Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 23 July 1941 — Page 12

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The Indianapolis Times

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WEDNESUAY JULY 23, 1041

HOW ABOUT THIS, MR. MAYOR?

AST year total attendance at Indianapolis’ five municipal swimming pools and one beach was more than 470,000. That figure apparently will be at least equalled this year. Almost half a million people—men, women and children —in municipal pools and not a single lifeguard Appoittied on ‘the merit system! It is not for us to judge the capabilities of the lifeguards involved in the two drownings of the last few days. But it is within our scope to point out that the City ‘Administration, after consenting to place playground work‘ers on the merit basis, balked at putting lifeguards on the same footing and withheld these 7 appoinfments as a sop " to the ward heelers. It is quite clear that the Recreation Department has - done an admirable job of selecting lifeguards under the conditions imposed. by the Administration. But we'd rather have our children not swim at all than swim under a political appointee.

‘WHY NOT EQUAL TAXATION?

JF the Ways and Means Committee has its way, and mar- ~ ried couples are required by law to file joint income-tax returns, it is going to make a whale of a difference to a lot of taxpayers in the eight so-called” “community property” states. These are Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, California, Idaho and Washington. Oklahoma also

recently passed a community-property law, but its validity.

has been challenged in the courts. Here is the way the thing works: Suppose you live in a non-community-property state—

+ like Indiana. Say you have an income of $5000, all earned

~ salary, and your wife has no income. Regardless of what ~ Congress does about joint vs. separate returns, you will be

* required to file one tax return on that $5000. Under the

- same income in Indiana.

proposed new rates, the tax will be $308. But suppose you lived in California or some other community-property state—and you had that same earned income of ‘$5000. If Congress doesn’t require a joint return, you would do what you have-always done—divide your income 50-50 with your wife. You will file a return on $2500 income and pay a tax of $137.50. You and your wife together will pay $2756—or $33 less than the tax paid on the If Congress changes the law and compels the filing of a single joint return, you would pay . $308—or the same as in Indiana. As the income increases, the difference becomes, more

" markéd—because splitting the income makes it possible ¢ to

stay within lower surtax brackets. Under the proposed rates, a $10,000 income, taxed as a single income, will pay $1166. Split 50-50, and taxed as two incomes, the husband pays $440, the wife $440—total $380, or a saving of $286. .On a $100,000 income, the tax saving will be $12,117. On $1,000,000 the saving will be $41,576. Rep. Dingell of Michigan says that if Congress refuses to compel joint returns he will then move to permit married couples in all 48 states to split their incomes for tax purposes, ‘as those who live in community-property states do now— ‘and then boost the rates to get just as much revenue. We * think that’s fair. We think that any two people who have . the same income should pay the same Federal income tax, ‘no matter where they live.

LONGER LIFE AND SUDDEN DEATH TWO reports from the Census Bureau inform us that— 1. The average life span of white persons in the United States is now 62.5 years, an increase of 3.8 years over the previous decade. . © 2, Traffic deaths in America’ 8 large cities are running ahead of last year—4791 so far this year, ‘compared with 4249 in the corresponding period of: 1940. Apparently our destiny is to live longer but to die in

a - the street instead of in bed.

THE LOAN TO BRITAIN . JESSE JONES has reached down into the bottomless vaults

" of the RFC and come up with $425,000,000 for a loan to Great: Britain, to finance some of her pre-lend-lease obligations in this country. And so we drive another nail into the coffin wherein repose the twin corpses of the Neutrality

Act and the J ohnson (no loans to defaulters) Act.

It’s all legal, of course. Congress passed another law,

. although without bothering to repeal those older ones.

This loan is reasonable, logical and safe. It is amply

covered by securities which, on the basis of their earnings

in the last five: years, should produce enough income to

_ amortize the loan in the 15 years stipulated.

Britain could have dumped those shares on the market

and obtained spot cash.’ But in view of the dull condition

of the securities markets in this country, the offering of ch large quantities of stock would depress values. There

was much disappointment: recently. when the sale of the

tish-owned American Viscose Co., largest producer of rayon, grossed only 62 million dollars (of which American bankers got a fat cut for handling the sale). So, Jesse takes British shares in A. T. & T., General ‘Motors, Sears-Roebuck, F. W, Woolworth, Loew’s, Timken, mmonwealth & Southern and a whole string of other terprises, puts them in his safe, and hands over the cash. He'll get 3 per cent interest. A nice day's work for even ich a big banker as Jesse. Still, Jesse is probably glad to think that he probably

n't be running Uncle Sam’s big bank 15 years from now, |

hen the loan falls due. For, suppose the income from those hocked securities falls off, and England decides she unable to pay—just as she decided she couldn't pay the War debts, Then comes the job of foreclosing.

srness, recriminations, cries of Uncle Shylock, hands

s the sea pointing with fingers of scorn.

