Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 29 April 1937 — Page 18

pacms The Indianapolis Times

(A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER)

ROY W. HOWARD LUDWELL DENNY MARK FERREE President Editor Business Manager

Price in Marion County, 3 cents a copy; delivered by carrier, 12 cents a week.

Owned and published daily (except Sunday) by The Indianapolis Times Publishing Co. 214 ‘W. Maryland St. Mail subscription rates in Indiana, $3 a year; outside of Indiana, 65 cents a month.

Member of United Press, Scripps =Howard NewsPaper Alliance, NEA Service, and Audit Bu-

reau of Circulations. RlIley 5551

Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way

THURSDAY, APRIL 29, 1937

NOT NEUTRALITY HE purpose of neutrality legislation is to serve notice on foreign countries that we will have nothing to do with their wars and to lay down in advance the course we will follow in treating all belligerents alike. In some respects the measure to which Congress today is asked to give final approval does this. A proclamation by the President that a state of war exists abroad automatically puts into effect impartial laws which: (1) Prohibit arming of American merchant ships engaged in trade with belligerents; (2) Prohibit travel by American citizens on belligerents’ vessels; (2) Prohibit shipment of arms, ammunition and implements of war to belligerents; (4) Prohibit use of American ports by belligerents’ vessels as a base of supplies, and (5) Prohibit the floating of loans for belligerents in this country. But in other respects, the measure does just the opposite. It gives the President power to issue a second proclamation at his discretion putting into effect another law— the so-called cash-and-carry law, under which belligerents wanting American goods must come and get them, pay for them at the dock, and carry them away in their own vessels. : A cash-and-carry law announced in advance we believe

would be a sound neutrality policy. But giving the Presi-

dent the discretionary power to decide whether and when

to proclaim such a law after war has begun is to make it

impossible for the President to be neutral. Mr. Roosevelt, of course, wants that discretionary authority. He doubtless thinks he I wield it wisely. But Congress might do well to consider whether it is the course of wisdom to give Mr. Roosevelt or any other President such extraordinary authority. The|danger lies not in what might be a President’s intentions, but in the fact that the President must make his decision [after hostilities start— and thereby must take sides. : 2 " : NE side would be sure to have the advantage if his decision were to put trade on a cash-and-carry basis at once. The other side would gain if the proclamation were postponed one or two or three or six months, or never issued. And whichever side suffered more by the President’s discretionary course would consider it an unneutral act. Another provision gives the President authority to forbid or permit the collection of funds, clothing and medi-

2 tod =n #

.. cal supplies for the sufferers in nations at war or en-

gaged in civil war. Here is a perfect example of the un-

- neutrality of launching a policy “after the fact.”

So slight are our chances of keeping out of any im-

portant war that it conceivably might be wise to give Mr. | Roosevelt or any other President the power to shift our |

Government's influence to whichever side he chooses. Existence of such unusual authority might possibly operate to prevent wars from starting and to bring peace quicker. » But—such a policy is not neutrality. And if it is neutrality Congress wants, those and other such discretionary provisions should be stricken from the measure. Failing that, candor should compel Congress to take the neutral label off the bill and give it a title something like this: “A bill to give the President extraordinary power to entangle the United States in the quarrels of belligerents abroad, without consulting Congress or the people.”

CHANGE THAT TAX BILL

EVER was there a more striking example of governmental spiral thinking than the Surplus Tax Bill, as that measure reiated to the problem of unemployment. At the very time the complex proposition was being put through Congress under the urge of one Federal department, another department was stressing the plea that relief costs could be reduced only as private industry absorbed the unemployed. That the bill would act as a brake on industry was then predicted. It has. Thus government has round-booked itself, as they say at the races. Taxes received are a way under estimates. And concrete examples of retarded industry continue to multiply. : Now a move is on to amend. And it is said to have the approval of the highest of the nation’s tax experts, in the Treasury Department and Congress. Whether by amendments the haphazardly concocted contraption can be simplified and made to work is yet to be proved. But one thing is certain, the tinkering should start—now. It should not wait for another bum’s rush such as characterized the last two tax sessions, nor should this Congress be allowed to die until something very definite is done. : For the relief problem is still with us. It still can be solved only by absorption of the unemployed into private industry—and only as industry's volume grows will tax weceipts grow. So, patently, it’s no time for letting the brakes continue to drag.

