Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 8 February 1952 — Page 22

The Indianapolis Times

A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER

‘ ROY W. HOWARD WALTER LECKRONE HENRY W. MANZ President

Editor PAGE 22

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Friday, Feb. 8, 1952

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Ready Is Not the Word

SQ WARMING up to Capitol Hill to defend the $52 billion military budget for the 1952-53 spending year, the heads of the Armed Forces have launched a cost-explaining offensive, The emphasis is on the high cost of military living— how much more up-to-date fighting equipment costs than the World War II versions. Inflation, which the Truman administration timidly tried too late to stem, also counts, of course. The military was met, practically at the Capitol door, by questions and charges about waste and luxury spending —turned up in abundance by congressional committees. This line’ of inqury by Congress is highly in order. Every wasted dollar, military or otherwise, is a dollar donated to the enemy. And if Congress is to rid the budget of a dangerous deficit it will have to cut defense appropriations as well as nondefense. But Congress has an equally important job—now that it has the defense chiefs on the carpet. And that’s to find out the basis for the Rattening- -out” policy in defense production.

ONE OF the official reasons is that the threat of Russian aggression is still some distance in the future. But the fact is no reliable information whatever has been given as to why or how the danger has receded. The Russians already are well ahead of us in jet plane production, as Korea has so brutally demonstrated. Another official reason for postponing American preparedness is that it couldn't have been done anyway. All the rosy forecasts from Washingten as to how fast we would get under way, and how many *‘fantastic” weapons we had almost ready, have faded into a policy of drift.

jar the civilian economy. And that if the Russians don't strike we would find ourselves with a lot of out-of-date planes on our hands, . We are told, now, that the defense program merely is being put on a more “realistic” basis. After more than 19 months in Korea, we are getting “realistic.” The only realism in the picture is that we are far, far behind where we ought to be and that we are not going to catch up as long as civilian luxuries get the call over military necessities.

This Issue First i MEMBERS of the Senate Banking Committee now have

decided to put a first thing first.

Before acting on President Truman's nomination of Harry A. McDonald to be the new administrator of the Reconstruction Finance Corp., the committee wants to find out if there is to be an RFC. It will ask the Democratic leadership to permit the Senate to vote on abolishing the RFC. And it will send a committee to “talk turkey” to Mr. Truman on this basis. There is no point in having a head man at the RFC if there is to be no RFC. And there is no point in having an RFC. It long ago overstayed its purpose. And that's how it got into so much trouble. Trying to “make” a job for itself, many of its officials became 1 reckless and political— until W, Stuart Symington, now resigned as administrator, put out the fire. The best time to get rid of the RFC is now.

No Drinks on the House

NE OF THE fancy theoriés, in too many quarters, is that something can be had for nothing. It is a theory popular even among some so-called economic experts. “ But economies is nothing moré than arithmetic. There are only four quarts in a gallon. Money spent on frivolity won't buy groceries. The CIO Steelworkers Union, in pleading for a “substantial” ‘wage increase plus “fringe” benefits, holds that the. steel industry can hike wages without hiking prices. Benjamin F. Fairless, president of the United States Steel Co., says that can be done—

BUT THE money for the wage. raises must come from

rise, it must come out of profits.

And if it comes out of profits, who pays? people who would pay the price rise—the public. . The government collects about two-fifths of its revenue from taxes on the net earnings of corporations. If the net earnings are radically reduced, the tax payments are radically reduced. And the government must get its revenue from somebody else. Mr. Fairless says that if the wage pattern proposed by the steelworkers were applied to all American industry— and the wages taken out of profits—the government would lose $11 billion in tax income it would have to get somewhereelse. . Mr. Fairless is using simple arithmetic. In economics, there are no ‘drinks on the house. Somebody, somehow, has to pay.

The ‘same

Truman Diplomacy fh

for sea and air bases in that country.

The line now is that if we go too fast we might unduly _

some place. If it doesn’t come from the public, via a price

PRESIDENT TRUMAN lashed out at Fyanso Spain Thurs. : day as a regime of which he is in no sense fond. He Fiade that statement right at the moment the United | States

2 hai been given $100 million in mutual security ia, 88 Bxport Import Banik loan of $62.5 million, and o get another grant of $150 million, all as a part of J ining to Jp consistently Inconsiste: the President has kicked the

ST Ly

$20,000 A ROUND TRIP .

