Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 18 December 1942 — Page 23

RALPH BURKHOLDER |

Editor, in U. S. Service WALTER LECKRONE Editor

Price in Marion Coune

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Give Light and the People Wilt Find Their Own Way

i FRIDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1042

_ INDUSTRY UNBOUND ; the stock market crash in late 1929 American in4 dustry went on the defensive. We always have thought that in this connection two and two were added to make at least six. In the public mind, what happened to the price of an industrial stock was blamed on the industry, rather than the stock speculator. Out of the wild binge and the ultimate {blow-up in lower Manhattan came condemnation to the far-flung factories whose stocks were on the “big board” t and “the curb.” 3 Though their products were the best in the world and constantly being improved by the inventive genius, the i eompetitive urge, the skill of the labor and the ingenuity ; cof the management, nevertheless, the wrath of the nation was’ aroused against them, and industry high-tailed it for ‘ithe doghouse.

4 Out ‘of that grew a golden opportunity for a certain 8chool of thought in this country which in the days of prosa I perity hadn’t been able to “get going.” It was the school that believed the whole capitalistic system was wrong and A {ought to he not merely changed but obliterated. : Individualism should be out. Equal opportunity was a menace because it encouraged the strong and thereby penal!ized the weak. Free enterprise and capitalism were destructive -social forces. They exalted the predatory and ‘submerged those who didn’t have the acquisitive touch. What wag needed was a leveling off. That could be done wonly by government, and more government. at 8 i» 2 » » » ! S° there developed a rapidly growing movement to exalt the state and ‘to slap down the individual; to divide the | wealth that had been created by that modern industrial miracle, mass production. - From now on it should be the { politico who rode in the driver's seat.

Thus came the boom of bureaucracy as the successor to the Wall street boom. Red tape quickly took the place {of ticker tape. ‘Public loans supplanted brokers’ loans. And a wild time, but of a different sort, was had by all. +That, long before the war. :

And industry remained in the doghouse.

Then came the war, At first it was still business as fusual, ‘As the war threat thickened for us a moderate con- | version’ “from peacetime to “defense” production developed. iBut only moderate and reluctant. Then Pearl Harbor.

} The story of what industry has done since Dec. 7, 1941, {has just been told in a Scripps-Howard series written by +Charles T. Lucey after long investigation at the plants \Where, in his words, mass production, America’s creation, . iis turning “the plush goods of peacetime to the desperately ‘ineeded tools of war.”

4 We hope you have read the Lucey articles. If you ave, you know that even the peacetime miracles of mass production pale before mass production functioning under ithe stimulating stress of war.

While the. politicos have been balled up with bickering {in Washington, industry has gone ahead, all-out and on a straight line. It has rescued this nation from the morass {in which bureaucratic bungling threatened to bog it. And ‘a glance at the recent election returns will reveal that in- :! idustry has exchanged residence with the politicos, who now are the occupants of the doghouse. ” f J 8 ® ” ” 18° much for the present. What of industry after the war

ls of the acchplishiaanis of hand and brain re:sultant fromthe war cannot yet be told, for obvious reasons lof not revealing to the enemy. But a forecast of industry . iafter the war—and, after all, industry means, or should HOE ‘mean, all of us—is given vividly in an article in the De‘lcember Atlantic Monthly written by Arthur Kudner, i If you want to cheer up, read it. The title is “Beyond Victory.” It is reprinted in The Times today, starting on i Page 1. Here are a few passages: “Under the pressures of war there are developing in ‘this country the makings of an era of prosperity and expansion so widespread and dazzling as to make anything {in our earlier experience seem puny potatoes indeed. “LY us examine a few things that foreshadow what may be. “The normal monthly output of new locomotive horse- | power in peacetime in this country is about 40,000. In another year we should be producing in air horsepower per month something like 20,000,000. After the war this immense bank of engine power will have to be dispersed, Progress in manufacture will force it.

piu : “The, dispersal will work a revolution in business, transortation; and in communication. Spell out the implica~

- rs ————

ons for-yourself as you prefer, whether in terms of tree- r

pened. oranges picked tonight in California, which will on the New York market at 8 o'clock tomorrow morning, » of transcontinental shipping generally, or, more import, transcontinental thinking, accelerating from, so to sak, eight days from coast to coast, to eight hours. The ol velocity of trade, travel, living, will speed up pronately; and marketwise this can mean at least the o oubling the'pepulation, y

of the shape of things to come

0 litical tape of those who, as Mr. Kudputs it, learned to worship security instead of oppory and 0 think in terms of dividing wealth fustend of

states, 75 cents a month;

Fair Enough By Westbrook Pegler

NEW YORK, Dec. 18. — The New York World-Telegram thinks ‘these dispatches are unnecessarily apprehensive that Paul V. McNutt, under the powers conferred on him by President Roosevelt's man= power order, might attempt to drive unwilling Americans into unions.

