Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 18 February 1943 — Page 17

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ROY W. HOWARD President

-RALPH BURKHOLDER Editor, in U. 8. Service ‘MARK FERREE WALTER LECKRONE ‘Business Manager Editor

(A SCRTIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER)

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«p> RILEY 5551

Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 1943

: ® ‘A FARMER GETS MAD : OUIS BROMFIELD, the novelist, has written a series of articles about the farm problem and the food crisis for

The Indianapolis Times and the Scripps-Howard newspapers.

You may think this a strange subject for Mr. Brom- |

field, but he is a practical farmer himself —operating 10600 acres in central Ohio—and until lately he was one of the - New Deal’s most ardent supporters. | Mr. Bromfield writes angrily, from bitter personal experience. Washington “muddling” and failure to plan, he says, are making it simply impossible for American farmers to produce more food, at a time when our military effort, our home front existence and our hopes for a just and lastiE ing peace all depend on increased food production. We wish we could say that Mr. Bromfield exaggerates the picture, but we see mighty little evidence that he is far wrong. However, we have asked Secretary of Agriculture Wickard to reply, and hope he will be able to present the situation in a better light. Meanwhile, we think Mr. Bromfield's articles will be valuable reading, (especially for rity people, who certainly need to know more about what the farmers are up against.

PASS THE AMMUNITION!

NHE bloody Tunisian campaign has begun. There have been reverses, and will be more. Casualties will be heavy before the axis is driven into the sea. Our troops are green, and they are going up against Rommel’s famous Afrika Korps and Hitler's best fliers. So the A. E. F.’s first taste of Nazi warfare will be bitter. Our government some time ago dropped its Pollyanna propaganda and began to prepare us for this. From the president on down, responsible officers and officials have been warning us that the Tunisian campaign will be very hard. But no amount of advance warning can ever prepare a people for retreats, losses and casualty lists—even the expected: blow is still a blow when it comes. to Some Americans here may not take it very well. A few may get panicky, and demand a scapegoat for every reverse —what’s wrong with our training system? Where are our generals? Why don’t our allies get in there and support our troops? And other irresponsible cries of the same kind may be heard. ; : But there probably will not be much of that. Our temptation, rather, is apt to be too much patriotism of the emotional variety. :

” ” ” » o ” HE test is not merely whether our hearts bleed for the men overseas, nor whether we give them our full confidence. The harder test for us is whether we match on the home front their effort on the fighting front. The men at the front do not need more flag-waving and more sympathetic words from us. They do need more ships, tanks, planes, guns, food. They want us to pass the ammunition. All this governmental bickering, this bureaucratic inefficiency, this capital-labor maneuvering, this public chiseling, this clock-watching, this picking and choosing of jobs, this complaining about rationing, this grumbling about taxes, this double standard of sacrifice for service men and something less for civilians—all this must go, if we are to pass the ammunition quickly enough to win the Tunisian campaign and the war. That is the kind of patriotism on the home front our fighters will understand. The only kind.

NOT CURED YET ONALD M. NELSON has forced the resignation of the war production board’s vice chairman, Ferdinand Eberstadt, and has turned Mr. Eberstadt’s duties over to Charles E. Wilson. It’s a good thing perhaps to see Mr. Nelson at last acting decisively in a situation which has festered for months, yet this seems not a. very satisfactory solution. : Mr. Wilson is an excellent production man. Mr. Eberstadt also is generally conceded to be an able organizer and, as Mr. Nelson concedes, he has worked hard. ~ One of these good men had to be driven out of the ~ WPB because, with both of them in it, the war production ~ program was being hampered by jurisdictional contlicts. = The trouble, we think, is that Mr. Nelson had divided duties between his two chief assistants in syeh a way that neither could function very well. We hope the sacrifice of Mr. Eberstadt will improve matters in the WPB. But it is more likely to.sharpen the conflict between WPB on the one hand and the armed services on the other. The services co-operated better with Mr. Eberstadt. : ! We have no notion that costly jurisdictional rows in the war production program, the food-production program, the manpower program or any other phase of the one big program which embraces them all will ever be prevented unless President Roosevelt provides a better organization at the top. \ - What is needed is a real war cabinet, giving the officials held responsible for all important programs frequent opportunity to meet with the president, explain their concts to him, and get prompt decisions from him.

