Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 22 September 1939 — Page 21
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The Indianapolis Times
ROY W. HOWARD RALPH BURKHOLDER MARK FERREE President Editor Business Manager
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Give Light ana the People Will Find Their Own Way
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 1939
DEMOCRACY'’S TEST—AT HOME EBATE is the essence of democracy. “Everybody knows more than anybody.” Never in our history has there been a clearer test of the democratic principle of collective wisdom than will come in the Congressional debate on the arms embargo. A clear test on a much-befuddled issue. Here is a law passed in the hope of keeping us out of war. Signed by the President, the same President now asks its change—to keep us out of war. Are we up against one of those damned if we do and damned if we don’t things? Is it fair or safe to change rules in the middle of the game? If we do anything at all are we being neutral? If we don’t do anything at all are we being neutral? Is either action or inaction a move that will generate hatred abroad and the emotional heat at home which leads to our getting in? Those are questions which throng the minds and hearts of our people, humbled by the thought of the millions of our lives and the billions of our resources that are at stake. No wonder a to-be-or-not-to-be state of mind now hangs over both lawmakers and the public. Hence, let us give thanks for the debate. May it shed the light we all need so badly. And may this greatest of all democracies, where freedom of expression is unhampered by the restraints of war, prove it can act so wisely as to keep our nation forever out of that age-old mess of European power politics. May reason rather than emotion, intellect instead of glands and vocal cords, prevail. We should like to be able to offer a ready answer and a firm conviction now. But the scene shifted when war started and a new appraisal is called for. So, from the discussion which will now come, we hope for help in reaching a conclusion. In the meantime, as they say in bridge, “keep the bidding open.” n © un 2 We have liked the approach the President has made to the whole emergency—his emphasis on playing down petty partisanship; such language as “the mantle of peace and patriotism is wide enough to cover us all”; his invitation to the broadest exercise of statesmanship. But, since in the full functioning of democracy lies the hope for wisdom, we do not like his suggestion that Congress go home after the arms embargo question is decided. In a time like this there should be no imbalance in our form of government—three departments, equal and co-ordinate. If the principle on which that Government was founded is to operate fully, if the theory is sound that all the people through all their representatives know more than anybody, then Congress should be in Washington, not merely subject to call, while the emergency lasts.
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In connection with the debate on lifting the arms embargo, we present today on another page the best pro and con arguments we could obtain in Washington—the pro by Senator Burke of Nebraska, and the con by Senator
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Vandenburg of Michigan. We hope they will help you reach |
your own conclusions.
THEIR BUSINESS MERICANS, it seems to us, have little right to ask the question so many are asking: “What's the matter with the war on the Western Front?” The tight’ French and British censorships have created an atmosphere of mystery, challenging to our imaginations. So perhaps it's inevitable that all sorts of theories spring up, ranging from a cynical suspicion that the Allies are pulling their punches in preparation for a deal with Hitler to something almost like disappointment that London,
Paris and Berlin haven't vet been bombed or hundreds of |
thousands of men slaughtered along the Maginot Line. We don’t know what the British-French strategy is. There may have been one key in what Prime Minister Chamberlain told the House of Commons Wednesday: “There is no sacrifice from which we will shrink. . . . There is no operation we will fail to undertake provided our responsible advisers and our Allies and ourselves are convinced it would make an appropriate contribution to victory, but what we will not do is rush into adventures that offer little prospect of success and are calculated to impair our resources or postpone ultimate victory.” But we do know that the British-French strategy, whatever it may be, is their strategy—not ours. The men who will live or die are theirs. The cities that will be bombed or not bombed are theirs. The responsibility for conducting the war is theirs. Whether they rush in or move slowly, whether they maintain strict censorship or tell us everything we wonder about, whether they fight to a finish or accept an early peace—these things, on which their lives and their future are at stake, are their business. They are none of ours.
