Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 11 May 1939 — Page 19
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THURSDAY, MAY 11, 1939
LEADING NOWHERE HERE is this “leadership of Congress” much about a few months ago? Remember? Right after the purges had failed, and a lot of “ves, ves" Congressmen had been liquidated. And in January, when the lawmakers with a new mandate from the people returned to Washington to take over. There
we heard so
was much tall talk then, about how Congress was going to pitch in and economize, tool down the rough edges of New |
Deal laws, make social reforms more workable, pass scientific tax legislation, re-establish business confidence, increase business volume, solve unemployment by restoring prosperity, Well, Congress is now in its fifth month—and still coasting. It has passed a Government Reorganization Bill, which the President asked for two vears ago, giving the executive power to do some minor reshuffling of bureas but taking no responsibility on its own shoulders. It has approved some defense legislation which the President asked, | adding a few pork-barrel projects for good measures. It | has voted, or is in the process of approving, the various appropriations bills. On the first of these it whetted the pruning knife: curs | rently, however, the practice is not to cut below the budget figures, but to add on. Witness what is happening to the! agriculture appropriation: the Senators are adding a few hundred millions here and a few millions there, to a point where that one supply bill is now nearly 400 million dollars above the budget estimates, After long delay, committees of the two houses got around to hearings on amendments to the Wagner Act. No step was taken toward rationalizing the Social Security taxes until after the Administration, through Secretary Morgenthau, made a specific recommendation. And nothing whatever has been done toward revising corporate taxes, admittedly necessary to build business volume and revenue. Tall talk has yielded to long vawns. Winter has gone and spring is going. The boys in Congress, who a few months ago were about to take governmental matters in their own hands and restore confidence, are now saying that maybe they had better go home and rest. Rest from what?
OTHER PEOPLE'S RAILROADS “WW HATS wrong with the railroads?” is a question that grows shopworn from much asking and much answering, though little enough ig done about it. A recent incident symbolizes one of the worst maladies of the railroads—the control of great transportation networks, actually the property of thousands of bondholders and stockholders, by men interests are closer to stock tickers than to ton-miles and whose investment is relatively trivial. A few years ago, when the Van Sweringen brothers of Cleveland were up against it, their friend George A. Ball, the Indiana manufacturer of glass jars, bought up some of their collateral from the bankers. His purchase included 2,000,000 shares of the Allegheny Corp., for which he paid $274,682, Those shares, bid in for a pittance, gave Mr. Ball working control of Allegheny, and therefore control of the whole 23,000 mile railroad system of which the Chesapeake & Ohio is the mainspring, for Allegheny was at the top of a holding-company pyramid erected by the Vans. Mr. Ball was content to let the brothers run the show, but in 1935 and 1836 they died and the responsibility became his. Two years ago he sold the Allegheny stock to a couple of Eastern financiers for $4,000,000 plus a note for 2.375.000. Now that note has been defaulted, and Mr. Ball with his nickel's worth of stock is again at the throttle of the multibillion-dollar Van Sweringen system (except for large sections of it that are being run by trustees). And still people ask, “What's wrong with the railroads 2”
THE METHODIST CHANGES FTER a seven-year interval, Indianapolis again is to have a resident bishop of the Methodist Church. Bishop Titus Lowe of Portland, Ore., who has served in mission fields, has been assigned to Indianapolis and leadership over the estimated 850,000 Methodists in Indiana. Indianapolis cordially welcomes Bishop Lowe. It is proud of its churches and proud that a bishop of this great denomination should be permanently located here. He and the other leaders of the church begin their new terms following a merger which brings together three divisions of Methodism, the Methodist Protestant, Methodist Episcopal, and Methodist Episcopal Church, South. An estimated 8,000,000 members are thus brought within one organization. Indianapolis is happy that Bishop Edgar Blake of Detroit, who previously had jurisdiction in Indiana, is to continue in charge of the Michigan area under the reorganization. Indiana members hold him in great affection. Particularly will they remember him for his unselfish work in the flooded areas of Indiana two years ago, an effort that affected his health.
whose
BORN 30 YEARS TOO SOON?