World-Telegram cites President Roosevelt's statement in the captive coal mine controversy a little over a year ago when John L. Lewis was insisting that a minority of 9 per cent of the miners be compelled to submit to his rule, since described by his, late friend Philip Murray, president of the C. I. O, as despotic and Hitlerian. The president took a stand against Lewis at that time and said: “I tell you frankly that the government of the United States will not order, nor will congress pass legislation, ordering a so-called closed shop. The government will never compel this 5 per cent to join the union by a government decree.« That would be too much+like the Hitler method toward labor.” That, I submit, is an unwise citation. For a short time later the government did order the closed shop in that very case and thus imposed the Hitlerian: condition.

Slavery Possible Step by Step

THEREFORE, THERE is no reassurance inthe president’s quoted remark and it is reasonable to anticipate thd}, little by little, McNutt will drive people into the unions if he finds that that is

the easier way in particular cases as it was in the Lewis case. Winston Churchill put his finger on the idea in his latest speech when he quoted from Hitler's writings to the effect that peoples could be enslaved if the conditions of slavery were imposed step by step and no one condition was harsh enough, by itself, to make them fight. Anyway, the Lewis case is one absolutely indisputable precedent proving that this government will impose the closed shop if that is expedient and the recent Montgomery Ward case is similar although not identical. In that case, the president, himself, ordered the company to’sign a “maintenance of

membership” contract with a C. I. O. union which

means that union membership is more in the view of the government than manpower.

There's No Need for Speculation

IF A WORKER decides to quit the union, Montgomary Ward must fire him and turn that much manpower into the street. Moreover, although Ward signed the compulsion of a government order, backed by a command ’from the president, and thus, plainly

under duress, the company was not allowed to say, in the contract, that it was submitting under duress. Americans may think they have freedom of contract but here is a case, one of many, incidentally, in which a company has been ordered to sign a contract on terms which it.objects to. Nobody can say that McNutt will compel the employer of George Spelvin, American, to fire him from a nonessential task, and compel Spelvin to take a job in a closed shop and joint the union, but he hasn't said he won't and, on precedent, he can. But there is no need for a lot of speculation. If McNutt won't do this, why doesn’t he say so?

‘Quicksilver’ By Richard Lewis

“QUICKSILVER” is a new novel. of theater people, the first by Fitzroy Davis, who has been connected with the legitimate stage long enough to view it real. istically and to treat it as a way of life, sometimes fascinating, more often dull, sodden, unceftain ard repféte with average moments, One imagines that Mr. Davis had a dual compulsion in enduring “a the agonies of writing a first novHe wanted to get something off his citest and he If so, he. has

el. wanted to write a good first novel achieved both ‘objectives. At times, he appears to be trying to say something profound about the theater, an effort which seems unsuccessful and unnecessary. What he succeeds in doing is pictorializing a segment of American life with penetration and skill. That should be enough for a first novel. The monotone in which the novel is written may be objectionable to some readers who are searching for lightness and humor in novels this season, Certainly it lends the work a_ quality of bleakness and discontent. Mr. Davis takes his theater seriously,

Readable and Well Written

WHAT SAVES THIS NOVEL from lapsing into a diatribe on Life in the Theater is a faint, wistful groping for the fundamental decencies of art and life, In their highly articulate way, the characters are unhappy, but they are hopeful, too, hopeful of getting somewhere, making something out of themselves and contributing something. : Although Mr. Davis uses the Dos Passos trick. of shifting the reader from character to character, the viewpoint of the actor dominates each character’s\ outlook . . . and a somber outlook it is. Humorless, sometimes negative, the novel's prin-

cipal claim to fame is its earthy insight ‘into: the theater and the people who strive to make a living in it. highly readable andy beautifully written.

“Quicksilver,” 8 novel by Fitaroy Davis." Harcourt, Brace &.Co. 630 pp. Price $3.

Brazil Turmoil By Allen Haden

) MONTEVIDEO, Dec. 18.—The confliet within'the ‘Brazilian army as to whether or not to make active war took a ‘turn against the allies with War Minister Urico Garpar Dutra's forbidding of,

Ine support. of thls ides, We}

published by |

. ° . ’ » A : ¢ 3 The Hoosier Forum I wholly disagree with what you say, but will defend to the death you right to say it.—~Voltaire.

