Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 19 February 1937 — Page 19

agabond

FROM INDIANA

ERNIE PYLE

WASHINGTON, Feb. 19.—Last summer [I wrote a column from Seattle, quotIng some paragraphs from the letters 1 get. A good many people said they liked it. So here is another. J. H. Seap of Akron writes: “I have read your Arizona snake story, and here's one you may use if you wish, “Back in the early Nineties a man named Oliver

Flyn was driving a team and wagon along a dusty country road near Hancock, O.

“Flyn saw a cloud of dust rising ! ahead of him, and supposed it was |

another team coming. But as the

dust got closer, he saw a large hoop |

snake rolling up the center of the road. “When the snake got right in front of the team, it uncoiled, struck the end of the wagon tongue, and stuck there.

“Flyn unhitched the team, un- |

coupled the wagon tongue and laid it beside the road, with the snake still sticking to the pole. “Then he took his aX, cut down a fashioned a new wagon tongue, put it in and drove on home. “Next morning he hitched up to a mud sled, and

Mr Pyle

dro e back to where he had left the wagon tongue. |

When he arrived, he saw the pole had turned into a log eight feet thick. The poison from the shake had swollen the pole into a huge log. “Flvn got some other farmers with teams, rolled the log onto the mud sled, hauled it home, sawed it up. and had enough wood to burn all the next winter.” I have written Mr, Seap that I consider his story

a lie. = » =

Life Saver Wriles KE PROEBSTAL, the man in Arizona who is an . expert at saving people who are near death from

thirst on the desert (I wrote a column about him), |

writes:

“Shortly after you were here, letters began to ar- |

rive from realtors, patent-medicine men, health

seekers, show men, an old friend lost track of for 30 |

years, one wishing to find an engagement for a 16piece orchestra and four entertainers, an author wanting to write a history of my travels and adventures. another to write articles with the title ‘As Told to Him by Ike Proebstal’ And still they come by every mail. “Rut what is most strange, T have never seen the article vou wrote, so I'm wondering if you would send me one? “I have decided to decline all the flattering offers to pose as a second Death Valley Scotty, but I assure vou if you should ever pass this way again I would be pleased to give you all my experiences at home and

abroad.” un n

Hears From Cyclist AST August I overtook a man riding a

wheeled cvele on the gravel road 20 miles west of Moose Jaw, Canada.

and a better climate. : I have often wondered if he got there. posted in Vancouver, told me:

“It sure was a rough trip, and you can bet I am |

plad to be out here and alive after a four months’ trip. Never again a trip like that. Vancouver is sure the roads was bad. Now everytime I see someone on a bicycle and have trouble on the snow in Vancouver I get sick that I remember all what I pass over?

| “If vou can spare one or two pictures I'd be very

olad. I save everything, etter picture and article in the newspaper. “I do not work vet. I still hope some days.

Mrs.Roosevelt'sDay

By ELEANOR ROOSEVELT

THACA, N. Y. Thursday.—Arriving in the late afternoon I was able to go to the alumni banquet yesterday evening with Miss Flora Rose. I anticipated hearing the glee club sing with pleasure, for I think the glee club here is particularly good, but I rather imagined the rest of the evening would be a succession of speeches much like every other public dinner, We had a pleasant surprise, however, when Sydney Landon, professor of dramatics at Ithaca College, gave us what he called two sketches of literary men. He made himself up while talking to us about the character of the man he was about to portray. For one minute he turned his back, put on a wig and the last touches of his makeup, still talking, and then turned around and addressed us in character. He actually looked and spoke like Rudyard Kipling and Mark Twain. He had seen and met them both and was able to give a very realistic performance. We breakfasted at 8 this morning with the same group of men and women who so kindly come and

sapling and |

three- | His name was J. A. Fontaine, | he was a war-crippled French-Canadian, and he was | riding from Montreal to Vancouver in search of work |

This letter, |

“I wish I could write, for a story from Montreal to |

The Indianapolis Times

Second Section

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1937

Entered as Second-Class Matter Indianapolis,

at Fostoffice,

PAGE 19

Ind.

‘The

Marshall Set Up Court As Final Authority.

(Second of a series on the history of the Supreme Court.)