CK WHERE IT BELONGS : congress well on its way to repealing President " Roosevelt's executive decree limiting salaries to $25,00 a year, the president comes up with a proposal that

ongress itself take action to limit not only salaries but all’

ncome to $25,000 for single persons and $50,000 for marjed couples. : ik The issue after a long journeysis back where it ought ) be—in congress, which has both the constitutional power nsibility to legislate on such mattérs, = iteve ion is t: should be taken by co

states, 75 cents a month; |

By Westbrook Pegler

WASHINGTON, Feb. 18. — It certainly would be real nice if all God’s children would learn to love one another in that brave new world of the future in which time and space will be almost annihilated and all the breeds and creeds drawn together. : : But unhappily for the project and the human race, experience does not argue that closer ac- - quaintance makes for understanding and friendship. It may cause friction, anger and

unrest.

I have in mind a miniature experiment of the kind. | Some years ago, in a large city, a newly married.

couple explored the outskirts in all directions for a love nest in which to start life together and found an ideal little apartment in a new building. A big housing promoter was putting up half a dozen huge apartment blocks. Almost all the rooms were light and airy, the the heating equipment was ; was, as the bride said, cute. So they rented a threeroom apartment and moved in.

A Prelude to Paradise!

THE NEW DEVELOPMENT contained quarters for several thousand persons and there was nothing in the leases which forbade children or dogs, and moreover, the rents were low because, at that time, the location was a little remote. : * All these attractions drew a full complement of tenants in no time and many of them came out of the slums to a new life in clean surroundings in which there wefe still some trees standing and a few small fields under cultivation. If living conditions could make people happy, and friendly, this would be a prelude to paradise. :

Some of the families had lots of children and |

pretty soon the little ones began to play pranks.

Although the plumbing was very modern and of | the best, the children were not required to go into the |

house and use it but used the gutter of a city street instead and the mammas seemed to think this was all right. That had been the custom of the slums, and they may havé thought that old ways were best. Whatever they thought, that was the way it was.

Radios, Card Players, Dogs

RADIO WAS JUST beginning to come along then and every family had one and they would turn them all on loud most of the days and evenings. : One family in a half-basement apartment used to drink almost every night and play some kind of card game which called for sharp exclamations in a foreign language. ; This would go on until past midnight and long about 11, when families which had been playing the radios all day and all evening would now want to sleep and voices would rise in the darkness on all sides telling the drinkers at their card game ta go die. The card players would yell “Shut up!” and go on with the bootleg port and the card game. There were plenty of dogs, too, and they would yap and bark and bay at will. : / A parrot also contributed to the sounds in the areaway and after quite a while one of the nightworkers whose sleep was so wantonly disturbed hit upon a horrible revenge. He had a phonograph and a loud comedy record in which the singer's voice would go off into insane cackles of laughter ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, like that, and he would_set the dingbat and let it repeat itself for an hour around dawn.

No Killings, but—

THE REST of the happy little cross-section of the brotherhood of man nearly went crazy. They would

turn on their lights in the court and yell and throw

things ‘but the nightworker would sit in the dark in his apartment and say nothing and just let her run over and over. After about a year along comes a man with a pushcart and parks it an the curbs and then another and then some more and these would yell their merchan-

dise and throw their paper trash and cabbage leaves. | and banana stalks in the street and the upshot of it

was that this nice, tidy, little brave new world of the future became another slum. There were no killings or serious fights but you couldn't say they ail loved one another because they were thrown together. : The happy young couple chucked that brotherhood of man thing at the end of their second year in this preview of paradise and moved away.

In Washington

By Peter Edson

WASHINGTON, Feb. 18—So poverty-stricken have some of the neutral nations of the world become that they are no longer interested in receiving even U. S. dollars. ‘ If that looks like a contradictien and an impossibility, maybe a little explanation will clear up this most curious of all crazy situations in this cockeyed world. : ° Normally, every country wants U. S. dollars and if it has anything to sell, it will peddle for as many dollars as it can get. But that situation no longer obtains. What these countries like Spain and Portugal, Turkey,. Sweden, Switzerland,” North Africa and the Argentine want more than dollars are goods with which they can sell to their own people. The result is that an old-fashioned barter—an exchange of U. S. kerosene and gasoline for whatever the neutral nation may have an excess of is a lot more welcome than U, S, cash on the barrel head. This is the situation which agents of the U. S. Commercial Corp., doing pre-emptive buying ‘all over the world, are meeting up with, increasingly. This U. S. Commercial Corp., a government-owned .subsidiary company, has as its principal job the buying

up of things that Germany also wants. But more and |}

more frequently now, it is not the amount of money

Germany or the U. 8. offers that decides which | country will get the goods, but what in place of money |

is offered for exchange. Attempt to Prevent Re-Exports

PERHAPS THE MOST valuable commodity which |

the U. S. can offer is petroleum. The United States hasn't any too much to spare, as you may have heard, but Germany hasn't any to spare and countries: like Spain and Portugal and North Africa haven’t any. at all. ; To get the metals and other war materials moving to. port where they can be shipped to the United States, it becomes necessary to feed a few low-grade

petroleum products into these countries—kerosene for |. 1 damps and stoves, gasoline to keep trucks moving, oil

to keep transportation rolling.

