Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 4 March 1944 — Page 6

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“PAGE E Saturday, March 4, 1944 . ALTER LECKRONE MARK FERREE ROY W. HOWARD ya Ls E YE :

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ATTERBURY RETAINS ACTIVE STATUS HE war department's dgcision to continue to use Camp Atterbury as a division training center seems wise. Millions of dollars have been spent to develop the 52,000acre tract near Columbus, and so far only two complete divisions, the 83d and the 30th, have used its facilities. Had it been abandoned after being used so briefly, many would have questioned whether the huge expenditure

was necessary or justified. The brief announcement yesterday indicated that.a full complement of troops will be stationed there, in addition to the previously announced expansion of the camp’s medical facilities to a general army hospital. Hence it appears that the camp may house even more troops than it has in the past.- Probably this move reflects the current belief in Washington that the end of the war is not yet in sight. Indianapolis has geared its entertainment facilities to meet the needs of Camp Atterbury, in addition to other nearby military stations, and will continue to extend its traditional Hoosier hospitality to all the men who train there,

LAST CALL FOR FINLAND HE state department's warning of last month to Finland to get out of the war, or take the consequences, still stands. If Finland misses the opportunity to negotiate now on the terms offered by Russia, she may not get another chance. Moscow controls the situation. London is backing Moscow. Washington can do nothing effective until Finland makes a genuine peace move, and even then

it may be too late. Russia's terms are harsh. True, they could be worse. Stalin—at least in the beginning—has not demanded unconditional surrender, or a puppet regime in Helsinki, or Soviet military occupation of Finland. His restraint doubtless is due in part to the sensibilities of Bulgaria, Hungary, and other Nazi satellites, which may pull out of the war if they think they can trust Russia. He is also influenced somewhat by American friendship for Finland and our opposition to Soviet domination of democratic states: But Stalin's armistice terms remain difficult. He demands immediate internment of the estimated 100,000 Nazi troops in Finland. In view of the trouble allied armies have had with Nazi troops in Italy, little Finlind may not be strong enough for this purpose. Hence Stalin's suggestion that Russia will do the job, if Finland desires. That amounts to a left-handed proposal for Russian occupation, which Finns fear from long experience. A friendly temporary occupation, under control of the neutral United States, seems to offer the best guarantee to Finland and Russia that neither will take advantage of the other while the Nazis are being ousted. s ” » s » o STALIN'S TERRITORIAL terms likewise are severe. They call for restoration of the 1940 frontiers imposed by Russia, and they question the status of Petsamo, Finland's —rich-mining-area-in-the north. I Russia forces renewal of the 1940 lease of the Hangoe peninsula and neighboring islands as Soviet military bases, Finland's freedom will be endangered. Nevertheless, it would be suicide for Finland to miss this opportunity to negotiate. Though the tragedy of being caught between Germany and Russia is not of her making, her government has been much too co-operative with Hitler and much too slow in peace moves. The time for saving a democratic Finland has almost run out.

FIGHT PAY HAT should a man be paid for risking his life? All

the statisticians in the world, in convention assembled, could not answer that one. A soldier risks his life as a duty. Iis basic compensation must be, as it has always been, the knowledge that he is fulfilling that duty.

Yet it seems to us that Ernie Pyle was on solid ground when he suggested, in a dispatch from Italy this week, that soldiers in the combat lines be given an extra allowance—Ernie suggested it might be called “fight pay.” Fliers now get extra “flight pay,’ whether they are flying in combat or otherwise. branches of the army and navy get extra pay allowances in recognition of their abnormal risks. And other armies, we are told, provide special pay allowances for troops in combat, As anyone who has followed Ernie Pyle’s articles must realize, the infantryman who fights and eats and sleeps - and dies in the cold and the mud of the front is fully as heroic as the combat pilots, the paratroopers and the submarine crews. We agree with Ernie that they are entitled to some recognition on the paymaster’s books. The appro-

