Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 24 June 1937 — Page 18

T Ie do Times

(A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER)

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Give Lnght and the People Will Fina Thetr Own Way

THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1937

THE BUTASH DECISION HE Indiana Supreme Court has thwarted a dangerous -attack_on civil liberties by reversing the conviction of Paul Butash under the State’s ism’! law. : Butash, a naturalized Hungarian, was sentenced to one to five years for a talk on economic injustices before a small group last summer at Angola, where he was selling magazines. The witnesses who testified against him admitted they arranged the meeting and induced Butash to appear so they could trap him. He began by saying he was no speech-maker, the unanimous Supreme Court opinion relates. He then made a brief talk on the “Farm-Labor” Party. There followed a series of |leading questions by the misguided patrioteers who had “framed” the meeting. The whole case, which the Supreme Court described as built upon an incident “so trivial as to be beneath the notice of the law,” was based on Butash’s answers to these questions. The questions that were asked Butash, said the Court, “assumed that there was something wrong with our system of government and our economic setup, and were asked for the purpose of eliciting from him what he thought was the solution of those problems, or else for the purpose of inciting him to violate the statute.” | The case against Butash, the first under the 1918 law, was so flimsy that the Supreme Court did not even go into the question of the law’s constitutionality. “There is no evidence upon which the verdict of guilty could rest, and therefore the verdict is not supported by sufficient evidence and ig contrary to law,” the opinion held.

“Having reached the conclusion that the evidence is insufficient, and that the verdict is contrary to law, makes it unnecessary for us to discuss or decide the other.questions urged by appellant (Butash).” " 2 2 ” " 2 ET the “evidence” trumped up by zealous red-baiters was sufficient to cause a lower Indiana court to condemn a man to prison for part of his life.

The Butash case points the danger. Indiana along with several other states was stampeded by the post-war hysteria into passing ‘“syndicalism” laws. This is the second case in recent months in which persons with a false concept of Americanism have used these laws to imperil the American right of free expression. Dirk De Jonge was sentenced to seven years under the Oregon criminal syndicalism act for participating in an orderly Communist rally. After the U. S. Supreme Court unanimously reversed that sentence as a violation of constitutional rights, Oregon wiped the statute from its books. Indiana should do likewise.

C.1 0S WEAK FLANK OMETHING -extraordinary has| just happened in this country: Troops have appeared at a picket line and the pickets have cheered. - In a country whose history records nundyeds of incidents where striking workers have fled from bayonets, the significance of what has occurred at Johnstown and Youngstown should not be missed. Especially, we think, it should not be missed by those who have a stake in the future of America’s labor movement. We may live a long, long time and never again see the use of the military power give an advantage to strikers —not even a temporary advantage. That, after all, is what martial law in the two steel towns has brought to striking labor—a temporary advantage, and nothing more. “Pending mediation.” That is the term which was used by the Governors of Pennsylvania and Ohio in proclaiming military rule in the strike zones. The President’s special steel mediation board, headed by Charles P. Taft 1I, is working as hard and as fast as it can to bring about a peaceful settlement. And the point on which mediation has snagged is a simple one. Tum Girdler, Eugene Grace and the other steelmasters who follow their lead say they won’t sign a contract with the John L. Lewis steel union because a eontract with a C. 1. O. union is not worth anything. That is not altogether true. A great many C. I. O. - unions are living up to their contracts. But it is true enough that for the first time in all the recent mushroom growth of unionism the employers have raised an objection which 1s capturing some public sympathy. Employers who halked at coliective bargaining did not make a dent in public opinion. Nor did those who stalled at dealing exclusively with the representatives of a majority of their workers, as the Vagner act provides. The strikers got collective bargaining—and their coliective bargains. But many employers who signed in good faith and lived up to their agreements haye been harassed by sporadic sitdowns, “quickies,” “skips” on the assembly lines and other outlaw violations of contracts. Employers are growing resentful, and more and more the general pub.lic, we believe, is sympathizing with this resentment. And it is no less true of the rank and file of workers indirectly affected, who are hurt more than anybody else as these acts cut down their working time and wages. John L. Lewis built his reputation as an effective labor leader on the solid foundation of a labor union which became famous for winning the best possible wage and hour terms in the coal industry-—and for observing both the letter and spirit of its contracts. But his C. I. O. drive into the other mass-production industries has spread to many fronts. To use a military

term, his lines of communication are broken. Irresponsible.