ELEVISION, the slow-born offspring of science and ine dustry, is precociously cutting its labor-trouble teeth | before it is half dry behind the ears. Several unions are already engaged in a jurisdictional dispute, friendly so far, over the right to represent tele- | vision actors and singers. The Actors Equity Association claims a prior lien on performers in this new field. The American Federation ot Radio Artists thinks it should have charge. The Screen Actors Guild also is interested, since some television programs are to be filmed first and telecast from celluloid. Television may be a child of the streamline age, but | it looks as if it will have to cope, with some old-fashioned |
problemiinherited from hors uggy days.
Re a —
ww
Price in Marion Coun- |
rushing out to commit mass suicide?
| to turn public opinion toward war.
| equally marked. She questions, she talks. but she
| she doesn't know what to do.
Fair Enough By Westbrook Pegler
He Respectfully Declines to Accept Reported Bid to Appear Before Florida Legislature in Capone Probe.
OUISVILLE. Ky, May 11.—<The A. P. reports from Tallahassee that I have been subpenaed | by the Florida Legislature to discuss the probability | of Al Capone's return to Miami on his release from | prison and the activities, meanwhile, of some of his old Chicago and Cicero colleagues in that happy land. This invitation has not been received to date and would be declined, anyway. The first phase of the subject is speculative, and the rest of it can be cov-
ered better by examination of Florida politicians, po lice, editors and race track operators and racketeers
| on the ground.
For a beginning the Legislature need not go oute | side its own membership for witnesses, because Senator Ernest Graham, who is running the customary | postseason crime-must-go-campaign, charges that many of his fellow members have accepted graft from the horse and gambling promoters either in outright cash bribes or in the form of race track patronage—which is to say, jobs for themselves, their kin and their constituents. Armed though he is with authority to examine books, records and corresponds ence, the Senator has merely puttered.
- - ”
OR one reasen, he is a farmer, not a lawyer, and another reason could be the fact—which he admits—that he himself put in for his regular share of the race-track jobs on behalf of his constituents. In most states a general charge of corruption by one member of the Legislature against others would be a serious matter, but Florida is different. The so-called small counties which run the State regard the Miami pleasure county as a sort of foreign settlement or de luxe slum. They derive big revenues from the mutuel business, and if hoodlums move in that is a local Miami headache. If it should be shown that backwoods or upstate statesmen chiseled private profit from the sinful pleasures of this alien spot public opinion
| would be likely to admire rather than deplore.
The racing business, with its gambling ramifica« tions extending out over the country, seems to be heading up to a general delousing. The Department
| of Justice and the Treasury have taken an interest | In the system by which bets are booked in every | city and town of any size at all and by which, also,
the odds are regulated at the track by the applica« tion of money pressure on the mutuel machines.
” SUCKER placing a bet with the subagent in the
” o
saloon or cigar store in Saugerties finds that
part of his own money is dumped into the machines at the track to shorten the profit should he win. In effect, he bets against himself
Racing is a gambling operation involving about al quarter of a billion dollars a year in the mutuels, |
aside from the poolrooms and books, and occupies the status of a licensed vice
In Florida the racing lobby operates as openly as | any other lobby in the Legislature, and recently this |
licensed vice threatened to fold up, thus depriving the
State of $2000000 a year in taxes if the Legislature |
had the temerity to tamper with its privileges. From this, it will be seen that a racket has grown so big and bold that it now presumes to govern the governs ment of the State
Business Sy John T. Flynn
Competition Between 3 Economic
Systems Seen as Barrier to War. |
