Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 20 August 1937 — Page 16

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The Indianapolis Times

(A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER)

WwW. HOWARD LUDWELL DENNY MARK FERREE President Business Manager

ROY

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Give Light and the Pcople Will Find Their Own Way

Membe: of United Press, Scripps - Howard Newspaper Alliance, NEA Service, and Audit Bu-

reau of Circulations. RIley 5551

FRIDAY, AUG. 20, 1937

CONGRESS AND THE UNEMPLOYED EVERAL thcusand unemployed Americans are spending money they can ill afford to lose on a ‘national job march to Washington” that is certain to prove futile. The Workers Alliance of America, which promoted this demonstration, mstructed the unemployed to travel to the capital in automobiles and chartered busses, has announced that the Congress is to put the Schwellenbach-Allen resolution through Congress. The resolution would order WPA

to stop cutting its rolls and to provide relief jobs for all un- |

employed workers who can’t find private employment. But Congress, if it has not already adjourned when the “job marchers’ assemble in Washington next Monday, will be at the point of adjournment. There is not the slightest chance that it will stop to consider and pass any new relief plan—certainly not one that might put relief spending back to or near its highest peak and that would destroy all possibility of a balanced budget.

Those who encouraged the unemployed to march on |

Washington, at this time, have made a cruel mistake.

Yet unemployed Americans, and all Americans, have a | very real grievance against the way this Congress has mis- |

handled the unemployment and relief problem.

It appropriated blindly, and without knowledge of the

actual need, $1,500,000,000 for relief in the most expensive form. It disregarded all protests that this amount, though probably far too little to provide WPA jobs for all who would require the Federal Government’s aid, might be made to cover the need if distributed more widely in the form of grants to supplement local direct relief.

becomes evident that a great many of these people can get neither permanent private employment nor local relief, and

that tens of thousands of them will face desperate suffering |

next winter.

The futile march to Washington will be a tragedy for |

those who take part in it. But the fumbling of Congress

with its duty to find out the right thing to do about relief

1s a worse tragedy, and a less excusable one.

MIND-READING BUREAUCRATS

HE Wages-Hours bill creates a bureaucracy—the Na- |

tional Labor Standards Board. It authorizes that hureaucracy to investigate conditions and inspect places and records of employment to determine whether any employer “has violated or is about to violate” any provision of the proposed law. Just how, we wonder, does a plain American citizen, by the mere act of being transformed into a bureaucrat, attain the omniscience to determine whether anybody is “about to violate” any rule or law? That phrase is on a par with the other one to which we referred recently, in the penal section of the Wages-

employer convicted of discharging an employee “because such employer believes that such employee has done or may do any of said acts.” The more we read and reread this bill the more we

are inclined to agree with Senator Borah that the way to |

establish minimum wages and maximum hours is for Congress to write them into law.

mine what wage and hour scales should be established to provide a decent standard of living.

city and country and North and South. But far better, we believe, that Congress should take the time—instead of passing a bill creating a bureaucracy with power to go about the country making an exception

to determine whether an employer is “about to violate”

some rule, and in another place prosecuting some employer |

who discharged an employee “because such employer be- | . | and the policemen may do the same after 25 years.

| Thus many an able fireman and cop quits the force

lieves that such employees . . . may do any of said acts.” Again we inquire: What is time to Congressmen? They are hired by the year.

SENATOR DIXIE T was true what they said about Dixie. A great many people, in his state and throughout the country, found it difficult to believe that Governor Graves of Alabama would appoint his wife to the U. S. Senate seat vacated by the new Supreme Court Justice, Hugo L. Black. But Governor Graves did just that. Mrs. Dixie Graves is a charming and an intelligent woman. Under different circumstances, the addition of her name to the list of women who have served their states in the Senate could be welcomed with approval. Senator Graves, it is understood, intends to serve only until a primary is held in Alabama to choose a more permanent successor to Mr. Black. By naming her, the Governor apparently has sought to avoid giving special advantage to any of the several men who were candidates for this appointment and who will be candidates in the primary. Perhaps he has played smart politics. But we greatly doubt whether the people of Alabama or any other state can relish the spectacle presented when a Governor plays politics by appointing his own wife to public office.