‘he Indianapolis s Rimes! Tair

Enough —

By Westbrook Pegler

@¢

NEW YORK, March 4.—Senator Barkley, in his dramatic huff | at the President, was the first to point out that Mr. Roosevelt did not understand the nature of the social security pool. The President, complaining that congress had refused to double the socigl security tax, said the increase “would have yielded $1,100,000,000 in new revenues; he

A Az. asgyiped” thal, this motey should be available for € nt spending. In practice this has been so from the beginning

through the device of tapping the till of social security and dropping in IOU’s bearing 3 per cent interest.

By Darel M Kidney

WASHINGTON, March 4. - — Wendell L, Willkie first I rien national attention as an expert witness for the private utilities be= fore - committees, The tousle-haired Hoosier from New York City could use the best phrases of the New Dealers to "defy their plans for wiping out Holding companies or building

TY week another Hoosier made a great hit here in a similar role—the role of what might be termed “professional witness.” He was on the government side of the case, but speaking for the states rather than the federal

The pool, it would presently become a menace by its

| their own money. For government spending is not

Certain other hazardous |

In favor of this practice .it has been argued that if the money were simply allowed to accumulate in

very size and inactivity. Therefore it should be invested. But it has been invested in debt, pot security. It is gone, spent, and the IOU’s in the shape of bonds must be repaid to meet the demands on social security as they mature. To repay them, the treasury must sell other bonds to the public or collect other taxes. 2 The ultimate answer is taxes because even if bonds be sold to meet the government's debt to social security, in the long run those bonds must be financed by taxes, paid, as Mr. Roosevelt himself once said, in the sweat of those who toil. So, eventually, the insured toilers must be swindled of their original social security payments or taxes. They must pay other taxes in the not necessarily sweet bye and bye to redeem the IOU’s left in place of their own money in the special cash drawer,

Inevitable Effect of Any Such Vote

“IN MY discussion of that proposal,” to freeze the tax at 1 per cent, “I stated that I had never regarded the monies procured by this tax as anything but a sacred fund to be used for the payment of the worthy purposes contemplated when the social security law was enacted,” Mr, Barkley said. “I did not, nor at any time would I, vote to increase the tax merely for the purpose of letting the treasury use it as revenue to carry on the ordinary expenses of tHE government.” But whether or not he consciously voted an in-

crease for this stated purpose, that would be the inevitable effect of any such vote by Senator Barkley or anyone else. He might tell himself he was voting to double the tax, as he was willing to do'in this case, only for the purpose of maintaining the reserve at a prudent figure, But he would know that the money would be drained off and spent as fast as it came in “to carry on the ordinary expenses of the

The Hoosier Forum

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

i i

government.” And he would know, too, that, in time, it would be necessary to go back to the people and tax them again, through their incomes, through their theater admissions and in*a hundred other ways, to replace

profitable even under the most idealistic administration. Government is not intended to show cash profits. It is an expensive institution devised to keep order and fight foreign enemies.

Private Organizations Levy Payroll Taxes

ALTHOUGH SOCIAL SECURITY is one of the gaudy landmarks of the New Deal, the President is only one of millions who do not understand it. He thinks the revenues should be available for spending and the people do not even know what benefits they are paying for under an: ipfinite variety of special circumstances.

Moreover, some unions of Mr. Roosevelt's following have adopted plans of their own which, in a general way; purport to supplement the’ public security. They ‘are completely private organizations, answerable to no public authority but they can, and do, levy payroll taxes” on both Workers and employers. In this they are within the law and the worker who pays in 1 per cent of his earnings to the union JAreasury while his employer contributes 2 per cent, may be expelled for some real or false violation of union rules or discipline and automatically lose his benefits, In one particular case of a union which compels members to pay social security, the man in charge of the treasury is a crook who already has served a. term for stealing from the death benefit fund of the same union.