“i,

. By Jim G. Ries

U. S. Spends Millions To Ship Women and Children Overseas

WASHINGTON, Feb, 8-The United States spends millions every month sending American women and children to potential danger zones

in Europe and the Far East, ° The Budget Bureau estimates it costs $10,000 to move a family of flve-—husband, wife and three children——from Kansas City to Tokyo with their auto and furniture. That's $20,000 a round trip. It costs about the sameé to send them to Germany. “ SD

THERE WERE 45,000 women dnd children dependents of military men—in Germany last August. The Defense Department says the number today is secret, But it's safe to assume the figure is more than -50,000, After the Korean ‘War started, we stopped sending dependents to Japan and brought back

Hearts Across the Sea

AMER\CAS SYMPATHY

DEAR BOSS .

‘The Man Nobody Wants'—

WASHINGTON, Feb. 8—Federal Security Administrator Oscar R. “Jack” Ewing, a native Hoosier, is getting as “popular” in New York state politics, as he long has been in Indiana and on Capitol Hill here, Which means he is “the man nobody’wants.” Although “Mr, Welfare State,” as he was called by Collier's magazine, long has had an eye out for the New York governorship nomination, it now turns out that the Empire state organization will not even Jet him be a delegate to the 1952 Democratic Party convention in Chicago.’ An account of what happened to him was carried on Page 1 of the New York Times under the heading—“State Democrats” Set to Snub Ewing—He Is Omitted From Delegates at Large to Convention-—-Mayor, Farley on List”

The story, written by The New York Times political reporter, Warren Moscow, showed how Mr. Ewing, ‘although a New York state delegate in 1948, has been given the brush-off now. Those tentatively selected included Sen. Herbert H. Lehman, W. Averill Harriman, Mutual Security Administrator; State Chairman Paul E, Fitzpatrick; National Committeewoman, Mrs, William H. Good; former National Chairman James A. Farley and New York Mayor Impel~ litter. Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt also was invited to be a delegate and the eighth will be picked from New York Negro groups.

“Conspiciously missing from the

MR, EWING . .. Nobody wants him,

11st”

Mr, Moscow wrote, “is the name of Oscar R. -

Ewing, who

SIDE GLANCES LL

Federal ' Security Administrator,

@

costs.

By Galbraith

a number. The ban was #fted in November, There are 9300 families — representing 22,000 people—in Japan now. More afe arriving at the rate of 2000 to-2500 a month. It's .almost impossible to figure what this The budget has it well hidden under two headings — “travel,” and “transportation of things.” But other bills are ‘paid from those accounts, toa, Travel, for instance, includes troop movements, Transportation of things includes war supplies. > © : : NEXT YEAR we plan to spend $398,258,368 for travel and $1,019,590,597 for transportation of things. This year, we're spending $376,103,126 for travel and $747,768,959 for transportation of . things. Last year, it was $263,537,520 and $652,016,506 respectively, The three-year total comes to more than $3.4 billion,

By Talburt

—r EEE es

. By Dan Kidney

Was a delefite at large In 1948 and who still is one of the highest, ranking political officeholders from New York in the Truman Administration. “The ommission of Mr. Ewing was deliberate, and it brings into the open the fact that Mr. Ewing is now in the political ‘doghouse’ as far as Edward J: Flynn, National Committeeman, and Mr, Fitzpatrick are concerned.

“This is owing to Mr. Ewing's behind-the- .

scenes activity in the abortive movement #o oust Mr. Fitzpatrick as state chairman. The drive was actually aimed at Mr. Flynn, but the opposition managed to get only a handful of votes at a state committee meeting Mr. Fitzpatrick called to meet the issue.” The story told of Mr. Ewing coming to Washington when Mr. Flynn was national chairman and added that he owed his present appointment to Mr, Fitzpatrick. Mr, Ewing denied the latter from Raleigh, N. C., where he had gone to tell a University of North Carolina meeting that his plan for compulsory health insurance is ‘not socialized medicine.”