EW YORK, May 11.-—There is one powerful reason why friends of human freedom should hope for the postponement of war. In the world today there is a great competition. It is a contest between three economic systems— the Communist, the Fascist and the democratic capitalist systems. Leaving out external influences nothing could be more certain than that the victory will go to the system which succeeds within its own borders. { For instance, if Germany were to bring to an end | her warlike adventures and focus upon her internal | economy and by this means produce a great, orderly | abundance and happy life for her people, nothing | could save the world from fascism. Similarly if | Russia succeeds in slowly and year by year raising the standard of life for her people, improving their education, bringing economic stability and abundance. | nothing can save the world from communism. Our own system faces the same test | In the same way nothing could so quickly and definitely bring fascism to an end as a complete | collapse of the economic systems of Italy and Gere | many. And this is what many economists in this | country have been expecting. There are a number | of economists who scout this expectation. They like {0 say that Germany is operating upon an economic system which defies the laws of what are scorns fully called orthodox economics My view is this criticism is invalid
Other Issues Involved It is,
<
d indeed, not wholly a questicn ot economics There is the human reaction to economic conditions to be considered. The notion that the German is sO utterly lost to all sense of independent action that he will never resist Hitler is a mere assumption, But what is more important is this: That the measules which the government is employing are proaucing certain social and economic conditions which it has tc find means of coping with, For instance, the pressure on war material proauction has severely dislocated the industries producing consumers goods. At the same time the haste in war proauction has created a shortage of labor, With a shortage of labor, everybody employed, and thus a rise in purchasing power and a shortage of consumer [004ds, the struggle to control prices hecomes continuously more difficult. Al this calls for ever newer | and more ruthless forms of labor control Moreover the speed with which machines have been used, the limited supplies of proper foods and the long hours have been using up both machines and men. Its standards of living are steadily de- |
creasing. How long can this last?
{ i | { |
- ——————
A Woman's Viewpoint By Mrs. Walter Ferguson
OMEN are beginning to wonder how much | : power they actually possess in this country. They've listened to a lot of talk—talk about their influence over men. Their ownership of 75 per cent of the nation’s wealth has been repeatedly broadcast. They know their purchasing power is practically unlimited and how much their approval or disapproval means to businessmen. And so they are pondering a bewildering inconsistency, Is it possible that the possessors of sll this amassed wealth, and all this economle influence, and all this force for swaying masculine opinion. are powerless to prevent their sons, brothers and husbands from
It can hardly be denied that efforts are being made t 4 Evidences are too oby lous to be ignored and, in spite of the fears they raise in the breast of the housewife, her inertia is
seldom acts, because she is honest enough to confess
Others are acting, however. And so I believe all leaders of women's groups, big and small, in every community, should call their members together in order to discover the tenor of the feminine mind on this momentous question. And, having discovered | it, every effort shoulg be directed toward using it. It's time to lay other projects aside. Let culture ! rest until we know our country is safe for its afl- | vancement. Another and sterner job is at hand. The women of America ought to present a united front to their business leaders and their Congres- | sional representatives in a vast protest against any | onstition of our istake of 1917. If we have power, et’s use it. If not, let's stop an to our real Ns i he Or A Ee Wie
Chas SR 3 ba AI fo . cs ¥
An
THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES On Borrowed Time!—By Talburt
In
THURSDAY, MAY 11, 1939
Washington
By Raymond Clapper
defend to
The Hoosier Forum
I wholly disagree with what you say, but will
the death your right to say it.—Voltaire.
THINKS BUSINESS NOT ‘READY’ FOR RECOVERY By H. L. Seeger It was a pleasant surprise to see Mr. Bruce Catton's column in your paper giving an account of the movement to rally the nation's lib-| erals behind a concrete program for ending unemployment, and re- | storing prosperity through drastic | Government action, under the Industrial Reconstruction Bill about | to be introduced in Congress. ! Of course there is not even a remote chance that the bill will pass Business is not ready for recovery. The speeches before the U. S| | Chamber of Commerce indicate elo- | quently that the average business man accepts mostly mythology | | about politics and economics. The | average businessman thinks the Re- | | publican Party is responsible for] | prosperity, even though 12 years of
| ment including Maj. Dyer's pension
it had already gone past, far ahead of schedule. Just what was the grand idea?
(Times readers are invited to express their views in these columns, religious cone troversies excluded. Make your latter short, so all can have a chance. Letters must be signed, but names will be withheld on request.)
