Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 28 April 1951 — Page 10

~The Indianapolis Times

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A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER Per

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

PAGE 10 - Saturday, Apr. 28, 1951

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Telephone RI ley 5551 @ive Light oné the People Will Find Their Own Wey

Cheapness Isn't Always Economy

E'RE not quite sure why the Board of Public Works invited a committee of able and disinterested engineering experts to study the various kinds of parking meters offered for sale here and then paid no attention to what their own experts said. Chances are it‘was because the meter the Board chose, finally, against the advice of the engineers, cost $7 or so less than any of the others. In view of the experience Indianapolis has had with a meter of that same make, it seems at least open to question whether we saved anything there. City records show up to 70 per cent of the meters now on the streets have been “out of order” for one reason and another during the past month . .. and similar performance in the months before .. . although they are still relatively new. The technical committee which studied all types of meters reported the new models not as good as those now on the streets. A number of other cities report unsatisfactory experiences with similar models, and in several cases have taken them out and replaced them. a

- - t J WE DON'T profess to be experts on parking meters. It is entirely possible that the kind the Board approved may be the very best kind you can get for that price. It might well be better business to pay more and get a more satisfactory kind. It might cost us quite a lot less, in the long run. : Seems to us—as we urged when meters were first installed—to be only good sense to get in some of each of several kinds, put them on the streets a while and try them out under identical conditions. Then buy the kind that gave us the best service for the money. Certainly Indianapolis’ experience with the variety we have on the streets now is a poor recommendation for buying 2200 more of a model independent engineers report is even less efficient. i

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Inflation Won't Wait RESIDENT TRUMAN asked Cangres§ Thursday for more effective power to fight inflation. His message called for strengthening in some respects the Defense Production Act of 1950—the law providing authority for the mobilization program and for pricewage controls—and extending its life for two years beyond next July 1. One of Mr. Truman’s proposals, in particular, drew immediate fire from the powerful farm bloc in Congress. When the law was enacted last summer the farm bloc wrote into it a provision which actually prevents effective control of many food prices. Under this provision, no price ceiling can be placed on any farm product that is below “parity”’—the level figured by the Agriculture Department as a fair price to farmers. High as food prices are, many of them aren't high enough to be legally eligible for ceilings. Because food is the biggest single item in the average family’s cost of living, this provision gives organized labor a strong argument against tight wage ceilings. And, if wages rise, higher industrial costs increase the prices of things farmers buy, parity goes up, and so does the level at which food-price

- ceilings could be imposed.

Mr. Truman rejected suggestions for stopping this merry-go-round by permitting farm-price ceilings below parity levels. He proposed something much milder—that, for price-control purposes, the parity price of each farm commodity be fixed once a year, at the start of its normal marketing season, instead of being altered every month.

® =” = - THIS, he argued, would make it easier to administer food-price controls and forestall the inflationary effect of frequent changes in parity prices. We believe that a much more positive attack on the problem would be justified. But the farm bloc is mighty. We shall now see whether it is mighty enough to prevail against even this gentle approach. He called—again—for prompt action on at least a $10 billion tax increase; for every possible encouragement to savings; for continued and tighter restrictions on business and consumer credit; for a more effective rent-control law, applying to business properties as well as homes; for new restraints on commodity speculation. This Congress, after almost four months in session, has not achieved much in the way of constructive legislation. The new and the repeated recommendations in the President’s message will require faster, better work in the two months before the present life of the Defense Production Act ends.

The Rome ‘American’

A MERICAN friends of the Italian people will find it hard ™ to believe that the action of city authorities at Rome in suppressing the only English-language newspaper in Italy will meet with the approval of many peoples in that country. % The Rome Daily American was established in March, , by three American GIs, as the successor of an AmerArmy newspaper which had been published in Rome the latter part. of the war. ¢ This little newspaper was greatly appreciated by the #mall American colony in Italy and the Mediterranean area, as well as by American tourists. Having no editorials and no policy other than an objective presentation of the news, it also served the purpose of refuting Communist and other partisan propaganda by its factual reports from the three American wire services. i The United States has been generous to Italy and th shabby treatment given this small American enterprise comes as a shock. The statement that the paper was closed because its presses were disturbing tenants in other buildings cannot be seriously regarded, because the publishers of the paper have been under government harassment of other kinds for eral months. Since this followed both Communist and

ghtist press attacks on the publication, the real reason

pr its suppression is not hard to find. The violently partiItalian press simply coujgn’t stand honest competition,

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highest bidder.