But here creeps in an element of ‘danger. If more

than just enough U. S. petroleum is exported to these. ||

countries, some of it may leak to Germany. Here the agents of the U. S. Commercial Corp. get another important job—keeving track of how U. S. petroleum supplies are consumed and that there will be no re-exports to the axis. : ~All sorts of safeguards have been thought up to prevent re-export. Instead of shipping in needed drugs like atabrine in bulk, the tablets are packaged in doses to permit widest possible distribution. If any leaks to the axis, it will be only in one or two-pill

lots. Tu cheek on exports right. in

— [Tale States. Befors.§

There is an over-all

color schemes were pleasant, | the latest, and the kitchen

> ory w }

Service, ———

the | &

* : .e The Hoosier Forum 1 wholly disagree with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it.—Voltaire.

(Times readers are invited to express their views in these columns, religious controversies excluded. Because of the volume received, letters must be limited to 250 words. Letters must be » signed.)

“ASKING AGAIN THAT INDIANA HELP SYMPHONY” By Elmer Kruse, 610 Ft. Wayne ave. \ The answer to my plea for the symphony bill by Mr. Hal Wilson pleased me a great deal—it shows definitely that people are interested for or against the future of our orchestra., j ; I am sure Mr. Wilson is being facetious when he says that musicians want to live “off the county” as he quaintly puts it. Many of them make a great personal sacrifice in earnings simply because they love to play symphonic music. Surely Mr. Wilson isn’t suggesting that the public: library or the Herron Art institute are living “off the county.” Perhaps it’s only. a matter of viewpoint, but we, as musicians (since I play in the orchestra) feel that our contribution to art is as vital as any of the other artistic activities that the public wants ang pays for. : As musicians we contribute many hours of service and effort entirely gratis. Were it to be paid for, it would run into many thousands of dollars. I have only to mention a few: Programs for the soldiers at Ft. Harrison, Camp Atterbury, the U.S:0., the Red Cross, the Community Fund; broadeasts by the symphony for these and other purposes are a matter of record. The orchestra to date has a very enviable war record, a glance at the personnel already in the army proves that we .are as Mr. Wilson suggests, “very able-bodied.” So without meaning to engage in a personal feud with anyone as to the merits of this bill, I'm asking again that Indiana take this forward, progressive step and keep the orchestra for the generation that is to take over after this war. I would be very happy to have Mr. Wilson attend one of our “pop” concerts to prove to him that we do not “cram music down ‘their throats” — more often we wonder when we can get away because of the many encores. . . .

and buggy days as their crystal guide. : In the amended acts of congress public law 772 sections 3 and 15, paragraph A states “the term between the ages of 18 and 45 shall refer to men who have attained the 18th anniversary of the day of their birth and other terms designating different age groups shall be construed in a similar manner.” Congress describes the 18 age selectees as men, and in 1940 public 783 chapter 720 stated that “any person inducted under the selective service act be permitted to vote in rson or by absentee ballot, proWing the election laws of such state where he resides at the time

any election.” Tories and reactionaries deprived the Negroes and women equal rights to vote. Congress eventually enacted amendments in franchising these citizens, then the states followed in order. It required many years to eliminate this race and sex discrimination, Until congress restored the soldiers’ right to vote in 1940, all citizens who became soldiers in defense of their country automatically were disenfranchised. It was considered patriotic to fight and die for the homeland, but the fighting patriots could not vote for the public officials who represent the same government they were fighting for. This bill is a soldier’s rights act to place all fighting men on an equal basis. There should be granted a public hearing at an early date in order to enlighten the senators what the people think of our ’teen age fighting men. » » »

“WHAT DO YOU THINK, FATHER?” By C. W. Harrison, 5548 Guilford ave.

Open letter to American fathers: 1 am a father, just as you to whom this letter is addressed, are fathers, We are all alike in our responsibilities, in our love and concern for the future of our families, and there is not one of us who is not willing and anxious to do everything in our power to defeat the axis and protect the freedom of the American home, What I am wondering is where we, the fathers of American children, can do the most good in helping to win this war. In the service

2 un =» “PUBLIC HEARING SHOULD BE HELD ON THIS BILL”

Guy publicity committee, D. W. ., Marion county chapter No, 4, 5801 Woodside drive.

