Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 25 October 1949 — Page 14

The Indianapolis Times 1 PAGE 14

Telephone RI ley 5551

Give Licht and the Peosie Will Pind Their Own Way

Mr. Truman's Speech . PRESIDENT TRUMAN chose an auspicious occasion to try to hold Russia's feet to the fire on the issue of outlawing atomic warfare. ; It was a day when bickerings and doubts were put aside as 59 member nations marked the fourth birthday of the United Nations, rededicating themselves to the goal of world peace and building up a better life for people everywhere. It was a day, too, when Moscow had just made it known that Russia would continue to support the United Nations as an instrument for general peace and security. This was in answer to speculation that the Soviets might walk out of the United Nations because a rebellious Yugoslavia was seated on the Security Council instead of a Russian satellite. In such an atmosphere of reassurance, Mr. Truman, speaking in New York before all the United Nations representatives at a cornerstone ceremony, sought to rally the . power of world opinion to compel Russia to accept the Baruch plan for rigid international control of atomic energy.

ot ’ 8 =» . » =» + THE PLAN of Bernard M. Baruch, first submitted in June, 1948, calls for an international body to control atomicenergy activities dangerous to world security. This body would have the power to inspect and license all atomic activities. Mr. Truman yesterday gave the Baruch plan his indorsement and pledged continued U. 8. support for it. | Russia has blocked its adoption in the Security Council. But “No single nation can always have its own way,” Mr. Truman said, when problems of humanity are at stake, problems that transcend national interest. Thus Russia would be put in the unfavorable light of standing alone against the world in the atomic controversy. We hope this works, but don’t look for any early signs of contrition on Russia's part. Rusisa doesn't shame easily.

Costly lllusion

[EPWARD DOWLING, retired Indianapolis candy manufacturer, has returned from a 10 days’ trip to Russia. In Moscow he was told by the U. 8. embassy that he was the only American in a non-official capacity to visit there - Not sure who he was, the Russian personnel of the plane flying him to Moscow treated him as a person of considerable importance. With wry humor Mr, Dowling sought to confirm their impression. “I told them,” he explained, “that I was the most important man in the world—that I was an American ” po

No doubt this was lost on the Russians, but it serves

to point up a little-recognized truth brought out in a special report last week-end by the Economic Co-operation

Tuesday, Oct. 25, 1949

oy : . ® = is that the American taxpayer has been pocket for the huge “favorable balIce trade since 1914. Between 1914 and 1949 ie balance on the books as in our favor amounted to $101 billion. But this was offset, according to ECA, in large art by outright grants and unrepayable loans totaling $68 oil! This included private capital investments a fr” contributions by the World Bank and Monetary Fund, and private remittances or donations. Of the $49 billion advanced as grants from time to time by Uncle Sugar, the report observed that it came either out of taxes or from increases in the national debt. ‘We could continue to subsidize Marshall Plan countries and others with grants of taxpayers’ money, says the ECA report, but such a policy of drift is “undesirable, to say the least.” With that understatement, we heartily agree. Instead of looking around for places to spread our money, let's see if we can’t begin to pull in some returns. The ECA suggests we buy at least $2 billion more annually from Europe. A good way to start would be to concentrate on building up our stockpiles of essential raw materials from those countries we are now aiding.

Get On With Defense

T° Gens, Bradley, Vandenberg, Collins and Adm. Denfeld— To Secretaries Johnson, Symington, Matthews, Gray— To all others who have been involved in the angry unification controversy, and who have now or may have in the future responsibility for the nation’s defense— We respectfully suggest: Now that you have unburdened your chests of your real and fancied individual grievances and have exhibited to a shocked public your collective failure to settle differences which it was your duty to settle in your own councils, your only honorable and patriotic course is to get back on the job and make unification work, We suggest to all you civilian secretaries, to all chiefs of staff and your chairman: Gather in the same room, sit down at the same table, make your apologies to each other, wipe the slate clean and start fresh. And when you come out of the meeting room, gentlemen, bring with you a public statement signed by all hands. A statement rededicating yourselves to your common purpose, telling of your will and determination to get on with the job of building America's defenses.

City’s Building Boom $39 million building boom in Indianapolis this year "is significant of more than merely an effort to catch up with the city’s back-log of construction needs. “It has become the basis of a broader foundation to meet _ the future needs of an obviously expanding economy of a much bigger metropolis. Industrial expansion here in the st two years has gone far beyond the necessities of the It is'pointing far into the future. nd . ; 4 . ’ THUS, Indianapolis is rapidly assuming a new position rce and metropolitan flavor. ith this new responsibility comes the need for planning to cope with the problems of a bigvill need better traffic facilities, a bigger er housing and an over-all plan for more

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EUROPE . .. By Marquis Childs Economics Rule

Finland's Fate

Money Power Could Aid Nation in Fight for Freedom

HELSINGFORS, Finland, Oct. 25—The

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and, eventually ‘a strike that had as its real intention political and economic chaos and the seizure of power. Thanks to the solid character of the great majority of the Finnish people and to the toughminded capability of such youbger Nien as 53 year-old Unto Varjonen, minister without portfolio, the Communists were defeated and the strike was ended. But that is far from meaning that the crisis in the wood industry is ended.

