Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 11 March 1939 — Page 10

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p> RILEY 5551 Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Woy

SATURDAY, MARCH 11, 1939

COSTLY BLUNDER ROM now until 1940 we can look forward to almost continuous ‘debate between Republicans and Democrats over responsibility for the weak record of this Legislature. It began the other day with Gov. Townsend attacking the

Republicans for lack of co-operation and Arch N. Bobbitt,

spokesman for the Republicans, calling attention to the obstructionist tactics of the Democrats. This seems to us to be the old story of the pot calling the kettle black. The record shows each party responsible for blocking meritorious legislation; each so interested in its own welfare that it forgot about the rest of the state.

The state’s taxation laws, for example, seriously needed overhauling. But in spite of admitted defects in the gross income tax law and in the tax on trucks nothing was accomplished toward improving either law. For these failures the Administration was solely and directly responsible. But more disturbing than the fact that this Administration was either unprepared or indifferent to these needs is the fact that the 1941 Legislature will be equally unprepared to make the necessary revisions. No one on either side of the House had the foresight to set up a Tax Study Commission or any other machinery for dealing with the problem two years from now. Next to the failure to amend our tax laws, this may prove to be the most serious blunder of the session.

BARGAIN WITH BRAZIL THE cost of two 35,000-ton battleships is about $120,000,000. That same amount—$120,000,000—-is approximately what will be involved directly and indirectly in the new United States program of financial aid to Brazil. Unfortunately, we have to build battleships, and hope that we will never have to use them. Fortunately, the Brazilian Government may be a decisive factor in making the use unnecessary. Brazil will do more business with the United States, less with Germany. Hitler’s chances of gaining political influence over Brazil, as a resul; of German economic penetration, will be ended if the new agreement works as it should. Brazil will have a better market for her products. United States interests will have better customers in Brazil, and American investments there will be more secure. We will have excellent prospects of getting back, not only the new credits and advances to be made to Brazil, but also of recovering- much of the American money now tied up in defaulted Brazilian bonds: In this agreement, we think, President Roosevelt and Secretary Hull on the one hand, and Foreign Minister Aranha on the other, have driven what is, from the viewpoint of both countries, one of the best of bargains.

THE WAGNER ACT

HILE considering the legalistic angles of three vital Supreme Court decisions on the National Labor Relations Board, don’t overlook the latest Gallup poll. ‘That remarkably accurate reflection of democracy’s final arbiter—public opinion—shows more than 66 per cent in ail income groups are dissatisfied with the Wagner act today against 34 per cent who want it unchanged, When it is considered that, normally, the general public ‘always has been sympathetic toward labor in disputes with capital, this is startlingly significant. [t is an underscored warning to labor leadership. For in that poll, union laborers as well as the unorganized public speak. The poll means that a lot of union workers are expressing their dissatisfactior. at the disruption of the job at a time when the job is more precious than ever before in our history. It is a tipoff to labor leadership that the rank and file want continuity of employment, and are fed up with paying dues info a contest for power and position at the top of labor unionism itself. This expression is more than a mere int that the rank and file of union labor, and the general public, do not regard that law, the purpose of which is benign but the execution of which has creaked, knocked and rattled, as something graven in rock. ;

principle of collective bargaining. Hearings on the amendment question have been post-

poned by the Senate Education and Labor Committee, to | see what comes of the President’s appeal for the A. F. of L. | That shouldn’t mean that |

and C. I. O. to get together. the hearings should be abandoned. And those who contend for suppression of all consideration of changes to clarify the act are adding to, not subtracting from, the Ne which the Gallup poll records—the tide of public resentment against, the devastating cost of industrial stagnation.

