Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 24 February 1943 — Page 15

The Indianapolis Times

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Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way

ROY W. Bow President

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| WEDNESDAY; FEBRUARY 24, 1043

“TOO LITTLE . .. AS USUAL”

AYS a wireless from Ernie Pyle, who was with our troops in the defeat at Sbeitla in Tunisia: “We had too little to work with, as usual . ..” There is a challenge to all of us here at home. It doesn’t need any spelling out by editorial writers. Just “too little to work with,” and the damning phrase “as usual’ Millions of Americans could do worse than to paste that comment—from a correspondent who has been in the field for months—above our workbenches and desks and kitchen stoves. ; | :

TO BE OR NOT TO BE HE Indiana house of representatives seems to be having quite a time trying to talk itself into killing the merit law. The truth of the situation is simplicity itself. The evils of patronage- -ridden departments and institutions were so evident that the people of Indiana wanted merit. The Republican party gave it to them. Merit was never popular with politicians and we cannot

expect it to be. Members of the public who have expressed |

themselves have all been for merit. What criticisms of merit have been made have come from politicians and, unfortunately, with not too much regard for accuracy. ‘The prime mover against the merit law is Rep. Jess Andrew of West Point. As hds been pointed out, Mr. Andrew’s record as an expert in these matters speaks for itself -—loudly. ~~ Mr. Andrew has, in the last few days, recelved the ‘vociferous support of Earl B. Teckemeyer of Indianapolis. Mr. Teckemeyer i is an able real estate man, former president : of the Real Estate Board, and chairman of the group which was established to fight the rent ceiling here. Those seem to be Mr. Teckemeyer’s -qualifications as an expert in personnel matters, which would make him an able ally for Mr. Andrew in this field. If the members of the house are convinced of what they say about merit, they ought to kill the law immediately. Their failure to do so might indicate they doubt even their own pronouncements.

HITTING HOME

OINT rationing of processed food brings the realities about war, about the farm problem, and about muddling in Washington, into every American household. : The drastic rationing undoubtedly is necessary, and the point system probably is right. We don’t quarrel with either, and we urge willing acceptance of and compliance with both. A very serious situation demands that. We do quarrel with the evident fact that this situation was allowed to become more serious than it needed to be ‘while government officials disagreed about the necessity for rationing, and so delayed the decision to ration, and then announced the decision two months before they could make

it effective. |

» » ”

HE government announcement does not exaggerate when it admits, for the first time, that the country faces “dangerous food shortages” which may cause “great hardship” to many unless the food hoarders are honest enough to declare their excess stocks. But it was not necessary for the government to deny, .as it has done until this week, that the hoarding so obviously going on for months provided real cause for concern. It surely is rob necessary for the OPA to enforce a regulation which rewards the “honest” hoarders by leaving in their ration books more point-coupon values than simple justice to non-hoarders should permit. It was not necessary for the agriculture department to issue so many reassuring statements about last year’s vast food production, and its wonderful plans for vaster production this year, when it knew the erisis already was so acute that dry beans, peas and lentils—the staples that the public has been told to substitute for scarce meats— would have to be added to the rationed list. ” » tJ -

” »

MOST Americans are eager to feed our soldiers, and our | allies’ soldiers, and the hungery people of friendly countries. They are willing to tighten their own belts to ‘do that; and, though it will mean actual hunger to many city dwellers, they are willing to do without more than half of the canned foods upon which they have grown dependent, now that it has been allowed to become necessary. But they should not be willing to put up longer with lack of co-ordination among government agencies which cannot co-ordinate themselves under the present badly organized scheme. They should not be willing to put up with promises that food production will be increased, when patri‘otic farmers warn that food production cannot be increased ‘unless agriculture is given Boghate | skilled labor, machin- ~ ery and fertilizer. They should demand that agriculture be treated as the basic war industry it is, and of should demand a govern‘ment war organization that will insure co-operation among ‘the federal agencies, provide clear lines of authority and responsibility, and stop the muddling and the bungling.