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SENATE PROBE . . . By Frederick C. Othman

BUT IT GETS ME IN MORE $4. TROUBLE

Engineer Gets the Works Now—

WASHINGTON, Apr. 28—The sworn evidence indicates there is a faraway country called Mississippi, inhabited almost exclusively by people known as Dixiecrats. In this beautiful and interesting land, the eyidence shows further, are a few lonesome folk known as Democrats. These Democrats do control federal jobs in this distant province and, according to the Senators who went there to observe local customs, have been selling same to the

oy

It develops further that these Democrats in Mississippi couldn't get along with their Senators -— and Congressmen in Washington who are Dixiecrats. So they hired a kind of ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary to represent them here at the White House and in the Democratic National Committee. He is a curly-haired young man from St. Louis, named Glenn P. Boehn, who identified himself as an industrial consultant. This, the evidence showed, turned out to be a fancy way of saying, 5 percenter. So the Mississippi Democratic Committee, headed by Clarence Hood, the lumberman, paid Glenn $1750 in expenses for engineering advice and in particular for arranging a luncheon with Donald Dawson, the White House personnel director, whose name has cropped up frequently in connection with the Reconstruction Finance Corporation's loans. Glenn said the lonesome Democrats of Mississippi did not consult him about the sale of postmasterships to the highest bidder; they just went ahead with business as usual until the Senate Executive Expenditures Committee caught up with ‘em. The youthful engineer with the friends in high places soon found himself being examined by that demon investigator, Sen. Joe McCarthy (R. Wis.) on his own 5 per cent operations. Glenn seemed to have taken in considerable cash from his customers, but delivered them no government contracts. Some of .the same Mississippians, who were interested in postmasters, paid him $10,000 in the hope of getting an Army contract for the manufacture of a new kind of machine gun. Glenn slipped a couple of the Mississippians $1500 each in appreciation for bringing in the business. He also worked briefly for the Lustron Corp., which is the RFC's biggest headache, and once he earned $300 for helping a Philadelphia paper company get a $200,000 government loan. Simultaneously he took in $125 a week from the Walker Brothers Co., of Conshohocken, Pa.,

SIDE GLANCES

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manufacturers of electric wires, and $200 a week from the Hoosier Cardinal Co., makers of aluminum ice trays. He said he did the best he could for both of them, but has produced no government business for them yet. He had still another customer, the Shelby Construction Co., which paid him still another $100 per week, but that blew up. As soon as this firm learned of his politico-engineering operations in far-off Mississippi, it removed him from the pay roil. A

‘Out of Business’

SEN. McCARTHY used the word, fraud, in connection with Glenn's operations. Sen. Karl Mundt (R. 8. D.) wondered whether he, or Democrat Hood, has been guilty of perjury. And the longer Glenn talked, the sadder he seemed. No wonder. ' When the proceedings were finished, he said he was, too. He meant that he feared all his customers, with the possible exception of the Democrats in the distant land, would find that they needed his services no longer. “As of now,” he sald, “I am out of business.” I kind of felt sorry for the guy; if he'd only stayed away from the lonesome ones in the mysterious land to the south, the Senators never would have heard of him.

TROOP PROTECTION . . .

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[HOOSIER FORUM—‘A Fine Poem’

“I do not agree with a word that you say, but Iwill defend to. the death your right to say i."

‘A Baby's Smile’ MR. EDITOR:

In November The Times. published a picture of me being reunited with my 6-month-old son. People talk about the great responsibility that « has fallen upon me, but Ben Burroughs wrote what is in my heart when He wrote the poem “Baby's Smile” (Times, Apr. 18.) “Nothing can be more inspiring to me than my baby’s smile. When he smiles, all the shadows vanish, and the world is mine. :

~Helen Huett, 2255 N. New Jersey St.

‘Strictly Dream Stuff’

MR. EDITOR: i i George Freyn, Democratic candidate for mayoralty nomination, has come up with a traffic control plan he's trying to represent as original and new. Mr. Freyn suggests turning the canal into a super roadway to carry nonstop trafic to and from the city. The plan is not new at all. It has been kicking around Indianapolis since 1931 and has been rejected in the past on the grounds it is not feasible from engineering and financial points of view. ii Mr. Freyn failed to tell us how he is going to pay for it without violating state law. Mayor Bayt believes the cost of the project would lie between $10 and $15 million. He also believes it is too close to the bonding limit of the city, if not above, for financial safety. That limit is now $12.4 million. ® © 9 OF COURSE the plan can be carried out with financial safety if we want to wait for the Legislature to meet. Then the city would have a chance to try once again to get the bonding limit raised. This has failed in the past.