(Editor's Note: The parade started earlier because of an error on the part of a circus executive.) » » SUGGESTS ‘CEREMONY’ FOR EUTHANASIA VICTIMS By Harley I. Newton When great emergencies arise in the history of a nation, and a crisis is impending, usually a Cincinnatus
or a Cromwell comes to the front, and saves his nation from destruc-
and the pauper's charity. They are not an investment. Whether your tax is big or little, it gives you no
right to the earnings of another, With all due respect, paupers are no more selfish than the rest of humanity. They labored, they were paid for their work, they spent their wages, they saved nothing, they beparasites on the taxpayers’ We have parasites in all
tion, History has repeated itself and again the once unknown man has come to the front to save his country, This time it is an obscure Major of the United States Army, by the name of Dyer, who had the cour-
came lican people how the troublesome
|
(age to state plainly to the Amer-|
Republican rule caused the worst | labor. collapse of business in our national classes, rich, middle class and poor. history, | There is this difference. The rich
There is a serious question as to|and middle class parasites live on whether business can really be civi-| ; : the earnings of their parents and
lized: whether it can be organized | . as a profession with standards and elatives. The pauper parasites live
ethics that relate it primarily to On the taxpayers’ earnings. the common good, instead of act= | y & =o
ing solely for its promoters’ gain. RESENTS EARLY START Business shoul shar itt | NTS . § siness should be charged with OF CIRCUS PARADE
a definite obligation to operate in By Henrietta Claybourne
the interest of the public welfare, as well as rechive the protection of | pyplicity was given to the effect property by law. We shall have to that the circus parade would not leave the grounds until 11 a. m,
return the Republicans to power but, to the chagrin of many hun-
again to demonstrate anew the incptitude of the party before we are qreds of housewives who brought their children downtown to see it,
ready to think more constructively. TO YOU
” » INSISTS ALL HAVE | By JOSEPHINE DUKE MOTLEY |My thoughts of you unfold
EQUAL OPPORTUNITY By James R. Mecitzler, Attica We are all born naked. The op-| Like rosebuds bathed in morning portunities of life are before vt ener ind fragile, gold, Some achieve great success. The, Yet eloquently true, majority pay their wag. Many fail!
‘and become pauper parasites. Great On: May some gentle breeze
minds, like comrade Sprunger’s, | In RRsSIng, their soft fragrance have thought out the cause of fail- On zephyr wings through space and ure. It is the wicked capitalists, the trees successful, the owners of property,| And touch you sweetly there.
the taxpayers. Failure is not due to any fault of the pauper. No, hog DAILY THOUGHT been bamboozled by those who own| But the word of the Lord enproperty. An alibi, and an excuse to| dqureth forever. And this is the Hoth n on Mi CPE of others. word which by the gospel is n Army job is not productive in| pp VOU .— : the sense of creating Oe It pro- preuchey vite: you = Teter 125, duces service, insures safety. Its lim- | HE shifting systems of false ited income is eked out by a pen- religion are continually changsion. Thus Maj. Dyer earned his ing their places; but the gospel of pension. {Christ is the same forever.—T, L. Taxes pay the expense of govern- | Cuyler.
land harrassing relief problem can be solved. His plan is simplicity | itself, and no doubt but that our | great financiers have spent many | sleepless nights, racked their brains | to exhaustion and shed ink by the hogshead, and arrived at the same conclusions the Major did, only they were too modest and timid to announce their decisions, so it re-| mained for the brave, courageous | Major to show the American people | the way. | The debt of gratitude we owe this great, unassuming man can never be repaid. Congress should at once grant him a pension of $20,000 a year, and provide him a couch of eiderdown to sleep upon, and strike medals in commemoration of his plan for ending the depression, and getting rid of the “parasites” known as reliefers. Now this is the way it should be done: Have all reliefers that are to be euthanized assembled at a designated place at specified times, making these events a kind of holiday or festive occasion. Next, | have a squad of our soldier boys | with fixed bayonets, hand grenades, | and tear gas bombs and bearing a large banner bearing the word “euthanasia” move into position. | Following them, a body of reliefers | who are to be euthanized. Then the soldiers with the military band playing the “Star-Spangled Ban-/ ner” and “America,” should parade the reliefers to the place to be euthanized. Let all true, loyal, merciful and patriotic American citizens do all | within their ‘power to have this |great plan, euthanasia, put into operation at once, because Rome is | burning while Nero fiddles.