DEFINITION ’ AR, (noun). A by-product of the arts of peace. The most menacing political condition is a period of international amity. The student of history who has not been taught to expect the unexpected may justly boast himself inaccessible to the light. ‘In time of peace prepare for war’ has a deeper meaning than is commonly discerned; it means, not merely that all things earthly have an end—that change is the one immutable and eternal law—Dbut that the soil of
peace is thickly sown with seeds of war and singularly suited
to their germination. It was when Kubla Khan had decreed his “stately pleasure done’—when, that is to say, there were peace and fat feeding in Xanadu—that he ‘heard from far Ancestral voices prophesying war.’ : “One of the greatest of poets, Coleridge was one of the wisest of men, and it was not for nothing that he read us this parable. Let us have a little less of ‘hands across the sea, and a little more of that elemental distrust that is the security of nations. War loves to come like a thief in the night; professions of eternal amity provide the night.” — Ambrose Bierce in “The Devil's Dictionary.” «
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Fair Enough
By Westbrook Pegler
It's Well to Be on Guard Against Propaganda as Press and Radio Have Been Doing for Some Time.
EW YORK, Sept. 22.—Everybody has been saying that we have to be on guard against disguised or insidious propaganda these days, and I will throw in with that. I will say so, too, and I think we are. You never saw the like of the mail that is received by newspaper editors and trained seals just now and, no doubt, by the radio people, too.
newspapers, but there are plenty of common mimeographed handouts and quite a few books that look pretty much like regular books. “Grapes of Wrath” is propaganda, and so are the books of Winston Churchill. I often find in my mail a little paper dedicated to the unconquerable aspirations of the people of Ethiopia, and this is a curio because all the reporters that I have talked with who were in there said the Ethiopians were the most abysmal ignoramuses they ever saw, who really didn’t care who ruled the country and, far from being up on reading and writing, couldn't even scratch their initials, if any, in the sand with a stick. ® &» ®
Y= this Ethiopian freedom paper is not badly put
Negus. say the British or the Bolos, are putting up for the propaganda, not out of any beautiful sympathy for
little publicity aganist Mussolini.
in Spain, too, also with a good deal of truth, and one dealing with China, but I never noticed which side the China paper is for. Another one deals with Japan and, although I don't bother to read it, I gather that it wants to show that the Japanese have been
standing off the Bolos in China.
pleasure to read them because the various sects hate all the other Bolo sects as angrily as they hate Bishop Manning or God. If you want to get the dirt
own sheets.
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radio stations for use at will with a suggestion, as these friends see it, that someone in the Administration is going to be terribly disappointed if this or that station doesn't find time to give the stuff a send. Unions, too, send out publicity, and while some of it is fair and truthful, this matter, like all other propaganda, has a habit of neglecting to mention further truths which would take some of the heat off their grievances and contentions.
Most of the states appropriate money for propaganda, or publicity, and there are any number of leagues, associations, foundations, institutes and so forth which are just publicity offices, ballyhooing isms and promotions or crying boycott against various hunks of our own population and foreign countries Tt seems to me that most ot the money spent on propaganda is wasted.
Business
‘By John T. Flynn
| Philadelphia Spending Money Due | Years Hence for Current Needs.
| HILADELPHIA, Sept. 22. Nothing makes a more fantastic picture than the household budgets of
many, if not most, American cities. Here is Philadelphia, one of our greatest cities. struggling with her money {roubles in a way and on a scale which reminds one of Germany and Dr. Schacht Germany, and other countries for that matter, have been living not merely on their fat, but on the | fat they expect to put on some day. For instance, Germany, before she began the war.
having literally exhausted all tax resources and borrowing sources, began to spend, along with this year's taxes, next year's. taxes. She issued tax receipts for next year's taxes and spent them as money, so that when next year arrived, persons holding the tax receipts could use them to pay taxes. But the upshot was that when the taxpayer made a payment of his taxes the government got nothing. Well, here I find Philadelphia doing something of the same thing. The city owns a gas plant. Tt rents the plant to a private corporation for something like $4,200,000 a year. Last year the city’s revenues fell short by many millions. To make that up the City Council sold the next year’s rentals of the gas plant. That got them out of trouble then, but now another year's bills are due. And this year the gas rentals are gone. But it is worse than that. The city's deficit was so great that the Council decided to “captalize” the | gas rentals not for a year, but for 18 years. It sold
What of the Future?