FOR BEGINNER DRIVERS

HE letter by W. C. Dorsett in today’s Forum presents a valid criticism and a constructive suggestion about new drivers. We have a new law providing temporary driving permits for beginners under a probation arrangement. Yet no instructions for young drivers are available when they set out to learn. They are “on their own.” Mr. Dorsett’s suggestion that some official or unofficial safety group provide such printed instructions is timely.

NDER the Wages-and-Hours Bill an employer can be investigated by Federal spies if he looks like the kind of fellow who might violate the law.

And now that | WPA, trying to stay within the present appropriation, has | dismissed some 400,000 men and women from its rolls, it |

| will continue to receive his $240 a | week even though he is physically, | mentally and professionally able to earn a first-class

against old age.

And it would take |

time for Congress to figure out proper differentials between gravy.

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

Home Sweet Home—By Herblock

Lo simniiguir se eons

ou)

Fair Enough By Westbrook Pegler

$12,000-a-Year Life Pension Jimmy Walker Draws Attention to Public Service's Old-Age Benefits.

EW YORK, Aug. 20.—As a reward for | | article in the Forum from Prof. |

] . . . . | Middleton of Greencastle. His plea in that which is known as the public service S peed

something over 22 years of employment

in New York, Jimmy Walker soon will be eligible for a pension of approximately one-third of his average pay for the last five vears of his attachment to the public payrolls. The pension will be around or about $12,000 a year, toward which he contributed, in his time. an amount

estimated at $16,000. There apyears to be some private feeling that Mr. Walker really does not deserve any pension, for he left town abruptly without trousling to explain certain matters which still may be regarded as unfinished business, and his current employment is looked upon by some as artificial and a political expedient intended only to qualify him for the pension. Nevertheless, Jimmy soon will be eligible for a weekly check of about $240 as long as he lives. He

Ah,

. Pegler

living at private employment, and this $240 a week

: viys . re. Quid | will be immune to the Federal income tax. Hours bill, providing a $1000 fine or a year in jail for any |

» ” VERY attractive service, says you. elegant service; and a fine way And, although Mr. Walker will be among the aristocrats of the pension roll, he may not be top man, even so. He may be a few dollars under Charles W. Berry,

”

Aye, an

| who used to be controller at a very fair rate of pay,

: | and who draws $12,425 a year, free of the Federal tax. It would take time, of course, for Congress to deter- |

Mr. Berry put $25,362 into the pension kitty over the

years of his relationship with the public treasury, and it was a grand investment. He gets it all back in a couple of years, and beyond that the pension is

John P. O'Brien, who served a short piece as

| Mayor after Mr. Walker hurried away, also does very | well. | Having been retired for three and one-half years he

He put in $26,185 and draws $11,989 a year now

has already withdrawn all he put into the pot and is

: : : 3 : | now a distinguished guest of the taxpayers at the rate here and an exemption there, investigating in one place |

of more than $200 a week. ”n » un MMREMEN, drawing around $3000 a vear. are eligi-

ble for retirement after 20 years on half pay,

in the prime of life with a guaranteed income and

| goes into the job-market to underbid men in need of I work to earn a living.

Disability or old age is no condition of retirement

| on pension in New York, and a man may step out with an annuity as steady as the taxpayers’ taxes, of

one-twelfth of his pay. Not always a living. to be sure, but a nice little gratuity from the public. There is no sense of scandal over Mr. Walker's pension or the manner in which he has been qualified for it through an appointment about as brazen as anything that Tammany ever has done in town. Oh, there is a little editorial indignation, but the general sentiment obviously is that $12,000 a year won't break us, and what if he did do what Seabury said he did? What do you want for a Mayor, a reformer?

for |

to provide |

The Hoosier Forum

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

| | AGREES WITH PROFESSOR ON FORUM WRITERS | By R. G. VanNuys, Frankfort I was pleased to read the recent

{toc The Times for a limitation of

{time and space to contributors in | {order that we may gain a rest from |

| the constant harpings from a certain few whose names he mentioned, is [no doubt, concurred in by many. His description of these creatures | was a good one; however, he might [have mentioned the order to which {they belong. They belong to the or‘der “Politico Dihardicus.” They are |indigenous' to practically all the | United States. From the latest data

(available it appears that they are |

| diminishing in numbers, approach|ing extinction at a rapid rate. It seems a peculiarity that as their [numbers grow less they become more noisy and assertive, and the reason (assigned for this is that they seek