lieutenants in many “sectors are doing great harm to his cause. Unless he can reform his lines, and consolidate his gains to make each contract won a contract kept, his army of workers may soon be scattered, demoralized and routed. John Lewis is too much a veteran not to see these strategic dangers. Will he prove himself a big enough leader to overcome them? Or will he let the Tom Girdlers and Eugene Graces win by C. I. 0.’s mistakes? 5

so-called “criminal syndical-

- as an alligator. man or Italian industry has nothing on this. The in-

CA Couple of Interested Listeners_py Herblock

THURSDAY. JUNE 24, 1037

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Fair Enough

By Westbrook Pegler

Campaign to Close Loopholes in Tax Laws Recalls Criticism of Bureau's Methods Made by Senator Schall.

(CHICAGO, June 24.—The arrogance of the Treasury Department toward the citizens in the application of the income tax has not been challenged for a long time, and

‘the agents nowadays seem to be encouraged

to believe that, like the cop in a traffic case, they must be feared and placated. Like the cop, also they appear to have the bulge on the citizen in any controversy over a tax matter, for there is a disposi-

tion to accept their word and their judgment as to the right or wrong of any dispute. Mr. Roosevelt's current campaign against not only fraudulent evaders but taxpayers who are admiited to have complied with the law probably will tend to make them even more overbiaring than they were 10 years go when Senator Schall of - | Minnesota spoke as follows: “The .one glaring goyernmental agency that constitutes; a menace to the citizens is the Income Tax Bureau which often goes outside the constitutional limitations and frequently harasses the citizens by unjust exactions, and by the oppressive conduct of its agents. | This system has one defect that is fundamental. hat is its lack of certainty involving not only the lime and manner of payment but the clear, definite and fixed amount. The Bureau believes it is so entrenched by authority and its anonymous character that it leven dares to attack the citizens by a charge of frand without substantial pretext or cause.’ This criticism was made in the good old days of prosperity and econdgmic royalty when the Bureau was much less bold than it has become under the New Deal.

Mr. Pegler

+ & = =

NCIDENTALLY, Mr |Roosevelt has made no direct |

mention of the indome tax cases of the Huey Leng gang in New Orleans, indicted when Huey was fighting the Administration, but exonerated without formal trial after Huey's death and the political reconciliation. “Such a regime of bureaucracy is deadly,” Senator Schall said 10 years ago. “The Bureau’s increasing arbitrary authority is becoming more sinister and obtrusive. The Bureau is inquisitorial. It is bureaucracy. Washington is cluttered with its offices. Its forces swarm over the country, and the cardinal doctrine under which it operates is to inspire the citizen with fear. “The agents and inspectors. must show some kind of results. The Bureau grades them for promotion, not on what taxes are finally returned to the Government, but by the amounts they ‘mark up' first or charge against the taxpayer. That oractice permits 4 species of blackmail against the American citizen. n 3 n = having started in pursuit, the agent assumes authority to impute fraud to the most innocent transactions, and the perfectly honest taxpayer must submit to indignities, odium, accusations of fraud and criminality, and be. put to heavy expenses to prove to his own Government that he is not a criminal.” Nowadays not even Government wire- -tapping is considered unethical in the espionage over citizens who may be strictly honest, and as for political

blackmail, the Louisiana indictments and their dismissal will suffice as an example.

EW YORK, June 24—On June 1, quite unheralded in the news, Mr. Maury Maverick introduced another of those bills to “regulate the flow of commerce.” At least it bears his brand.

The latest bill is clever and abstruse—as clever as the court message or the Black-Connery bill. It is a bill for the Federal regulation of industry and, if the executive reorganization proposal passes, it will be regulation under executive control. It follows NRA far enough to adopt the “code authority” idea, except it calls them “industrial authorities.” They are to be committees of equal representation of management and a labor union either selected by labor in the industry or named by the Government—at all events a particular labor union.

8 8 2

I the industry does not agree on a program covering production, prices and wages, the administrator prescribes one. Whether agreed or prescribed, the industry is taxed 25 per cent of its manufacturing costs and can get it back only if it steps up to the captain’s desk and does what the Administration says ought to be done in that industry. It is the Blue Eagle reincarnate with as many teeth Hitler's or Mussolini’s control of Ger-

The Hoosier Forum

&% 1 wholly disagree with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it.— Voltaire.