now with the gas rentals gone for 18 years? with city costs mounting? shrinking ?
values. money at which it is assessed. Because of this we see cities imposing income taxes.
sales taxes. Federal Government thus caught, people hear with apprehension talk of new levies—billions for war purposes. Rich as it is—can this country afford a war now? Of course it can fight one—but what will the war do to it, to its cities, its states, its Federal Treasury, its whole economy?
A Woman's Viewpoint By Mrs. Walter Ferguson
E watch our children off to school these days with feelings of despair in our hearts. With Eastern skies so black, American mothers would be dull indeed if they failed to share In the universal despondency. Unless some miracle happens we face davs of alarm and months of anguish, for even if we can remain out of the war—and God grant us the strength and foresight to do so—we cannot close our minds to the misery of our oversea friends and neighbors. What will be the plight of Europe after this war ceases? Most of the prophecies are gloomy ones. There are a few comforting words, however, in the Sept. 13th issue of the Christian Century, in which the writer reminds us of facts we are apt to forget during turbulent days. ! “No matter what is swept away,” he says, “certain precious things will always remain to man and upon them he builds new civilizations. First of all, the Earth and its resources will be available, As Carl Sandburg reminds us, ‘the grass will grow’ and although citips may be in ruins, ‘seedtime and harvest cannot be destroyed by guas’.” The accumulated knowledge of centuries and priceless treasures of art may perish, but human love will survive. Even in his bitterest nationalist struggles, the fighter carries love within him-—love for his parents, for his wife and children, and so hearts retain this capacity, we cannot believe mankind is utterly lost to all decent and humane sentiments. And we must believe, or be lost indeed, that after the fighting is over, the human spirit will once more seek its God. Perhaps mangled humankind will creep
which we have wandered so far. 1
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THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES
A lot of it comes in the form of little tom thumb |
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FRIDAY, SEPT. 22, 1939
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together and contains a lot of truth, because, no | two ways about it, the truth is on the side of the | Still, IT have a suspicion that somebody else, |
a people who have been wronged but to needle up a
There is a paper plugging the late Loyalist cause
The Red papers are all propaganda. and it is a |
on all of them you don't look to the record of the | Dies Committee, which is hard reading, but to their |
T= New Deal also turns out a right smart bit of propaganda in mimeo handouts, and some of my | radio friends tell me that the Government also pro- | duces platters, or pancakes, which are sent out to |
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doing the nice nations of the world a great favor by 1
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| could conduct a military campaign.
Gen. Johnson Says—
Hitler No Military Genius, but Has Proved Value of Motorized Army And We Should Profit by the Lesson,
NDIANAPOLIS-—~The question mark against Hitler's Napoleonic complex of conquest was whether he There was no question that he could conduct one of propaganca and OGPU suppression of liberties and minorities,
| or of diplomatic double~crossing, He had done that | to greater conquests in shorter time than Napoleon
ever dreamed-without firing a shot or spilling a drop
| of blood. But is he a great captain=-a military | strategist or an artist with armies?