»

No Assignment

IT WAS this plan, violentl$ opposed by the American Medical Association, plus his cutting off Indiana welfare funds, that got Mr. Ewing in bad in Indiana: His plight was such that Democratic National Committeeman Frank M. McHale, a fellow-worker with him for the nomination of former Gov. Paul V. McNutt for President, reportedly got Mr. Ewing to cancel an Indianapolis speech just before the election of mayors. last November, He also was given no assignment during -the 1950 campaign in Indiana, although he is a graduate of Indiana University and native of Greensburg. A similar unwantedness confronts Mr. Ewing every time he goes to the Capitol. Twice President Truman has set up reorganization plans, which would create a Health and Welfare Department of cabinet rank, and éach time the Democratic Congresses have turned them down because the word went around that Mr. Ewing would be the new segretary,

IN A JAM .

WASHINGTON, Feb. 8—Untrue are reports that a tavern keeper on Seventh Ave, in New York has rigged up a juke box that will deliver three solid minutes of silence for five cents. He may have Sontomlated this: significant development while listening to “Little White Cloud That Cried” being played over and over again on the big box in the back of his place, but he never -got around to it. Nowhere in this land can you buy a nickel's worth of nothing on a juke box. At least, not yet. : 2 4 8 I HAVE this information straight from Hammond Chaf« fetz, counsel for the Assoclation of Juke Box Manufactur- - ers. These gentlemen are in ‘a jam with a boogie-woogie beat; they've got more important things to worry about than the price of silence. Namely: The cost of melody. Seems that under the law as written in 1909, en the only juke boxes played in penny reader for one man at a time earphones, a juke-box tor can buy a phono-

*

One. Army budget> "expert estimates that packing, crating and shipping household goods and autos represents 15 per cent of the total spent for transportation of things. The same goes for tgavel. That would be §510 niillion for the fiscal years 1951-53: Congress has indicated it would like to know more about this. In last fall's budget hearings, Rep. John Taber (R. N. Y.) Fematked to Army budget witnesses: “The thing that bothers me po why you need such ‘an everlastingly large amount for transportation of things. It looks to me like it is quite overdone.” ; ¢ © 4 REP. ERRETT P. SCRIVNER (R. Kas.) after a series of questions, remarked that the Army “does not give us much information.” Mr, Scrivner pointed out that while the size of the Army hadn't doubled, the cost of transportation of things went up 900 per cent in the Army Engineers budget, Travel and transportation of things are only the down payment, It's the upkeep that costs. When we send families overseas, we send a little package of American suburbia with them. We establish communities, complete with shopping centers, beauty parlors, drive-in theaters, hamburger stands, bowlingralleys, liquor stores, ice cream parlors and country clubs. The Army likes to use such earthy terms as “austere,” “billet,” “mess” and “subsistence.”

SCANDALS

They sound basic. Gen. J. Lawton Collins, Army chief of staff, described Gen, KEisenhower's chateau as “very austere quarters in an open field” before Congress last fall, In Tokyo, the plush Imperial Hotel-—re-quisitioned from the Japanese—is a “billet.” Until recently, high-ranking Army officers and civilians could live there for around $1 a day. The Imperial’s Peacock Alley is listed as a mess, One of the bones of contention in writing a tleaty to include American military bases in Japan has been the retention of such plush billets, The Army wanted to: keep them, The State Department and the Japanese felt we should give them up. The State Department won as far as the Imperial is concerned. It's going back to the Japanese next month, - in bb

ONE OF the main attractions of some overseas duty is the luxury. Fairly low-ranking officers and noncoms live extremely well, notably in Japan and Germany. One told me in Tokyo: “T don't necessarily want to be a millionaire,

. I just like to live like one.” In Tokyo, a major

or lieutenant colonel enjoys a standard of living $50,000 wouldn't buy ‘at home. A Japanese millionaire’s furnished mansion is his for the requisitioning at $100 a month, He gets five servants for another $100. Schools and medical care are free, There are 450 American school teachers in Japan; another 500 in Germany.