Petrillo Presents Another Variation

JIMMY PETRILLO'S Federation of Musicians presents another interesting variation. Petrillo demands a royalty payable to the union; not the members, on mechanical music. He is able to enforce his demand under the New Deal's Roosevelt union policy. He says the purpose of the collection is to care for musicians thrown out of work by the mechanical repetition of original human effort. But,

obviously, as music becomes thoroughly mechanized, only a handful of musicians will continue to perform and, the rest, having dropped out of the trade, will cease to be union members. The collections, however, will multiply rather than decrease and the money will belong to Petrillo and his officers and the privileged few remaining members. A nation founded to escape Europe and its huddling, timid ways and its groupings of people in masses and classes finds painful problems when it attempts to adapt European social plans to the American system and tradition.

'We The People

By Ruth Millett

MANY WOMEN blindly accepted the adyice, freely handed ; out at the beginning of the wap, . to writer men in service letters filled with cheerful news. Now women are being told to ease up on the news and to make the letters more personal tionate.

It seems the men who got those A 5 “Mary is doing this and George : 4 is doing that” type of letters began } to wonder if their wives, girls, or parents weren't taking their being gone a little too lightly. They missed the “You” talk in the letters they received—and weren't at all impressed by the supposedly morale- building, newsy letters. It's hard fo understand why women ever fell for that “fill up your letters with news” advice, anyhow. They wouldn't have—no matter where the advice

priate committees of congress could do a service to frontline morale by looking into this suggestion.

THAT ARABIAN PIPELINE

its pipeline investment in 25 years. The purpose of the pipeline is to tap the rich oi

being jmvited in on it to the tuhe of 130 to 165 millions?

E have read some rosy estimates on how the proposed” pipeline to carry oil from the Persian gulf area to the Mediterranean coast is a good business proposition. It is said that it will cost less to pump the oil some 1200

miles across the desert and mountains than to haul it around by tankers, and that the government will .amortize

concessions of the Gulf, Texas and Standard of California ‘companies. If it is such a good deal, why are the taxpayers

came from—if they had stopped to think just what it was about the letters from their own men and boys that they remembered. They're Sentimental, Too

husband’s love for her. future and their life together,

one -of her fried chicken dinners.

are missing and how interested the ones back hom

o | are in w .are doing.

and affec- |

“BUREAUCRACY WOULD OUTWEIGH EVILS” By J. E. R., Indianapolis Mr. Roger A. Freeman's letter in the Forum fills me with disgust. Under socializeg medicine, Mr. Freeman, wouldn’t government bureauc-

| racy, waste and dirty politics far

outweigh the very few minor evils of free enterprise in medicine? Anyone in his right mind can see the horrid example of “government in business” by looking at the mess the New Deal and its “experimenters” and theorists have created in this country in the last 12 years. I thought we were fighting this war for the preservation of free enterprise and our American way of life. Socialization of medicine and similar collectivistic schemes never have and never will fit into that life.

= 2

“18 THAT ANY WAY

TO TREAT FAMILY? By Mrs, E. R. G., Indianapolis I am in accordance with a reader

who wrote about rentals and the]

landlords. How well I know what that reader means. I am a navy wife with two small children, and the only place that I can find to live is nothing but a dump. I have lived here for nine months, but life isn’t at all peaceful. I have been asked to move. But I can't move. Landlords won't rent to me because of -~-my--boys. -- Now..they haye resorted to gossip to get me to move.

Now I ask you, is that any way to treat the family of a serviceman?

He who is out there fighting for you and me. I say there should be something done. After all, children are born and they must be cared for. What are we to do with them? Hang them on a nail?

2 = “WHY NOT MAKE FRIENDS OF STRANGERS?”