There was no record to judge and Hitler's military experience was confined to a corporal’s squad. Now
| Poland, a nation of 30 million, has been literally wiped
off the map in the shortest and most devastating campaign in history. Does that rank Hitler with the great commanders—Hannibal, Alexander, Caesar, Ghengis Khan and Napoleon? Need the nations tremble before a new invincible genius in the art of war? Nonsense, This was the first try-out of a well-equipped, mechanized, motorized, armored army against unprotected human bodies. Readers of this column will remember that since its beginning it has insisted that the mechanization and motorization of our land forces is an absolute necessity, » » » T has frequently said here that to send men not 50 equipped against such armored dragons is exe actly like hurling naked savages in canoes, with bows and arrows, against an armored cruiser—-suicidal sacrifice, That was then in part conjecture. Now it has been proved. That is the sum total of Hitler's gene eralship. It proves nothing more as to his military genius than that a gorilla can lick a man. Where does this demonstration leave us and our arly? Why, we haven't even selected our types of some of this Kind of equipment—much less begun to produce them. We are months, if not years, away from any such equipment for any sizeable force. This is not intended to eviticize anybody. But it
| 1s not true that the money for this was never made
| available
by Congress. Away back in 1933—when Hitler started—this writer proposed in a draft of the
| Recovery Act that such part of the whole appropria=
The Hoosier Forum
I wholly disagree with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it.=Voltaire.
OPPOSES REPEAL OF ARMS EMBARGO By Ellis C. Mull, Greenfield, Ind. This is the most important and vital session of Congress in our history. The decisions made and policies adopted will determine either the continuance or eventual sacrifice of our American form of gov-
ernment.
Congress is meeting in special ses- . a § . sion to consider the proposal of few commercial profiteers can con-
amending or repealing the arms, tinue to glean their spoils from warembargo which mow prohibits the 8lutted nations. In defense of the sale of arms and munitions to na-| coasts of our own nations, yes, But tions at war. Any consideration elsewhere, no! Before we enter angiven the repeal of this law must other war, let the enemy bring her be strictly on a non-partisan basis. armies to our shores. , , . Politics and personal ambitions must | » » be ignored along with legislation CRITICIZES LINDBERGH
which would benefit certain classes te . of business. This is most important FOR NEUTRALITY STAND
now, as never before, [By Earl G. Cline, Albany, Tnd. The future of our Christian Te. I wish to raise an objection to zation itself is at stake. Will these YOUr editorial of last Saturday. The
(Times readers are invited to express their in these columns, religious con troversies excluded. Make your letter short, so all can have a chance. Letters must be signed, but names will be withheld on request.)
views
ligion, our Constitution, and civili-
[things which we all hold so dear |editorial in question was in praise
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the rentals for $41,000,000 to clear away its deficits. |Crusading newspaper and may it|
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Having descended into deficits even with the gas |After” was good. A rentals available each year, what is it going to do [Put on the front page? Why didn't] And (You play up Lindbergh's speech |
And with tax assessments more?
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taxes on insurance premiums, on savings banks, sales [indifferent about. taxes on everything in addition to State and Federal [realize it but thousands of young to give body to their ideals and to And with cities thus placed and the {men in this city are not in favor change the world in
long as human |
| back then to find solace in the spiritual realities from |
along with millions of American of Col. Lindbergh for his national Ey i wel on ovsane sion for temy 'y war prosperity? | dais : This is the question to be decided. | I believe, Mr. Editor, that you did We cannot remain neutral if ihe|the nation a great disservice by un-
arms embargo is repealed. [Sneiitiedly indorsing the broadcast!
Mobilization plans already indi- © os Wiioge enter Ly o Joust cate our country will become a dic- . : ¢ » 0 tatorship the day we declare or go Grover Cleveland Bergdoll. Both to war. Our constitutional govern- | Col. Lindbergh and Grover Clevement will vanish. and there is no|land Bergdoll have been self-exiles
i: vs (from America , . . One would not assurance when it will be restored. |’ . Every American will defend his fight for his adopted country. The
|country with everything he has Other has been traditionally against |
Let us remain this country fighting a treacherously loof from foreign entanglements. |388ressive, lawless Germany. TFor the sake of God and our| Just what part did Col. Lindbergh
ountry, let us not repeal the arms Pay in the Munich affair? Is he a. b P working for a second Munich?
The great question before the
against invasion.