WELFARE FUNDS GOING TO

{ WRONG PERSONS, CHARGE

By Mrs. Mary Worley, Columbus, Ind.

I noticed in a recent issue of The Indianapolis Times quite a bit -of complaint from various sources about the seemingly high cost of the welfare work being done in Indiana.

In fairness to all concerned, may we really tell where the funds which are appropriated for Federal relief are really used? Most certainly the indigent, ‘the unfortunate blind and the underprivileged children are not receiving all the money.

The-money is going to clerks, investigators, stenographers, field workers, welfare managers and many others. "When these people are paid (and well) what is left for the unfortunate poor of Indiana? Nothing; at most, very little. In our fair city of Columbus, which boasts 13,000 population, we have old men and women that roam the alleys daily for paper, rags and discarded store products. We have blind people sitting with their tin cups begging for a coin, and we actually have children eating out of garbage bins. -Is the State Welfare work a success? Far from it, but it could be, with a lot less legislation.

It shouldn't take one year or Wo to investigate a case; a month at the most should be sufficient. Sure, the welfare staff members want to keep their jobs, but at the expense of the poor and unfortunate of Indiana. So we shall continue to have the unfortunate among us until Federal Welfare is really welfare and relief and not an endless chain of office workers. E- » 2 SEES BILBAO CONQUEST AS

MOST BRUTAL OF WAR By Agapito Rey, Bloomington The fall of Bilbao into Rebels’ hands will be a death blow to the aspirations of the Basques for selfgovernment. The Basques have been fighting heroically against unsurmountable odds. They have been the victims of the most brutal outrages of the Spanish conflict.Denied the means of defense by England and the other neutral countries, they had to witness helplessly the leveling of their cities and the slaughter of their innocent people by the German air forces. The destruction of Guernica, the Basque “Holy City,” will long be remembered as one of the greatest crimes, Germany fought strenuously ' to conquer Bilbao because the control of its vast iron mines is essential to the Nazi armament program. It will be able now to collect pay for the

enormous quantities ot war mate- |

rials sent to the Rebels and also to pay the soldiers fighting in Spain. The country will be despoiled of its natural resources by these foreigners. The fall of Bilbao will simply delay the conclusion of the war. For the Basques were isolated from the main territory held by the Spanish Government and could neither render nor. receive help. There is, however, the possibility that with the iron mines of the

General Hugh Johnson Says—

, Rep. Maverick's New Bill Provides Business Regulation by Codes with ‘Teeth’ in Law to Assure ‘Compliance Formerly Wanting Under NIRA

teresting thing is this. book called “$2500 a Year,”

Last year there appeared a by Mordecai

(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.)

north and the copper mines of the south in their possession, Italy and Germany may feel satisfied and insist en a compromise to salvage their investments. They will be in a good position to talk peace. But the Government can hold on indefinitely and a compromise seems out of the question after so much brutality. The people are not going to lay down their arms and go back to feudal conditions. They are fighting to preserve their “New Deal” Gov-

‘ernment and they seem to be determined to fight to a finish.

"nn 2 SELF-GOVERNMENT IN AMERICA DEBATED By W. Scott Taylor

It may be true, as the Senate committee says in effect, that the American people are not now tit for that degree of self-government by majority rule which is enjoyed by the English. But to assert that they never will be fit, is an unnecessary look into the future.

It may be best for many years to permit an unelected, absolute and irremovable power to remain in the hands of those who assert that the supreme law is what they say it is. The American people may need such a power at this time, as the early English needed it in their kings, and as the later English needed it in their House of Lords—but why forever?

Who knows but that some day ou# people, under the combined influence of schools, churches and the reading of good books, may develop the heart, conscience and common sense which is so necessary to determine for themselves what is the greatest good for the greatest number? . . It may be that the committee is quite right in asserting in effect

COMPLIMENTS

By MARY WARD

What could I write that learned folk: would care to read! All, all is known and more that I might say, no personal with you makes indeed, So please accept my compliments today!

Yet, communication

me sad

DAILY THOUGHT

These are the commandments, which the Lord commanded Moses for- the children of Israel in Mount Sinai.—Leviticus 27:34. °

OOD laws make it easier to do

right and harder to do wrong. ~—Gladstone.