[to convey the impression that they |

| exist in great numbers, { I have noted these peculiarities {in them and feel sure the explana- | tion is correct. They are amusing and perfectly harmless, so much so that one really would like to see {them preserved to a certain extent. | ” » = HITS JOBLESS CENSUS AS WASTE | By Pat Hogan, Columbus

Your editorial “Counting Is Not | Enough,” is a gem and should | awaken the public to facts. Some { wit has said: “Figures won't lie | but liars will figure.” Why the need-

| less spending of five million dollars | for an April fool and still leave five | million fools abroad in the land to|

| aid rather than fight unemploy-

The

| Economic Royalty with character- | up production | machinery |

[te greed speeded |w it h profit-making | which enabled one man to do the | work of 10.

| for profits the young man was re- |

tained because it was easier to scare and rush him than the seasoned | mechanic.

| Indiana has a with

firm | young dandy employment manager {and his assistant put

| ination for employment. : The president and vice president

| draw $18,000 salary: two vice presi- |

dents and two factory managers $25,000 each: a dozen phants get from $5000 to $10,000; the office is flooded with sons, daughters, cousins, in-laws of the stockholders—indeed, an office force large enough to run a huge corporation and this office army works

General Hugh Johnson Says—

Workers' Alliance Advertising of Job-March on Washington Probably Bluff, but Is Interesting as Experiment in Threat of Incipient Riot.

ASHINGTON, D. C,, Aug. 20.—In a full-page but unsigned advertisement in its daily papers, Washington is warned of a march upon it of WPA workers who may be discharged if the present appropriation for Administrator Hopkins is not increased by about a billion. It threatens a bonus “job march” of thousands. Mr, Lasser, who is the current Coxy of this mass movement of jobless or anxious WPAers, hopes to mobilize six to eight thousand men for this on-to-Richmond push. Why? To pretend to intimidate Congress into passing the proposed Schwellenbach-Allen Bill forbidding the discharge of any WPA worker who “cannot find employment in private industry.” The march is sponsored by the Workers’ Alliance of America. The long advertisement carries this sentence in italics: “The Workers’ Alliance of America is ready to cancel the national job march to Washington if the Schwellenbach-Allen resolution passed.” It is probably a bluff. Congress is ready to adJourn. But even as a bluff, this is interesting.

= » » WH seems to be intimidation of the Legislature by a tiny minority using the silent threat of incipient riot. But what can be done about it? The Constitution certainly protects the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances and the right to come to seat of Government.

But in Anglo-Saxon law from

treason known to the law.”

“We should find out | The |

In this mad scramble |

four

small factories employing less than | [500 men, half the time. A dashing

prospective | | employees through an army exam-

white ele- |

“riot” is the “gravest breach of the peace short of The gist of that offense is not whether the combined purpose of three or more people acting together is lawful or not—it is whether they have combined to effect their purpose

(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 |

[ed instructions for

beginners be made available. I believe if such instructions were

available, all parents would feel it

It Seems to Me

their duty to properly instruct their | children before applying for a driv-

er's permit for them. Proper instructions before

the |

be signed, but names will | permit is issued would be of far |

be withheld on request.)

— |

[ full time. This is one “why” of un- |

| |

| more value than a lecture or, perhaps a fine after an accident.

" "n n

employment. You may know others. MAKES PLEA FOR SMALL

{Will any kind of census help the | situation? |

on n " URGES PRINTED INSTRUCTION | FOR BEGINNING DRIVERS | | By 'W. 'C. | This morning I called the Acci- | dent Prevention Bureau of the Indi- | anapolis Police Depaftment for in- | formation in regard to procuring a | permit for a child 16 years of age | to drive an automobile. After receiving the desired infor- | i mation I made inquiry as to wheth- | er the Police Department or any | other department provided rules or instructions for beginner drivers, | and, to my great surprise, I was in- | formed that no such printed in- { structions were available. I was { advised, in effect, that it was up to | the child procuring the permit to “paddle its own canoe.” Through your good paper I would (like to suggest to the Indianapolis | Police Department, the Indiana | State Police, the various motor | clubs, and all other organizations and individuals interested in the! | prevention of accidents, that print- |

