Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 18 October 1949 — Page 14

The Indianapolis Times

ROY W. HOWARD WALTER LECKRONE HENRY W. MANZ President Editor Business Manager

PAGE 14

Tuesday, Oct. 18, 1949

5¢ 8 indey Se 8 copy. Telephone RI ley 8551 Give Liokt and the Peovis Will Pind Their Own Wow

As Giants Battle

(CONGRESS moves toward adjournment, unconvinced that an onrushing crisis of frightening proportions demands its continued presence on the job in Washington. Two weeks hence, if the coal and steel strikes go on, it will be evident that Congress should have remained in session, prepared to assert its authority for the country’s protection. But by then, it seems probable, the members will have scattered to their homes or be junketing abroad.

. = =» - - » JOHN L. LEWIS proposes that his coal miners’ union and the American Federation of Labor spend $2,500,000 a week to aid Philip Murray's CIO Steel Workers in what he terms their “vital economic conflict” with “adversaries of limitless financial credit and powerful beyond compare.” Mr. Murray suggests that all unions pool their resources in support of the mine workers, the steel workers and any others who may be “forced into necessary strike action by the opposition of the monopolists and financial interests who dominate the gréat industries of this country.” It is true, certainly, that the steel industry, the coal industry and others have great power. But no combination of industrialists and financiers could exercise such super-monopolistic power as Messrs Lewis and Murray can wield—and do—because Congress sanctions industry-wide bargaining and has given unions immunity from the anti-trust laws. :

» » » " » » NO group of mine owners would dare cut the country’s supply of coal to a trickle, as Mr. Lewis has done repeatedly. No group of mill owners would dare shut off all but a minor part of the supply of steel, as Mr. Murray has done. As to organized labor's financial strength, Mr. Lewis says that his union and at least nine AFL unions could each “disburse one-quarter of a million dollars per week for an indefinite period without strain, burden or inconvenience to their membership.” ' _And as to political power, the President of the United States so values the votes which union leaders say they can deliver that he promises to abolish even such mild safeguards as the Taft-Hartley Act places on their use of economic force, : . a. 8 = - . » WE are seeing a struggle between giants of labor and giants of industry, with the American people helpless in the middle. Our jobs, our hopes of prosperity, our influence for world peace are at stake, and it is no exaggeration to say that even our form of government may be endangered. This menacing situation should not be left to Mr. Truman and the “implied powers” which he has said are adequate to meet any industrial emergency. No one has told the people what these powers are. No one in authority has explained what Mr, ‘Truman might undertake to do with them. Congress should stay on duty. If Congress will not do that, the adjournment resolution should authorize its leaders to call it back to Washington on short notice at any time before the new session convenes next January.

Tavern Brawling Menace

INDIANA laws regulating liquor taverns are specific in fixing responsibility for the conduct of customers on the owners of the licensed drinking places. In too many instances the managers of some taverns have become lax in supervising their patrons with the result that serious brawls have become a public menace. . The fatal shooting in a S. West St. tavern recently is an example of the results of lax management in the failure to control patrons before they reach the point of committing murder. The Marion County Liquor Board and the State Alcoholic Beverages Commission are vested with full power to revoke licenses and close up taverns where the owners fail to control patrons. A closer check on some of the drinking places and revocation of a few lcenses would go a long way toward curbing the menace of tavern brawling.

Fun Does Not Mean Vandalism

HE season for Halloween fun is here again and with it is tendency of some over-zealous celebrants to indulge in “vandalism. : Destruction of property, false fire alarms, safety hazards and other extreme “pranks” undertaken in the guise of fun are actually criminal acts and should be handled accordingly. Police Chief Rouls properly has alerted all police officers to watch for attempts at vandalism during the Halloween season the next few days. Halloween fun does not mean vandalism.