By WESTON BARCLAY

Times Special Writer

HIEF JUSTICE JOHN MARSHALL and his associate justices decided one day that they had been drinking too much. They determined to restrict their imbibing to days when it rained. There ensued a dry spell. Justice Marshall became so irked that he waved his long arm in a wide sweep

and said: “Gentlemen, we have jurisdiction. over all the United States, and under the rule of probabilities it is proper for us to hold that it is raining somewhere. I propose that we have a drink.” That anecdote probably isn’t true—it is so hard to find any unquestioned truth in history—but it fits Justice Marshall's character like a glove. He was not at all like Charles Evans Hughes. He was convivial, almost to excess, sloppy in dress and careless of the details of his work.

n ” 2 E handed down a decision in 1803 that affected the course of American history as has no case before or since, the decision in Marbury vs. Madison, in which he and his colleagues ruled that the Supreme Court had the power to declare an act of Congress unconstitutional. Marbury vs. Madison appears in all the textbooks, but few tell the voung readers that the case came into being through Marshall's carelessness when he was Secretary of State. Marshall held that office during the latter part of the administration of John Adams. When Thomas Jefferson, radical Republican, was elected to succeed Adams, the Federalists decided to pack the government service with their friends before Jefferson was sworn in. Among the appointments made bv Adams for that purpose were those of 42 men to be justices of the peace of the District of Columbia. The commissions were signed, sealed and given to Marshall to deliver. He forgot to do it. He often forgot such things. After Jefferson was sworn in he instructed his Secretary of State, James Madison, not to deliver 17 of the commissions. Most appointees didn’t care, because the office was trifling. William Marbury was anxious enough to be a Justice of the Peace to go to law about it. He sued in the Supreme Court for a writ of mandamus. n ” ”

ONSTITUTIONALITY was never mentioned in the argument. But Marshall was determined to find a case in which

—Acme Photo.

The new $10,000,000 home of {he Supreme Court.

he could assert the power of the Court over Congress. He was deeply of the conviction that Jefferson was a dangerous radical who was likely to persuade Congress to ignore the Constitution. The Court had not asserted its authority earlier, although the issue of constitutionality had been raised in several cases. It was not to do so again in all the 32 years Marshall sat on the bench after 1803. If it had not been for the Marbury-Madison decision the power to declare acts of Congress unconstitutional—if it existed—might have been allowed to atrophy, just as the power to bear arms, expressly granted to the people in the Constitution, has atrophied. Marshall's opinion was long. It went into the merits of the case and reached the conclusion that Marbury was entitled to his mandamus if—an enormous if— the Supreme Court had the power to grant such a mandamus.

COURL therefore, rules-

ne a

John Jay, first Chief Justice of

the Supreme Court.

No lawyer in the case had raised this question. Marshall had devised it to bring in the issue of constitutionality. He pointed out that the Supreme Court obtained its power to sit as a court of original jurisdiction in certain mandamus actions from a judiciary act passed by Congress. But did Congress have the authority, asked Marshall, to give such power?

” ” ” E pointed out that the powers of the Supreme Court were limited in the Constitution and

ORIGINAL ‘BOY WHO MADE GOOD’ OWNED EGYPT'S OLDEST HORSE

| By Science Service

ous to assume that it was Senmut’s

“famous character” come to |

The Egyptologists found the horse

other corners formed a girth.

forced.

| The underside of the saddle was rein-

Oliver Elsworth, second Chief Justice of the Supreme Court

said that Congress could not increase them in violation of the Constitution. Therefore, he said, the judiciary act was unconstitutional; the Supreme Court had no power as a court of original jurisdiction in this mandamus action and Mr. Marbury couldn't get his job as Justice of the Peace, Marshall was undeniably a lawver of amazing talent. His argument upholding the right of the Supreme Court to declare an act of Congress unconstitutional had a brilliance and clarity rare in court decisions. “The powers of the Legislature are defined and limited,” he said, “and that these limits may not be

Inset (above), John Marshall, whose decision took unto the Supreme Court the power to declare

legislation unconstitutional.

| kind, which had the perspicacity to

{ n Led to Snobbishness

by those intended to be restrained? “The distinction between a government with limited and unlimited powers is abolished if those limits do not confine the persons upon whom they are imposed. “The Constitution is either a superior paramount law, unchangeable by ordinary means, or it is on a level with ordinary legislative acts, and like other acts is alterable when the Legislature shall please to alter it. If the Jormer part of the alternative be true, then a legislative act contrary to the Constitution is not law; if the latter part be true, then constitutions are absurd attempts on the part of the people to limit a power in its nature illimitable.” on ” = ARSHALL pointed out in his decision that the Constitution provided that no bill of attainder should be passed and asked if the courts must condemn to death a man against whom such a bill had been voted by Congress. When Madison read the Mar-bury-Madison decision, with the concurrence of his Federalist colleagues, the indignation of the Jeffersonian radicals was boundless. Jefferson damned the decision to the day of his death, saying that “to consider judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitution-