THE RAMBLER ROSE

By FLORENCE MACDONALD The rambler rose is a venturesome knight, Who aspired but to scale the stone wall’s great height—

Dorsett |

COAL DEALER

| By Small Dealer

In a recent issue 1 noticed an ar- | ticle headed “City Coal Dealers Seek | Ban on Bootlegging by Small Firms." |

It would appear that the city

dealers want the City of Indian-

apolis to underwrite and guarantee them a better profit on coal, ali of

which will increase the cost to the |

consumer and eliminate hundreds of truckers who are able to keep body and soul together apd stay off relief. There is a lot of coal coming into Indianapolis by local truckmen who deliver this to the trade at a less price than the Indianapolis dealers. Even so it goes to buyers who are short on funds and at a nominal cost. These truckers must show their weight ticket receipted and also show to whom the coal is going. This being true, there is no more assurance of short weight than from any Indianapolis dealer with the same evidence. Nothing but downright selfishness is such an ordinance and a detriment to the small wage earner. In fact it takes from the American citizen more of his liberty—to give a one thousand dollar surety bond, provide scales and pay a $40 license

spectors at $1800 a year each for weighing.

creased profit to all the Indian-

"Til near the gray wall, quite sheltered from sight, Strolled a beauteous star-lit night,

lady one

Rare fragrance proclaimed his presence close by— rich beauty won breathing a sigh | She plucked the red rose whose prayer was to lie On her bosom to live—to love and to die.

His her; so

| This tale was told by the Southwind that blows, Gleaning night's deepest secrets where’er he goes who save the sweet-scented Southwind knows The desires in the heart of a rambler rose?

For

DAILY THOUGHT

apolis dealers on coal that likely {will be trucked into Indianapolis,

|let alone the cost of the bond and

the $40 fee. Trouble is the coal deal- |

ers can’t take it. There is nothing |to prevent them from doing just | what they are complaining about. I might as well ask the State of | Indiana to place such restrictions on trucks that have almost ruined my business—reduced the Indian- | apolis daily receipts from 25 cars to none

| 1 am quite sure no such ordinance

| will go through. If so, the only good thing would be the two $1800 saljaried men and the increased cost |to the poor man, If that is what's wanted, it will go through. ” » » STATE SURPLUS WORRIES READER By R. ML. The surplus in the State Treasury

fee, used to compensate two city in- |

This $3600 is more than the in- |

| to play

By Heywood Broun

Broun Accepts Author's Challenge And Grooms Quentin Reynolds for Big Bout Despite Mental Handicap. « TAMFORD, Conn., Aug. 20.— Ernest Hemingway has announced his readiness to return to this country in six months and defend his title as literary heavyweight champion. Accordingly, I have decided to take a piece of Quentin Reynolds. There are

several pieces of Mr. Reynolds left in case any other | curio collector { is rather a short time to get our man in shape for a

is interested. Of course, six months

one-round bout, but I have him up here in the woods, and he has already started training. At first he will chop down trees. Later on, as he grows more fit, he will be expected to tear them down with his bare hands. This will be good exercise for him, and I need firewood for the winter. Just now the workouts are being held in private, because it wouldn't be a good idea to let any of the boxing experts get a look at our man just yet. That mighe spoil all interest in the coming bout. Indeed, one or two veteran fight promoters have , suggested that our white hope would do well to wear a domino both at work and play. They think he will draw better if we bill him as the masked marvel. Within a month it may be possible to open the training camp to visitors at 256 cents a head. My present notion is to supply a swim in the lake, a lobster dinner and a look at a Reynolds workout, all for the same price of admission. As a matter of fact, any customer who just wants the lobster and doesn't care about looking at Reynolds will have to pay only a dollar extra. n

AST Sunday I put him in a baseball game just L as a breezer, and at the end of an inning he was wardly puffing at all. The only thing that worries me is his mental attitude. It was his first game of the year, and he was the first man up. When he got a base in balls he walked slowly down to first, stretched his arms, yawned and remarked in a tired voice, “Gee, 1 wish the season was over,” If we decide not to fight him in blinkers and call him the masked marvel, it is probable that our challenger will be billed for ring purposes as Larruping Lennie. The name was chosen, of course, on account of the striking resemblance between Mr. Reynolds and the hero of John Steinbeck’s novel “Of Mice and Men.”