The Reluctant Pandit

JE YERYWHERE he goes in this country, the red carpet is being rolled out for Prime Minister Nehru of India. President Truman sent his private plane to London to fetch him here. He got the No. 1 treatment in Washington— Blair House, state dinner, addresses to House and Senate, and all that—and in New York he gets the works, City Hall welcome, Broadway. parade and honorary degree at Columbia University. All told, India's P. M. couldn't have done better on his first jaunt to America—not even if he had been a channel swimmer. Only thing is, he hasn't quite swum that channel yet. In a New York interview, the political heir of the Mahatma Gandhi was asked whether he had made any commitments to place his country on the side of the Western Democracies in the cold war, He replied: “We have no intention to commit ourselves to anybody at any time.” Okay, the Pandit has laid it on the line. If India insists on remaining aloof in the cold war, can’t we at least

Mi County > cents a tor daily ; : i mer b reek FESR

POLITICS .... By Charles Lucey

.cans, on the other hand, seem to differ on what

1950 Election

Democrats Are Optimistic; GOP Worried and Unsure

WASHINGTON, Oct. 18—A stumbling-tired Congress plans to slam the door and head out for the political pastures this week. Democrats generally are cocky, Republicans worried and unsure they've gained ground in 10 hectic months of battling Harry Truman. By now the Congressmen have missed most

of the county fairs and fall clambakes, but |

almost to a man—save for a half hundred barging about ov! break - straight for home to set trap-lines for the 1950 election. At home many a will run into voters deeply concerned over a situation that has not yet caused much worry in official Washington—the strikes. Nearly a million men are on strike in coal, steel and aluminum. Another half million are idled by layoffs due to the strikes. And if the steel strike continues through October two milHon will be out of work, according to an estimate by Secretary of Commerce Charles Sawyer. Another month would raise that figure to five million, he said. If conditions get that bad, Congress might come hurrying back to Washington.

Tired Congress

BUT Congress today is in no mood to postpone its vacation. It's a tired Congress. Day after day in recent weeks the Senate, which normally knocks off at a leisurely 5 p. m., has

8 p. m.—sometimes up to mi For weeks Senate and House members have blen locked in bitter disagreement over legislation. They've struggled on three months beyond the contemplated July 31 adjournment and most of them are thoroughly weary of Wash-

n. During all these embattled months the Republicans were able to hobble the administration here and there—on Taft-Hartley repeal which Mr. Truman had promised in his campaign speeches, on enactment of the Brannan farm plan, the compulsory health insurance scheme, and elsewhere. But the Democrats reached other goals, and those in which they failed will be pressed in the new session beginning in January. Where they still fall on them they'll use the issues as campaign fodder next year,

Democrats Optimistic

WHETHER it's play-acting or the real thing, Democratic leaders show much more optimism over the political situation at the session's end than do the Republicans. They've got all the jobs patronage can give them and they've got momentum. They've had a 90-vote edge on the Republicans in the House this session but that hasn't been enough at all times and they're busy with plans to capture another 20 or so seats in the next election. The Democrats have got the bucks, too, and that's important. The GOP fat-cats of old are lean these days, in their kick-in to the party treasury. Republican leaders say some of this is due partly to holdover resentment against Gov, Thomas E. Dewey's failure to win what seemed a sure thing in 1948. But the Democrats today have a nice crop of millionaires of their own and the party's national headquarters “take” is far ahead of the GOP now. President Truman himself is fairly satisfied over the progress of his program in this Con- ot gress, and the White House ‘box score” on the 10-month session called it a “remarkable record of achievement.” It included a whole sheaf of point-with-pride laws on foreign affairs—the European Recovery Plan, Atlantic Pact, arms aid, a reciprocal trade program unscathed despite vigorous Republican opposition.

Civil Rights Stopped

ON THE domestic side the administration was stopped on civil rights—but by southern Democrats rather than Republicans, It did get a housing program, a continuing but weaker rent control law, authority for more storage space for crops—an important farm-state issue in 1948-—pushed a much-liberalized Social Security law through the House and ready for Senate action in 1950, and obtained wide power to reorganize the government. There probably will be an increased minimum-wage law. The Democrats think their San Francisco and Des Moines regional conferences laid a base for some effective vote-getting, and a similar New England meeting is just ahead. Republi-

their own Sioux City farm conference accomplished. They have yet to come up with an affirmative farm program. Republicans will make their big bid for gains next year in suburban and big city territory now held by the Democrats. The Democrats will try to hold the fort here and add seats in the farm areas. National headquarters of both parties have bush-beaters out through the country now trying to determine where and how the fight can be made most smartly.