THE TWO CUPIDS BOTH Mussolini and Hitler have decided they need more babies to grow up and die for their fatherland’s glory. But each in his Cupid’s role has his own technique. Cupid Benito is setting up a system of bonuses and tax-exemptions for those who beget many bambini, and of punishments for bachelors and married slackers. Cupid Adolf will use the subtler method of education. He expects many weddings and many kinder from his new Reich marriage bureaus and his school for marriage bureau managers. The managers will bring lonely men and women together, instruct them in love-making, urge them on to the German goal of “the normal five-child family.” “Some Cupids kill with arrows, some with traps,” quoth Shakespeare. Maybe II Duce shoots love into his victims because of his Latin realism and Der Fuehrer coaxes them out of German sentimentalism. : Maybe the difference is due to the fact that Mussolini is a married man and Hitler a bachelor. Bachelors are likely to be softies about such things.

Nv |

{

Fine Opening for a Bright

n EE WHO WANTS

To ENGAGE (NTHE yFACTURE OF VIRGIN FALE IN THIS

(OUNTRY MAY DO SO.

THE" INDIANA! OLIS ‘TIMES 2S a Young Man—By Kirby

os ik

Fair Enough

By Westbrook Pegler

N. Y. Legislature Still Looking for $20,000,000 While Bookmakers Walk Off With About $45,000,000.

EW YORK, April 29.—The New York Legislature is still fumbling in the citizens’ clothes for $20,000,000 with which to balance the million-dollar-a-day State budget. But up to this writing legislators have not found it advisable to interfere with the bookmaking industry, which is a politico-sporting racket. The bookmaking racket is a political concession to a few professional gamblers with strong political connections, | and it handles upward of 300 million dollars a year, of which the gamblers retain at least 45 million for expenses and profit. The expenses are not to be estimated without access to the most intimate account books of the gamblers, but it is reasonable to assume that they are largely, political expenses, because no group can expect to obtain an exclusive state concession in a $300,000,000 yearly business just for love. The gambling concession belongs to the State itself, and, if the pari-mutuel machines were adopted, 1t probably would yield more than enough to cover the $20,000,000 deficit. The protection of the gambling racket by the New York Legislature is a little more raw than most such jobs, because it is maintained at a time when the statesmen are pretending to be very sorry, indeed, about the necessity to lift $20,000,000 off the people. There are now 23 states which have legal racing and 21 of them have legalized mutuels, while New York is the only one that forbids the mutuels by law. Most states take a percentage of every dollar wagered through the machines, and many of them also collect the breakage or nickel-and-penny money.

" n 8

n Maryland the mutuel tax is only 1 per cent, ‘hut the tracks pay a license fee of $6000 a day, and there is a further yield from a net revenue tax. Ohio, with a comparatively small gambling industry collects from 10 per cent to 30 per cent of the money wagered through the machines, raising the percentage gs the volume of business rises. But ew York, with the greatest volume of gambling in -the country, did not receive a dime last year from this source. All New York collected was $487,000, and this was picked up in the form of a tax on gate receipts. The New York Legislature has now legalized dog racing, which is a notorious racket operated by the same types and many of the same individuals who operate the slot machines. Unlike the horse tracks of the State, however, the dog tracks will be permitted to operate a racket known as the phoney mutuels, but without either supervision or tax.

Mr. Pegler

» 8 2

HE State Legislature doesn’t explain its conduct: in these matters. It does not have to explain yet, because nobody was paying much attention to the Legislature what with the Supreme Court disturbance, the sit-down strikes and one thing and another. But it was only within the last week that the public began to hear about the tax potentialities of the legalized rackets of the horse and dog tracks, and the victims doubtless will have something to say to the statesmen when they realize that the $20,000,000 . deficit might have been met by withdrawing the racket’s exclusive gambling concession which is actually the property of the taxpayers. Incidentally, the same Legislature has also neglected to pass a law recommended by the Govtrnor to apply the state income tax to its own salaries and several hundred other tax-exempt public salaries ranging between $18,000 and $28,000 a year.

. : . : The Hoosier Forum I wholly disagree with what you say, but at defend to the death your right to say it.—Voltaire.