Fair Enough

By Westbrook Pegler

Picture of Veteran’ Youth Worker Gives a Clue to Type of Students - Who Were the Guests of First Lady

EW YORK, July 23. —Last week, while Harold N Ickes was berating Chatles Lindbergh again for running with the Nazis, Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt was entertaining something called the Summer Student Leadership institute, which is sponsored by something else called the International Student Service, at the private summer home of the President of the United States on Campobello Island, near Easts

port, Me. Mrs. ‘Roosevelt wrote of these activities, social and intellectual, in her column and mentioned that Justice Felix Frankfurter of the United States Supreme Court, was among those present. Justice

Frankfurter was “staying in the }

house with the students” and gave +. a “number of interesting talks” and a “lecture,” Justice Frankfurter is the one who wrote the opiion holding that any organization calling itself a labor union might, without penalty, interfere with interstate commerce in a jurisdictional strike involving no labor dispute and that Congress intended that the victim of false representations by such a group. resulting in a boycott would simply have to pocket his loss. 8 8

USTICE FRANKFURTER is one of the most influential men in the United States, not only because of his social and political intimacy with the President and Mrs.. Roosevelt, but, more effectively, through the loading of the Government with aggressive lawyers who studied under him, I am, to my regret, unacquainted with either the Summer Student Leadership Institute or the International Student Service, but I doubt that many Americans are acquainted with them. An “institute” is easily organized and a “service” may be equally fictitious. There are literally dozens of organizations containing in their titles the words “youth” or “student” and the Communists have been active in many of them, as the Dies Committee showed.

However, I see a clue to the character of these two groups in the fact that in the Sunday picture section there appeared again the countenance of Joseph Lash, an inveterate youth who has been active in the youth business for at least a dozen years and who was identified with Communist front youth organizations in testimony taken before the Dies Committee, - Lash admittedly was a Socialist, and thus an enemy of the American economy on which the American system of government is based, and he is executive secretary, the key job which the Communists always strive to control, of the American Student Union. » ” 8 NOTHER authority on Communist activity under the cloak of innocent titles, Benjamin Stolberg, also identified with the Communist effort the organization of which Lash was, in effect, the head man, Last was one of those misunderstood youths whom Mrs. Roosevelt entertained not once but twice at luncheon in the White House the time that she attended the sessions of the Dies Committee to manifest her disapproval of the inquiry into Communist activity in the guise of youth organizations. As to the details of the sessions at the President's own summer home there was no newspaper report beyond Mrs. Roosevelt’s own writings which sometimes are rather sketchy. The nature of Justice Frankfurter’s counsel to the eager young people sitting at the feet of wisdom may only be surmised from the trend of his opinions and teachings. On this basis, and that of Lash’s past associations, however, it is difficult to quell a slight flutter of apprehension that American capitalism escaped a very severe wigging and that collectivism and compulsion, which are the kernel of both Hitlerism and communism, got rather the better of the encounter. Mr. Ickes, whe speaks with the consent and approval of the White House and keeps a still tongue in his head when his remarks are deemed inopportune, is alert to suspect the motives and objectives, indeed, even the American loyalty of private citizens who run with the Nazis, and so am I. I can’t trust anyone who can trust a Nazi, but I go further than Mr. Ickes, for I can’t trust anyone who can trust a Communist or anyone who runs with them. Mrs. Roosevelt doesn’t meet the same test that Ickes applies to Lindbergh, and Mr. Frankfurter, too, must expect to be known by the company he keeps

‘| as well as by the slant of his decisions.”