Our Town

By ANTON SCHERRER

CAN'T recall that we had many snobs around here when I was a little boy. Cer tainly not enough to worry about. As a mate ter of fact, it didn’t occur to us to worry about snobs until sometime in the Nineties

when they became powerful enough to represent a state of society. They turned up, I remember, just about the time celluloid collars did, along with detachable cufis, pug dogs, and 10-cent cigars. We got rid of celluloid collars and returned to nickel cigars, but for some reason, the snobs stayed with us. From the way things look they're here for good. As you probably know without my telling you, Indianapolis today has three kinds of snobs. At least that, because anybody who gets around the way I do knows that we have the money kind, the intellectual kind and the pedigree ppp. Scherrer pick the right ancestors. Of course, the pedigree kind is the least pernicious, Indeed, I sometimes think the pedigree snob does me a good turn because, without his telling me, I should never have suspected the kind of blood coursing through his veins. Sometimes the money type and the pedigree type are combined in one person. This is pretty bad, of course, but it’s nothing compared to the snob who rep= resents all three types. Look out for him. There's no telling what he’s up to and the sooner something is done about him, the better it will be for a lot of things around here—like cabbage and corn muffins, for instance, which are just about ready to pass out of the picture because of this particular kind of snob’s predilection for broccoli and crumpets. on o

Money Kind First

NDIANAPOLIS didn't always have the tiree kinds of snobs because I distinctly recall that snobbishness around here started with the mongy kind. If one should venture so daring an effort as a cone densed statement of the forces that brought about the Nineties, which in turn produced the first snobs, one would have to say, I think, that many of them had to do with money. At any rate, it was in the Nineties that I first heard of men “making money” as if it had the Importance of men practicing law or medicine. The fact of the matter was, of course, that the making of money had attained the stature of a career. After that there was the devil to pay, because right away we had two classes of men, to wit: Those who were successful at making money and those who, for some reason, couldn’t inake money. Which doesn’t mean that some men didn't want to make money. Not at all, because, if my memory serves me

right, everybody was out to make money. n n

HIS led, of course, to a state of society which consisted of those who had money and those who did not. It also led to a state of snobbishness, because those who had the money could find various uses for it and brag about it, which didn’t s»% any too well with those who didn’t have anything to brag about. If the truth be told, snobbishness in the Nineties was largely a matter of braggadocio. It's a lot more refined now, which is why you have to be on your

| guard,

The most virulent form of snobbishness back in the Nineties, I remember, was the man who carried a railroad pass and bragged about it. This always struck me mighty strange because, when you come to think about it, it's the people who haven't got the money and are least likely to brag about it, who really ought to have the railroad passes. The fact remains, however, that every rich man

{ of the Nineties had a railroad pass and it wouldn't

surprise me to learn some day that it was the start of snobbishness around here.

A Woman's View By MRS. WALTER FERGUSON

RE you old enough to remember how we talked about the defense of democracy before 1917? If so, you must have noticed how similar are the phrases we hear nowadays. “The great democratic nations must stand together,” it is said, and the inference is that we shall have to hurry to some foreign shore to keep alive those principles by which Americans live. Even th: Cause

| and Cure of War Conference recently held in Chi=

cago sounded the note—a note which acts upon our emotions like the cry of the clarion bugle. Great Britain and France have men over here right now who are busy sowing the sort of seeds that

| drew us into their late catastrophe.

We love democracy; that is true. If there is 2 principle for which we are willing to fight and die it is

mistaken or forgotten ths Constitution is written. To what purpose are powers limited and to what purpose is that limitation committed to writing if these limits may at any time be passed

Court Proposal Was Double Surprise, Sullivan Declares

By MARK SULLIVAN

ASHINGTON, Feb. 19. — The surprise attending Mr. Roose- | velt's action about the Supreme Court was of a double kind. It was a surprise in the sense that Mr. Roosevelt had with great pains kept it secret until the moment he read it to the newspapermen. It was a surprise also in the sense | that nobody expected it, or anything

that which is embodied in our Declaration of Inde=pendence. The question is then: How can we best preserve it in a world torn between the opposing forces of fascism and communism? Certainly not by running over to Europe to fight for it as we did with such poor results in 1917. The only way we can protect democracy is by refusing to become involved in a war anywinere at any time except to repel attack. Maude Royden, the great Englishwoman who is now our guest, tells American audiences in plain words not to participate in a new European war, should it break out. She even says that things would have been better if we had stayed out of the last one. By coming in, we prolonged the fighting: we made victory more complete for the Allies and defeat more overwhelming for the Germans, thereby helping to set up the vicious Treaty of Versailles which is responsible for much of the present European turmoil. Remembering, I shrink when I hear once again those slogans about democracy. To be beguiled by them would be to betray and destroy that which we wish to cherish. We can save democracy only by keeping our little part of the earth's surface serene and peaceful. For behind the guns of war ride always the Four Horsemen, and with them march fascism, communism and

