Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 11 January 1938 — Page 12

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The Indianapolis Times

(A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER)

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

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reau of Circulations. Rlley 5551

Give Lioht and the People Will Find Their Own Way

TUESDAY, JAN. 11, 1938

OFF TO A MURDEROUS START!

HE year 1938 is getting off to a furious start toward the predicted new record in automobile slaughter. In Indianapolis, nine persons already have died in traffic, compared with two fatalities at this time last year. Violent deaths came to 22 Hoosiers in week-end traffic. Three women were killed in a collision here on an icy road. Madison County's grade-crossing death traps claimed five more lives, bringing their grim total to 13 victims in three months. The trend also is upward in many other states. These figures are even more alarming when the tragic record of early 1937 is examined. In the first five weeks of 1937 more than twice as many persons were killed in Indianapolis traffic as in the same period of 1936. Nationally, traffic deaths increased 24, 31 and 19 per cent, respectively, for January, February and March of 1937 compared with the same months of 1936.

And despite the unprecedented safety campaign— The nation’s 1937 traffic toll will be close to 40,000— an all-time high and 5.8 per cent above the 37,800 killed during 1936. Indiana's fatality list, which showed a ? per cent inerease in 1936 over 1935, is expected to record another gain of about 7 per cent for 1937. A sizable decrease in 1937 Indianapolis traffic deaths —due to a belated but intensive safety drive—was almost offset by a big jump in fatal Marion County accidents outside the City. td ” ” ” ” ” N analysis of the incomplete national figures shows that rural accidents last year increased out of proportion to city fatalities, that deaths among small children dropped 8 per cent, and that the latter part of 1937 saw a more-than-seasonal decline in fatal accidents.

This last trend gives some hope that the concerted fight against the traffic menace finally is sinking into the public's consciousness. Horrible accidents, like the ones here yesterday, take place in a highly localized manner. National leadership can help. But the battle must be fought and won in local communities. : The techniques of accident prevention are now well developed. They are only partially in use here. A balanced and comprehensive attack along the three major fronts—education, enforcement and engineering—will bring results.

FORD ON WAGES AND PRICES ENRY FORD may be a V-8 industrialist and a Model-T sociologist and maybe he doesn’t always practice what he preaches, but every so often he turns out a little sermon that just can’t be matched for durable and unassailable common sense. Today's text is on low prices and high wages. It was delivered in a Dearborn interview, and we think that it should be cut out and pasted in a number of high hats both in Washington and the industrial cities of the land.

“The people are getting a good education in the fallacy of the economic rule now in force,” said Mr. Ford, referring to “the prevailing belief that wages should be reduced and prices raised.” “Whenever prices go down and wages up benefits accrue,” he continued. “Eliminate the greed for money and substitute a little zeal for production and normal conditions soon will return. Production should come before profits all the time. “In analyzing many competitive fields, I find just the opposite to these facts. Some are trying to drive wages ever downward, while costs of living are being forced upward at a rate which is beyond economic sanity.”

accident

s = = ” = = HE Hudson Motor Car Co. is going to double its factory force and spend $11,000,000 on production of a new low-price car, and President Roosevelt has welcomed this as an excellent step toward re-employment. We agree. Under our system, with all our labor-saving machines, the only hope we can see for putting the unemployed back to work—and for boosting the national income to 90 or 100 billion dollars a year, which is Mr. Roosevelt's goal—is to keep increasing production of cars, and of other useful and desirable things, and to make it possible for more and more people to buy them.

THE PARALLEL COURSE

R his selection of Joseph P. Kennedy as Ambassador to Great Britain, President Roosevelt deserves congratulations. Seldom, if ever, has the post at London been quite as important as it is today. In Europe and in Asia, powerfully armed dictatorships are riding roughshod over the territory and interests of others. And apparently the sole bulwark between the “foundations of civilization” and the forces of destruction are the democracies—in particular, the United States, Great Britain and France. Even so, much depends upon the extent and the nature of their co-operation. We do not mean, of course, co-operation in the sense of alliance or coalition. We have always—and we think rightly—fought clear of foreign entanglements in time of peace. But, like it or not, similar interests are forcing us to steer similar courses—even when we take great pains to make them independent.