By Mrs. Lochinvar, Indianapolis

‘My earlier zeal for reform has long seemed inconsequential beside my career as wife, mother and homemaker, but “More Than Disgusted” has stirred latent fires. The real estate practices she reveals are no strangers to me. Apparently it is standard Indianapolis procedure. If Indianapolis doesn't want its war boom bubble to burst into its pre-war deflated chronic-

(Times readers are invited to express their views in these columns, religious controversies excluded. Because of the volume received, letters should be limited to 250 words. Letters must be signed. Opinions set forth here are those of the writers, and publication’ in no way implies-agreement with those opinions by The Times. The ~ Times assumes "no responsie bility for the return of manuscripts and cannot enter correspondence regarding them.)

depressive <tate, why not "make friends of us strangers? P. S.: My husband's deferment is up March 1, which automatically makes us undesirable tenants! No human acts can counteract war's mad whimsies.

” “NO FIT PLACE TO RAISE BOYS” By a Proud Mother of Four Boys, Spencer

60 miles away from my husband's work. The little boys and I are all alone all week. And now they don’t want to give my husband enough gas to come home on week-ends to be with his family. Of all the dirty deals we have had them since moving to Indianapolis. I say let's put something on the landlords that will make them suffer and think back when they were young. When I would take our boys uptown I'd hear severaN passers-by say, “Oh, look, four little boys! Isn't that nice?” Sure, it is and I'm proud of them, but at the same time I was thinking “no home is there for them.” Now they are taken &way from the Daddy (who leaves in a few months for the army) they worship, on account of some slick-nosed landlord who worships a few dollars more than the happiness of children. We are not to judge them here on earth. Let's just face it,

#3 ” - “WILSON WAS TRYING TO ABOLISH BLOODSHED" By Mrs. A. C. H., Indianapolis I disagree with you, Mrs. Cheek, on Mr. MacArthur for President. In the first place Gen. Wainright

In answer to “Disgusted With 1ndianapolis,” and “A Reader,” I just say heads up. We are but a few who are nmiore than disgusted with that city. It's true there are n very nice people there, but oh so very few. Yet child delinquency is reported in-all.the newspapers every | iday. - What kind of children can they expect who aren't good enougn to be given a fair chance for a good home. As for me, I wouldn't buy the best home in Indianapolis as it is no fit. place to raise four boys. We, lived there four years, I know. The first place we could possibly get (before the war) was for six dollars per week. When the lights were turned on at night the cock? roaches and yes, bedbugs, would run for shelter. Well, we didn't stay long, even if we had to take a tworoom house. My husband worked all night and of course had to sleep most all day. Can you picture what a mother of four little boys could do to keep them quiet all day? But no, no other house could we get. Yet, all the time we were buying every bond and donating to every charity organization that came along. - Well, to make a long story short, we finally had to move over

Side Glances—By G

albraith

{was the hero of Bataan.

| MacArthur is all right, but do you

THE PART of her husband's letters that Sue Jones reads over and over is the part about her and her

The part of her flance’s letters that Clare Smith knows by heart is the part where he plans for the

And what Mom repeats. out of the letters from her son Joe is how much he would like to sit down to

It's the personal part of the letter that is important to all those women. And men are no different in that respect. When they get letters from the ones they love, they want to hear how much they

R : COPR. 1944 BY NEA SERVICE. INC. T. M. REG. U. 8. PAT. OFF.

® 1 Politics, saginsering and the stock market were okay in your- dey,

For news send your man the ‘home town news * | paper. ‘make your letters warmly

He is the one who went on the death march with our soldiers and sailors.