TIRE EXAMINATION (CRITICISMS of the OPA requirement for periodic te inspections are answered by announcement that, in one large drea, half of the spare tires sold to the Sots ment were found good only for scrap. For the country as a whole, the OPA YoRORs that ,000 passenger car tires have been rescued through reginspections. A few more miles of driving would have each beyond reclamation. ‘Tires have ceased to be our purely personal headaches. have become a ‘national asset, if saved, or a ‘national

Fair Enough

By Westbrook Pegler

: NEW YORK, Feb. 24.—The civilian manpower program is a complete washout, incoherent, unworkable and unenforceable, and there is no indication that the same people who have made such a sorry job of it to-date, operating under the same laws, ever will be able to. do any better. : That is a dreary estimate of the situation but it cannot be improved by wishing or self-decep= tion. The government has made gestures and threats, indicating an intention to draft workers for essential jobs, including farm work, but in a few days these were shown to be meaningless and impetuous efforts

‘to intimidate some workers and cajole others.

A government, to command confidence and respect, should thoroughly consider its decisions affect ing the freedom of the. citizens and refrain from thoughtless or half-considered measures such as the recent one about the 48-hour week,

Confusion of Agencies : THE WAR MANPOWER problem is badly com-

plicated not only by competition for men between the

armed forces and war industry and between war industry and thé farms, but by a confusion of agencies which are supposed to have authority. in labor problems. The department of labor still exists but is barely in the picture and other authorities, not directly constituted by law, are much mere important but in conflict with one another, The mock-work system, a great man-wasting device, has been sustained by the supreme court but Paul V. McNutt, who is struggling te make the greatest possible use of manpower, apparently, has no legal authority for his favorite plan, which Is’ to squeeze men out of nonessential jobs into essential works with the alternative of being drafted for military service. The issue of compulsory union mefubership has not been met, except in one recent decision in an isolated case and undoubtedly illegal, that a worker going into a closed shop plant must join the union, presumably with the other choice of entering the army.

'It Is Not Too Late’

IN ALL THIS confusion, it is not too late for congress to restore the situation by passing laws to establish in a legal, forthright way the assurances which the people want and without which, notwithstanding their” patriotism, they will resist or evade war work, accept it sullenly or appeal to habeas corpus is they should be drafted into the army. for refusal to join unions. For it is almost certain that a man ordered to join up as a fighter hecause he refused to join a union could take Mr. McNutt into court and tear his plan to pieces. Mr. McNutt may construe the selective service act to mean that he may use it to procure factory labor, but the most devious lawyer in the entire New Deal cannot construe it to mean that men must join unions. The pathetic fact is that this obstruction has been caused by a few union politicians in Washington who, for years, have been used to having their way.

McNutt and Byrnes Unhappy

THE AMERICAN people are not unwilling to go into war work and Mr. McNutt and James Byrnes, the author of the mock-work opinion of the supreme court, are not happy in their situation. Obviously in their present troubles, they would be immensely helped and relieved by congressional action abolishing mock-work and establishing the individual's right not to join any union but, because they are serving the administration, they will not speak out. The best they can do, unless they are ready to step down, is to worry along under conditions which they know are to be detrimental to the tasks which they are trying to execute not for the administration but for the country. Congress can cure this. No bureau chief can do it. The administration can, but will not and the result is a great shortage of hands where they are needed, all for the lack of some plain laws, which would have the overwhelming approval of the people.

In Washington

By Peter Edson

WASHINGTON, Feb. 24.— Everything explained in the previous article concerning AAA payments and penalties will go on just about as it has before, despite the lifting of limits on wheat production, and regardless of what congress decides to do about the administration’s second request for “incentive payments” to induce farmers to plant more acre- . age in crops most necessary for the war effort. The original idea was that the incentive payments would supplement the triple-A payments, be administered by department of agriculture’s triple-A county committees, would encourage the production of needed farm products, and would work something like this: In Washington, the over-all requirements for farm products are calculated by the department of agriculture. These are the so-called farm goals for the year.

These goals are then hroken down to a regional |

basis, figuring how much wheat can be produced in the wheat bel, how much corn in the corn belt, how much cotton in the cotton belt, and so on.

The area goals are then broken down into state | goals, then by counties ahd townships. Finally the |

program gets down to Farmer Jones, an average farmer, who may have 200 acres in wheat, for which

he will get $184 triple-A benefit, ard another 200 in | which he car plant war crops.

Suppose Farmer Jones is given a quota of 50 acres of flax.

Where Bonus Comes In

bo.

