Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 8 March 1941 — Page 8

PAGE

The Indianapolis Times

(A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER) ROY W. HOWARD RALPH BURKHOLDER MARK FERREE President Business Manages

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Give Light and the People Wiil Find Their Own Way

SATURDAY, MARCH 8, 1041

INO PUNCH PULLING HERE T BEGINS to look very much as though those who chars acterized the Mayor's Advisory Committee on Traffic Safety as just “another” committee may have to eat their words. | Here is a group that seems to possess courage, vigor and intelligence. And, what is even more important, one that will not be content with merely issuing reports buf intends to see that something is done about them. The subcommittee on enforcement, in its first major report, bored into the weaknesses of enforcement in a fashion that shows thorough research and thorough under: standing of the problem. There can be no argument that court laxity, police inefficiency and non-co-operation of offi cial groups is hindering safety. Perhaps the most important of all the recommendations is the one for the employment of a full-time traffic engineer responsible directly and solely to the mayor. This step is long overdue in Indianapolis. We hope city officials will give serious and immediate consideration to the hiring of a competent, full-time engineer. ! ‘As for the committee, we hope it continues the good work.

F. D. R. ON JURISDICTIONAL STRIKES

PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT never was a better friend of organized labor than yesterday when he denounced jurisdictional strikes as an obstacle to the national-defensé program. Consider the jurisdictional strike. It is not for higher wages, shorter hours or better working conditions. It is not to compel employment of _ union labor. It is a weapon with which union labor battles union labor. It is one union refusing to let a job be done because members of another union are on that job. As at Wright Field, Ohio, 400 A. F. of L. members stop work on urgently needed aeronautical research laboratories for the Army Air Corps because four C. I. O. members are employed by one of the contractors. As at Army posts in Maryland, work on housing rol ects is disrupted by an A. F. of L. roofers’ union strike because members of an A. F. of L. Carpenters’ Union are laying some asphalt shingles—although the head of the A. F. of L. Building Trades Department had awarded the right to lay asphalt shingles to the carpenters. . These are jurisdictional strikes. They are inexcusable.

The country, as Mr. Roosevelt said, cannot approve of them.

The influence of national labor leaders, as he added, should prevent them. But it does not. There is no machinery for adjusting jurisdictional disputes between A. F. of L. and | C. I. 0. There is machinery for settling such rows within | the A. F. of L., but it too seldom operates.

The President’s stern words may jolt the leaders of | ‘labor into a realization of their neglected duty. If so-—if | the jurisdictional strikes are stopped voluntarily—that will |

be a great victory for the true welfare of organized labot.

MEDICAL STUDENTS AND THE DRAFT

A amend the draft law so that medical and dental students, hospital internes and resident hospital physicians would not be conscripted until they have completed their professional training. Arguments for it are that these young men will be more useful, whether in military service or in civilian life, if permitted to finish their training now; and that the internes and resident doctors are greatly needed in the hospitals, many of which are already understaffed. The argument against it is that if draft deferment is granted to one class of men it will be demanded for othér classes—pharmacy students, engineering students, skilled

workmen, movie actors, ballplayers, etc.—on the ground

that these classes also are now more useful to the country,

or are learning to be more useful, than they would be if put

immediately into the Army. If any class has a better blanket claim to deferment

than all others, we'd say it is the medical and dental stu-

dents and hospital workers. So we think the Murray bill ' should at least have thorough consideration by Congress, always remembering the danger that it might lead to deHands for wholesale deferments by classes.

PANAMA CO-OPERATES

N-view of the rather nasty reports that have been circulated about pro-Nazi influences in the Republic of Panatha, President Arias’ manifesto permitting the use of Panamanian territory for United States air bases is particularly good news. . This development and others, such as the newly announced negotiations for Mexican-United States co-opera-tion in defensive measures, and Canada’s project for rushing the installation of a string of airports leading to Alaska,

testify to a growing solidarity in North and Central America |

with regard to possible dangers from overseas.

t

SIRENS FOR CRASHES

. A. LITTLEDALE of The New York Times, one of the |

survivors of the recent tragedy near Atlanta, offers a

good suggestion—that planes be equipped with automatic | sirens to direct searchers to the scenes of future crashes. |

¢* An automatic siren might have spared Mr. Littledale, “Capt. Rickenbacker and other seriously injured persons their agonizing hours of waiting in the dark for aid. But, of course, the chief need is to prevent the crashes. And - while no one dares to hope that all risk can be eliminated from the flying business, the fact that American air trans.