WISCONSIN COLONELS

HEN we think of Wisconsin we think of many things —but not of colonels on a mass production basis. Kentucky’s the state for that. However, Wisconsin's new Republican Governor, Julius P. Heil, invading the feld in which Kentucky's Ruby Laffoon was once supreme, has appointed 57 honorary colonels to his military staff sinc hé took office in January. And so a Progressive State Senator, Philip Nelson, has introduced in the Legislature a bill to regulate the Wiscongin colonel industry as follows: The number of colonels ‘shall not exceed 5000; not more than 10 per icent shall weigh more than 200 pounds each; not more than 2000 shall be residents of Milwaukee (Governor Heil’s' home) ; not more than 1000 shall belong to the same club or society; mounted colonels shall ride only on white Percherons; and the daily rations for colonels shall be restricted to one pony (434, gallons) of beer, 32 ounces of bonded whisky and 15 pours of “select food.” The proposals seem liberal, as, of course, the proposals the Wisconsin Progressives always are. To he onel has not been one of our burning ambitions, hut if e Nelson bill passes we might be persuaded to accept one

in Indianz, $3 a year;

a

lIn Washington By Raymond Clapper

Political and Economic Interests Of Brazil Linked With U. S. in New

Pact, With Germany the Loser.

YY ‘SHiNaroN, March 11.—Of great significance, both political and economic, is the tie-up just effected between the United States and Brazil. Beckoned by Germany, Brazil has chosen the United States. It means just that. Politically, the arrangement means that Germany's s hope of using Brazil as her foothold on the Western Hemisphere has been crushed. Economically, the

arrangement means that American capital and

American interests will have the inside track ‘in Brazil. Thus the political and economic interests of

this South . American country, which is as large as

the United States plus another Texas, are pointed

toward the United States instead of ort total- |

itarian countries in Europe. This is a two-way deal from which both parties stand to benefit. .®8 » 8 : RAZIL promises, among other things, to undertake the following: 1. Resume payment of interest and principal on some $350,000,000 in defaulted bonds owned by American citizens. 2. Create a central bank, somewhat after the Federal Reserve System, which will steady the value of Brazilian currency in terms of dollars, to eliminate violent fluctuations which cause American exporters so much grief. 3. Remove restrictions from the exchange market, re-establishing a free monetary economy so that Americans doing business in Brazil can obtain their money and bring it out.

4. Employ U. S. financial experts in setting up this :

machinery. 5. Give American investors edualiiy of treatment with citizens of Brazil. That is particularly important because pending in Brazil is discriminatory legislation which will be dropped.

» ® = Tee United States undertakes the following: 1. President Roosevelt will ask Congress.to authorize advance of up to 50 million dollars in gold to Brazil's new central bank reserve, to be repaid out of Brazil's annual gold production. Brazil mines eight to 10 million dollars in gold annually, about one-fourth

of which would be available for Tepayment to the United States.

2. Our export-import bank will advance $19,-

200,000 on a two-year credit to enable Brazil to abandon at once controlled foreign exchange and to switch to a free exchange basis for U. S. trade. 3. The export-impert bak will co-operate with American manufacturers and exporters in assisting them to extend long-term credit for purchase of railway equipment and other capital goods much needed for development of Brazil. Each deal will stand on its own feet. 4. American Government agricultural experts will be lent to assist Brazil in developing rubber, quinine, certain hardwoods and other noncompeting products which the United States could use. It is understood that the Brazilian decrees to be issued under the arrangement will make it extremely difficul; for Germany to make. further progress with the system of blocked marks which she has been using in Brazilian trade. Thus Secretary Hull’s reciprocal trade policy comes through with flying colors in its collision in Brazil with Germany's managed discriminatory system.

Business By John T. Flynn

F. D. R. Likely to Find It Difficult To Know What to Do for Business.

EW YORK, March 11.—There is a widely held view that if the President were just to give in to business and do what businessmen want that we would see very quickly a glorious expansion of business activity, & “If the President should do this—should go the limit on appeasement—there are many pious souls who may be enormously Surprised if nothing important happens. The simple truth is that business is one thing and businessmen another. Doing something for business does not necessarily mean doing what businessmen want. Businessmen do not always know what is best for business, as witness their angry opposition to Carter Glass’ Federal Reserve system and their valiant championing of it 20.years later. If there is one thing which is obvious it is that businessmen do not necessarily understand the mechanisms of the economic system of which they

‘are a part.