NOW, - BEFORE Farmer Jones can collect his

triple-A benfit for not growing more than his allot-

ment of 200 acres of wheat, he must plant at least 90 | | '§

per cent of the goal set for him on every war crop allotted to him—flax, soybeans, garden truck or what ever, In this case, flax, Farmer Jones must plant 90

per cent of 50:acres, or 45 acres, RB flax before he | -can collect his $184, i

Furthermore, for every acre Yois. than 45 planted to flax, Farmer Jones can be penalized $15 an acre, And now, ot long last, you come to this incentive payment business. Since the government doesn’t want Farmer Jones to grow less of any war crop, but more, it proposes to offer Farmer Jones a bonus if he will plant up to 110 per cent of his quota on any

war crop. The Jones flax acreage quota was 50 acres, |

and 110 per cent of that would be 55 acres. The

The Hoosier Forum

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

“BOXES OF TIN CANS WAIT TO BE COLLECTED” By Mrs. R. F., Indianapolis

To the housewife of north Indianapolis, T wish to tell this lady that there are boxes of tin cans prepared for the tin salvage in the Christian Park addition that are waiting to be collected. I called the salvage office on Fri-

hadn’t taken our cans. The lady informed me they would get them that day. They are still sitting in front on the curb. Ii these are needed so bad why don’t they pick up what has been prepared for them? I know they could not have missed seeing them

/|as:they are in boxes. I suppose the

weather got too cold for the men to drive over the city to get them. As far as people being patriotic or lazy, what is the mgtter with the tin salvage officials? Why don’t they get the cans after they are prepared for them? Or should we take them up to them, using our four gallons of gas to do so? Then walk back and forth to work. I think we in our community are as patriotic as those living in north Indianapolis, as we have our sons and husbands in the service.

Ed ” »

“A HOOSIER FATHER TELLS HIS THOUGHTS”

By John Whitcomb, Chrysler Local No. 371, New Castle

Reply to father, C. W. Harrison: In The Times of Feb. 18 you asked fathers to tell you their thoughts. As a native Hoosier and father of four children I’ll tell you some of the things I think. If you had stated what your small business is, I think I could answer much better. ‘First and foremost, I think this war is for all the fathers, mothers, sons and daughters of America, that the time is at hand when petty jealousies and grudges must be cast aside and whatever fighting is done must be done against Nazis, Fascists and Japs instead of among ourselves. I am above the age for military service but if there is better use for me in North Africa or India or China or Guadalcanal than in my present job, I'm ready to bid my family farewell and be on my way. I know some fathers who are as much devoted to their families as. you can hope to be, who have not waited to be drafied and they were already engaged in essential war work. . Don’t you think you could really put up a better fight for thinking of what a great difference victory or defeat might make to the family

you love so deeply?

Your principal aversion to taking an essential war job seems to be a

day, the 12th, and told them they|®

(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 wards. Letters. must be " signed.)

fear that you might be forced to join a union.- I work in a plant where it is the choice’ of the employee as to whether he wishes to be a union member or to just ride along as a hitch-hiker without helping pay the expenses of reaching a certain goal, o o » It is evident that you entertain the widely propagandized idea that the union’s sole business is to keep a sharp lookout for some unreasonable excuse to call a strike. Let me tell you what its real purpose is. It is to effect a more equitable distribution among the employees of mass production industries of the wealth which they cre-s ate, not to put the industries out of business. If you .., can land a job at the Chrysler Carp. plant at New Castle, I'll see if the union boys won't let you ride free. » » t 4 “THERE ARE TWO SIDES, CAPITAL AND LABOR” By Mrs, Guy Palmer, 1235% Oliver ave. “Voice in the Crowd” has an exag-

gerated, one-sided idea about free

“capital.” There are two sides, capital and labor. It is a 50-50 proposition, for neither can succeed without the other. He says “material wealth” is all that matters, “anything else is fiat.” The C. I. O. union recognizes the fact that men’s health, morale, and a little application of the golden rule mean just as much to their workers as great accumulation of wealth means to the management. Practically everyone knows today that#nen worked for 35 to 60 cents an hour befere the days of the C. I. 0, They worked 10 to 12 hours a day and seven days a week, straight time, in rush seasons and stood on the streets three to five months every summer with no work, at all. Their yearly average earnings were $700 to $1200. They had no seniority rights. A man on a job 10 years could be laid off to give a plage for the young brother of a foreman. As for the “tough jobs” with “bare hands” and strong backs, we have only to look at old factory employees today to see knotted, -calloused

hands, stiff fingers, ‘missing fingers,

Side Glances—By Galbraith

federal government would, therefore, make incentive ||

payments for flax of $10 an acre on all acreage above |

90 per cent of the 50-acre quota.. Of course, it should be understood that the in-

centive payments are over and above anything the |

farmer gets for selling the grain in the. open market. Simple, isn’t it?