Sound Economic Exchange

THE ANSWER is not necessarily in loans or handouts from the American government. In the long run loans and handouts solve nothing. What is essential is to achieve some kind of meaningful economic exchange. . In Finland there is a good example of what might be possible. Out of their abundant timber resources the Finns manufacture prefabricated houses. Most of the 13,000 they have made in the past year and a half have gone to Russia as reparations. But now with the reparations bill nearly paid they can sell the output of the pre-fab factories. It appears, however, “that the only customer, for the time being at least, is the Soviet Union and that is unhealthy, both politically and economically. The United States has a desperate need for housing for Alaska, both for troops stationed there and for civilians who are paying exorbitant rents. This is so urgent that Gen. Omar Bradley, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, called public attention to it, implying that the lack of housing was a severe handicap in the defense of a vital territory. The prefabricated houses made by the Finns are probably not up to American specifications. Americans here who have inspected them say they would not pass Army tests.

Finnish Independence

BUT, SURELY, if the United States would send a few experts here to work with the Finnish manufacturers, it would be possible to work out details of a ready-built house that would come up to minimum requirements. This is the kind of practical arrangement that could mean a great deal to Finnish independence. For America, where dwindling forest reserves are being rapidly cut down, it is plain common sense. Economic dependence on Russia can bring the kind.of pressure that can mean eventually political dependence. To pay the reparations bill Finland has created a metal industry that has turned out machines for Russia. New Finnish shipyards have sent ships across the Baltic to Leningrad. There is not likely to be any market for this production except the Soviet Union when once all the world gets caught up on its needs. That is at the outset a binding link with the East. The United States can see that positive steps are taken in the wood industry to counter this trend and those steps can be to America’s advantage. That is the real way to wage the cold war. ¥ :

IT WASN'T until I entered my adolescent period (circa 1898 or thereabouts) that I learned about Sidney Vernon Blackwell and his fabulous snuffbox. The discovery came as something of a surprise for, up until that time, I nursed a notion that I had seen just about everything the South Sideshad to offer in the way of wonders. Mr. Blackwell and his darling wife lived at 435 Madison Ave, right across the street from one of H. H. Lee's four tea stores which, at that time, identified strategic trading posts in Indianapolis. Today Mr. Lee's tea stores are but a memory of a civilization that cultivated the amenities of living. Thank goodness, though, the house once occupied by Mr. Blackwell is still standing. Indeed, except for a different colored paint on its exterior walls, the little cottage looks just the way it did when the Blackwells lived in it some 50 years ago. After I got to know the Blackwells, it always struck me that both husband and wife had a hand in picking the house they lived in. Certainly, Mrs. Blackwell was not unmindful of the advantage of running across the street to deal with Mr. Lee. As for Mr. Blackwell, he, no doubt, chose the house because of its proximity to his work.

Dinner With Tea

AT ANY rate, the E. C. Atkins shop was located only a block away, a geographical setting that permitted Mr. Blackwell to walk home every noon and enjoy a hot dinner washed down with a dish of H. H. Lee's tea. All of which is a columnist’s way of padding his stuff to say that Mr. Blackwell was a sawmaker by trade who (with his tea-drinking wife) had come all the way from Sheffield, England, to try his luck in Indianapolis, z To see Mr. Blackwell's snuffbox, it was necessary to know him well enough to be invited to take tea in his house. He never carried the box around with him. I can account far that, too. For one thing, he never sniffed snuff. Moreover, it wasn't his to carry around. Legally, he was only its guardian, for the reason that it had been transmitted to him by inheritance— by a personage no less, indeed, than the Bard of Avon. No fooling. By this time, no doubt, you're wondering how in the world Mr. Blackwell ever came to be the legal custodian of William Shakespeare's snuff-

POLITICAL CRISIS . . . By Ludwell Denny Dangers in France

PARIS, Oct. 25—The man now at bat in France's 3-week-old

box, Believe it or not, it was because Mr,

SIDE GLANCES

OUR TOWN . . . By Anton Scherrer

Fabulous South Side Snuff Box

Shakespeare wanted Mr, Blackwell to act in that capacity. I didn’t believe it, either, the first time I heard the story. One day, however, Mr. Blackwell took time off to shake his family tree right before my eyes, with the result that the fallen fruit revealed that his maternal grandmother was a daughter of James Shakespeare, the fifth of the Shakespeares in direct lineal descent from the one who married Ann Hathaway of Shottery. The inescapable corollary of which was, of course, that nobody had a better right to have William Shakespeare's snuffbox than Sidney Vernon Blackwell, a sawmaker of Indianapolis.