Business By John T. Flynn

Proposal fo Raise Security Tax To Aid Defense Held Indefensible

EW YORK, July 23.—The proposal to tax husbands and wives as a single income individual has aroused a terrific blast from the husbands and wives who will be thus taxed. They constitute a comparatively small number of people, but also a very vocal number with great influence. The blast will probably defeat the plan. But what about another tax proposal which will hit millions—and hit them at a point that is utter indefensible? This is the proposal to increase the social security tax. . To get this clear, it is very necessary to keep in mind what the social security “tax” is. First of all, it is not a tax. The social security system is an insurance

system. It is a plan under which A

the Government operates a gigantic ‘Insurance concern to insure chiefly the worker against two risks: (1) the risk of old age, and (2) the risk of unemployment. The Government makes the worker pay for this insurance. He is assessed so much per month, and his employer is assessed the same amount, These sums are paid into the Treasury. The object of these payments is to cover the cost of this insurance, just as your life or accident or fire insurance premium covers the cost of that. The money which the worker

pays in is not given to the Government to pay the

wages of Congressmen or soldiers or Government employees—the cost of running the Government. The

* Government should not charge the worker any more

for his insurance than it is going to cost. - i 2 8 2» ue : . E must remember also that these workers who

pay for this old-age and unemployment insur- |

ance are in the same category as those who pay for life insurance, fire insurance, automobile accident insurance, and all other kinds. The only difference is that in one case the business is run by private persons and in the other case by the Government, In other words, Americans as a group are juss a big batch of insurance premium payers. ld-age insurance and unemployment. insurance at are no different from the rest. Perhaps there is one difference. They are paying a higher rate already than they should. The Government has already collected more than a billion dollars in excess of cost, has borrowed that and spent it. : Why then should the old-age pension and unem-

ployment - benefit insurance payers of the Govern- |

ment—the lowest income group in the nation—be singled out for a boost in the rate? The boost, mind

you, is not to pay for the insurance, but frankly and |

brazenly to‘pay for the cost of defense. Defense must be paid for. Every person must bear his part. Every person must be taxed. If workers must be taxed the- tax should be should not be discriminatory. ‘They will incomes taxes, sales taxes, every eo thers. But why those insured should be for a special additional tax is Ire ian mortal can fathom. To do this would be nothing Jess an outrage.

So They Say— PALA Yau do nok look |

But that’s a long way off; and somebody else will likely | at little children

DNESD

om se a cl a Ren go ip

WE AMERICANS CANNOT. AFFORD To '¢PECULATE WITH TH

SECURITY OF .. AMERICA.

/ + ERC

THE 3 SPONSIBILITY

PESTS SOLELY WITH THE CONGRESS.

a

po Ea D. ROOSEVELT ~ Commanper

A ETRE RET

An Appeal to ‘Reason! So

Rd ery

1

ma p=

~The Hoosier Foram

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

LAUDS FDR FOR

ASKING PUBLIC'S ADVICE By J. L. B., Indianapolis Washington dispatches report that President Roosevelt will make a direct appeal to the people to retain selectees and National Guardsmen in the Army beyond the oneyear limit. In other words, the President is asking the American public's advice on a question of grave urgency. This is a healthy step and we pope the President will make it a habit.

® 8 = PREFERS AL WILLIAMS TO JOHN T. FLYNN By rat Hogan, 1120 Illinois 8t., Columbus,

Thanks ‘a million for giving us Maj. Al Williams to fill the space wasted with' John T. Flynn's idle drivel and water-logged theories. With so many issues of vital necessity to the welfare of this nation, it is an abject shame to publish the hallucinations of Flynn on the editorial page of a great newspaper. If you have been hooked to carry Flynn for a definite period, why not put him back among the liver pills? Flynn, Lindbergh and Wheeler are the co-saviours of America—that is, saving it for Hitler; and now Flynn makes a bizarre attempt at wisecracking when he says, “Now I suppose we will be asked to help make Europe safe for communism?” Why not? He and Lindbergh are doing everything in their power to encourage communism in America. Granted that this so-called America First Committee is composed of luxurious loafers and idle theorists, kindly state one single suggestion or idea that Flynn has ever contributed to the general welfare. Al .yilliams is a wise man, a practical man, an invaluable man to this nation right now, as his opinions come from both observation and experience. By all means give us Williams. There is no place in a modern news. paper for Flynn; he should be writ ing to the professors with nets chasing butterflies. 4 "0 URGES SOME ACTION ON PINBALL ‘MACHINES

By W. J. R., Indianapolis As our prosecutor is at his cleanup campaign I wonder why something isn't done about the pinball machines. . I was interested in a case that

{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.)

came up in Municipal Court last week where the proprietor of a tavern had been arrested for_ having one of these machines as 3 gaming device. The witness testified B had played the machine and had won money and lost money on the machine and signed an affidavit to that effect. | The witness also testified that he had taken his 11-year-old son in the tavern and bought him a coca cola and played the machine while they were in there. The judge called the juvenile probation officer and said it was hard to believe a man who would take his child in a tavern. But when a child wants a drink it is pretty hard to find a place fo buy it in some parts of our city unless it is a tavern and the law says a child may go into a tavern if accompanied by its parent. I have learned that the witness has been employed by a reputable firm in this city for the last 15 years and provides for his family well. It looked to me as if instead of trying the man on a gaming device charge the judge seemed to be trying the witness on a child-neglect charge. I am a tavern worker myself and have owned taverns in this city and I believe they should be cleaned out aplenty. Here was a case where they had evidence and the affidavit. The case was continued. I am hoping that the witness will go back and the probation officer will investigate the witness’ character and then see if the judge will believe him then.