remember during Hoover's presidency the sick and crippled soldiers that..went._to Washington? . i Hoover ordered out the army. . . And MacArthur was the man that came to Hoover's call. And he is the one that burned the places where they were staying, and I believe several sick soldiers were shot. Maybe Mr. Mellinger hasn't any sons in this, but I'm in this war up to my neck. I won't go into the details, but my baby brother has been in the Southwest Pacific almost four years. I have six brothers under 37 and a son-in-law. We are all navy and the navy hasn't been doing-exactly nothing.<You are just electioneering for the Republicans. I would also like to speak to the Voice in the Crowd: My dear sir, this war did not start as a spark. It started by the deepseated plot. ting of a vicious menace. If Wilson was wrong, which he was not, how would it have been stopped in the beginning without bloodshed? That was what he was trying to abolish, the bloodshed of world war IL The trouble with so many people like you is you're armchair gen-

you are a man, use your spare time writing to soldiers, sailors, marines and coast guardsmen, etc., or start planning your victory garden early. Or you might build yourself an air raid shelter in case Roosevelt and our veterans can't keep the Germans out of the Mississippi valley. Me? Ill fight along with Roosevelt and give him all the backing I can and forget politics until the war is won. P. 8, My brothers and son-in-law

is going back if he can.

DAILY THOUGHTS

For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to shew’ Himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart .| .is perfect toward Him.—II Chronicles 16: 9. ;

EYES are bold as as. Hons—roving, running, leaping, here and there

were the prewar utilities magnates to them.

on behalf of the American Association of State High-

Well, |.

erals. You don't want to fight, you just want to give advice and let someone else do the fighting for you. | If you are a woman you need to apply for war work or take someone's children to watch. And if

weren't drafted. My husband is & navy veteran of ‘world war I and

far and near. They speak all lanEE, or dination of hfe t:18 dischatged frets Ons

government. In some administration minds that

The witness was Samuel O. Hadden, chairman of the Indiana state highway commission. He appeared to advocate a $3,000,000,000 post-war highway program

way officials of which he is the president.

Life-Long, Old School Democrat HEARINGS ON the measure are being held by the. house roads committee. Afer Mr. Hadden testified many of the committeemen shook his hand and con= gratulated him.. Included were both Democrats and Republicans, Mr, Hadden is a life-long, old school Democrat. His personal friend, Senator Samuel D. Jackson (D. Ind) accompanied him to the hearing and several of the Indiana congressmen also ate tended. All ‘were impressed. : In his own mild mannered way, Mr. Hadden quietly told the congressmen that the federal gove ernment had horned-in on gasoline and other taxes on motorists and they should get out of this business or return all the money they collect to state and local road funds. The federal government long penalized the states for diverting gas taxes to other than road construce tion and maintenance, but now they are doing the very same thing, Mr. Haddén pointed out. His attack was made in such a helpful manner that the committéeemen, many of whom had voted for things Mr. Hadden criticized, took no offense whatever, “Highway officials are in no sense a. pressure | group,” Mr. Hadden told them, “We are here merely { in an advisory capacity and our one purpose is to

give timely and competent advice, with supporting

data, for the consideration and use of the members of this committee and the full membership of the house of representatives, . .

Choice Between Two Alternatives

*A POINT which should receive consideration at the outset is whether or not it is proper for the states to come to congress for such a large appropriation at this time in view of the fact that the federal credit was extended first to the relief of unemployment during the depression years and now to the waging | of the great war, “This is a fair question and we have no disposition to ignore it. “We believe that at least a part of the answer is found in the proposition that the federal government, in al] fairness to state and local governments throughout the country, is confronted with the choice § between two alternatives, namely, either to retire from the field of automotive taxation or to return to the states for expenditure on state and local roads and streets the entire proceeds from the taxes levied by the federal government on automotive units and parts and on motor fuel. “It has been our observation that our people bes lieve this choice should be made, and without delay.” Such pointed testimony marked all of Mr. Had- | den’s two hours on the witness stand. During the cross-examination he never failed to let the congrbssman doing the questioning have his (Hadden's) | way. All hands present agreed he turned in about the | most perfect performance since Mr. Willkie was suavely fighting for Commonwealth & Southérn.