Ezekiel,

that the American people of today are influenced only by the ungovernable passions of a mob. But to assert that they always will be so influenced is a reflection on their possibilities. people will resent it. As for the Progressive Republicans—they resent it now. : un E ® LABOR MASSACRES CAUSE INDIGNATION By L. L. P. Eight Army Officers Executed in Soviet Russia—that was front page copy on every newspaper in this country. The newspapers were indignant. Yet, here in America, unarmed and defenseless workmen are being killed and wounded by scores, and ‘“play-boy Moors” are volunteering to man machine guns

and mow down more—yet the American press seems neither in-

dignant nor alarmed. Unless this thing is immediately ended you may expect some of us farm boys who can use a machine gun to go to the support of the defenseless workmen. This is not Spain, Russia or Germany. The press, if it wishes to avoid revolution in this country, would do well to point that fact out to our “American Moors.” s ” ” BROAD RIPPLE CYCLISTS : CALLED DANGEROUS By Broad Ripple Merchant The Times recently published pictures to illustrate. the dangerous practice of boys riding on the sidewalk. You wouldn’t need to have boys pose for these pictures if your photographer would station himself in the 6300 block on Bellefontaine St., Broad Ripple. We have women and children knocked down by cyclists on our sidewalks. Come out and get real action. ” u ” URGES FREE FUNCTION FOR NATURAL LAWS By E. B. Swinney, Los Angeles The erstwhile “brain trusters” have been supplanted with the “intellectual intimates.” They retain

all the earmarks. of their predeces- |

sors in superior wisdom, wholly ignoring natural laws which they would replace with artificial measures that never have nar ever will work. Nevertheless the natural economic laws are constantly operating independently of human laws, which act as monkey wrenches in the machinery, resulting in no end of trouble.

What the wiseacres in Washing-

{ton should do is to eliminate these

monkey wrenches and. give the natural laws a chance to function in freedom. We should then witness for the first time a correct economic and social order, Henry George has blazed the tr ail. We can either [follow it and be happy or leave it and be sorry. His rhilosophy is fundamental and has never yet been successfully refuted.

Some day the |

Hkh

It Seems to ys

By Heywood Broun

a TE

Sympathy Is Given to the Leyran in’ Argument Between W. C. Fields and: Doctor Over Fee and Diet of Liquor.:

STAMFORD, Conn., June 24. Tn the dise-

pute between W. C. Fields and his physie: cian I must admit that my sympathies 20: with the layman. I doubt that any case of: pneumonia (and I'm speaking of double: pneumonia, at that) is worth a nickel over: $10,000. Many of the legal and. medical points involved are: too remote to make cross-continent criticism possible:

but, according to the news flashes, the good gray doctor cited among. his own personal achievements the alleged fact that he had taken the defendant all the way down from two quarts of: whisky a day to. some minute lower bracket among: the ounces. : If such a thing has actually: taken place, it would seem to me as if part of the credit should 0+ to the patient. To be sure, Mr, Fields has violently denied that hel ever drank as much as two quarts - even in “the good old days.” i Such discussions are difficult to : put upon a scientific basis. They tend to be a little academic, like arguments as to whether Jack Dempsey could have licked Fitzsimmons in his prime. ” 8 2 FRIEND of mine once sought medical advice dur« ing a/ moment of depression, and after getting the name, address, age and business references the doctor inquired, “How much do you drink a day, Mr. Yorick?” Yorick looked st him coldly and replied, “If: I knew the answer to that, why on earth would I be: coming around to see you?” My late friend was quite right. It is a silly question. i Members of the free fraternity may sign tabs, but they seldom keep them. The only reasonable answer which Yorick or any other member of his clan could make would be, “It all clepends.” Weather, companionship, price and even quality: may all enter into this most unstable equation. I: knew Mr. Fields during the good old days, and was. privileged on several occasions to drop in at his dress: ing room when he was playing the role of the genial swindler in “Poppy.” W. C. Fields had two large trunks, ‘and in one of them he kept no costumes. Still, upon the days Lcalled I have a vague recollection that the comedian: drank nothing but sarsaparilla with a little lime juice. It may well be that I was a discouraging companion: as a pace setter, since it is difficult to go drink for: drink with any man who merely says, “Make mine: another mineral water.” #8 =n : i OWEVER, had the California doctor, or, better yet, his lawyer, seen that particular show I think: he might have picked up a telling line to use in his: summation. After all, it was in “Poppy” that W. Cs Fields first furnished to the world the famous adage, “Never give a sucker an even break.” Actors in many cases do not in any way resembles the roles they play. Mr. Fields is, I fear, one of the most naive and gullible of men. He should at his earliest convenience escape from the rigors of Cali«fornia, even though some of its prospects are Ci and find sanctuary in Connecticut. It is true that the natives of this State have some-. times been known as the makers of wooden nutmegs.: I have never investigated the charge, and believe it to be without -foundation. E Possibly the days are not as good as they used to: be, and they may get worse before they become betters But it will be a dawn gloomy beyond the widest¥ stretch of imagination when W. C. Fields cannot think up for himself some suitable and satisfactory libation: wholly without benefit of nutmeg.