SPIES AND SPIES SAID SecretaryIckes in a radio oration: “Mr. du Pont might profitably read a recent report of the Civil Liberties Investigating Committee of the U. S. Senate showing how many of our business enterprises have infested their plants with spies.” Do you suppose the Secretary of the Interior remembers in what Government department the telephone wires

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THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES County’s Toll for 10 Days: Nine Lives—By Combes

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Fair Enough By Westbrook Pegler

Columnist Asks Quick Settlement Of Dispute Between Farley and Press on Second-Class Mail Rates.

EW YORK, Jan. 11.-—I have a special interest in the dispute over the so-called postoffice subsidy to the press, particularly the newspaper section of the press as distinguished from the magazines, because this complaint was what Jim Farley had in mind that time he said that if he had a message for the public he preferred the air to print.

I gave him an argument, and it turned out that

Jim wanted some publicity for a deficiency between the amount which the papers pay for their second-class postal service and the amount which he claims that service costs. This was no compliment to the mob of Government press agents who have burrowed into the hide of the body-politic in Washington, but it was no medal of honor for the press, either. : = < Anyway, the piece has been in A RY a print three ways since then. It RIANA broke in the annual report of the Postoffice Department and was Mr. Pegler given a good ride; then Mr. Roosevelt talked it up in the press conferences, which made it practically “must” copy, and now it is in again in the form of an answer from the postal committee of the American Newspaper Publishers’ Association. That answer has its merits, but not enough of them, because there is one point where it says that the papers can be transported and distributed by private agencies more cheaply than by the Postoffice Department. Knowing that. publishers are not philanthropists by nature, I have to wonder why they don’t quit using the mails and go over to the private agencies if that is so, ” n » ERTAINLY somebody is either misrepresenting things or using expense account arithmetic, and it will be in the papers’ own interests to clear up the matter. Otherwise, Mr. Roosevelt, Jim and Harold Ickes, who are always needling the press, will be able to toss off cracks about the newspapers’ postal graft according to the Administrations own figures and break the force of any honest criticism of the Government. Jim Farley's accountants and service experts claim that a newspaper riding the mail as second-class matter at a very low price receives the same care and speed of delivery as a first-class letter under a three-cent stamp. Newspapermen who know the circulation business claim that this just isn't so. That should be easy to settle, and no amount of otherhanding and whoevering can justify the continuance of any rates which give the papers a free ride or a cut rate at the taxpayers’ expense.

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HERE is just no argument about the fact that some small country papers do ride absolutely free in their own respective counties and even though this is only a small item in the total deficiency which Jim charges to the handling of papers, nothing can be said to justify it. One curious thing occurs in this controversy which seems to upset the old Upton Sinclair superstition that a kept or subsidized press is servile to its sugar daddy. Because if the American press does enjoy a subsidy it has not only bitten the hand which feeds it but munched it off clear up to the shoulder.

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Target Practice Along the Potomac—By Herblock

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The Hoosier Forum

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

PROTEST DISMISSAL OF SPEEDING CASE By W. L. Burkdall

We note that the president of the Indianapolis Bar Association was arrested for speeding 44 miles per hour and was dismissed in court after testifying he was not going that fast.

We seem to remember reading also an address by this same gentleman in which he deplored the playing of politics in our Municipal Courts. Of course, since he denied speeding, the officer's speedometer must have been inaccurate. The next time I am caught speeding I will merely arise in Court, tell the judge the officer was mistaken and have my case dismissed. Yeah! Dismissed with a fine.

By B. L. Willman

The other day after 20 years of driving cars and overland trucks, with a perfect driving record of no arrest or accident, I was slated for speeding and paid a $1 and cost fine. The arresting officer told me at the time of the arrest I was going 38 miles per hour. In the court he said I was doing 40 miles per hour. On the same day Thomas Stevenson, according to newspaper reports, was slated at 44 miles per hour and dismissed. My case happened when traffic is light; Mr. Stevenson's at a time when ehilaren were going to school. I would like for someone to explain the difference.