port lines not long ago did operate for 17 months without

a single accident argues persuasively that most crashes th could be ‘prevented,

o> RILEY 8551

BILL introduced by Senator Murray of Montana would |

{| two ways.

| Wallace,

Fair Enough By Westbrook Pegler

Wherein He Replies to Criticism Which Followed His Comment on Union Activities of the First Lady

ASHIWGTON, March 8 —Do you mind me taking up, in some detail, certain editorial reactions to a recent comment of ‘mine on the activities of Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt? It has been Miimated that, because Mrs. Roosevelt is the wife of the President of the United States, good manners and good citizenship require that any discussion of her activities be couched in language less searching than would be appropriate to the activities of Burt Wheeler, for example, whose motives have been furiously impugned. Yet Mr. Wheeler is a gentleman and a Senator, with a warrant from the people of his state, oft renewed, to represent them. Mrs. Roosevelt holds no certificate of election, but it seems agreed that she does partake of her husband’s. office, and I have heard no specific denial of the contention that she has used her position for private gain. What she does with that gain she will not specifically say. An important point of my discussion has been that Mrs. Roosevelt has actively participated in the drive to persuade workers into political organizations which would have the power to tax them, to limit their opportunities, to regulate their private affairs, to ostracize them forever from all employment and to prevent whole masses of them from working on national defense jobs. That has not been denied. It is merely ungentlemanly to call attention to these conceded facts.

28» HAVE said that Mrs. Roosevelt has no right to membership in the Newspaper Guild, and that she is excused from the two most painful requirements of membership. Mrs. Roosevelt's ineligibility is plainly written in the Guild constitution. And it

was agreed, by Mrs. Roosevelt's own stipulation when she joined, that she should not be required to strike or picket. I have heard no challenge to these asser-

tions, except on the ground that proper respect for a

lady and her husband's office would forbid their utterance. On another occasion Mrs. Roosevelt had delivered a sympathetic address to a meeting of members of lhe electricians’ union of the A. F..of L. This local a few months ago mobbed a detachment of New York police in an unprovoked riot. It is modeled on the pattern which endeavors to

take over the management of industry. Its brother |

union in Dayton, O., is the one in whose behalf the Jurisdictional strike was called which is crippling a vital expansion job of the Army Air Corps. It was in this company that the wife of the President elected to say that American workers “ought to” join unions.

o ® ® T was further said that because of her Guild membership and her position Mrs. Roosevelt is enabled to hold press conferences which produce sympathetic publicity. It is contended that membership in the Guild does not affect the objectivity of a journalist,

but the Guild thoughtlessly threw away that argument when it required Chief Justice Hughes to quit the American Press Society on the ground that he

might favor that group in some hypothetical issue .

between the Guild and the society in the future. If the Chief Justice could not remain impartial as an honorary member of the A. P. 8, it is inconsistent of the Guild to say that active Guild men, loyal to the C. I. O, can’t even be suspected of partiality to a member of their own organization. I said Mrs. Roosevelt was not naive, that she was a clever politician of long experience and that she was actively trying to coerce American workers into collectives. I have heard, by way of reply, no denial, but only that it is bad manners thus to speak of the

| wife of the President of the United States.

Business By John T. Flynn

Producers Foolish to Seek Extra Profits by Piling Up Inventories

EW YORK, March 8—There are many signs that the good old custom of gambling has made its appearance in stocks—not stocks on the Stock Exchange but stocks of merchandise in the hands

of merchants and manufacturers. Prices are rising. There is plenty of reason to believe that they will continue to rise. There does not seem to be much energy in the Government for controlling them. Therefore manufacturers seem, from all accounts, to be piling up raw materials at present prices with the expectation of making better profits when the prices of those materials’ go up. Merchants are doing the same, All this is partially evidenced by the fact that inventories are rising despite increased production, and that current commercial bank loans are increasing. Manufacturers and merchants can make money in .One is to produce or stock goods at one price and sell them at a legitimate profit. The other is to speculate in raw materials. In normal times it is sometimes possible for business concerns to buy materials with a certain skill to get the best prices at the best seasons and in the best markets. This is hardly speculation, but wise buying. But in abnormal times merchants and producers see the possibilities of great profit by speculating on a large scale in raw materials—buying today in the expectation of a heavy price rise in the future and making a profit out of the difference in price— speculative or windfall profit, as distinguished from normal profit. : FE HE whole trouble about this is that such men are gambling against events of which they have and can have no knowledge. The sudden end of the war would put a different face on the whole situation. The first thing that would fall would be the price of raw materials. Those who had stocked up would find themselves facing a heavy loss instead of a profit. In short, while it is possible to make. profits by this speculation in inventories, it is also possible to make a loss and a ruinous one. It is an axiom more widely, respected now than ever before that no producer or merchant should ever try to make profits by speculating in inventories. The producer’s business and the merchant's business is primarily selling—not buying. The closer he can keep his production, which he sells to the market in which he buys, to the needs of that market the better off he will be. The greatest insurance producers and merchants can buy for themselves now is to cut out ruthlessly the lure of speculative profits in inventories,