"8 » BELT RAILROADER CAUTIONS PARENTS

By Muorvin McNew, 1445 Blaine Ave.

Please publish this letter in the interest of humanity. It may bring wakefulness to some parents qf our city who seem to be very much in need of an alarm clock to waken them from their carelessness. I am a brakeman on the Belt R.R. We run our trains wholly within the limits of the city.” We have many crossings and some are

Side Glances — By Galbraith

protected only by bells and signs, Won't you- Please obey and _ob-

serve these warnings to protect your own as well as your family’s life and health against the usually fatal train-auto collision? We are prohibited from using the steam whistle to any great extent under penalty of the law of the city. Our engineers are held liable for violation of said law and yet must make every effort to avoid tragedy at grade crossings. Please, Mr. Motorist, give us a chance for our lives and give your family a safe and sane ride. . . And one more thing. Please, parents of our city, can’t you keep your children from playing on the property of the railroad? This is a privately owned property and not a playground. You would not allow children on your lawn to romp and play; yet you will permit them to play on the tracks of the Belt. Why? Can it be carelessness on your part? Let us hope not. A few nights ago on the reverse curve just east of Winter Ave. only quick, alert action by the crew saved a tot's life. This baby, who could not have been a day over 3 years old, was playing with his dog so .close to the tracks that it was almost a foregone conclusion both would be killed. But fate intervened, and the child and his dog escaped unhurt. The nervewracking experience to the engine crew and conductor ‘and head brakeman cannot be told. It is a terrible feeling known only to those who experience it in fact. God forbid that we kill anyone, especially a child, but if we do (and it 4s sure to happen unless parents wake up), no one but un

responsible, . . . : 8 0» » A DIG AT CRITICS OF WHEAT PENALTY By N. G., Frankfort, Ind.

Last spring, a bill was presented in Congress that caused little commotion, passing the Senate with

sier Senators voting for the biil. The law was to firther check a wheat surplus, and placed a 49-cent penalty upon wheat over allotment. It met approval of the Farm Bureau and its legality ‘was approved by the courts. However both Indiana Senators recently home scouting, voiced stern disapproval of the law, especially Mr. VanNuys. He says he will aid all farmers in opposing the law, and since the law adversely affects him, he even defies the Government to enforce the law on him through the courts. This is the law he helped to make. * Now we have been taught that a good ¢itizen obeys the law as long as it is on the statute books and that

|deflance of organized law is had {| citizenship and a danger spot. to any

government. You would not ‘expect this from a high public official. -* One of two things must be true, either he votes for the bill without first reading it, or he is just playing the ‘old political game back: home among the boys. Which do you think? Again I see by the papers that the “boys” (not all farmers) had a big protest meeting in my neighboring Boone County Seat and as compared to others. The chairman was a G. O. P. county official and the selected secretary-treasurer is the aggressive Republican county chairman. Their resolutions were

We wonder; how much of

{this protest is just the old political

game at work.

LUCKLESS FISHERMAN By JANE SIGLER

DAILY THOUGHT

The truths shall make you ~=John 8:32. o

Says— i

‘ages in ‘other kind of

and thoughtless parents can be held |

only two dissenting votes, both Hoo-|

Can. Johnson

heii

"

lts Time Someone in Washington Gave Heed to Little Business Now Caught in the Middle of War Effort

TASHINGTON, July 33.—In addition to crushing hy _probably highly inflated prices and shortmany services and supplies, under present trends, the American people are with anof unshirted hell about which thers has not been much discussion, The: wholesale diversion of foo much material from civilian to’ mil use with no regard to ‘some 80! of just balance between them threatens to orl DP all hsinoss” the pn of “small business” in’ this coun I mean the smi inedjenadn merchants of all kinds of and even some larger ‘ones, souds hundreds of thousands of small manufacturers of all shris of supra plies, small service and repair op erators ‘and the millions of people employed ‘by. Worn, I do not refer to the effeqt of rapidly increasing taxes on everything or even to the