By Clifford Reno

According to the police reports, a certain Thomas Stevenson was arrested by Officer Hill for speeding at 44 miles an hour. Stevenson simply denied this and Judge Karabell dismissed the case. I was arrested recently on Sunday morning coming home from church by Officer Long. He said he clocked me at 48 miles an hour. I went down to court and paid $5 and costs, costs suspended. During the time I was in court, I heard several other cases for speeding, none of which were dismissed, whether they pleaded guilty or not. Their speeds ranged from 40 to 50 miles an hour, and their fines were from $5 and costs, costs suspended, to $1 a mile over the limit. Is this Judge Karabell’'s idea of justice? I thought we were stamping out this slaughter caused by the so-called speeders.

By Mrs. W. F. 8S,

It seems to me that if Judge Karabell is so determined to stop traffic violation, he would be fair and square and fine all alike. On the front page of The Times recently was an account that a traffic officer, doing his duty, reported Thomas Stevenson, president of the Indianapolis Bar Association, driving 44 miles an hour. Mr. Steven-

son said he didn't believe he was,

Business—By John T. Flynn

Savers Slowly Have Collected the 18 Billion" Spent for Recovery: The Solution to the Business Slump Lies in Freeing These Dollars.

EW YORK, Jan. 11.—A number of persons have asked lately this question: What has become of all the billions spent by the Administration on relief and recovery? The Administration has spent one way or another 18 billion dollars on recovery and relief. These dollars have been paid out to people out of work, to business concerns in trouble, to workmen on public works projects. But where are they now? Why are they not still going around making business and creating purchasing power? Eighteen billion dollars is a whale of a lot of dollars. They cannot have completely disappeared. What has become of them? It would be impossible to ask a more important question. The answer to it is the key to our whole problem. A dollar has a way of keeping on the move. Give a dollar to a man and he will do one of two things with it. He will spend it or save it. If he spends it

he hands it on to another man in return for some goods or some service which he wants more than he wants the dollar. 8 ” » HEN the other man has the same choice over the fate of that dollar. And as long as the dollar is passed on from hand to hand into the possession of people who are willing to spend it, the dollar will keep on Micuing. It will be in circulation. It bwin be exercising creat purchasing power. it is con I TEAL 2 or mies BOWES, (ad 11 Jo oa ; or later every dollar comes into the

(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.)

so Judge Karabell dismissed the case. Why should he get out of paying

a fine when others have to pay?

By Charles France I have been following the traffic campaign and I think it is a fine thing. . . . But I notice that one Thomas Stevenson, Bar Association president, was arrested doing 44 miles per hour. Lots of other drivers get caught doing less than 44 miles per hour and are not so lucky as Mr. Stevenson. They have to pay a fine. Of course maybe Nolan Hill could have been mistakén about Mr. Stevenson doing 44, but it hardly seems likely when he has been right in so many other cases. .. .

n ” ” CONTENDS POLITICIANS’ CRY IS “COULD DO LOT WORSE” By Daniel Francis Clancy, Logansport

Governor Aiken of Vermont recently made public a letter wherein

RIVER WHARF By F. F. MACDONALD

The blinking stars pale o'er the desolate wharf— As night lowers a curtain of sootbesmirched fog; Commingling with the lap of the river's backwash Is the ominous cry of night-things and croak of the frog.

Loose creaking planks of the wharf now resound With steps of policemen on their perilous round; Here seething brewpots of crime have been found-— Here criminals and crooks in dank hideouts abound.

Commingling with the lap of the river's backwash Is the ominous cry of night-things and croak of the frog; And lone slinking figures that lurk near the wharf Disappear with weird shadows into the unhallowed fog!

DAILY THOUGHT

For Thou are my hope, O Lord God; Thou art my trust from my youth.—Psalms 71:5.

HERE is a God in science, a God in history, and a God in conscience, and these three ar one.—Joseph Cook. .

was set forth a nine-point program for the Republican Party. Within a few hours one of his fellow Governors gave voice to the opinion that the G. O. P. “could do a lot worse” than designate Aiken its standard bearer during the next Presidential election. Every time a politician lifts his head the least bit above his fellows, someone starts pointing at him and suggesting that his party “could do a lot worse.” Oh well, I suppose that is American politics—just button-holing someone who could be a lot worse. Irish Constitution Day was celebrated by the issuing of a new stamp—shades of Farley!