LET'S EXPLORE YOU
&; N
a, A
|
x
Bo WOMEN SWALLOW SUPERSTITIONS, POPULAR AND BUNK MORE
wl 1 TRS LEAS AE Yea RH} OX : ME MUCH ErroRt 0 BE ATTRACTIVE BF 206 ME ENVIRONMENT > NEN AS NESS WOMEN A 2 No. |3 YOUR OPINION A RECENT investigation showed, more and spend a little more at the that professional women, as a| beauty lor and, in the end, get rule, spend more money for clothes |More their money. Other than business women, but secure less effective results. Probably usir
ERECT COND
Ay NOWBER WE Wok BY
fi are
up
fessional women
Ve
By DR. ALBERT EDWARD WIGGAM
studies also show that many pro-
R MIND
YES. A psychologist, Dr. George J. Dudycha, submitted 25 popular superstitions to a large group of ‘college freshmen—men and women, These superstitions included be‘lief in palmistry, astrology, readling character at sight, birth marks, | tapping on wood cond the like. A considerably larger proportion of the women than the men believed lin these notions which science has time and again exploded. This |accords with the fact that more | women than men consult character | readers, fortune tellers, astrologers (And other distributors of what all scientists regard as pure bunk. » ” EJ
ENVIRONMENT can discover and promote genius or it can veto it; and all studies indicate | there is a lot of genius that is vetoed by our failure to discover the per=- | sons who possess it. However, while the “IQ” can be raised somewhat |even considerably —by special environment, it cannot as yet pro|duce Shakespeares, Bachs, Angelos, Napoleons, Washingtons or Lincolns. Environment cannot produce that high intelligence, coupled with end- \ nerg passion to
- ak i
Yi
Senate Action in Increasing the Agricultural Bill Proves Economy Talks Not to Ba Taken Seriously.
ASHINGTON, May 11.—In view of the performance put on by the Senate over the -Agriculture Department Appropriation Bill this week, the big talk about economy which we have heard from various Senators stacks up pretty much as empty wind. During a five-hour session on Monday, the Senate voted 108 increases on new items. In not one instance was a reduction voted. Never was there a roll-call, so that everyone avoided the unpleasant duty of going on record. Only rarely was there a word of debate. Item by item, the Senate inched up the appropriations by a total of nearly $400,000,000—or $381,000,000 if you want the figure—above what the House voted. Throughout all of this the economy-minded Senators were strangely silent. They did not even try to put the Senators on record hy asking for roll-calls. They were there—at least they answered a quorum call in the midst of the proceedings—those Senators who make indignant speeches about Roosevelt's extravagance. They are listed as being present—Bailey of North Carolina, Taft of Qhio, Glass of Virginia, Burke of Nebraska, Bridges of New Hampshire, Byrd of Virginia, Tydings of Maryland and Vandenberg of Michigan, ” “ ” ANDENBERG did get in on the debate once to urge that the Constitution be changed so that ’ the President could veto single items in an appropriation bill. Thereafter he lapsed into silence. It was again evidence of the old political maxim once cited by Senator Ashurst that when it comes down to voting appropriations, Senators have . the courage of their constituents, Practically all of the increases were recommended by the Senate Agriculture Committee which is headed by that veteran anti-Roosevelt Democrat, old Cotton Ed Smith. For hours the procedure rolled through item after item with no more formality than the reading of the proposed increase by the clerk and the mumbled word fram the chair, “without objection, amendment agreed to.” Only half a dozen times was this routine inter rupted with explanations as to the meaning of certain items. Once Senator King of Utah relieved the monotony by a long, earnest speech on economy, packed with figures. But after he finished pointing with alarm, the Senate resumed and rolled through some 50 more increases, . ” ” ”n OME weeks ago Senator Pat Harrison announced that a determined drive must be made to cut all appropriations. Senators, and particularly antiRoosevelt Demoerats and of course the Republicans, wail in holy horror about New Deal extravagance. They go to Chamber of Commerce conventions and bask in thunderous applause with their pleas for economy. But put them right up against an appropriation bill and you hear not a peep out of them—not even a call for a record vote. Around Washington most of the economy talk is regarded as bunk. Anyone who knows politics knows that you will get no real economy until the President, or a President, puts on the heat. For various reasons there is little disposition here now to put on the heat. I am not sure by any means that drastic economy would help. If there is to be any holding down, it ought to come in these departmental items. Instead we are feeding the bureaucracy.