So They Say—

WHEN A CHILD walks through the door and enters a school, his color, race and religious beliefs remain within his own heart.—Newbold Moms, president New York City Council.

IT LOOKS as though he farmer were going to carry most of the burden of defense without too much compensation.—~Fred H. ‘Sexauer, president, the

Dairyman’s League. * Ri

YOU ARE TAKING a step now that you will regret to the end of your life.—Judge Alfred C. Coxe, U. 8. District Court, to a draft vader, .

‘WE CAN learn, one trom the. other. —Vice President , on Suter American relations,

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

’

But Joe—

SATURDAY, MARCH 8, 1941

The Hoosier Forum

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

DEPLORES ATTACK ON BRITISH EMPIRE By C. E. Faucette, 28 E. 16th St. In Clarence F. Lafferty’s letter, printed in the Feb. 25 issue of The Times, Consigning the British Em-

pire to Perdition, it is not difficult to detect a serious inclination to-

viewpoint—perhaps . . . overburdened from reading un-American propaganda. . If that’s the "best he has to offer, I for one suggest he keep quiet and save the space in The Times for someone who has something to say that is more constructive—more democratic and more sane. 2 = = WANTS ARMS KEPT FOR OUR OWN DEFENSE By Mrs. Anna Bell, 1515 N. Warman Ave. As an American mother of two sons and one daughter, may I present my views briefly on the leaselend bill, or shall I say the “re-lease”-lend bill? How is it possible for this nation to build up its own defense and at the same time use all its resources in men and material ‘to supply Britain in the short space of time needed to be really effective in helping her win this war? We are being told the next six months will tell the tale. I believe Senator VanNuys gave as his reason for supporting. this measure, the fact that in opposing it he would be helping give Hitler and Mussolini the “go sign.” Does he really think these two gentlemen are not already aware of our situation? I can only say if we do go all out with aid to Britain, that that would be the time for these dictators to attack, because we most certainly would not have adequate defense to withstand an attack on either land or

sea. Another point I might make is that no country I can think of has ever given away or loaned out military equipment vital to its own security. Can you name one? Did Britain give her all to Belgium or France to stave off the dictators? I shudder to think what an attack on this country by Hitler would mean, but to contemplate British control of our destiny is just as ab-

ward a warped and uninformed|

(Times readers are invited to express their views in these columns, religious controversies excluded. Make your letters short, so all can have a chance. Letters must be signed, but names will: be withheid on request.)

horrent. As an American, I can only say I want none of either. That is why I believe our best defense is the strongest home and naval defense we can build. The only material we ought to give any other is just what we can supply after, and not before, our own defense is built to maximum strength. . .. Probably the saddest and most alarming feature about too many Americans is - their gullibility to propaganda, both kinds. After all, Germans will be Germans, Italians will be Italians, Frenchmen will be Frenchmen, Spaniards will be Spaniards, Englishmen will be Englishmen. Why in the world cannot Americans be Americans? ” = ” CLAIMS U. S. CAN'T AFFORD TO LET HITLER WIN. By the Rev. A. C. E. Gillander, Greensburg. Answering Patrick Fisher, who takes issue with the Indiana Committee for National Defense, would like to know when this committee ever stood on other ground than “The United States can not afford to let Hitler win.” Mr. Fisher, who is within draft age, would set up the proposition that we can afford to let Hitler win. . . . This writer is also within draft age. But this writer wonders if it is not the safer thinking, even in Mr. Fisher's terms, of saving one’s own skin, to crush Hitler now while we would have an ally in Britain. Safer than to let Hitler succeed. Can Fisher or Wheeler guarantee that a boot-licking Russia, seeing Hitler victorious, would not fully join up with the Axis? . .. Can any isolationist guarantee that they would not attack us overwhelm-

ingly? If no guarantee, then why flirt

Side Glances—By Galbraith

i |

E-(

3-8

"Those {wo room together—they're looking for a dress that : irons ‘both’ al dhamd:

with a real danger not only to our skins against tremendous odds, but to our souls and our freedom, and our children for generations? All that we can do to prevent Hitler ..from generating further success and further power is merely assuring our own ultimate safety. We are safe from England's vietory. We know that by experience. But all clear signs point to disaster from a Hitler victory, ” » »