300 Years Old

THE poet's snuffbox, I remember, was somewhat the worse for wear when I first saw it. At that, it was in pretty good condition when one considers that it was every bit of 300 years old. It was made of ebony and the top of the lid was inlaid with pearls. An inscription of curious caligraphy, and a system of spelling out of this world, disclosed that the relic was a gift presented to Shakespeare by a friend during the Globe Theater period. Besides the snuffbox, the treasures secreted in the house at 435 Madison Ave. also included a string of beads and a vinaigrette bottle. According to Mr. Blackwell, a man as honest as tea drinkers come, both were gifts given to Ann Hathaway on the occasion of her marriage to William Shakespeare. Indeed, to hear Mr. Blackwell tell it, the beads were worn by Ann during the marriage ceremony. I never did learn the purpose of the vinaigrette bottle—not from Mr. Blackwell’s lips, anyway. However, there is a South Side legend that, on the day of the wedding, Miss Hathaway took the precaution of carrying the bottle in her bosom—just in case she might swoon, Could well be.

Names of Owners

I REMEMBER, too, that a little card identified every relic, telling in the funniest kind of lettering the chronological order of its various owners from the time it left the poet's family until it reached Indianapolis. You can’t expect me to remember all the genealogical details incorporated in those cards (after all, I was just entering my adolescent period), but I distinctly recall that in every case the poet's name was spelled S-h-a-k-g-s-p-e-2-r-e, and not Shakspeare or Shakespere, as some modern scholars would have us believe. ‘Which, I suspect, is what a trained reporter, writing this column, would have revealed in his opening sentence,

By Galbraith

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By Jeanne Seymour, City . Sometimes I wonder if the long hand of Russia (like Frankenstein) hasn't reached into our vital life. Coal, one of our essential .elements at present that keeps industry humming, is continually on strike. Almost every enter prise is closing down or laying off a great number of employees. America should wake up and remember you can kill a dog more ways than one. . While America is expecting the atom bomb, the stopping of the wheels of our industrial plants is just as destructive. Suppose we are plunged into war. Time must be taken to start the wheels, I think every plant should make a complete investigation of its officials, employees and find, If possible, their attitudes toward the country that is giving them a living. For the want of a nail, both horse and rider were lost. For the need of coal, America can be lost. ¢

* ‘How About New Column?’ By DeWitt T. Hager, Columbus, Ind. Why don’t Mrs, Walter Haggerty and A. J. Schneider start a new column in The Times and call it the “Gripers”’? Mrs. Haggerty gets her Irish up about the poor old Republicans, butter milk and lemon pie. Schneider gets his Dutch up over anything. Seems like Henry (The Great) Schricker, the only two-time governor of

trust department. y ® ¢ o

‘Profit by Mistakes’

By Francis Thompson.

around to the socialized medicine bill for some time, it is good to keep in mind changes that can be made. Now that Great Britain has a plan similar to the proposed one of ours we should be able to profit from her mistakes,

What Others Say—

WHEN the day comes that Russia begins her production of atomic weapons, we will still rely upon an overwhelmingly larger stockpile of our yown as the principal warning to aggressors.— Sen. Brien McMahon (D), Connecticut, chairman of the Joint Atomic Energy Committee. ® & IN this shrunken world in which we live we cannot afford to permit our friends to remain so weak that they will invite aggression and be picked off one by one like pigeons in a shooting gallery, —Sen. Tom Copnany (D), Texas.

WE have done a lot of uniting lately (but) it is my honest opinion that there will be a great deal more done before we reach the state of purposeful unity.—Navy Secretary Matthews, on armed forces unification. ® & o WE don't consider that there is any actual danger of war (with Russia) now, but the situation calls for working toward strengthening the peace. — Yugoslav Foreign Minister Edward Kardelj. ® 4 o

British people, but we've got to square off to our commercial position. — Hector McNeil, British minister of state, " val ution of the pound.

UNQUESTIONABLY the vitality of the aged is going to increase in years to come. With this improvement there will be less desire to retire at 85, especially on an insufficient amount.—Henry W. Steinhaus, Equiiahie Life Assurance Society. * * I FEEL right at home in Hollywood. A hot kitchen and a hot sound stage are alike—you're surrounded by hams in both.—Peter Manakos,

heir to restaurant fortune, now in movies.