Mr. Broun

The Washington Merry-Go-Round

Roosevelt's Quiet Naming of Federal Judge Cloaks Arkansas Dramas; Parran Maps New Poster Campaign Aimed at Venereal Disease Victim,:

By Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen

White

Economic Adviser to the Secretary of Agriculture. This bill condenses precisely the proposals of that bock. The rival economic seers of this Administration are now Harry Hopkins and Henry Wallace. The former's new white rabbit is supposed to be “tax the rich to pay the poor.” If this new Ezekiel panacea is not that of Henry Wallace, it is at least that of Henry's economic familiar. : 8 mB HE significance of that is that it the President is now coming out with a fireside chat, telling us how to abolish poverty, it is highly likely to be one or the other or a combination stew of these two white rabbits. Mr. Maverick says his proposal is not advanced as an Administration measure, but this bill bears watching because there is a curious truth about three recent bills. The Wagner Labor Act is Section 7A of NIRA with teeth in it. The Black-Connery bill is NIRA’s hours and wages provisions with teeth in them. This Maverick bill is NIRA’s code provisions with teeth in them. Taking them altogether you have NIRA reconditioned, armor plated, rearmed with 16-inch guns, and refueled for a record trip. This Administration never yet has faltered in its faith in NIRA.

ASHINGTON, June 24.—A one-line House communication the other day placed before the Senate the nomination of Tom C. Trimble for Federal Judge of the Eastern District of Arkansas. The behind-the-scenes actors in this short drama were Harvey Couch, former member of the RFC and Arkansas’ No. 1 utility and railroad {ycoon; some Arkansas labor leaders violently hostile to Couch; C. Hamilton Moses, a Couch attorney; Senator Robinson, former law partner of Moses, and Mrs. Hattie Caraway, Arkansas’ junior U. S. Senator. : Following the death of the incumbent, John E. Martineau, stories appeared reporting Moses practically certain to succeed him.

” ” =

OUCH came East, followed a little later by Moses. They were preceded by a heated barrage of letters from Arkansas labor leaders to the President, Robinson, Mrs. Caraway and Senate Judiciary Committee members bitterly opposing selection. Couch conferred with the President, but several

- days before Justice Van Devanter had announced his

resignation from the Supreme Court and Robinson blossomed into the leading candidate for the vacancy. Robinson cooled toward the ambitions of his onetime partner. To back the appointment of a corpora-

tion and utility lawyer would do Joe's aspirations nox good. = Mrs. Caraway dropped a pointed hint that she did;not favor Moses’ selection.

Moses returned to Arkansas and let it. be Known: that he had decided he didn’t want the job after all. : With the atmosphere thus cleared Joe went to bat) for Trimble, another former partner. Rn 8 : HE country is going to hear a lot more about: venereal disease before Thomas Parran 182 through. The aggressive Surgeon General, who has= been putting hitherto forbidden words on the Jong pages, has a new publicity campaign in the making. He reasons that the current type of publieity does not reach those most in need ch Figures show.rg. the number of children born blind as the result of syphilis 'are impressive to the general publi¢, and bring a clamor for preventive measures. But that ig’ not possible until victims have been persuaded to | to clinics. The new campaign will feature posters placed where they will be seen by men. They will make direct appeal to the individual, telling him what Ay symptoms are of verereal disease, where he can treated, and—most important-of all—that he may go: to a clinic hon; 8 giving his name.