The same 90 per cent to 110 per cent principle ap-

mye)

plies on other war crops for which incentives be offered.

The department of of agriculture economists

who | figured out the incentive payment principle insist it || tev:

isn’t a su

enterprise. He sees only the side of .

stooped shoulders and a fired, beaten look on their faces. They have pragtically nething saved for old age, Where would they be today if it were: not’ for the C. I, O. union? It protects these men’s seniority. It has definitely succeeded in bringing higher wages to every factory where it has bargaining rights. It has shortened the work week, and distributed the working days the year around. It strives every day in all the plants to safeguard the health and safety of its workers. : As for any man being sad because his job was made easier, any intelligent person can just imagine that. As for any man having a broken heart because his job was “sissified,” has anyone ever seen one of these old men crying with a broken heart? I can never understand why Eddie Rickenbacker, Voice in the Crowd and Westbrook Pegler, bursting with their so-called patriotism, don’t go to the nearest U. S. employment agency and demand a factory job at straight time and lots’ of overtime and get right in there and pitch. @erfainly the articles they write and the ballyhooing they do isn’t doing one iota toward winning this war. The other men on that raft with Rickenbacker were union men and they suffered all the pangs that he suffered, but they did so in silence, they haven't run all over the country telling about it and seeking hero worship. The C. I. O. members enlist by the thousands, the automobile workers alone have 190,000 men in the armed forces, every C. I. O. member uys 10 per cent of his wages in bonds, the international union has bought $100,000 worth of bonds, C I. O. members have, in co-operation with the Red Cross, given thousands of pints of bloed, and they have their own canteens for service men all over the country, and they haven't got time to write and ballyhoo about what they are doing. They just do it. ;

» = » 2 “MAY BE GOOD PUNNING AND IT MAY NOT” By Raiph Donham, 221 E. Michigan st. Globaloney may be good punning.

‘And it may not. Call it what you

will, it must have a sickeningly perverted sound to thousands of American parents today.

of the race with its sordid and its noble facets, have found their cynesure in the idealism of women. Through bloody centuries fond

somewhere the mothers, wives and sweethearts of the dead and maimed would at last arise to force abandonment of war's brutal futility,

and in its stead: the substitution of organized international amity. Possible psychological repercussions of this war are not pleasant to contemplate. In millions of homes around the world there has been dangerous emotional repression, anguish crushed to hopelessness. In our own land the grim, last homeward parade of our dead, our maimed, our tortured has barely begun. . . . But as victory comes in sight the pent-up wrath of the people will vent itself in a universal demand for a hetter way than this — for some sort of world-wide unity to end forever the barbarous recurring resort to the sword. » Then will .come woman’s apportunity, her chance to help fashion that unity. And what will be her answer? We refuse to believe that it will

"| | be globaloney!

Four years of such a war as this

have pretty well saturated the pub-

lic’s capacity for reacting against horror. Yet, there is still something terrible shocking in the ghoulish facetiousness of a Claire Boothe

DAILY THOUGHT

Be ye strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak; for your work shall be rewarded. —1I Chronicles 15:7.

THE FRUIT derived from labor

: 18

Threughout the checkered history | 7

the hopes of men

belief had persisted that some day |}

Hitier will be. a bust. »

© he of Wa r

{By E. A. Evans

WASHINGTON, Feh. 24—The ‘other day I wrote something about my 18-year-old son going away to join the army, and the response is a little overwhelming. It will be some time before all the letters that have come in can : be acknowledged individually, This is an interim attempt to acknowledge them en masse and to thank all those who have expressed sympathy, understanding and concern over the point I tried to make—that every boy who has gone to war deserves and needs the support of an effectively organized war government on the home front. Most of the letters are from other parents, many of whom are groping as I am for a way of translating their feeling into action. “I am not. ashamed of the tears that have come to- my eyes almost every night since Pearl Harbor,” writes a father. “My son came through that one, but he was killed in the Coral sea. It almost breaks my heart to realize that every day other moms and pops are getting

| messages like the one that came to me June 14, and

then to read in the papers about confusion and muddling among the men in Washington who ae in charge of the war program.”

