Peter finally finds his brother, but too late, by accidentally attending a meeting of the Penitentes. This is an especially well-written story with a slight love interest. The action sometimes seems to drag but the plot sustains the reader to the finish ana - is ended almost too soon.. (By. Dorothy. Ritij).

Entered ns Serond-Clane Matter at PostofHce. Indianapolis. Ind.

Gen. Johnson Says—

Times Books

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Rodney Dutcher