Your Health

By DR. MORRIS FISHBEIN

Editor, American Medical Assn. Journal

T should be remembered that scarlet fever antitoxin overcomes the poison which the germs develop, but, does not affect the germs themselves. It is especially useful when there is high fever and a severe eruption, Various American communities differ in their recommendations as to the length of time that scarlet fever victims should be kept at home. The recommendations vary from a minimum period of 21 days to a maximum of six weeks, the shorter period being observed in the South, where there is not a great deal of scarlet fever, and longer ones in some of the cities where scarlet fever has been especially severe. Decision as to whether the schools shall be closed during scarlet fever epidemics must, of course, he based on the extent to which closing of the schools helps or stems spread of the disease. Since infection with scarlet fever is a menace not only because of itself, but because of its associated complications, special attention must be given to pro= tecting the kidneys and heart during the time the child is sick. Every patient with scarlet fever should remain in bed for at least three weeks. The diet should be light and soft, consisting mostly of liquids, until the fever has disappeared.

A smaller box found farther along the gully was at first taken for a child's coffin. But again the Egyptologists were surprised. A pet ape! Identifying the animal as a | cynocephalus ape, the Egyptologists say: “The animal had been carefully wrapped and buried just as though it were a child, and in the coffin had

talk with us every year. The question propounded was: “Is it possible to prophesy the. agricultural future of the country, say 30 or 40 years from now?” The question is, of course, of deep interest to the College of Agriculture and the College of Home Economics, for they are training boys and girls today whose future is bound up with the agricultural fu- : a ture, not only of this state, but of many other states. | as old On its back, among the wrappings, How hard it is, however, to project oneself into | must be. then. a 15th Century B c they discovered a saddle. And this the future. We are always prone to think of the |, cc and therefore the oldest | 1S believed to be the oldest saddle conditions which are with us today as being perma- | horse ever found in Egypt First vet found. It is a rectangular piece nent conditions. To have a vision or a dream one |. .cec were brought to Egypt by of linen and leather, with a projec- | been placed a saucer of raisins. Its must be able to guess at what changing conditions |:)o Hvksos about 1700 B. C.. but no tion toward the rear. Tapes at the owner, whether Senmut or another, may bring and prepare for them. remains of those early steeds have front end were tied around the horse's | had evidently heen very fond of his I am wondering if our changes will be entirely ' I neck, and two longer tapes at the !pet monkey.

. : | yet come to light. economic or will be greater along mental and spiri- And if the beast belonged to the tual lines.

| famous Senmut, whose parents were New Books

buried in the hillside, why, then, PUBLIC LIBRARY PRESENTS—

| that would give the horse added prestige. For Senmut stands out in history as a classic example of the | self-made man. Over 3000 years be- | fore Horatio Alger’'s heroes began et " » rs ki HE reader in whom the spread of fascism and ED he So io Re communism has awakened a question in regard to the future of America, will find a necessary bolstering of the spirit in Gilbert Seldes’ MAINLAND (Scribner) To explain his meaning of America the author divides his book into four sections. The first part is an attack on the intellectuals who have con-

| ing how the trick could be done. demned the excellence of life in America, and have

al questions would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy.”

NEXT—Skullduggery in Congress gives to corporations the protection intended for Negroes.

light in Egypt in Senmut’s horse. | wrapped up in linen just as though When Egyptologists, digging in 2 | jt were a human being. They could ravine at Thebes, found a huge cof- | find no signs, though, that it had fin and lifted the lid, they were been put through any mummifying frankly surprised. A horse! process.

statutes effective, passed the Ashurst-Summers Act. This statute forbade shipment of convict-made goods into any state which outlaws such goods.