FAVORS ABOLITION OF THE U. S. SENATE By James Forrester, Cleveland, O. Why not abolish the U. S. Senate in the interest of economy, efficiency and democracy? It has become a place where successful lawyers,

politicians and businessmen top ‘off their careers by acquiring a title. Experience with the aid-to-Britain bill provides a perfect example of the Senate’s utter uselessness. They examine the same witnesses that testified before the House and listen to any story or fable that will consume time. We’ know ‘that the rules in the Senate are so loose that any one of the 96 men, if he so chooses, can delay final enactment indefinitely. We are apt to think of the Senate as a democratic body when actually it is no such thing. The state of New York with 13,479,142 people has the same representation as Nevada with 110,247.

2 ” » CHARGES NEW DEAL USES COMMUNIST STRATEGY By Lester Gaylor, 655 E. 21st St. One of the strategies of the Com-

munist Party is to charge their|; opponents with the crimes they |;

knew themselves to be guilty of. In order to pass the dictatorship war-making H. R. 1776, the Soviet New Deal is wrathfully ranting that Americans opposing this deadly poisonous bill are “poisoning” the people against it. There is no technique too base, no lie too defaming, no stooping too low for the Roosevelters to gain their ends of war and a tie-up with Soviet England and Soviet Russia. Shall we take the motto, “In God We Trust” off our coins and substitute, “In Soviet England and Soviet Russia We Trust”? Are these “democracies”? Since when? " ” ” » A BLOND RISES TO THE DEFENSE OF BLONDS By Edith Roark, New York. I am tired of the constant degrading references to blonds whenever folks mention them in general and infer that they are as a rule beautiful, but dumb. Take half of Hollywood's biggest money-mak-ers and you'll find they're blonds, wise business folk and worthwhile people. Therefore, I am appointing myself a committee of one, since I am a blond, to defy for evermore all those folks who constantly wise-

‘| crack about blonds. I'll wager that of a blond is|

in general the I. Q. just as high as the I. Q. of a brunet.

WILL THERE BE SPRING?

By JANE SIGLER Will there be spring in lands across the seam A spring with grass and flowers, every tree

‘1A leafy nesting place? Will warm rains fall

Prom clouded skies that harbor ‘ death for all Who once knew peace? Will nature strive again To hide destruction wrought by foolish men? Will fragrant buds unfold or birds take wing

Amid war’s hblocaust? Will there

be spring?

DAILY THOUGHT

For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.—Matthew 6:14.

GOOD to forgive; best to forget. wning.

Gen. Johnson Says—

Our World War | Methods May Be

Outmoded, Still British and Nazis Are: Using Them With Good Effect

ASHINGTON, March 8.—This column has been accused by some of its best customers of nostalgia or too much yearning toward World War precedents and experiences in mobilizing American industry and mezn-power for defense. Sometimes from the hostiles this criticism takes the angle that the ‘“nostalgia” is for a Government job on the defense front. More frequently it is from sincere and understanding personal friends, and is that too much emphasis is put on mobilization principles and experiences 23 years old and thas, like “a quail a day for 30 days,” it gets too monotonous for the readers’ relish, This isn’t written in rebuttal, There is a lot more than meets the eye in the trade axiom ‘the customer is always right.” Furthermore, if’ anybody _desperately needs the advice and even: editing" of proved friends, it is a guy in this queer trade of daily columnar kibitzing. Consideration of the mistakes of judgment that have been made in this space that could have been avoided by merely asking some wise

shivers or goose-pimples—or something. Usually there isn’t time, or the fear of becoming a pest prevents. Fan letters are always welcome, but they do not help too much. It requires a considerable emotion to overcome the universal human inertia and result in a letter—either of Pegler’s “dear-sir-you-cur” variety on the one hand, or “you-Daniel-come-to-judgment” on the other. Most fan letters are inspired either hy anger or ecstasy and neither is a very good guide,