They may know how to produce goods, how to sell them, how to manage their accounts wisely, how to make a dollar go farthest. know just how their own business and all the other industries in the country can be made to mesh into a well-geared and: operating machine. : One of the greatest businessmen in the country once said to me that he knew how to make steel, that he had immense plants with every implement necessary to produce great quantities of steel. But what he did not know was how purchasing power Soul be created to buy the steel he knew how to make.

He Finally Gave Up

He told me that President Hoover had summoned him in 1930, again in 1931 and finally in 1932 to ask what he thought ought to be done. The first two times he told Mr.. Hoover with complete confidence what ought to be done to restore prosperity. But in 1932 he had run out of advice. He said to me: “I felt that Hoover in those three years ought to have at least found out that I didn’t know anything

_1t is to tie interest of all labor that the ameidment *™New no

i pe net blindly opposed, but instead that it he ap-| idea y op : p | do something to revive private investment. If he fails

proached open-mindediy, in a spirit of preserving the | to do this he and his party are sunk.

Now no one will deny that politi~ally and, for that matter, socially, the only course for the President is to

But the President is going to find that business is as difficult to appease as the dictators. Having surrendered—and his statement that he has no more bills or plans to offer must be taken as such—business will now expect him to go the whole way.

’ : . A Womans Viewpoint By Mrs. Walter Ferguson I HERE are two worlds in the life of the nation,

the world of man and the world of woman. Nature has done well to entrust the man with the care

| of the nation. The woman’s world is her family, her

husband and her home.” Adolf Hitler speaking, ladies and gentlemen, upon the occasion when he ordered German women from the universities and the professions. We hear next from certain legislators of Oklahoma with House Bill No. 316, which is “An Act relating to the employees of the state, counties, municipal subdivisions and school districts; prohibiting the employ=ment of married women where the husband of such employee is earning as much as $100 per month. Fix« ing penalties, defining terms and declaring an emergency. ” In effect, do not these statements say precisely the same thing? When the women of a democratic republic are coerced by man-made laws and told that they shall not work if they are married, and that if they expect to hold their jobs they cannot marry, then we have the same sort of dictatorships which started the Nazi Cyclone on his ruthless way. Whatever finesounding names we may give to our law, it smells of dictatorship. It is dictatorship! Such measures are vicious. Our economic situation may be dangerous, but no matter how far we slide into depressions we shall never be in more peril than we now are from the trend evident in so many states, where an effort is being made to pass laws which will give power to one group of citizens by taking it away from another group. e ghosts of pioneer mothers ought to sweep ov

But they may well not:

plan its national income and carry

ELLLES

DELL

y ? ® ST J The Hoosier Forum I wholly disagree with what you say, but will : defend to the death your right to say xVolizive:

x

\ }

SAYS NATIONAL INCOME SHOULD BE PLANNED By H. R. S. Our economic quack doctors are legion. Mr. Hopkins hopes to bring the national income back up to 70 billion this year. That is a modest objective. He hopes to achieve this by coaxing business leaders to invest money and expand production. Government has long ago assumed power to regulate business; it has never assumed power to direct business to operate for the public service. The productive capacity of American enterprise is capable of an annual income of 100 billion dollars. Just why we should allow, busisness to limit our income to 70 billion is not yet explained. Why must the national income be left to chance or to the caprice of those who own the property rights it represents? Why should not the sovereign power have a voice in setting the operating schedules of American industry? Why should private ownership have absolute control as to what rate of production it will allow the public to endure? What is this sovereign power anyway, if it cannot control its economic standards of living? Is there a super government that can tell us not to demand production at full capacity? Apparently so. At least no attempt has ever been made to enforce a public right on private enterprise to operate for the social good.” It was this failure to operate for the public good that caused the economic ‘distress in Germany and Italy and that brought about government dictation for preduction. ~ We must not wait for a crisis to come before we set about the busi ness of planning our nétional income. It cannot be left to chance or to the will of private enterprise. Business has a national obligation to operate as the Nation’s needs appear. This operating schedule should be decided upon annually around the conference table, by representatives of business, government, labor, farmers and financiers. The fate of democracy depends upon the economic efficiency of our industrial machine. Democracy must