It Seems to Me
By Heywood Broun
Stamford Booster Drops a Hint, So He Writes a Column About Ducks.
TAMFORD, Conn, May 11.—We had a “Boost Stamford” banquet the other night, and after the last oration a bunch of us local businessmen went over to one of our cabarets to try and forget. I am loyal to the Connecticut countryside but I was captious with my associates in the plan to make our community “the Venice of Long Island Sound.” “Gentlemen,” I said, “I think the man who wants to have commuters met with gondolas at the New Haven station talked at least an hour too long. Even the most important subjects can be overdone to the point where the listener gets sick of them. Unfortunately I had not noticed that Fred, the orator in question, had joined the party. He spoke up rather sharply. “Did you ever give a reader a break?’ he asked. “Day after day I start your column and put it down again when I find that it's another piece about Hitler and Chamberlain or Chamberlain and Hitler. Couldn't you, as a favor to a fellow member of the Make Stamford Bigger and Better by 1939 Association, write at least one piece for the paper which has nothing to do with war, politics, labor or your personal and consuming passion for the better life?” I gave Fred my word.
Duck Derby Proposed One of the most soothing things in the world is to raise ducks. You don’t have to do anything about them, except to let them eat a little bread from time to time. But there are potentialities in the duck which have not yet been realized. Every sportsman knows the wild duck as one of the fastest of all living things when he really gets going. The tame duck is also a natural racer, It is my intention to capitalize upon this latent ability of the domestic fowl and establish the first duck track in America, Already I have four birds in training. Two of them seem doomed to be nothing more than blue-platers for some regular businessman's luricheon. War Admiral and Seabiscuit are birds of a different feather. The training is simplicity itself. All that is necessary for me to do is throw some bread upon the water, well in advance of the thundering herd. The two dumb ducks are smart enough to know that they can’t win, and just loaf away from the barrier. In our State neither mutuels nor bookmaking is legal, although it is quite possible to bootleg a bet in most of the lunch wagons, drug stores, bars and circulating libraries in Stamford. My system will be aboveboard. You don't bet on the duck. You buy a picture of him. If he wins you can have the duck, and how! In fact, I will be quite willing to throw in the rooster, who has proved to be a conscientious objector,
Watching Your Health
By Dr. Morris Fishbein
ITH the coming of summer, more people begin to travel the seas and the lakes. Again many of them will become victims of seasickness. Recently, the assistant surgeon on the Aquitania has made a record of some of his experiences with people who suffer with nausea and distress that accompany a voyage on rough waters. He is convinced that seasickness, when not complicated by a hangover from toe much celebration before getting on the boat, is due to unusual reactions that occur in the nervous system because of stimulation reaching those parts of the body that are con. cerned with balance. The ordinary case of seasickness begins with a constant and severe headache, a feeling of fatigue and lassitude, and then general depression. The body temperature falls, the pulse rate gets low, and the blood pressure declines. With this comes a feeling of dizziness and excess flow of saliva, sametimes a sudden attack of nausea and vomiting. In another type of seasickness, nausea ic constant and pronounced vomiting occurs over and over again, accompanied by a severe headache. Such cases are restless, excited, or agitated. Dr, Zorab gives some good advice on the prevention of seasickness. He says fresh air is most important, as is bodily warmth. The person should have plenty of sleep before going on the boat. The fatigue, worry, and excitement that usually occur 24 hours before sailing help to increase the tendency to seasickness. Because of uneasiness around the center of the abdomen, many people find the wearing of a firm abdominal binder
necessary that voyagers be moc
it