1

”

u ” HE decision upholding the Ashurst-Summers act seemed to break the jam caused by the | Court's invalidation of NRA and other New Deal legislation. It seemed to ease the tension between the President and the Supreme Court. The way opened by the AshurstSummers decision consists of a combination of state and Federal legislation; it conforms to what Mr. Roosevelt himself suggested in his Jan. 6 message to Congress, “Federal laws supplementing state laws.” Any state that wants to can, and probably all would, pass statutes forbidding the manufacture or sale of goods made by child labor or made with labor receiving less than a minimum wage, or made under

|

" i U ia th o Science Service Photo. op: Excavation scene in the ravine at Thebe bones of Egypt's oldest horse have just been found by Where Ste The giant coffin housed the favored steed of famed Senmut whose life antedated the heroes of Horatio Alger by several thousand years. Below: The bones of Senmut's horse after the coffin was opened and the wrapping removed, . 3 . 2

te | like it. On the contrary, nearly ENMUT joined the political band every well-informed person expected, wagon following the royal lady so to speak, the absence of any senHatshepsut, who had an eye on the sational step by the President. throne of Egypt. Everybody supposed the President thus “left it helpless before the impact of hostile Hatshepsut seized the throne had turned his face in the direction European systems.” from her stepson, nephew, son-in-| KE : be J of calm and healing. The author continues his analysis of America in | law combined-—the usual confusion OR 3 . yn °% X. 3 Bi yu.» the section entitled “The Event,” which is a state- | of Egyptian royal relationships— ; Sh ty 8 § : Po : HY Mr. Roosevelt should have ment of the formation of a solid America out of | and made herself not merely queen, | g eo. # v RR . blasted this atmosphere of isolated and hostile parts. The third section of the | put king, with false beard and full ] oR eB 3 3 uiet with one of the most sensabook is a declaration of the author's belief that only | kingly honors. And Senmut, Who i Bh ns ; Bd |S and provocative actions in demceracy can defeat fascism in America, that | had kept right along with her, be- AV. ‘ 0 TE | po loan history is a question, of communism will fail in the attempt. The fourth part | came the favorite of the world’s Gi SER AF which the answer lies in the myssets forth his conception of the three fundamental | first great queen in history. teries of human personality. requirements for the average American citizen. The Egyptian expedition of the The general expectation of seren= There can be no doubt after reading this book | Metropolitan Museum of Art has ity was confirmed when the Su-|other disapproved conditions. These that Gilbert Seldes loves his country, even though he | unearthed Senmut’s horse, along preme Court on Jan. 4 handed down |local laws will, of course, protect the feels that something should be done about it. with much other evidence dbout a decision in which the Court states against the making of such yy 8&8 = high, t of the latest discov seemed to accommodate itself to|goods, or the violation of Such por - i . i TS. N artist-husband and his author-wife, with two eri Ae Lansing and Wil- Me, Boosevels, seem Se standards, wishin er own borders months of leisure, $300, and a 1929 Ford, set |)iam C. Hayes of the expedition ac- HN toward him. This decision HEREAFTER, Congress can out to explore an island they had noticed by chance | count for the horse receiving spe- | Sede it, possible for Mr. Roosevelt's pass a law, analogous to the while studying a map of the United States. SOUTH | ciai burial: | obj ectives to be attained without | Ashurst-Summers one—a law forTO PADRE (Lothrop) is a chatty account of the “The horse was, in the time of | necessity of constitutional amend- | bidding the shipment of goods made experiences that befell Dorothy and Nils Hogner. Senmut, a recent importation from | ment or of any change in the Court | under disapproved conditions into Padre is a long, slender, uninhabited island lo- | Asia into Egypt, and it is natural | or curb of it. y any state that outlaws such goods. cated on the east coast of Texas close to the Mexican | that anyone who owned a horse “The Jan. 4 decision of the Su-|By this Federal law the state would border. Infested by mosquitoes and sanderabs, it is | would have prized an animal so | preme Court in the convict-made- |be protected against disapproved accessible only by an old-time ferry. The Hogners | spirited as compared with the lowly | Die ds case. was immediately recog- | goods coming in from other states. made a short trip into Mexico, where they were highly | donkey, which up to that time had Pied by lawyers and students as|By its own local statute it would be amused by pigs wallowing mm the middle of the [been the only animal of the sort having far-reaching importance. | protected against the making of streets, and not so much amused by the cock and (in Egypt. Several states had passed statutes|such goods within its borders. By It is especially important to avoid exposure of the bull fights. forbidding the sale within their |the combination of the two, the | patient to cold. Bathing preferably should be done When their vacation ended, the campers were borders of goods made by convict | Federal law supp ting the state | in bed by spon ing wi lukewarm water, The paback home in New York, with 6500 miles behind labor. Thereafter Congress, in or- | one, the § a ted | tient’s skin sh id | d to aid peeling them and $20 in cash, * der to aid the states in m ch | completel Galati and to,

” ” " T any rate, it is not much of an assumption to consider this a pet horse, nor much more bazrd-