Senator Von Eichorn’s emergency bill for an act granting teen age soldiers the right to vote is mired down in senate Judiciary A committee and undergoing slow motion debate. 3 The senator is a Democrat while the majority members are Republicans. They take the position a ‘teen age soldier is not-a citizen, eligible to vote, because he is not 21 years of age, and cite the 1851 constitution done during the horse

Side Glances—By Galbraith

D. Sallee, chairman,

pra

‘lis for his immediate family.

of induction entitled him to vote in

‘| building the characters of our children who will some day be the next

!|generation in which we and our

||soldiers can put our hopes for the lend of all wars.

|| habitation.—Exodus 15:13. | SWEET MERCY! to the gates of

| This Minstrel lead,

| With vain endeavors =

as fighting men? That is where we are told we will be by the end of the year. Granting it is true that fathers are needed that badly as fighting men, it is a simple and unescapable truth that a man’s greatest love, even over the love for his country,

You fathers will fight if you are called, sure you will and so will I, but we will be thinking of our wives and children as we fight. And modern warfare leaves no room in an

efficient. soldier for thoughts other than that of fighting. How efficient will you be? We will be wondering how our wives can make ends meet on the small sum of money they will receive while we arg away. Because we fathers are the breadwinners, we know our wives will be ‘unable to pay those necessary. pills on the money allowed her. FG We'll lose our homes, because in spite of the year’s moratorium to be given us on all debts after the war is over, we cannot possibly earn enough money over and above that year’s expenses to pay the debts incurred while we are gone. So our wives will have to go to work, What happens to our children while the mothers are not at home? . . . Once the ties of a home are broken, nothing can bring them back together. I want to know in all sincerity is the need for us fathers so great as to jeopardize the character of the coming generation, which will in a few short years be the United States of America? | py Most of us will go into war work as we have been directed, in spite of our belief that this example of bureaucracy will ruin many. of those small businesses deemed unneccessary, and we are willing to consider those businesses unnecessary. But. when we go into war work we may be forced to join a union. How can any business, no matter what its nature, be called more uvnnecessary than the strikes called by various labor unions, strikes which have not been effectively controlled despite the fact they are the stoppage of produciion n:eded by men on the front? At least & small business contin--ues earning money with which to pay taxes for the upkeep of the government. . . , And if we are in a union we may be forced to strike, even though that strike hurts those boys who are overseas fighting for us. It seems to me we fathers have our fight to make here at home; paying taxes and producing the needed war materials without the benefit of a union card unless we are inclined by choice to join; arguing against strikes, inflation, bureaucracy and every other ailment of our national effort: helping maintain national common sense when it is most needed; protecting and

foundation of this democracy, a

What do you think, father? x » % » “IS THIS THE SAME LADY ASTOR?” By Mattie Withers, 1525 N. Arsenal ave. - Who is this. Lady Astor - that dares to criticize one of our representatives in congress, Clare Booth Luce? Is she the same Americanborn heiress and present member of the British parliament from whose estate in .England the Cliveden set derived its name? That set is notoriously’ proFascist and anti-Communist and that may account for the lady's impertinence,

DAILY THOUGHT

Thou in thy mercy hast led ‘forth the people which thou hast redeemed: thou hast guided them in thy strength unto thy holy

Heaven ; his sins forgiven; 2s The rueful conflict, the heart riven

Our Hoosie

By Daniel M. Kidney ~~

Adequate Care Necessary

And memory of

earth’s = bitter

WASHINGTON, Feb. 18. — In the current movie about the fighting family of that one-time idol of the prizering, “Gentiéman Jim" Corbet, there is this swell line:

“The Corbets are at it agin!” =

Substituting the word *“Ho0s-: « fers” for “Corbets,” such & line almost might be a standing head over dispatches from Wast dealing with the high-placed In~_dianians here. " The latest case in point was an attack in the house by Rep. Raymond S. Springer (R, Ind.) against ~° the Saturday night broadcast made by Manpower ° Chairman Paul V. McNutt and Maj. Gen. Lewis B. Hershey, both Hoosiers themselves. Te oy It seems that Mr. Springer didn’t like the idea of the big army which will be built by selective service + drafting 12,000 men a day between 18 and 38 as explained by these selective service officials. He fears that it will deplete entirely the already ° deficient farm labor and also play havoc with war = production in factories. : In fact he told his house colleagues that he didn’t

that is how everyone else felt also. :