A few Water Co. engineers and traffic experts believe all existing bridges would have to be torn out, new ones built to gain necessary clearance and width. Then there's the question of the aqueduct near 22d St. and Burdsal Pkwy., which carries canal water over Fall Creek. That would be another item to balloon cost. On top of that there's the question of privately owned property, industrial and residential, adjacent to the canal. The canal itself is the property of the Water Co. All that property would have to be condemned and purchased

GRAIN TO INDIA . . . By James Daniel

by the city. A little legal red tape might be involved here. oo ¢ 2

THE “Freyn plan” calls for a sunken road

way ... that is, lying between the banks of the canal . . . the water running under the road-«

way in pipes Can it be drained during heavy rains without the use of pressure pumps? Another possible cost item. The plan sounds like a good one for Indian. apolis 20 to 25 years from now when we have resurfaced our streets, put in enough fire > N

houses, built enough hospitals, expanded the police and fire departments and a few million other things we need right now. Let's hit first things first. We've a terrific lag in almost every unit of city and county government. Existing facilities have not caught up with city growth and must before too many years go by. Mayoralty candidates love to dream, but it would probably be better for all concerned if they started talking in concrete terms about things we need now. —Not Convinced, City.

‘A Small Man’

MR. EDITOR:

. « . Harry Truman is too small in principle to hold his place and should be put on the donkey and taken back to his home state. All we can say for him is he is a good hearted soul in some ways, but not broad minded enough to hold the chair he has. Gen. MacArthur kept the flag floating and you can see that the nation loves him. —Mrs. Mabel Sawyer, Bloomington.

Judd Points Out Asian Dangers

WASHINGTON, Apr. 28—One of the bestinformed critics of American policy toward China is now urging his country not to make a similar error toward India. He is Rep. Walter Judd (R. Minn.), the one man above all others in Congress who is entitled to say “I told sma you so” about the ~ flasco of U. 8S. policy in China. Step by step, Rep. Judd has had the gloomy satisfaition of seeing practically all of his prophecies about China fulfilled. Now Mr. Judd is in the middle of a controversy between the State Department, which says the U. 8. must give 2 million tons of grain to i India with nothing Pequired In veturn, Rep. Waller Judd and a Republican- «=o i010 you SO Democratic coalition in Congress which apparently doesn't want to extend assistance under any feasible set of circumstances. He says both positions are dangerously in error. He opposes the gift idea because it would open Prime Minister Nehru to the charge that he secretly made a deal with the United States d thus undermine Nehru with those Asians who have not yet chosen sides. He also opposes the no-help-at-all position because it would be regarded in Asia as

By Clyde Farnsworth

Army Concentrates on Water

TOKYO, Apr. 28—Increased attention will be given to supplying safe water to our troops in Korea and to training them in the necessity for purification of drinking water, Brig. Gen. James Stevens Simmons (Ret.) said yesterday. Gen. Simmons is Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health and senior consultant on preventive medicine to the Surgeon General of the U. 8. Army. After a recent tour of the Korean battlefront, Gen. Simmons said the GI in that country faced great hazards of disease. He sald he favored assignment of a preventive medicine specialist to each division. For the most part, however, Gen. Simmons was optimistic.

Few Disease Deaths “ALTHOUGH it's too early to compare the Korean conflict with other wars, it's expected that the picture will be as good if not better than in the previous confliets,” the General sald in a statement issued through Far East Command Headquarters. In the Spanish-American War disease deaths were 25 per 1000 men per year, and 13 died of disease to every one killed in battle. In World War I these figures were down to about 16 per

1000 men a year and one disease death to every battle fatality. The World War II rate was 0.6 per 1000 men per year and in the European theater only one man died of disease to every 85 killed in battle. Gen. Simmons said Americans had been given “a high degree of protection.” He continued:

Good Protection

“THEY are protected against disease-bearing insects. They're provided with safe food and water and with proper clothing. These and many other procedures have served to reduce disease hazards of troops in Korea to a remarkable degree. “There are, of course, still problems to be solved. Jaundice ig one of these. “Among otherf are the many varieties of intestinal infections. “Scientific investigations and studies must continue and be increased in their scope to develop applicable methods for prevention and control of these diseases for which effective preventive measures have not yet been developed,” Gen. Simmons said. Meanwhile, he said, our troops are backed up by “the very best that modern scientific medicine and public health can offer both now and in the future.” ‘

By Galbraith CONGRESS . . . By Earl Richert Chances for More Controls Not So Good

WASHINGTON, Apr. 28—President Truman's program for

had accepted fixed

proof of U. 8. indifference in that part of the world and of this country’s exclusive concern with Europe. Among those who want to do much less for India than dqes Rep. Judd, oddly enough, are

many of the Congressmen who are quickest to.

condemn Secretary of State Dean Acheson and his predecessor, Gen. George C. Marshall, for the way they pulled the rug out from under Free China. + And wanting to do much more for India than Rep. Judd considers wise are many liberals who objected to any assistance to Chiang Kal-shek

hecause he wasn’t as democratic as they thought

he should be. * Why what was not justified for Chiang, an anti-Communist, is now justified for Nehru, who is obscure on the issue, is not clear. The Nehru government has most of the faults that were alleged against Chiang’s, but up to now they have not been advertised in this country.