out definite schedules of operation. We cannot survive on chance cr whim, : ” ” ” URGES SUPPRESSION OF BINGO GAMES By Ralph A. Thompson In my opinion the Safety Board is to be praised for its de-

games. Let us hope that their

decision results in prompt, deci-§

sive action. Enforcement agencies haven't been very conscientious about enforcing antigambling laws

cision to stop the operation of bingoy-

(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.)

or these games would have been stopped long ago. If bingo is to continue, no ‘favoritism should be shown, Let us have slot machines, marble games; let everyone shoot craps and play poker unmolested, operate dog and horse betting, roulette, faro and all other gambling devices.

® = x CITES GANDHI AS EXAMPLE TO WORLD By Observer : Strange, is it not, that in far-off

India one slight and aged man, so frail physically that it seems he might blow away, can cause viceroys and potentates to await a sign from him. Strange that a tiny and wizened patriarch can be the unperturbed storm-center of the political and social winds that blow across India’s millions. Strange that this man, with no storm troops, no trained ruffians or streetfighters at his disposal, can yet wield a power given to few. BY. his purely negative act of selfstarvation, he forces compromise and concession from those who have the armed might of an empire behind them. Why? Mohandas K. Gandhi wields the weapon which at the last wields all other weapons—an idea, and an ideal. He has followers, yes. Not men trained in a military manner to obey, unthinking, his commands. But men and women by the thousands who are devoted to his idea, his ideal,. of increasing self-govern-ment for his couniry, India. They follow not his orders, but his life;

PEACEFUL THOUGHT By. MARY JANE Lend a helping hand To those in need; As you tread life's highway. ‘Cheerfulness and kindness: Take with you on the way; It will leave behind you A pathway of happiness.

DAILY THOUGHT.

Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called.—I Corinthians 7:20.

O thoroughly occupied man was ever yet very Miserable ~L. E. Landon.

not his teachings. alone, but his | living. : >

has never had a thought for hime

‘has lived for his cause, and for

They know that for 20" ‘years this wizened, almost toothless little. man

self, not for his avn comfort or his very life. They know that while other leaders hope for place and advancement, Gandhi wants nothing but to see his idea made reality. They know that he has done more

than the millions of men who have given their lives for causes. Gandhi

theirs, thing.

So the mute protest of a frail old man of nearly 70, whose gnome-like body scarcely scales 85 pounds, is sufficient to force a great empire to come to terms, because within the failing flesh there burns the flame of i an idea, selfless: and unquenchable.

In years to come, it is possible that the brutalities of forceful rule may be listed in history as a mere catalog .of meaningless disturbances of a bygone age. But ‘those same future historians may write pages about a little old man who .trusted in ideas alone, and who, because his people trusted him, won more lasting victories without raising his hand than ever Napoleon blasted out upon the battlefields of Europe.

sa 8°

It is a harder and a rarer

” THINKS PEGLER UNFAIR IN ESTIMATE OF SINGERS By Charles Wisner Rarrell Westbrook Pegler writes himself down as considerably less than “fair enough” when he makes a virtue of his own tone-deafness by asking, ‘Is singing ever an art?” He also shows a surprising lack of imagination when he brashly refers to Marian ‘Anderson as “a hitherto obscurs singer.” At least three years ago Arturo Toscanini, who is amply qualified to speak on the art that seems unknown to Westbrook Pegler, said: “A voice like Marian Anderson’s is heard only once in a hundrei years,”