1apid inflationary tendency of prices—hope for con-

trol of which seems to be fading. I thean the threat-

_ened sheer inability of thefe “little fellows” .to get ° ‘transportation, power and, above all, raw and fin-

ished material with. which to conduct their- business and necessary services to the public. It is the fashion to decry any reference to this as short-sighted sloganeering. for . “business as usual.” People who do this are frequently so exalted with war ° enthusiasm, not to say hysteria, that they can't take time off even to look at this side of the problem and consequently rarely know much about it. There can be no business as usual bit there should be: extreme care to preserve our economic systems. ) #8 = : - HE British understand, this. “Says Bir Kenneth Lee, representing the British Industria! and Export Council: “You may be sure our nation is not going to put out of business the smaller firms if they can help it” No responsible high authority on this side of the Atlantic has’ as yet expressed such a polfcy. In the maze and labyrinth of conflicting vonmmittees and officials conducting our war effort, - know of none who is‘giving this angle ‘prime Tost, ay eration. True, Mr. Henderson, in OPACS, is charged with “civilian supply,” but he seems to regard that “CS” at the end of OPACS as’ meaning’ | ‘civilian sacrifice and not civilian supply. . We can’t go too far in this direction. We, seem to be brewing a fine broth’ of popular discontents—soldiers and their families, because, while they are being asked to sacrifice in many directions, mo curbs are being applied to labor, prices and profits. ' Farmers are. sore because the plans and promises to ‘produce “périty prices” are not precisely ‘working ‘out. Ad even hotter and, in some cases, more justified resentment will be created if one of the props of American economic life—the widespread institution of “little business”’—begins to' fold up, and there is no evidence of administrative concern to prevent it. » 5 »

T IS usually said: . “Oh, these people can get war work.” That is tommyrot. ‘The very essential character of this vast war-production effort throws it automatically into® the great industrial corporations, concentrates it in a few already congested Jo. dustrial areas and so; unintentiorially and perhap avoidably, vastly increases monopolistic ten a and, if something is not done to control it, will do more to wipe out small individual enterprise and the continuation of competition than anything that" ever happened in this country. Commendably the great corporations are doing what they can to “farm out” in subcontracts as much of this work as possible. But the field in which this can be done is pitifully small. It can’t touch the bulk of the great area ‘of merchandising and distribution at all. As this tendency proceeds, if not. checked, it will begin to bear with hardships, which will be believed by them to be unnecessary, on the whole civilian population. Neglect of civilian morale is no way to win a war. Revolution in our economic system is no way to survive a war.

A Woman's Viewpele

By Mrs. Walter Ferguson :

EOPLE who run away from things are called escapists, and are scorned ‘by the brave. : But no one is really brave enough never to run away, We all have favorite devices: for sneaking out of reality—the comics, the movies, ‘sentimental fiction, ‘murder Jnysteries, bridge, golf, horse races, Somes, prize fights, whisky and dope. Today every pefson needs an ivory tower into which he’. can withdraw when the pressure of horror offered by world events becomes unbearable, Every heart must find its own little havens, build its retreats, create its lovely Edens—or break. Yesterday I moved into my sanctuary—~the realm of a book— . and what a satisfactory method 2 of escape a book can be. To all who are weary of evildoing I recommend A. J. Cronin’s “The Keys of the Kingdom” (Little-Brown), It's a great love story, although there is no courtship or marriage in it—only the beautiful, moving recital of a man who loved God and who endured much for the sake of his love. Filled with ageless wisdom, it moves smoothly and majestically to the inevitable close—the twilight. of a life dedicated to doing good. And the author wisely calls that twilight “The End of the Beginning.” One sees human existence as a series of struggles, never won, yet somehow forever:inspirational because they prove so conclusively that nobility is ever pres-. ent amid . the gruelty, # - arrogance of men. “This is life.” est after a major defeat, “to a en ‘everything lost.” He is right. So life has” so life will ever be, a record of triumphs and’ defeats, each short-lived, each vital to progress in the. exormous struggle of humanity. reaching ‘for m ‘sickiiof bate.” 1 af daily, an ok on collins : Loving: * another, ‘of noble, “excuse evil deeds, pa A one conqueror who is able to van-

The “guish - ae hy oie con How much we need to

and kindness and tolerance these

te Fup Hi tke furnishings of the

days—for

' tuaries men ald women have ever She only sani:

minds.

Editor's Note: “The views expressed By columnists in this newspaper sre fheir own. They are nef necessarily those of The Indianapolis Times. , . = «| ©

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