» » o

0, this column is not in rebuttal of any of these criticisms about nostalgia. It is just to talk some of them over. As to nostalgia for a job. That isn't good sense. Any man would like again to have some active part in a great national effort in a crisis, but that natural wish was abandoned long ago. Quite understandably, this Administration would not seek out a critic for any more important job than janitor in its dog-house. It is not to be blamed for that. Any other course would be b It wouldn’t make for harmony. On the other hand, the Administration has shown great consideration and restraint. This column could have been silenced any day, without justifiable criticism from any source, by simply calling its conductor to active service as a reserve officer—a course which would also have put him in a considerable financial crimp and could have resulted in no more interesting employment than counting cocoanuts at San Juan de Bac Bac. As to nostalgia for World War methods of moWhilization, they were adopted for manpower. For industrial mobilization, the President is reported to have said of the War Department's plan (which followed our World War model) that we need a 1940 mobilization and not a 1918 blue print. That isn't what the Germans said. They are on record as having modeled their whole industrial effort on the war industries board plan so far as it was applicable, 2 8 =

OME very similar. criticisms of Winston Churchill's urgings were made in Great Britain from 1933 onward. Now Britain, like Germany, is operating on something very closely resembling our War Industries Board of 1918, and we have the Knudsen-Hillman “one man” with two heads of the O. P. M. It may be nostalgic to revert to a successful war experience. I know I have done too much of it and intend, no friendly advice, to do a lot less, but that applies - only to my column. For others, it is just about as nostalgic as it is for soldiers to study the campaigns of Lee and Stonewell Jackson, That also the Germans do prayerfully. A great deal of their stabbing thrusting strategy, both in Poland and along the Somme, traces straight back to that kind of nostalgic study of an earlier American method. We could stil} berfefit greatly by more of that in industrial mobilization, Two of its present leaders recently said that they had never even read the reports and history of the War Industries Board. Maybe that explains a lot.

Editor's Note: The views expressed by columnists in this newspaper are their own. They are not necessarily those of The Indianapolis Times,

A Woman's Viewpoint

By Mrs. Walter Ferguson

NE aspect of the national defense program must alarm those men who have steadfastly refused to believe the feminine brain capable of mastering machinery. Surely they must awaken these mornings shivering with apprehension, as they read that girl pilots are being turned out in job "Slots and that other lively lassies are in training for ambulance driving. - Perhaps it is tactless to bring up the subject; it must be a bitter dose for the masculine palate, and we are truly sorry for some of our disillusioned male friends. Most of them still hug to their hearts the notion that all women are poor mechanics and unskille ful, even dangerous, drivers, They've heen comforted and suse tained by this thought for a long time, and it has enabled them to maintain their usual patronizing attitude when the matter is mentioned. This attitude, let us remind ourselves, has enabled other intelligent husbands to wave their little women aside while they slide under the wheels after being picked up at the office. Apparently it neve occurs to these men that their wives have driven through traffic for several hours of the day, shopping, gathering the groceries and carting the children to school, and therefore could probably guide the family flivver safely to the garage door, No, Father is at hand. ' Knowing he can always do a better job of governing the gears, he promptly takes over. And then, somehow, car accidents are so offen attributed to feminine wool-wathering. Women are supposed to be more perilous than men to passengers, pedestrians and other motorists. On this point masculine public opinion remains adamant; we are sure nothing save a major event could ever alter it, The event having arrived, we herald another momentous change. A cherished and cockeyed theory about women is passing. War, and man’s ‘pressing need for aid, are responsible. So, amid the noise of drums and the acclaim of press agents, the modern girl is not a menace but a patriot at the controls. We shall store these things in our memory. And we serve notice now that, when the emergency is over and if we survive it, we shall vehemently resent each repetition of the boresome crack, “Huh, probe ably a woman driving.”

Questions and Answers

(The indianapolis Times Services Bureau will answer any question of fact or information, mot involving extensive ree - search. Write your questions clearly, sign name and address, inclose a three-cent postage stamp. Medical or legal advice cannot ‘be given. Address The Times Washington Service Bureau, 1013 Thirteenth St, Washington, D. C.).

Q—On what basis is the Federal Tax on Sazoling levied? A—On the number of gallons to which title passes when gasoline is sold by the manufacturer, \ Q—Does a United States patent furnish protections in foreign countries? A—No, it protects an invention only in the United States. Protection in foreign countries is obtained by separate patents in each country. Q—What is meant by the dark and light of the moon? A—The expression “dark” and “light” of the moon ‘are popular terms having no astronomical cance. The “dark of the moon” is defined as the ine terval of a few days near New Moon when the moon is invisible; therefore the remainder of the month may be regarded as the “light of the moon.” ° Q—What is a slush fund? :

As a Folscal om iv aca vast ol panel

| SS ire es

friends to read the manuscript, produces blushes or %