It is an easily asdriainable’ fact that she has been acclaimed as the foremost contralto of our time by musical authorities, Season after season hundreds of thousands oi music lovers throughout the European capitals have packed the largest halls available to hear her sing. Even in faraway Pinlafd she has been the recipient of the highest honors ever accorded any American in any branch of art. More than one of the crowned Heads in the Old World have entertained tiis charming and highly talented Philadelphian with the golden voice. ay s

MORE ; Tins LESS 00? 1 YOUR OCOINION cmos = comvaianr wae som once

YOU cannot make a general rule. It depends. Certainly men are far more conservative and

modest in their clothes, and they about

ithe other hand, a recent investiga-

LET'S EXPLORE YOUR MIND

By DR. ALBERT EDWARD WIGGAM

ARE LAZY 2y PEOPLE IO EA THA REST EaE AND-COMING EOPLE TO Pi "CRIME? yes camo

tion showed men college students to be considerably more liberal and less opposed ‘to changes in eur mar-

found by psychologists to be at

»

than women my in phases of social welfare, women are the liberals and progressives.

» ” 2 . IT IS just one little straw that shows which way the wind blows and indicates that the wind is blowing in your case toward a selfcentered, neurotic personality. It indicates. you are suspicious of pedple, feel ‘they are rather agin’ you, and that you have a sort of persecuted feeling. Of ‘course one swallow does not make a summer nor does one trait describe anyone’s entire personality, but this has been

least an Unfavorable indication. » » CRIMINALS are all lazy - J they want swagger, wear loud clothes and jewelry, spend money freely where others can see them—and yet are too lazy to work for these things as other people do. Very few of them have ever developed regular work habits. I spent a day one time at Joliet Penitentiary with Herman Adf®r, Illinois

State Criminologist, ~&nd- August|

Vollmer, famous Berkeley, Cal., Police Chief. Dr, Adler told ‘me hat in building the new prison most of the prisoners learned a skilled trade

an arbitrary and uncompromising attitude.

'| did not’ sleep a hk all ‘as many as five or six hours of Slash between

so well and found how ‘enjoyable it was to work on something inter

Gen. Johnson

Says—

Innocent Public Worst Sufferers In Washington Strike Which Again Shows Need for Mediation Law,

ASHINGTON, March 11—~There is a strike against many of the leading Washington hotels. The waiters want a closed shop, the managers to agree to hire none but.union waiters. The hotels are willing to give the union “preference” in hiring wait ers, but not an exclusive monopoly. The picket line is of the “chain” variety, pickets in columns cone

| stantly walking back and forth in front of all ene ‘trances. ‘| pictures whenever they catch big-shot politicos walke

Press photographers are on the job to take

ing through picket lines. To avoid having the President do this, a party in his honor at a principal hotel has been called off. That raises a problem. Very few people like to crash a picket line. Politicians especially do not like to do so—and get caught at it. But Washington is only a temporary residence for most members: of Congress. Hotels are the only homes some have, Even if they move, they know that these affairs never last very long and that they will be moving back again at once. Some of them have leases. They can’t move without breaking or forfeiting them. In this strike, the teamsters have joined sympathetically by re using to deliver food and supplies to - ‘hotels on str yo» 8 ; THAT this all boils down to is a strike against the guests as well as the hotels, an interfere ence with innocent bystanders who are in no posie tion to aid or hinder either side of the argument. Speaking. generally, hotel employees have had less consideration than many other groups. More advane tage has been taken of them. They work longer hours at lower wages. Their conditions of employe ment are less stable. One reason why they never had more consideration was that they had never had a strong union. NRA got more for them than they had ever had before because it didn’t require a union, But although NRA took the Washington hotels to prosperity from a general state of collapse, those hotels- were backward about improving the condition of their help. In this particular local difficulty, the workers are not asking for more wages but only for the closed shop to strengthen their union. Knowing so well the history of their case, it is impossible not ta sympathize strongly with them. . EJ ® ”

UT it is also impossihje not to sympathize with the"

innocent guests who are caught between these conflicting forces and are virtually having their homes picketed and their food supply , restricted through no fault of their own.