“SOMETHING THAT MIGHT ' HELP TRANSPORTATION”

By R. Sheets, assistant plant manager, Electronic Laboratories, Inc., Indianapolis Something that might help releive the transportation system is as follows: Defense plants issue to their employees arm bands denoting the name of the. company they wark for. In this manner people driving cars will be more, considerate in picking people up. If one knows you are a defense worker, and in what direction you are going it relieves the driver of guess work. As long as I know where somecne is going I will gladly pick them up. To know where someone works, and in what direction they are going is almost like an acquaintanceship. When they step in your car you already have a conversation in common, which is a great factor in satisfying .one that you are helping the right people. Something drastic must be done, but let's. think of all. the other angles until that time comes,

2% =» “TAKE CARE OF THE HOME FRONT ST”

. Recently this paper carried edi~ torially a copy of Lincoln’s pronouncements favoring private profit. I, too, regard private profit as the chief incentive to individual ‘effort. But there are limits to which private profit should confor. I here have in mind the care of some men in this city who are working for $20 a week of 49 hours. And it’s not .a white collar job either. Instead, they work in -an auto wrecking ‘yard,’ and the work is so rough and dirty that:it entails extra cost for clothes and laundry, Now this is plainly a case where the; employer- makes a fat profit at the. expense of his workers. And it is no use to ask why these men do not join a ‘union, for one of them told me that he would rather suffer want than contribute to the most. outrageous’ racket in this country.’ And to add’to these men’s ‘misery’

(Times vagiae are invited fo express their views in these columns, religious controveries excluded. Make your letters ‘short, so all can have a chance. Letters must be signed)

is the fear that out of their $20 a week they may have to pay an income tax. God pity those poor wretches if they are saddled with an income tax. In the Atlantic eharter, President

Roosevelt proposed the four Iree-|

doms for all the people in the world, and among those four doms was the freedom from want. I think the president would do well to take care of the home front first. ®'=N » “DID LANDLORD EVER WIN AT HEARING?” By Mrs. Landlord, Indianapolis I returned home today from

; another trip to the office of rent control weak and limp with rage

+ {and frustration. , , . It’s time we had By Mattie Withers, 1525 N. Amen ave.. |

someone in that office who dared to see both sides of a subject. , . « And don’t let anyone tell me I'm

‘unpatriotic for criticizing that of-

fice. I am a widow with two sons— all the children I have—in the armed forces. . . . I got a job to support myself and to try to hold our home together until they can come back to it. I have some rental property but am expecting nothing of it but that it shall be self-supporting. This property was run down HOLC property acquired before my husband’s death, We spent $800 on two houses and raised the rent in accordance with rents in that neighborhood of similar properties. But back I had to go to July, 1941—regardless. Then I appealed, but the rent board denied my request. . . . The job I have taken to support

Side Siances:=By Salbraith

For all of i*s overcast mood, “Quicksilver” By 5 x =n

speeches, lectures and publications | | 48

on the subject without previous

B “Tie snmetiate purpose 1s to | Se ate Biko |

silence

least temporarily the officers and liberal elements of Brazil, and to maintain his own no-war

position. The public has reacted ‘unenthusiastically to mo- |!

order

free-

myself is only half-day work. I cannot take a full-time job because I must run after this property and it does not bring ‘in enough now to enable me to pay an agent to take care of it. I could not sell it since the rents have been cut. I have a bear by the tail ‘and can't let go. Now comes the final straw, I.have a letter from the federal income tax office saying that I should not have taken $800 deduction for the repairs on the houses. ‘That board says that was a capital investment, therefors I must pay taxes on all but $200 of it. : The rent control bosird said this expendittire whs for only normal repairs. Therefore I could not collect rent for it. In other words, the. federal income tax office charges| me taxes on $600 of income and the rent control board takes: away the wherewithal to pay the tax.’ Again I went to the rent controf board to try to talk the matter over with ‘them. After shuffling papers around a while the. man at the desk told me that there was no changing a decision on their part, I might appeal to Cleveland, yes. T have done that on one property already three months ago and I am still buying coal and paying for services at a loss to myself. People of Indianapolis, why are

we not given a personnel in that|. office who can sometimes make de-|: cisions fair to poth sides? Did the|:

landlord ever win on a single hearing? I have yet to hear of one such instance.

y. » » »