CHARGES UNFAIRNESS IN . POLICE EXAMINATIONS

By Roscoe Bredell, Deputy Sheriff and Candidate in Two Past Police Schools

Mayor Kern's police school is conducted three nights a week for a period of about six weeks. The past two schools were conducted by Capt. Petit and Sergt. Canterbury of the city force. : During the school, no members of the Merit Board attended one session, nor did the Chief of Police. That leaves only the two men qualified to select the successful and deserving candidates — Petit and Canterbury. But the joker is that they haven't the slightest consideration in the naming of new police officers, nor are they admitted to the meeting of the Merit Board when the Board chooses successful candidates. The first school was composed of two sections with 30 candidates each, of which six men were chosen out of each section. The last school was made up of 60 candidates, from which 12 officers were named.

Take Written Exams

This is the point where the unsuspecting public is being hoodwinked into believing the system is

one knows that the police school is a good thing that tends to build a more reliable and efficient police force. However, it enters as only a fifth of the grade for the actual appointment, while the public is led to believe that it amounts to about 90 per cent. After the course is completed students take a written examination from an Ihdiana University professor and it is on this that school work is graded. Next, one goes before the Merit Board. . . . Each of these examiners gives the man a grade against 100 per cent. Thus far it is possible to have a grade of 400 accumulated from test papers of Dr. DeArmond, Dr. Pfaff and Mr. Allen. Now comes the last hundred (last mile for some) and the most mysterious one. That comes from the infallible Chief Michael Morrissey. Though he never attends a class and doesn’t see the examinations before the rest of the Board, he has some strange intuition which helps him select the capable candidates. He can have a man removed from consideration simply by saying he could not make a good police officer. ‘Gave Me a Cheer?’

On investigation, they found that I am a Deputy Sheriff for Otto Ray, our good and efficient Sheriff, and know that on account of the brotherly love Mike has for Otto he gave a big cheer for me to the rest of the Merit Board and told them how: much he needed me. Before I went to the schools and while endeavoring to become a candidate I went to Joseph Tynan, the Mayor’s secretary, for aid. This public servant informed me in no uncertain terms that they would take me only on the recommendation of the ward chairman. . . .- In the first school I ranked 13th and in the last school I ranked

General Hugh Johnson Says —

There Seems to Be an Incipient Mutiny Against President in Washington, and-Jt Is Mindful of Wolf Pack Turning on Leader.

AJ ASHINGTON, April 29.—In the Mowgli stories of the Jungle Books, Mr. Kipling very vividly showed how a wolf pack turned on its leader and ripped him to pieces at the very first hint that he was no longer a match for any of them—no matter to what well-being his leadership had taken them. There is something savoring of this in the air of Washington and, so far as the press reveals, elsewhere in the country. The unrestraint, if not downright viciousness, of some of the debate on the Couft plan, the untempered charges of bad faith and double pur-

pose hurled straight at the White House, both on the.

air and in the press, and the talk of blocs and cabals on particular legislative proposals—some of the authors of these screeds would have hardly dared to utter them last fall—not for fear of administrative reprisal, but for fear of popular resentment, Is their greater boldness now a sign that they diagnose public opinion to a different conclusion today It is an intangible, very difficult measure. The last election proved that you can’t gauge it by the intensity of the anti-Roosevelt press. You can get some indication of it by the behavior of crowds at speeches and open forums if you are sure the crowd 1s well mixed, but there has been no sufficient oppor-

getting into a tight place.

| less of qualifications.

a grand and glorious thing. Every- ;

THINK part of this incipient mutiny arises from the undeniable fact that the Administration is

~ (Times readers are invited to express. their views in these columns, religious controversies excluded. Make your letter short, so all can have a chance. Letters must be signed, but names will be withheld on request.)

14th. When I asked Mr. Schlensker, secretary to the Chief of Police, for my grade in the last school he informed me that the grades would not be shown ‘to anybody because that would indicate where the student had failed and he might go and harangue the Board member giving the grade. ’ All the police school and the Merit System amount to under such a setup is to take the heat .off the Mayor and his associates for any appointment made and allow them to put in whom they want, regardTheir answer to the unsuccessful, no matter how deserving he is, is “We would have liked to have you on the force, but better luck next time.”

8 ® 2

SUGGESTS METHOD TO VETO COURT RULINGS By J. E. Burton The Constitution provides that “The Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction both as to law and fact with such exceptions and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.” The written decision rendered by

the Court should be the complete judgment of the Court and not just the various opinions of individual justices. T Seemingly, they have lost sight of the fact that they are members of one body and are sitting as one court. Thus, they provide divided thought not even contemplated by the founders of the American system of jurisprudence. : To correct this, Congress may make exceptions and regulations pertaining to the Court. There is no need of amendment.

THESE MEN!