Japan's Wankness By Marshall McNeil

WASHINGTON, March 4-= ' “Japan’s, Achilles heel is steel” | 4 That, according to Rep. Albert Thomas (D. Tex.), ranking majority member of the house naval “APPropriations su % not just a paradoxical phrase After a study of statistics gathered for him by various intelligence serve ices, Representative Thomas is convinced Japan's chief industrial weakness is her relatively low steel production, He contends she Is | unable to replace adequately the losses we have inflicted upon her fighting and merchant fleets. This | will mean her defeat sooner than many think, Mr, Thomas believes. . Secretary of the Navy Knox said this week that § well over 3,000,000 tons of Jap merchant shipping | had been sunk in the war. Mr. Thomas said today that approximately 500.000 tons of Japanese ships } had been sunk in Febuary alone. i “Japan has supplies-of oil, light metals, food and crude rubber,” Representative Thomas said. “But she § doesn't have enough steel to win this war; she may # not have enough steel to carry on much longer.

U. S. Production Rises Steadily

“OUR PRODUCTION of steel has gone up steadily, # from about 84,000,000 tons in 1841 to perhaps as much as 97,000,000 tons in 1943. i “But figures furnished to me by the navy show that Japan’s production is only about 10,500,000 tons. ; We've got an advantage of eight or nine to one. Even | in the face of our allocations of steel to the European war, our edge over Japan is enormous.” 8 In the face of large and growing shipping losses, Mr. Thomas believes Japan has long faced the problem of how to stretch its steel; and he says that in | his opinion Japan's steel supply problem is now acute. | “We all were impressed by stories about how great were our exports of iron and steel scrap to Japan prior to Pearl Harbor, » “But the figures show that our exports of scrap § iron, steel and tin plate to Japan for the six years © prior to Pearl Harbor ran about like this: 1938, 1,057,000 tons; 1937, 1,900,000 tons; 1938, 1,380,000 tons; 1939, 2,000,000 tons; 1940, 950,000 tons, and 1941, 289 ns. In 1941 we sent a total of about 3500. tons of scrap metal of all kinds to Japan, but it was mostly SCrap copper. ;

Japan Has Stockpiled Metals

“I THINK these figures dissipate the, feeling that A we added enormously to Japan's ‘steel supply. “Of couse,” Representative: Thomas went on, “Japan has stockpiled all sorts of metal, including steel, but she just hasn’d got the steel capacity to keep up replacing the losses we have inflicted upon her fighting fleet and her merchant fleet.” ‘The congressman said he believed that if Japan | cracks; “she will crack wide open;” and that “she will not let us tear up her country with bombings.” He believes the Japs will not last long after our forces drive them out of the Philippines.

To The Point—

THE SEASON has come for ‘the swapping of political bunk for gn. easy berth,

| - paTHER GETS home wih his pay on Seturday

> gramps, but there isn't enough dough in it=—I'm going to diet and be a swoon-crool

IN ITALY group of A-20 field that was British engin Its dark es

It is an od and hear a di opera as she outdoor toile . Italian peasa wall at you ¢ care, and you

Home-Ma

EVERYBO officers and 1! tents are sce or so apart, i There are all sleep on f{ big warm ai fortably.. The inside of its occup: furnished wit boys' own Car like, surpassi of life. All the ter home-made { tent is a can

Insi

PROFILE Smith, U. 8. and probably official. For to arise befor

Mr, Smit! it. He receis H. Smith—Y . He has I pulled out b gray. About 180, and has His greate C. South, ski has been hot William H. § in the Aleuti

Likes to

IP HE H backyard wo wood hauled county and hauls it to t in the furna He enjoj" isn't worth ¢ have trouble cars, can't d Between | flagstaff on day. He lo __8ent to the

“home with {

Fad

WASHIN! between Wa and Moscow ment of sma remains to b

Germany. Washingt Washington what it can’ same. If t members of themselves, cept whethe aims of the

Protests

REP. JO to the Presi “If Russi a8 is the an have been I win it milit: In reply,

WASHIN listen to a c to cub repo reporters at experience g