Congressman Judd says India now stands at the same crossroads where China stood after World War II. The Nehru government is weak and in grave danger of collapse, according to Rep. Judd.

Contacts in Orient

AS A FORMER missionary, Mr. Judd still has contacts in the Orient. These contacts tell him that the lower levels of the Nehru bureaucracy have practically ceased to function and it is considerably less effective, as a government, than the Nationalist regime on Formosa.

Eating away at Nehru’s power are a tireless Communist underground and one of the most greedy wealthy classes in the world, both with their adherents very close to the top. Some private reports to Washington have been saying that if the Nehru government fell —most likely as a result of its inability to provide enough food—the probable successor would be a conservative, pro-Western government of the type symbolized by the late Sardar Vallabhai Patel, who was No. 2 man in the Indian government. But Rep. Judd says he doubts a conservative would take over if Nehru fell. “Without American help,” he says, “there will be mass starvation in India. Mass starvation would bring down the present government, The government that would succeed it would be Communist. It is not a question of having Nehru or something better. It is a question of having Nehru or something infinitely worse.”

First Concern

“OUR first concern as Americans is that

dia’s potential strength be kept out of the hands of our enemies,” he said. Rep. Judd is supporting the bill which would authorize a $190 million loan to India to buy two million tons of grain. The loan would be on:generous terms, with scant prospect of repayment unless India pulls out of her present difficulties. The bill faces a stiff House fight, with a coalition determined to kill it. “At the time of the suppressed Wedemeyer report,” Rep. Judd recalls, “many people were horrified at the thought of spending $500 million a year for three years to build up the National ists. Now we're spending $500 million a month in Korea, to try to save us from the Communists who replaced the Nationalists.”

support tion is that there will be no

#20 olla tn BY_NEA SERVICE, INC. 7. M. REG. U. 8. PAT, OFF.

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"It's time you were told, Junior, that only an extremely rich man can afford to have table manners like yours!"

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more controls faces a rough and rocky road in Congress. Odds are that he'll get only a comparatively small part of

additional powers asked, unless the

worsens drastically.

international situation

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Two items “marked off” already by many top congressional

leaders are his request for a freeze of farm parity at the beginning of the marketing sea-

son for each crop, and his request for g power to control rents of ¢ om m erclali buildings. The farm bloc in Con-

parity freeze. Among the Sen. Ellender critics were, ,, has a chance the chairmen of both Senate and House Agriculture Committees, Sen. Allen Ellender (D. La.) and Rep. Harold Cooley (D. N. C,). ‘Rep. Cooley said he might go along with the parity freeze proposal if the administration could convince him that it was also freezing industrial wages

' and profits. “But as of now, tt?

I'm not convinced,” he said. Mr. Cooley also pointed out that if the administration kept steady the prices of things the farmers had to buy, thén it wouldn't have to worry about parity because it, too, would remain steady. = » o

REP, CLIFFORD HOPE (R. Kas.), leader of the GOP House farm bloe, also ex-

pressed strong opposition to the proposed parity freeze. He said it undoubtedly would encourage farmers during the latter months of a marketing year to hold their products off the market since they would know there would be a sharp jump in parity and thus in their prices at the beginning of the next year. Major farm organizations also oppose the parity freeze idea. One leader said, however, there was a chance that it could be pushed through Congress on ‘'the ground.that since farmers

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prices for their products at the start of each marketing season they should also be willing to accept a fixed price ceiling at full parity at the beginning of each harvesting period. “There is a strong argument to be made for it all right,” he said. “But we think it is impracticable.” The administration is believed to have a good chance of getting power to impose rent ceilings in now - decontrolled defense plant and military camp areas.

o . ” CHAIRMAN Burnet Maybank (D. 8. C.) of the Senate Banking Committee said he favored giving price control officials stronger enforcement powers. (The administration asked for higher civil penalties than the present law permits.) And there is considerable sentiment in Congress for approving the use of subsidies to increase the mining of domestic metals. But there fis strong opposition to approving subsidies on food products, Congress has in the past refused to give the President many other powers for which he asked again in his new message. And the gener#l expecta-

change of congressional view point ongthese matters now. These include the power to extend the existing tough credit controls on new houses to already-built homes and the power to. control margins on the commodity exchanges,

” ” 8 THE President also renewed his request for $10 billion in additional taxes and the general consensus is that Congress will vote only a half or twoe thirds of that amount. Some influential Republicans on the House Ways and Means Coms Rites, now writing a new tax , Bay y are shooting onl for a > Sion rie > taxes. ; Congress is ex to renew the Defense Production Act which carries the price and wage control powers. But general belief is that the extension will be only for one year instead of the two asked by the President. The present law expires June 30 and the public hearings and debaté will take time, Sen. Maybank said it would be difficult to get the bill through in time, especially since interest will be focused on the MacArthur hearings. +

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