By VIRGINIA POTTER

They build you up, Then tear you down, With flowers, dates and candy. They take you here, And take you there, Sometimes, they're fine and dandy.

Then when you think

You're on their line,

How different they will act— They never know Just what they want, You all know it’s a fact!

DAILY THOUGHT

For we must needs die, and are as water spilt: on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again; neither doth God respect any person: yet doth he devise means, that his banished be not expelled from him. —II Samuel 14:14.

EATH is the golden key that opens the palace of eternity. — Milton.

The need is for Congress to enact a law that: ; When the validity of any legislation is questioned it. is the duty of the court attacking it to notify the Attorney General, who must immediately proceed to the defense

peal. The action should take precedence in all courts including the Supreme Court; Should the final decision be an adverse one it must be the duty of

correction and how such correction can be made. Then it must be immediately considered by the house of Congress where the act originated and then the other house. It it receives a two-thirds

of the President, the law must then be the law of the land, regardless of all decisions to the contrary. The law under attack should remain in effect until otherwise decided on, with all accruements thereunder, in the case of ultimate rejection, should remain the property of the United States. This procedure would provide a needed and vital method to veto the decisions of the Supreme Court. The regulations should include changes for a reduction, if not the entire elimination, of the fee system. Now a poor man cannot get into the Federal Courts because of the high cost. The poor man must let his case go to the dogs. There is justice for the rich man only, . o ” 2 DEMANDS DEMOCRATS OPPOSE COURT PLAN By E. F. Maddox An open letter to the Democrats in Congress who haven’t the nerve to stand up for their own convictions: You were sent to Congress to preserve, protect and defend the | Constitution; to legislate for the welfare of the American people, and to represent to the best of your ability the best interests of your fellow citizens. : You were not elected as yes men to fall in line with every radical scheme which some visionary might propose, but you were charged with the duty of guarding our liberties, lest some ill-advised legislation lay the foundation for a future despot to subject the nation to absolute tyranny. Now you are. face to face with an issue as great as any of those which held. the old continentals firm in the face of the British regulars at Bunker Hill. You are face to face with an issue as great as any for which redblooded Americans have given their last full measure of devotion. Are you too subservient, too fearfu. eof losing your political job, to vote against the court reform bill when you know it is against all sound principles of democratic government? . If you can’t vote to preserve democracy, you have no right to pass laws to compel your fellow citizen to fight and die for it.

in that and ali other courts of ap- |

the Court to state wherein lies the |.

vote of Congress and the approval.

lt Seems to Me

By Heywood Broun

Writer Gets Watchdog That Combines Promise of Protection Against Both Blaze and Burglar,

STAMFORD,’ Conn., April 29.—The lights

blew out again last night, but now we have a watchdog. The man who is going to try to turn the swamp into a swimming hole threw in the.dog without extra charge. It seems that Henry's mother was a Dalmatian and his father a police dog. When I heard this I grew very much excited, because the only Dalmatians I have ever seen lived in fire houses and bit : the heels of the gray horses as they drew the engine in response to an alarm. - And so here combined in a sin= gle dog lies the promise of protection against both blaze and burglar. It was my original intention to christen him City Service, but that is too long a name, and so naturally I thought of Doherty, This has since been shortened to Henry. As yet Henry needs to be housebroken, and perhaps it will be necessary to do some more fundamental education in order to teach him to bark at cops instead of pickets. Fortunately Henry is still at a formative age, and I have every hope that we will be able to class-angle him. : It looks as though my present rest cure may keep me out of New York for some time. But a commentator gets a chance to polish up his perspective when he looks at the world ftom Hunting Ridge rather than 42d St. Still, even at this distance the state of world affairs seems less than likable, Although somewhat dented by the last election, there still remaians the American adage “As Maine goes so goes the nation.” If that is true, the fight against Fascist tendencies must be redoubled, for the State of Maine seems to have made complete surrender to a legal lawlessness, and we find a Federal judge using the injunction weapon to the very extremity of forbidding a labor union to feed its starving strikers,

Mr. Broun

8 » 8

N isolated spots, of ccurse, progress may be observed. After more than half a century the Union League Club has permitted a woman speaker to darken its doors, or perhaps it might be mora gracious to say “enlighten its portals,” since the first feminine orator was Miss Dorothy Thompson.