” ” # URGES PATRIOTS TO JOIN FIGHT AGAINST WAR By Jasper Douglas It is probable that those who profit by war will try to arouse the youth of America to enlist iin a war on account of the sinking of the war vessel and the oil tankers by the Japanese. We should keep coo! and think of the present in the light of the past. Spain was having trouble with her colony in Cuba. Some who wanted to get control of the sugar production of Cuba raised a hullabaloo, and finally when the Maine was sunk we went to war. When all Europe was fighting, Germany estaklished a blockade to prevent landing munitions to her foes. Our munitions makers loaced

the Lusitania with a cargo oi munitions, and Germany promptly sank the ship. We raised a howl and entered the war for our right to the high seas. We had no right to meddle with either side.

Object to Meddling

Now we have a case wnerz2 an oil company sent three ships loaded with oil which was consigned, it is supposed, to China. The Japanese objected to such meddling and sunk the vessels. Suppose we were haviny a little undeclared war with Mexico or one of the South American countries and Japan or China were to send their gunboats up the Mississippi River or into Chesapeake and Delaware Bays to guard the interests of their people in this country Kow long before we wculd tell them to go back home and mind their own business? ~Americans in China have been warned aud our :hips are there to bring them. home. If they prefer to stay, let them do so and take what they geu. Every true patriot wants our country to remain at peace. To fight against war is the job of every woman's club, iodge, labor organization and every citizen. America has 40,000,000 boys who would rush {o the colors in defense against attack, but they do not want to fight for the interests of a few.

TUESDAY, JAN. 11, 1938

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Gen. Johnson Says—

Cummings’ Annual Report Reflects

Credit on Department of Justice; His Recommendations Are Praised,

VV ASHINGTON , Jan. 11.—The annual re-

port of the Attorney General is a constructive record—not only in its recommendations for the future, but in the relation of what the Department of Justice has done in

the past year. Of course, the record of Edgar Hoover's FBI is known to everybody. The work it has done in crime suppression is a major accomplishment and the work it proposes to do in crime prevention is a matter of national concern of first magnitude, While it is true that Mr. Cume mings did not appoint Mr. Hoover, and that the latter's work is his own, yet the Attorney General insisted on his retention and has supported him in his magnificent efforts. If Homer Cummings’ plans are carried through, he will lay down the administration of Fed eral justice in far better condie tion than he took it up. His principal recommendae« tions are (1) for complete proe cedural reform, simplying and speeding the archaic rules of practice in the Federal Courts, (2) the appointment of a sufficient number of addie tional judges to insure that none of the present hearte breaking judicial delays continue for want of proper manning of the bench, (3) the creation of an administrative and fiscal overseer for the whole judicial system under the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Taken together, these three accomplishments would work a beneficent revolution in Federal Court procedure.

Hugh Johnson

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HE latter, I think, is of the utmost importance. After all, the administration of justice is a- busi ness. The planning and conduct of it is not a judicial function. It is a purely executive or managerial job. It seems incredible that the vast sprawling court system for so long has had no managerial department to plan and speed and supervise this mechanical aspect of its work. The Attorney General, pleading for the United States, is the principal litigant before these courts. He should have the smallest possible function in controle ling them. As the Attorney General points out, a cone ference of judges is bound to be ineffectual in the cone stant task of administration and business management. The Attorney General seeks to be shorn of his part of the power in the interests of a more even justice. I think it is the first time on record that the head of a bureau ever did that.

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HE report on the antitrust division by Mr. Robert Jackson, Assistant Attorney General, is partly a political screed. But every lawyer must agree with him that the antitrust acts are a flop and that, for the sake of business, big and little, as well as the public, they need a good going over. Neither Mr. Jackson nor the Attorney General make any specific recommendations for changes. But Mr. Cummings repeats what ihe is already on record as saying, that what this situation needs most is a careful and deliberate study and not more snap shooting. : After finding so many things to pan, it is a pleasure to look at the story of a whole year’s work in one

"great Cabinet branch and find so nearly a perfect

score—a well organized and manned machine hitting on all cylinders.