VESPER THOUGHTS

The evening shadows fall aslant the sky, As that great crimson orb sinks in the west. It tints the clouds with colors that defy The efforts of the artists at their best, A preview of that empire we shall know, It gives a glimpse of where we will abide, And indicates the sand is running low, Preparing us to cross the Great Divide.

Some in the past have thought that they would die; Some in the present, they will always live; But whether dreamless sleep or life go by, The fact remains, they both are positive. Pronounce me living, I shall keep my ties!

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worked right straight through to 7 p. m, or | ht. {

} SOMETHING went out of Indianapolis when the big department store came in. To be sure, the department store contributed something of its own, but it never quite compensated for the loss of the individual smells that used to identify the little stores around here, It’s all of 60 years since I was a little boy, but my nose still hungers for the spicy aromatic odors that used to be an integral part of H. H. Lee's tea stores. And I still sniff when 1 think of the pungent acrid smell of Emil Martin's apothecary; or clean calico smell of Jacob Efroymson's little dry goods store; or the sweet virtuous smell of Mr.-Haerle's lace and embroidery shop; or the robust Rabelaisian smell of Kaese Mueller's cheese store; or the musty moldy odor of Karl Pingpank’s sec-ond-hand book store; or the luscious fragrant perfume of ‘Joe Becker's pastry shop—what a

Heady Smell SOMEHOW, though, I remember best the smell of Mr. Pingpank’s second-hand book shop. It was a heady smell like that of old leather and paper incorporating, as it were, the hundred flavors of the books on his shelves. The smell changed from day to day. Sometimes the perfume of the French novels came to the top; sometimes, the poignant earthy odor of the Russian books; sometimes, the lavender scent of English stories. It depended altogether on the way Mr. Pingpank’s stock moved. Occasionally—but never more than once in a blue moon—Mr, Pingpank achieved what I shall always remember as the perfect bouquet of books. When that happened, there was no smell like it in town unless, perchance, it was the blended beuquet in Hermann Engelbach’'s sec-ond-hand book store. It wasn’t only by way of the little stores that I learned to use my nose. The training I received at home contributed its part, too, From father I learned that the nose is the best qualified organ to warn us kids of impending dangers. “The nose knows” was one of father’s favorite quips.

Symbol of Appreciation AS FOR MOTHER, she carried the idea still further. She insisted that the nose could be trained to serve not only as an instrument of precaution, but also as a symbol of appreciation. Unlike father who resorted to dictums, mother showed us kids exactly what she meant. For example, I still recall the hurt expression on her face when I failed to stick my nose into the turkey dressing before pitching it on my tongue. Mother was no exception. Sixty years ago when I was a kid, every woman who had reason to be proud of her cooking expected her guests to show appreciation by way of their noses. Otherwise the dinner was counted a dud. The theater polished off my education and made my nose what it is today. When I was a kid, the theater was a three-dimensional affair which is to say that it included not only something to see and to hear, but something to smell as well. Compared with which, the two-dimen-sional thing known as the movie is nothing but an infantile affair. It is my considered opinion that James A. Herne produced the best smelling plays when I was a kid. He was to the stige what Willigm Dean Howells was to literature—the pioneer American realist. Both were sticklers for the unvarnished truth. Mr. Herne stopped at noth-

Claim I am dead, but I shall yet arisel

ing to make his plays as real as possible and I

SIDE GLANCES

; T 10-18 :

DOPR, 1940 BY NEA SERVICE, WC. T. WM. REO. u. & PAT. OFF,

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truculence.” The report states:

projects in the Marshall Plan.

France bridles at the thought.