In addition to being a pioneer among the window

sitters, Miss Thompson deserves a special supereroga=tion ‘award for her exquisite tact in denouncing the doctrine of Karl Marx to the Union -Leaguers and boldly stating that she herself was no radical but a believer in the capitalist system. Had she spoken otherwise, the more fiery members of the club might have torn the red carpets inte banners and marched up Park Ave. in a frenzy which would have left no property holder safe in his bed at night. Still, she did a revolutionary thing by bringing to a successful conclusion the longest sit-down strike in American annals. She took her courage in both hands and roundly declared for “capitalist produce tion.” # a.» AM told that when Dorothy Thompson came out in favor of “the profit motive” the members of the ancient order were thrilled to their toes in a manner which has not happened to any one of them since the second election of Gen. Grant. One particular colonel rose from an armchair which he had not quit for 40 years. Indeed, this solved one of the club's most perplexing problems. For more than 20 years a lively debate has continued in the game room of the Union League Club as to whether the ‘colénel slept or had been stuffed privately by some previous board of governors. But distinctly his fellows saw him rise to his feet and give three feeble cheers for Benjamin Harrison and Dorothy Thompson before he tottered back to his chair again. -

The Washington Merry-Go-Round

Lobbying Is Strong as Ever on Capitol Hill Despite Lack of Publicity;

Sugar Refiners' and Radio Broadcasters’ Groups Are Particularly Active,

By Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen

ASHINGTON, April 29.—Not much appears in the headlines about it, but the old art of lobby-

tunity for that.

The court fight started it. Smack on top of that came the failure of revenue, resulting in a distinct wavering of Federal credit and the certainty of another staggering deficit. If that were not enough, then came the political necessity to demand a bulk of 1500 million dollars relief appropriation in the face of the figures from all sources showing an astonishing re-employment by all industry. " " ” t A these lugubrious events threw into higher relief than ever the incredible omission to count the unemployed, luridly illuminated by Senator Vandenberg’s ‘charge of gross overestimation and an unspoken charge that unemployment is being deliberately exaggerated to excuse wholly unnecessary sbending In a tax-strangled country. It is a real interior crisis and it seems to be raisIng a crop of real interior revolt in- many quarters. There is the beginning of what looks like a veritable senatorial sit-down strike on Administration proposals and in the midst of it the President departs for a needed vacation—probably the wisest thing to do. Freeze, freeze thou bitter sky, thou dost not bite 50 nigh as benefits forgot.” t

ing is as strong as ever on Capitol Hill. One of the most active is the sugar lobby. The big refiners have rented a ritzy house at 1917 23d St. Here dwell Ellsworth Bunker, lobbyist for the refiners, and Jack Dalton, once head of the AAA Sugar Section, but now doing valiant battle for the refiners. The 'sugar refiners claim that they now have in their pocket more than 100 Congressmen and a majority in the Senate who will vote their way when it comes to dividing up sugar quotas in the new sugar bill. Another energetic lobby is that of the big radio broadcasters who are worried sick over the tax proposed by - Federal Communications Commissioner Payne on the kilowatt strength of their stations. 8 89.» NE of the most outspoken Senate supporters of the President's judiciary reform is Theodore F. Green, a close friend of Chief Justice Hughes. They have been brought together through their mutual interest in Brown University, where both are members of the Board of Fellows. In recent years when Hughes returns to Brown for alumni reunions or for meetings of the board, he wa oo Bd 7

often visits his friend Green. And ever since Green has been in Washington—at 70 he is a freshman

Senator—he has often called at the home of friend

Charles, aged 75.

» on 8 A FTER four years of repeated promises by Presi dent Roosevelt, a low-cost housing bill in some form will probably be enacted this session. But if it does, no thanks will be due to Rep. Henry Steagall, The Alabaman is chairman of the House Banking Committee, which for some unexplained reason was given jurisdiction over housing legislation. Solely be cause of his strategic position, Steagall was made co author of the Wagner bill, thus taking recognition away from a younger colleague who really merited it—Rep. Henry Ellenbogen of Pittsburgh. : Ellenbogen offered a housing measure as early as 1935, and worked closely with Senator Bob Wagner

in the drafting of his bill—which now bears Steagall’s name.

Yet, despite the Democratic platform’s specifi °

pledge for a low-cost housing program, despite Ade ministration prodding and the fact that his name is on the legislation, Steagall has lifted not one finger to push it. He has even refused to hold hearings. : fo 84a)

_ THURSDAY, APRIL 29,1987

ARR

Bal

RA SRE EX.

ROB AA

—

SES SEL SET ER

“I