Mr. Broun

u ”

» » » ARRUPING LENNIE can't accus= “ tomed to our quiet country nights. After sundown his thoughts wander, My chief task as maneager is to find something to occupy his mind which at the moment appears to be a sort of deserted tourist camp. We have been frying to teach him slapjack, but he doesn't seem to get the

general hang of it. He insists on slapping queens and deuces. Naturally, none of us expect him to

seem to get

| grasp the fine points of the game until the snow

Conte unts Me all yes that Jabor | has us more worried than if the |

{ and are heavy laden, and I will | give you rest.—Matthew 11, 28. E cannot too often think, that d there is a never sleeping eye |that reads the heart, and registers | our thoughts.—Bacon.

very early times

| total were a deficit. It keeps us | awake nights thinking up ways to | spend it. But maybe we'd better keep still about it or the Federal Government won't let us have those millions Senator Minton asked for | to use in State flood control work.

| |

flies. All his training will have to be rigidly supervised, because he seems to be incapable of making any constructive suggestions. I asked him what sparring partners we should get for him, and the only name he had to offer was Anna May Wong. They won't let him play any more baseball up here, because all the pitchers have discovered his weakness. It seems that our challenger is a fall guy for a fast blond on the outside corner.

The Washington Merry-Go-Round

A. F. of L. and C. |. O. Look to Next Congress for Test on Wage Bill; WPA Demands Dixie Communities Return Funds Used to Build Mills.

By Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen ASHINGTON, Aug. 20.—Neither A. F. of L. nov C. I. O. leaders will shed any tears if the WageHour Bill does not pass this session. Of course they are not saying this publicly. That would be impolitic.

But privately they will be just as

in a “turbulent” manner. When any such meeting becomes “turblilent” the nearest law officer is required to “read the Riot Act.” That is exactly what Maj. Pitcairns was doing when he yelled at Lexington, “Disperse, Ye Rebels” and drew the shot “heard 'round the world.” All of which is a dramatic way of saying that the thin margin here between constitutional rights and civic crime makes such a mass mob movement about the most dangerous thing in government.

munist tactics. It is a “demonstration” —like his moving into state capitols, occupying the seats of legislators with his jobless brigades and staging a sit-down strike in deflance of government. Mr. Lasser knows he won't intimidate Congress, but perhaps some blood will be shed or Mr. Roosevelt may be goaded into the silly action Mr. Hoover took with bonus marchers, and call out troops to

manhandle hungry and ragegd men.

| spring and summer. R. LASSER is an expert in such matters. Whether | Communist or not, this march is pure Com- |

well satisfied if action on the measure goes over until

next year. There are two reasons for this attitude. First, the bill suspended in mid-air in the House, as a result of the refusal of the Rules Committee to allow it to be considered, does not suit them. Both labor camps consider it weak and too restricted in scope. Second, they feel the chances of putting through a more drastic measure will be better next year. The Congress that convenes next January will have its eye cocked on the primary elections in the That means that a lot of the boys who have been cold to the legislation this session will be much more tractable next year.

» »

HE Works Progress Administration has made peremptory demands on a group of Mississippi communities for the return of relief funds, which they used to erect mills for Northern manufacturers. The mills employ school children at pay scales as low as $3 and $4 a week, and complaints have poured in to the WPA, 5, b

The money was allotted to these towns for the purpose of erecting vocational training schools. When WPA investigated, it discovered that the build«

ings were not schools bui factories. They had been turned over to Northern concerns as an inducement, together with cheap labor, to bring their business to the towns. The latest instance was in Ellisville, Miss. WPA officials have notified trustees of an agricultural high school and junior college there that unless they immediately return $24,537 contributed by the Government, legal action will be taken against them.

" ” »

OSEPH B. EASTMAN, veteran member of the Interstate Commerce Commission, and renowned as an authority on railways, is becoming famous on another count--as a picker and trainer of talented men, There are now six high Government executives who began their careers as “Eastman boys.” The latest to join this select band is John L. Rogers, whom the President has just promoted from chief of the Motor Carrier Bureau to a member of the I. C. C. Other Eastman proteges holding high posts are ° Otto Beyer, member of the National Mediation Board; James Carmalt, chairman of Board; Robert Freer, Federal Trade Commission; Murray Board,