‘Chip on Its Shoulder’

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need twice as

flat on its face. And as a result the chances of the plan achieving its basic economic aims there are seriously jeopardized. This is revealed in a report of the joint congressional ECA watchdog committee. It is a penetrating study made by two | staff members of the committee who spent practically all summer | in France analyzing the problem. They are public relations ex- | perts Robert L. Fallow and Gabriel R. Vogliotti, | Unfortunately, Mr. Fallow and Mr. Vogliotti discovered, most of the causes for the failure to sell the French people on the merits of the plan are nothing that ECA officials can do much about. They exist in the peculiar postwar state of mind of the average Frenchman and in “French sensitivity, resistance,

“France's fierce pride is one of the elements slowing down the operation of the Marshall Plan. To be told that the bread they eat contains free flour, their rails made of donated steel, their currency backed up by donated money, is galling. The suggestion that Frenchmen should be grateful arouses an antagonism so fierce as to jeopardize the negotiations necessary to

“ECA's American administrators and publicists have long since learned that the kiss of death for any publicity project is the suggestion from any quarter that the United States is doing it out of a kind heart, or that it is a gift, or that France should be grateful. But the fact remains that ECA aid is free aid, and

“PAST events have created a French attitude of mind which is almost hysterically opposed to any hiAt of domination, and & belligerent attitude even toward the best intentioned advice. France has a chip on its shoulder that has no counterpart in, say | consistent effort to get the western sid

sequences of this attitude, so difficult to visualize in the United States and so real an

mediate. They have a direct bearing on the rate of progress of the Marshall Plan”!

OUR TOWN . . . By Anton Scherrer Lesson in the Art of Smelling

think it fair to say that he reached the top when he produced “Shore Acres,” a picturesque New England drama in which he took the part of Uncle Nat Berry, possibly the most lovable and certainly the hungriest character the stage has ever produced. It was in the third act of “Shore Acres” that the whole company celebrated a marriage anniversary by way of a real-for-sure dinner. As nearly as I recall, it embraced a 15-pound stuffed turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, celery, an enormous dish of parsnips anda gallon of “gravy. It ended with pumpkin pie, and enough for every member of the huge company to receive a quarter cut.

Smells From Stage I DON'T think I'll ever forget that act. The savory smells swept down from the stage and reached every part of the theater, even the remote corner of the gallery where I sat. Except for my home training, I never would have been able to pick up-smells at such long range. It was a heavenly experience compounded of exquisite pain and partly of a feeling that Mr. Herne and his company had invited me to participate in the feast. I don’t know how Mr. Herne's company managed to put away a whole turkey every night (and two matinees a week), but the fact remains that they did. I guess I saw the play six, times, and on the last occasion Mr. Herne seemed to enjoy the meal as much as he did when he started eating turkey on the stage in 1893, Mother, I remember, was extremely critical of the first two acts when she saw “Shore Acres” for the first time. The juvenile delinquency of a wayward daughter in the play didn’t suit her at all. Mother was completely carried away, however, when in the third act every member of the cast stuck his nose into the savory dressing. :

James A. Herne . . . Stage realist.

By Galbraith | EUROPEAN RECOVERY .. . By Douglas Larsen

| French Pride Hampers Marshall Plan Aid

i WASHINGTON, Oct. 18—As a propaganda weapon against communism in France the Marshall Plan is reported to have fallen | | i

the various

; France. This is obstacle in France, are im-

Hoosier Forum.

do not agres with o word thet you say, but |

will defend to the death your right fo say

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pick up and care for the of society, while no effort is made to patch the “rotten fence on

Mrs. Studebaker, in her recent article in The Indianapolis Times, has the right idea on how to improve the looks of our city through architectural rebuilding. But whether her suggestions will make any progress with the pow ers that be is something else again,

What is attractive or alluring about a great

hunk of drab, gray stone, rearing its discon» solate head toward a bright blue sky, with a tiny window here and there? Take one look and all the impression you get from it is Alca=~ traz or Sing Sing prison. Are we to have more of that on Mounment Circle? Let us sincerely hope not. y 3 One of the prettiest and most attractive buildings we have in the downtown area is the Wm. H. Block building. It is seen for squares away. Not only is it attractive, but it serves as a guide-post to the out-of-town. folk who use the bus station to and from the city, More buildings like this one would make Indie anapolis a city to be proud of. ‘ Getting back to Mrs. Studebaker’s sugge