American people today is not neutrality, nor is it whether Britain did or did not pay her war debts, nor is it whether Europe's age-long quarrels are or are not our quarrels. The great question is how, when all Europe has finally been laid pros- | trate, can the American people keep the Mongol, Asiatic Axis hordes from eventually over-running their borders, England and France are not fighting our battles, but they most certainly are fighting our avowed enemies, Because England and France have used bad judgment since the | World War is no excuse for Amerlica at this time to use bad judgment, {In the name of this same so-called neutrality, England and France allowed the Axis powers to begin the work of despoiliation, and today they are having to fight desperately or he despoiled themselves. Does Col. Lindbergh want Amer|ica, after all these examples, to play such a naive role?
> % & URGES BANISHMENT FOR FRITZ KUHN Ry E. Coller
I have just finished reading about Fritz Kuhn holding a rally at] | Sellersburg, Pa., telling 2000 German | (bunds that “Adolph Hitler would) lick the whole of Europe.” He said that the best way to serve the fatherland and to show Germany | that their hearts belong to her was [to stay absolutely neutial, Let me say that the United States is no place for Fritz Kuhn. . » In my estimation he isn't even good German or he would go back home and fight. . . . I wonder how long this Govern= ment will tolerate this agitator?
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OPPOSES WAR UNLESS U. S. IS INVADED By Harold L. Cooper A The Times has always been a
New ‘Books at
the Library
| always stay that way. i Your editorial “The War — and |“ Why wasn't it
HIS is a book,” writes Allan Seager, “about five people for whom the world was not good enough.”
Are you afraid to put your | There have been many for whom
stand against our entering any
This is the story of American cities. Tt is being |more World Wars on the front the world was not good enough. But complicated by the inevitable shrinkage in real estate Page? S In many cities real estate is not worth the |Way about it?
Or do you really feel that these five about whom Allan Seager | writes in “They Worked for a Better I'm writing this in strong lan- World” (Maemilian) had a force. guage because war is nothing to be fulness which urged them on to Maybe you don't|action—which drove them to try
which they
of going to war in France or any found injustice, oppression, inequalother foreign battlefield just so ality, or, as with Emerson. a mental
Side Glances—By Galbraith
"It's after closing time, young man. Try and decide what
you want with the other two cents!” ;
inertia which smothered the development of the individual, Each of these five people relin-
quished present and future security to embody in word and action his, protest against things as they were. Roger Williams left safety and com- | panionship in order to realize nis | conviction that each man’s religion| Is an expression of himself, Thomas Maine left the safe niche] in life enjoyed by a tax collector to becom» “an editor, a pamphleteer, soldier, statesman, and at last a pauper,” living to see the two great 18th century revolutions which owed so rauch to his labors, Emerson turned his face from the conventional mental attitudes of his time and risked the ridicule and even the hostility of those who were shocked by his philosophy of the individual and individualism. Elizabeth Stanton early rebelled against the laws and customs which fettered women, and her rebellion has found its fruition in presentday woman's ability to choose her own career, to own her own prop(erty, to work and to play freely. And Edward Bellamy, strongly affected by the hardships of the 19th | century under the rapidly expand- | ing capitalist system, wore himself out in his crusade against it. In this volume the author relates | briefly and simply the lives of these five idealists. “It would not have been a bad thing to have helped with their work,” he says, “and it would not be a bad thing to hunt out, recognize, and help the men and women like them who are living now.”
A PRAYER FOR PEACE
By LOUISE WHITLEY Dear God a prayer for peace we pray. May armies put their arms away. Let nations in good will abide. As friendly neighbors side by side. War's price is far too great to pay. Our Father, give them peace today.
DAILY THOUGHT
Wherefore I say unto thee, her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much; but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.—Luke 7:47.