This kind of situation rises every time there is a strike in a “service” industry—elevators, hotels, railroads—any calling upon which the public depends for the daily business of living. In the tailroads such strikes rarely happen because there is good statutory machinery for mediation. The public is almost never suddenly held up with a gun in its stomach because either side of a labor dispute takes It has a “stake in this controversy and a way to make

its voice heard. Sure such ‘machinery is a ‘necessary part of secure an

By Heywood Broun

Constructive Suggestion On:How to Help Our Railroa

IAMI, Fla., March 11—On many diners a slogan is served to the passenger along with the olives. He is asked to help ‘save the American railroads.” I am glad: to report that I am ready to step forward with a highly constructive suggestion. And it came to me on a diner during the middle of the evening meal. Just across the groaning board there sat a lady and ‘her son, a manly lad of five. Junior was fractious. His mother ascribed that to his tonsils, but I believe his disability was deeper. “Junior is going to drink his nice big glass of orange juice,” she said and shoved the tepid draught in his direction. That, I think, is a wrong approach. After the manner of cod liver oil, orange juice should be forced down the throat of each tiny tot. It doesn’t make any difference whether. he likes it or not, and it is a pity that a parent should descend to the sheer hypocrisy of pretending that orange juice unadorned is a zippy beverage. They couldn’ fool Junior. “l don’t want no orange juice,” said Junior in a voice which suggested adenoids as well as tonsils, And the little rascal reached out to hurl the contents of the glass at a passing waiter. Just in time his mother caught his wrist, but she failed to break it. , “Junior,” she announced with false optimism, “is going to drink all of his lovely glass of milk.” This time the cute shaver was too quick for her and he spilled the entire contents of his lovely glass of milk right in my lap. The dining car steward said I took it like a gentleman. As I remember, I told the lady that. it. was an old suit anyway and that we were all young once.

Fare Should Be Reduced

But right here the idea hit me of how to save the American railroads. First of all, half fare is too much for children. They should travel for one-quarter fare, And nobody should be allowed to take his child into a coach, sleeper, parlor car or lounge. Each child should be checked at the beginning of the journey and claimed when the ride has ended. Here and there a parent will protest that it is harsh to put his little boy in the baggage car. There may even be a fear that there will be confusion in distributing the various offspring in the depot. That's nonsense. If properly tagged and stamped, there should be slight incidence of error. I know a man who ships Airdales from Great Barrington, Mass, all over the country. He says he has never had a single puppy go astray for more than a day or two. But, anyhow, we must save the railroads, and we will even help the youth movement by taking up dee vices to keep it off the toes of fellow travelers.

Watching Your Health

By Dr. Morris Fishbein

TE experts who list everything in terms of mathe-:

matical facts have calculated we spend one-third of our lives in sleep. Of course, for most people the figure is much higher because babies may sleep as much as 12 out of 24 hours, and some adults never get" over the habit. There are, however, other persons who seem to do very well indeed with five or six hours of sleep day after day. Probably most of those who have accomplished the greatest success in life from the point of .view of

productivity have slept less than those who have -

averaged 10 hours daily.

There would seem to be a “best” amount of sleep -

for each individual. Thus it has been reported that Thomas Edison got along on about four hours & night. We know, however, that many a man who gets along with four or five hours of sleep a night can be immensely. refreshed by as little as five minutes of . sleep during the day. Shane ‘human body tends to recover very rapidly from exhaustion, provided there is complete rest. It seems doubtful that under modern conditions of living many people can spend eight Wburs each night in actual sleep.

Fortunately, however, if one night happens io be

curtailed, or if five or six nights in a row happen to

be curtailed in total amount of sleep, one or two

nights of sleep of about eight hours each will apparently bring about recovery. Actually, however, most, people do ‘not. recognize how well they sleep. The person who insists that he . night has probably put in periods

of tossing and wakefulness, sleep

Few: people

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