‘Burned Up' by 'Bungling’

ANOTHER: “You are quite right that there are millions in this country who are baffled and sick at heart over the fumbling and bungling and jockeying for position among the government's ‘czars’ I am sure all of these millians would give anything to strike a blow that would help their sons or brothers or fathers. They need a leader. Can one be found?” Another: “My best wishes that your boy will come through safely and that somehow our chief may be stirred to action uninfluenced by any consideration except the safety of the United States of America.” a : Another: “I have two sons in the service. I spend considerable time in Washington, and it burns me up to see the bungling going on there. Sometimes I think that we, the parents and relatives of soldiers, Y should organize.” From a mother: *“Do you think it might be possible: for all of us parents who feel as you do tn form a real pressure group? I don’t believe thai individual letters ever get to Mr. Roosevelt, or that he would recognize anything less than a large organization.”

Wisdom of Organizing Doubted

ANOTHER: “We cannot be complacent when some of the country’s ablest executives are excluded from any official part in the war effort, while untried amateurs give daily exhibits of petty squabbles over power and authority in the highly specialized field of producing the all-important engines of war. We need organization and leadership to make our demand for something better heard.” Let me say that I, being a newspaper man in Washington, am very doubtful about the wisdom of organizing a new pressure group. One of the country’s great troubles is too many organized groups, making conflicting demands. An organization of service men’s parents and relatives, determined to act unselfishly and to demand nothing except that the war be won quickly and the boys be brought home safely as far as may be possible, might accomplish good. The difficulty would be in keeping the organization and its leadership unselfish. Then there are other letters. One gentleman. anonymous, writes: “You are a fool for saying that" you're willing to trust Roosevelt to decide the size of the army or anything else.”

Unashamed of a Few Tears

AND ANOTHER, ALSO ANONYMOUS: cry baby! Congratulations on 3 masterpiece of sabotage, Because your precious son gets jerked into the, army you seize an opportunity .to let loose a blast against our great commander-in-chief, You are trying to divide the American people, but you won't succeed. I hope your son is ashamed of you.” Well, somehow I don’t think he is. My hoy went willingly, months before he would have been drafted.

“Hello,

‘He chose a dangerous branch of the service, and his

only fear is that. the war will end before he gets to

| fight. I wanted him to go, and if we both cried a

little when he left, it didn’t occur to either of us to be ashamed. : I am willing to trust Mr. Roosevelt with decisions that may mean my son’s life because he is the com-mander-in-chief, and because only he has all the information upon which sound decisions can be based. But I want him to make the decisions that are necessary to insure a better, more effective, less confused war government. I want no muddling in Washington to deprive my son, or any son, of anything he needs to give him a fighting chance.

We the Women

By Ruth Millett

~ GETTING INTO uniform far the duration would be awfully good for some types of women. \_ Think what it would do to the personality of the woman who*has always depended on clothes to put herself across. The woman who has always expected service, admiration and respect for no other reason than that her coat was ‘mink and her dresses desigped by, the tops of the fashion worick And think what it would do to the weman who “never has a thing to wear” and was: always so busy being apologetic about her clothes that she didn’t know what was going on. And how good it would ‘be for the woman who has always sacrificed everything in life to have good clothes, stepping daily out of a run-down, neglected home looking like a fashion ad. All those women would find themselves face to face with the fact that nothing counts but what they ‘are themselves, how capable they are, how likable, how charming, how good-natured,

No More Masquerade

THEY COULDN'T get by any longer—or think they were getting by—hidden behind good-looking clothes, pretending they really were whatever charaeter they were dressed to play. They couldn't any longer walk inte 8 room’ and expect everybody to take natice because of their clothes. Dressed in the uniform worn by thousands of other women, they might realize that it was up to them to amount to something er be lost in the crowd. Uniforms aren’ a bad idea for women at all

To the Poinf—

' THE ONLY monument that will be sporopriate for)

IMAGINE A soldi? being assigned to aia farmers, and then returning to the army in pet & ‘potatoes he helped raise.

» » TEETH THATS you aren't true to are e likely to be false 10 you : ' “we. * .. z THE FACT that the government 1s point way doesn't make it any easier to