, not wrath, is God's
best attribute.~B. Taylor, w
a a sitimiis ty prs pom i ws
tion of billions as the President might direct should be available for ‘“‘motorization and mechanization of army tactical units.” Congress accepted and passed that proposal, exactly as written. Most of that money went for raking leaves. ® 8 =»
1= suggestion apparently came too soon. The wheels of our domestic orisis were going around too fast. Even the army didn't fight very hard to use that money. Only Hitler was on the job. The warning has probably not come too Hitler merely has proved what this kind of equipment can do when not similarly opposed. What will happen when two such swift armored forces meet each other? We don't yet know the effect of collisions of modern air armadas. We don't even know what mass air attacks may do to these flocks of steel dragons. At Guaralajara, in Spain, an air squadron surprised one in a defile and practically destroyed it with bombs, No. Hitler has once more demonstrated the plode ding thoroughness of German preparation. He hasn't yet shown military genius. There is plenty here to speed our preparation but nothing to start any fear.
late,
Col. Fleming
By Bruce Catton
Ickes’ Ex-Aid Would Be Efficient, Tough Wage-Hour Administrator,
VY ASHINGTON, Sept. 22~The Wage and Hour Administration will get a tough, efficient, and thoroughly “liberal” boss when« and if Col Philip Fleming of the Army Engineer Corps replaces Elmer F. Andrews as its Administ rator., News of the Administration's plan to hand the Job to Col. Fleming started two contradictory ins terpretations going around the capital. : Some people figured that the White House was taking cognizance of the current rumors of poor ens forcement of the Wage-Hour Law and was putting a tough guy in to make things hum; some thought that Andrews had stepped on the toes of the influential Southern “cotton bloe,” and others, and was being replaced as a species of business-appeasement strategy. Whatever may be the case about the tation, it seems tolerably is all wet, Col. Fleming worked under Rexford Tugwell in the old Resettlement Administration, and Tugwell thought he was aces. He was Secretary Ickes’ right-hand man in PWA, and Ickes swears by him. Men who have worked with him in both organization insist he is the last man in the world to put into a job if a little calculated punch-pulling is what is wanted, Administrator Andrews has had his troubles in the wage-hour post, and it is only fair to say that most of them were not of his making,
A Record of Success
first interpre« certain that the second one
He had to spend his first months getting his outfit organized and putting on an educational campaign, Complaints about violations of th. aet piled up un« til, early this summer, there were some 22.000 on file, Only in the last two months has he been able to hire enough investigators and legal assistants to handle these complaints, and even then he had to start from scratch and train his men as he went along, On his record, Col. Fleming is a good man to handle a situation like that, too. As its executive officer, he helped organize PWA; a vear later he be= came its deputy administrator. In the spring of 1935, he was sent to take charge of the Passamaquoddy tide-harnessing project: as an engineer and an organizer he did a superb Job there A little later he was loaned to Tugwell, whose Resettlement Administration was having trouble in its construction division. He smoothed things out. The general verdict is that the Wage-Hour Law will get enforced right up to the hilt when and if the colonel gets his hands on it.
Watching Your Health
By Jane Stafford
MERICA, land of the free, will some day also be known as the land of the healthy and long-lived, The health of the American people is getting better all the time and as a result, they are adding years to their average length of life. Since the turn of the century, statisticians of the Metropolitan . Life Insurance Co. compute, the avers age length of life of the white boy baby has increased by 12': years, while the girl baby has gained even more--14 years, “These gains have been accomplished,” it is pointed out, “despite the World War, an influenza pandemic which destroyed even more lives than did the war, and the greatest economic upheaval of generations, with its health-menacing potentialities.” The increase in length of life since the beginning of the century appears even more striking when measured in terms of the proportions of babies born who survive to later years of age. In 1901 less than nine out of every 10 white male babies born alive sur vived to reach their first birthday. Now at least nine out of 10 newly born boys will attain the age of 24. The girls have gained even more. In 1901 less than nine out of 10 survived their first year of life, but now nine out of every 10 white girl babies will reach the age of 32. This means that haif of American men will live 67 years, on the basis of 1937 health conditions, and half of the women will live 72 years. Large share of the credit for the gains in health and longevity goes to the discovery of the role played by germs in causing disease; of ways to fight germs; and of the health-building factors of food. We still need to find ways of combatting the health dangers of middle and old age. The knowledge we already have, ent oud he Laure widely applied. Too many e still eat inadequate diets and 00 many still * die of ts.
curable ailmen
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