Reports People 'Appalled’ i

“THE PEOPLE of the nation were appalled as they listened to the broadcast by Gen, Hershey and Mr. McNutt,” Mr, Springer began. , : “Staggering figures were given as our army’s need: : for 1943. The figures and the program outlined by

those two officials exceed by far any development of --

our army which was contemplated by our people. 8 “While the people of our country are in full ac- « cord with any program which is entirely essential for - a speedy and complete victory in this war, yet the. people realize that a vast army, such as is proposed = by those two officials, will throw production on the ?®

| farm and in the factory entirely out of gear and

this huge army, proposed by them, may find itself without the necessary food, equipment and trans- '

portation for its maintenance and for use in reach- -

ing the battle lines,”

So rampant have been the complaints in congress |

lately, that some outstanding observers are h~2inn‘n9 to be afraid that this common scolding may result in a fourth term for F. D. R. ¢

‘Mr. Tibbs’

By Stephen Ellis

IT ISN'T OFTEN that you find a novel whose 2p- * peal is definitely more in the writing than in the story | itself, But that’s true of Mr. Tibbs Passes Through.” } It’s the work of Robert Neumann, who was once a : citizen of Vienna and who has long been known as one of the great writers of the continent. His “By the Waters of Babylon” is widely known in this country and England as is his biography of the arma- . ments king, Zaharoff. His books have been published in 21 different languages and he was a best . seller in Germany before he had the “honor” of hav- | ing his books burned by the Nazis and was forced to ' seek refuge in England. ; : ; Most writers in exile continue to write in thelr native tongue. But not Robert Neumann! It was & : matter of pride and dignity to him te adopt the lan- - guage of the people who had offered him freedom and hospitality. So he set out to write a novel in English to “escape the curse of the otherness,” to protest 3 against the deeds done by others who used his native : tongue. . For 30 months he labored, ‘having to grope for every word, to fight for every rhythm, to despair | at every metaphor” Part of that over which he ! labored was written, destroyed and lost in a British internment camp. ‘

sry pdt

Fresh and Tantalizing

WHAT HE FINALLY produced in his new tongue ° comes to us as “Mr. Tibbs Passes Through.” It's a - strange book, more interesting as the author's first . attempt to write in English than for its story. The English is a bit foreign but in what way it is hard . to say. But that makes the book the more tantalizing | and provoking. The phrases are given a freshness in | a stranger's verbage and the rhythms are piquant indeed. ; : As for the story, it is something like a tapestry on which Mr. Neumann has painted the secret life of a . little village. The picture is bright—and pleasurable —but the figures seem just a bit unworldly. * ia There is Mr. Tibbs, who flees to the village with his family from a bombed-out city. All his life, Mr. ' Tibbs has stood aside from life, letting others, including his children, go their unmolested ways. But now, : at last, his attention is needed. ' In this brief, strange interim, where they are. refugees together, he comes to know his family—ihe i beautiful daughter Miriam with an unspoken sorrow ' against her heart; the young daughter, Archibald, so . trusting and unshielded, and Pugh, the grandson, . with a blind and naive faith in his grandfather’s | omniscience. '

A Strange Appeal i

THE TOWNSPEOPLE, {00, come to Mr. Tibbs with | their hidden hurts and as Mr. Neumann puts it, “he * gave lavishly of his heart hoardings in his metamor- | phosis. °

Maybe this transfiguration of Mr. Tibbs is sup- 5

posed to teach some lesson—maybe it is a modern version of “every man is his brother's keeper.” One ° could readily guess that Mr. Neumann is trying to tell : his readers that people should never try to live to. themselves. Frankly, I don’t know. : Certainly the book is written with a tender seri- | ousness and a strong emotion. And I repeat, you'll

4 g

‘ a. a

find strange appeal in the way Mr. Neumann writes {

his adopted tongue.

“MR. TIBBS PASSES THROUGH,” by Robert Neumann; E. P. Dutton & Co.; 255 pages; $2.50, 3

We the Women

By Ruth Millett ~~

A WIFE is as morally responsible for taking care of her children as her husband is for supporting them. | Jona i There are many men who have: to be forced: by law to provide, for their children’s support. . And; there - are a lot of women who!

a i

should be made to stay af’ home

and take care of the children they: E brought into the world. ~~ | - In Beattle, so many of the mothers of school children are at work that second, third and fourth graders are being taught cooking: so that they can get their own meals when necessary.

SOME OF those mothers undoubtedly have to work: for their own and their children's support. But: among the working mothers who leave their children: to get along on their own all day are sure to be many

women who do not have to work, who do so because: they can't resist the temptation of earning s pay check—even though it means their sma]l children may have to cook their own dinners. 3 "The mother who neglects her children to hold down a job she doesn’t need ought 5 she