“JUST THINK, A WORLD

WITH NO MISTAKES' By E. B. L., 2116 N. New Jersey st. This is my first effort to break into ,the Hoosier Forum. First I want to state I think it is an ideal place for excess steam to escape. Then, too, I think it is one way of letting the various columnists know what ’ the ‘average ‘reader thinks of them, More power to such writers as Pegler, : “Clapper, Simms and Pyle, also your editorial ‘com--And then, there is Eleanor, which

' |him back a few years ago. His de-

ductions and for the

[Fuel Rationing -

Btite o

TRL Tei

Sm 18—mne }

”

ated. avon, he Truman committee dn the senate

pin ner am ne ew, win

| Fo 107 . tation. ‘Only 14 per cent of the questionnaires were

properly filled out. Not only were many farmers ute terly unable to understand them, but a majority lacked the information to supply the requested details, 7 For instance, for each three-month period in the previous year, the amount of gas used, miles operated, ‘number of trips, average 10ad in tons or cuble feet,

; average capacity of the. truck in tons: op ‘cuble feet,

and the like, ad infinitum, Ne Amerionss ermar over Kepkia fetus ‘of ish

|:day-by-day multifarious activities—use of thé

for taking feed to cattle, running over to the neigh bor’s, to the store, rs is a ig ‘town with produce, bringing supplies. back. ‘Many farmers saw red.

Eastman Sees Error of System

THE TRUMAN COMMITTEE, holding its temper better than the farmers, scored the system a8 “une necessarily complex.” Leon Henderson could nof be blamed for this one, . Joseph B. Eastman, defense transportation iteotar, } was responsible. He explained that the system was adopled besa rationing boards in the East, unfamiliar with truck operations, had given truck operators what they asked for, with the result that excessive allowances in some cases created a black market. He wanted to avoid this,

The Truman committee urged that, instead, farm ers be put on local ration boards so. they could punish

those guilty of black-market operations, and said the’

whole problem should have been handled locally by Joaivs which knew local needs. Mr. Eastman saw the error of hig system, and naw

| local boards are doing the administering,

‘The farm truck nightmare is typical of the lack of understanding in Washington of the problems which have brought so many complaining letters to congrésse men and which reveal the need of a simplified, decéne tralized system with more discretion for local boards,

Better Job of Education Needed: Ar

FUEL-OIL RATIONING is now the chief source of complaint in such states as Kansas and Missouri. The kicks are largely based on the misconception that off is plentiful in that area. Investigation discloses that there is more fuel oi

in that particular area than a year ago, while on the other hand a shortage of coal is claimed, The people can’t see why they should not:be allowed to use the fuel oil and why conversion to coal should be demande o, particularly with the shortage "of conversion The Truman committee's analysis of the situation in the Midwest, if properly publicized, Hg contribute to the.acceptance: of rationing. , It disclosed that petroleum district No. 2, come prising the Midwest from: Ohio to the Rockies and from North Dakota to Oklahoma, has a daily sup .of crude and fuel oil of approximately 1,000,000 barrels and 475,000 barrels, respectively, and a daily consumption of 1,100,000 barrels and 473,000 barrels, respec~ tively. So that, taken as a whole, there is a shortage even in this area. But even though there is sufficient fuel oil in some parts of this area, nevertheless the Midwest muss share with the East if the East is to be kept warm this -| Winter. It is necessary to get as much fuel oil as possible from the Midwest, for the turn-around with ‘tank cars is much shorter than from the gulf area. A better job of education wdlld simplify the ration ‘ing job in the Midwest as elsewhere,

In Washinghon,

By. Peter - Edson +

WASHINGTON, Tee: 18<Rae tioning of meat and coffee . ine ' creases the demand for. cheese and milk, . . . Milking cows three times a day instead ‘of twice is being recommended where there is available labor. . .:y Department of agriculture has asked {amen gto raise 121 miltion head of » miext year. .:, hin gh + shipped to North Africa under lend-lease: because ‘the Nazis stripped every pouny available for German consump= tion. . . +, Prisoners otswar will alsy Have. to be. fed from lend-lease food supplies, =. o.oo ft } 7 dh

os Storage Irregular Sin 2

Natural gas storage, strikes an irregular pattern across the Ui. 8, 14 states using no natural gas, seven state using natural gas exclusively, .’, . Artificial gas, used largely in cities for domestic cooking and made from coal and oil, is manufactured in 41 states. . Thirty-four states use both natural and Manufsciured gas, some of them mixing it. . . . Olive oil stocks for

1943 will be 20 million pounds against a normal of 70 million pounds. . . . Soldiers attending religious services in August numbered over 3.6 million, which means 900,000 a Sunday, which means about one sole dier out of every five. .

We: the. Women By Ruth Millett

’