U.S. RESOURCES . . . By Bruce Biossat

Ore Supply Fading

Hoosierland, should have Schneider in his brain :

Although Congress probably will not get

IT'S not the most palatable thing for the

cabinet crisis is a former school teacher who came up through the wartime resistance movement. Georges Bidault, 50, has been asked by President Auriol to try to form a cabinet. He is head of the MRP or Catholic Laborite Party. : Radical Socialist Rene Mayer, whose party stands for free enterprise, and Socialist Jules Moch tried, but struck out. It's up to Bidault now. Bidault is younger than most French political figures, still growing but unseasoned. During the war he served in the ranks and was imprisoned for 18 months. Afterwards he headed the Resistance Council inside ¥rance. He is not a strong man like his party colleague, Robert Schuman, a former premier and former minister in recent cabinets. Nor is he as able as Mayer or Moch. If he is to form a cabinet that will last, it will have to have former Finance Minister Mayer, former Interior Minister Moch or former Foreign Minister Schuman in it—preferably all three. Can't Agree FRANCE'S difficulty in settling on a cabinet of the moderate parties which will hold off the Communists on the left or the De Gaullists on the right, is the result of partisanship. The moderates haven't been able to agree on a common policy because they can't take their eyes off the pressure groups on which they depend for votes. Of course, that is not unusual in any country, But the difference here and, say, in the United States is that France is 80 near the edge of the cliff. The nation and the democratic world cannot afford the customary luxury of French partisanship, But lobbies of unions and businessmen, and equally of middlemen and civil servants, are putting their own interests above the larger needs of the nation. They seem oblivious to danger. Not that some of these lobbies lack legitimate grievances, particularly the civil servants and the lower-paid industrial workers. Even conservative anti-inflationists admit there is Justice in some wage demands.

Little Saved

THANKS to the Marshall Plan and hard work by many Frenchmen, France has enough to go around, at least for a while. But too much is being consumed and too little saved. And that which is being consumed is too unevenly distributed. All three moderate parties have agreed in principle to a wage bonus up to a minimum $42.50 a month. The only quick way , to do this and prevent inflation is by paying price subsidies. Even that has not been effective in keeping down prices in the past because of the black market. » Whenever lower-paid workers are helped, then higher-paid labor, merchants and farmers, also insist on increasing their e. At the bottom of France's maldistribution and inflation is the inadequate and grossly unfair tax system. The little man pays both in withholding taxes and more through sales taxes ch constitute a te. share of government

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revenue. : f Wholesale tax evasion by farmers, and by merchants and

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"The Barkleys must be doing awfully well—every time they see an expensive new home advertised they rush out to look at it!"

farmers have been dodging taxes since France was a monarchy. It's not only tax evasion. There is a fairly wide lack of

no chance of starting the cure without a strong unified ronment. This is what makes Mr, Bidauilt’ difficult and so important. e300 0 in

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WASHINGTON, Oct. 25—The United States is a nation built upon steel. And most Americans probably don’t give too much thought to the problem of where the steel comes from. They assume that because the supply has been ample up to now, it always will be. The truth is that our reserves of high-grade iron ore, from which steel is made, are seriously depleted. Some steel firms face a shortage of raw material within a few years. The most fore tunate can see stocks lasting no more than 20 to 25 years. Since before the turn of the century, this country has had an amazingly cheap source of iron ore: the famed Mesabi Range in Minnesota. Here high-grade ore has been mined in open pits by the simple steam shovel method. From these pits came the material that carried America and its allies through two world Wars.

Reserves Eaten Away

/BUT while the second great conflict was in progress, a steel man said: “This is the last war that will be fought off the Mesabi.” In other words, the reserves were eaten away so badly by our huge armaments program that they would play out if forced to supply the sinews of another war, This realization is food for sober thinking. The dwindling of our top-grade ore stocks means this: Either we must find new sources of supply or we must see one of the stoutest props of our economic strength knocked out from under us,

There are two main possibilities before the nation. One is .

to turn to foreign sources. Fabulous undeveloped reserves of iron ore exist in Brazil and Labrador, and Venezuela is a sec ondary prospect. aa The other course is to dip into America’s own vast holdings of low-grade ore—a material hitherto largely untouched because of the high cost of mining it. Heavy investments of new plants would be needed to concentrate low-grade ore sufficiently for commercial purposes. = 3 :

Oppose Foreigners

a Sous eastern Tyls already rely on Venezuelan sources. And evelopment work is now going forward in Labrador on a « siderable scale. aa But American steel companies are understandably reluctant to plan a wholesale switch to foreign ores. The 8 many: Keeping “friendly political relations with the

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