According to Heywood Broun—

Companion's Outburst During Mayor Hague's Speech Creates Sensation; Columnist Is Indignant Because Policeman Mistakes Him for Offender.

to spend it. If he decides to save the dollar he may do so in several ways. He may decide to bury it in a tin box under the house. In that case it is easy to see that that dollar as a spending dollar is dead as long as it is buried. But instead of doing this he may save it by invest-~

ing it. He may decide not to spend it, but to lend it to some man to build a house or buy a machine or go into business. In that case the borrower spends the dollar and the dollar starts on another career of spending, until it comes into the hands of another

saver. 2 " s

T= man may decide to save his dollar by putting it into a commercial bank or a savings bank. In that case the bank may lend it to someone who will, by spending it for building or machinery or capital uses of some sort, put it back into circulation. The importance of all this lies in this simple fact. If, when one of these dollars comes into the hands of a saver, that saver does not lend‘it or invest it or put it in a bank which lends it, then the dollar ceases its career as a spending dollar. And sooner or later every dollar arrives in the hands of a saver, This is what has been happening to the relief and recovery dollars. They have been slowly filtering into the hands of savers. They are trapped. Their only escape is when some one of these savers decides to quit saving ahd spend. The investinent jam is the key to the whole trouble, How is it to be broken?

EW YORK, Jan. 11.—I get blamed for everything. Before going to the Hague rally in Jersey City I decided that it might be a good idea to take a friend along in case there was any trouble about the visas on our passports. Crossing the border was less difficult than I had anticipated, because the monster turnout promised by the Mayor's press agents did not materialize. I think it would be quite safe to take two grains of salt before accepting one statement that 75,000 people crowded into the Armory to listen to Jersey's little Caesar. The hall was filled, but 15,000 would be a fair estimate as to its capacity, and there were perhaps a couple of thousand people milling around outside watching the roman candles and the rockets. Anything over 18,000 you could stick in your right eye. As for enthusiasm, one man’s tumult is another’s tepid applause. I have seen many more vociferous cheering sections. Johnny Gavegan, the Surrogate, acted as demonstration director, but at times the assembled cohorts were a little slow in picking up their cues. = 8 = OROTHY PARKER, for reasons unknown to me, was seated in the front row of the American Legion delegation just behind the press section. She told me that the legionnaire to her left was very affable and that they carried out quite a pleasant conversation about the climate of California. “The only difficulty,” Mrs. Parker reported, “was that whenever Mayor Hague paused my friend would say, ‘Please pardon me,” cup his hands, shout ‘Hooray!’ and then resume at the point where we had been interrupted.” They passed out the Mayor's remarks only a few minutes before he came on, and my friend and fellow found a passage on the fourth page which

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“When the big stuffed shirt gets to this,” he cone fided, “I'm going to boo.” I looked at him severely and said, “If you've any booing to do please take it away from me and go over to the other side of the hall. I'm here as a working newspaperman, and never let it be said that partisanship has reared its ugly head and ruffled my complete neutrality.” My friend went away, but presently he was back again, and right in the middle of a Hague periodic sentence he cut through the orator’s cadence with “Nuts!” in clear tones. ” 8 o EVER in my experience has a single word created such a sensation. The mood of Mayor Hague's henchmen was not so much anger as one of horror, Everybody waited, fully expecting that lightning would come through the ceiling and strike the offender dead or that she-bears wouid amble down the aisle and eat him up. Apparently it was the first time in all Mayor Hague's life that anybody had ever said anything to him but “Yes.” . “Who interrupted?” roared Frank Hague, but after waiting a moment for somebody to bring him the miscreant’s head on a platter he went on with his oration. But something was missing. In his confusion the speaker referred t0 Roger Baldwin as “a slack dodger,” and'some of his sentences neither scanned nor made any particular sense. I was very sorry, but I was also indignant, because I was the fellow the nearest cop selected to tap on the shoulder and warn. “None of that, now.” The next