tions, let us hope they will bear good fruits «5 Let us make our famous Monument Circle 8 **

place to come to, not to stay away from. ® ¢

‘Why Fuss Over License Togs? By Harold B. Smith, 701 W. 82d St. Why all the fuss and hullabaloo about issu-

ing low license numbers to “deserving Demo~ «

erats”? If you can cite a single administration— Democrat or Republican—that has not done exactly the same thing over a period of at least the last 20 years, I should be very glad to know about it. I have had occasion to have been in a position during that time to know personally that one had “to know someone” among the powers that be'in order to get low pumbers, star plates, etc. I agree that plates should be put on sale and issued to the citizens of Indiana on the basis of “first come, first served,” but I am sure that you will have to agree with me that this ideal is not likely ever to be reached under our system here in Indiana—that “To the victors belong the ils.” . i Let's go by the record.

‘What Others Say

WE need no change in the membership of the Atomic Energy Commission. The come mission is not guilty of the charges that have been leveled against them.—Sen. Brien D. McMahon (D. Conn.). & o

SURE I'll be back next year, but if we lost 1 would have been .gone—Casey Stengel, manager of world champion New York Yankees. ® ¢ @

, + MY political philosophy is based on the Sermon on the Mount.— President Truman. * * ¢ MORE important than to know when an enemy has produced its first atomic bomb is to know how many bombs per year will be produced-—Dr. R. E. Lapp, nuclear physicist. . * + % THERE'S no reason why we should have this shoved down our throats. Let's take the lead on pensions.—Henry Ford II, on Ford's settlement with United Auto Workers. ¢ @ A STAGE actor is like a snow sculpture. The sun comes out and warms the statue with success and it melts away. A movie is around forever. Nobody remembers you were in the play, unless they happened to see you in it.— Gertrude Lawrence, British actress. * So SCIENTIFIC and technical progress have been adversely affected during the current year by congressional investigations.—Dr. Robert Bacher, of the California Institute of Tech~ nelogy.. ¢ © © FEW people seem to understand that the addition of 17,000,000 users of real estate to our population in nine years is a big thing. Lots of houses are going to be built and lots of builders are going to build them.—Herbert U. Nelson, of the National Association of Real Estate Boards.

In their efforts to break down these national phobias,ECA’s public relations men have been hampered by lack of co-operation from the French press, the report states: “The French press, the non-Communist press, is lying down. It is not championing the Marshall Plan. It is not news that many of the leading newspapers of France can be their reputation for venality is pretty well founded. As a result any paper adopting a strong position on an issue is inevitably charged with a sell-out. In an issue as controversial as the Marshall Plan no papers have cared to go all out.” . Little Official Support THE French government's apparent lack of enthusiasm in helping ECA officials to sell the plan to the French people is explained in the report: i “Government inaction stems from the fact that the present government is a coalition incorporating a wide range of violently conflicting economic groups. As a general proposition it is un- - questionable that the coalition government ‘has indorsed the

bought and that

tion on the Marshall Plan in France should t the ‘its work, the ability of its staff, SEH th nding » delicacy of the job.” . tis » ’ — Te Cal tenn

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Auto Credit

AUTO FINAN in this region, fi their money pre all of the finar want. This does big ones; CIT, mercial Credit w but the others row the money deep as they wa There won't be ening, in spite o serve Board's threatening clou business horizon When the cred blow could so unemployment into depression days. That's what serve Board is probably what ought to look af #

Sales Vitar

THE WOODE {s taking sales About half of en office desk: from Indiana ( and Shelbyville’ of the veneers ¢ Today the wo dealers and th going through f{ a sales training pool Hotel. ~ While Indian of the wood des business, the s ing spotted st centers through men who sell h far as 150 mil their sales app their closing a There was a one bought wc and chairs. It of circumstanc any other kin ferent. Steel is steel office fu competition.

Steel Com,

STEEL whic pare in appe beauty of well cheaper and m and lighter ths that is not alw: The big cha -the office furni of mind. He 1 high polishes, g But unless it | or a directors’ is likely to functional ste have to be pret The invasion once well-corn put the wood makers on th going out to LEGAI