. ».By Frank Clarvoe

Politics and the Tax Bureau

SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 8—The part that politics “ and . careless handling of personnel records can play “in putting a government Dureay under public suspicion is being developed ere. There are also ways by which people with potential tax troubles may. get special freatment and others with actual tax troubles can defer the day of atonement. The record is being unfolded before a congressional subcommittee headed by Rep. Cecil King (D. Cal). The witnesses were William E. Frank, chief special agent from Seattle, and H. H. Stikeleather, chief of accounts and collections, Okla~ homa City. Both were sent here to clean up the mess in the local office. Mr. Frank testified: That <4ndicted former Collector James G. Smyth got three government jobs despite unfavorable reports sent to Washington by speclal intelligence agents. The jobs were (1) deputy collector of internal revenue, (2) administrator of the defense savings program in San Francisco, and (3) collector of internal revenue. Each succeeding intelligence report called attention to previous reports which charged Smyth made improper income tax returns and drank too much. But; on the recommendation of the Treasury Department, Smyth’s appointment by President Roosevelt was confirmed by the Senate in May, 1945. An employees’ welfare fund, set up in 1944 by Smyth's predecessor, Harold Berliner, started out with $600 left over from a benefit collection for a dying deputy. This amount, plus $10,457 collected from prospects listed as “bootleggers, bookies, liquor dealers, houses of prostitution and others with potential tax troubles,” was disbursed without audit ‘and the checks destroyed.

Mr. Roosevelt “es appointment

Mr. Frank testified that John Malone, a

deputy collector and brother of the San Francisco Democratic county chairman, William Malone, and Paul V. Doyle, indicted former chief office deputy, handled the fund and spent it.

Little of the money was used for its purported purpose, Mr. Frank sald, but so far as he knew no one got preferential treatment by contribute ing. Malone has been suspended. “It was something like a motorist buying ticket to the policemen’s ball,” Mr, Frank commented. “Much of the money came when taxpayers offered deputies money for helping with returns, The deputy could not take the money himself, but probably said ‘drop it in the box for the welfare fund.’ ”

‘Used for Entertainment’

SOME OF the welfare fund: money, he said, was used to entertain Tax Bureau officials from Washington. Taxpayers, the committee learned, can sometimes defer collection of taxes by “offers in compromise.” During the consideration of these offers, no attempt usually fis amount due, or the interest. This helps people with poor credit, who otherwise might not be able to borrow money at lower interest than the ‘6 per cent charged by the bureau. But here again a collector can abuse his discretion, as happened here in the Fairmount Hotel Corp. case, involving $500,000. Offers in compromise were made, the committee was told, and much money paid up, but it was not until Smyth was removed and succeeded by Charles F. Masarik Jr, that a lien was filed and payment obtained.

Views on the News

OPTIMISTIC NOTE—There always is something to be thankful for—the Agriculture Department doesn’t have charge of the gold storage at Ft. Knox.

SOME IDEA of the speed with which Congress operates can be learned from the fact that it takes two weeks to celebrate Lincoln's. birthday.’

SECRETARY OF STATE ACHESON says . the Paris mee $f the United Nations was successful, All fie delegates got home safely,

WHEN Ambassador O'Dwyer returns to New

York. City he will have an easy time calling on his old friends—provided they all are in the same jail.—D. K.

cassenssassNeNng

HOOSIER FORUM—‘Pen Power’

"| do not agree with a word that you say, but | will defend to the death your right to say it."

CserrasaNsRNESARERRARRRRRRRRERIRNR

MR. EDITOR: o I wonder how many of we citizens have exercised a right that is unmistakenly a weapon of some importance? ‘How many of us have

ever written a profoundly serious letter to our governmental representatives? How much voice have we actually had in the operation of this democracy of ours? The lobbyists, some minority groups, welchers, politiclans and grafters seem to be the forces that are leading our stumbling way into eventual chaos. I am of the opinion that we of the great majority are being taken for a iong ride, from which, there will be a long slow return, if-at all. For ‘quite a period of time it seemed that all the world was our business, and perhaps rightly so at one time, but now our internal affairs and our own salvation seems to be startlingly real and dangerously in need of great care and attention. Day by day it becomes more difficult to stretch our dollars to meet the mere cost of lHving , ., . the basic necessities. Our overtaxed dolldr leaves a pitifully meager remainder, but with this we must pay for over-priced homes, food, furniture, clothing, insurance, ete, A lifetime of heavy debt is the future for all of us. * > »

THE NEWSPAPERS, Communist factions, grafters, and spendthrifts beating at us from within and without our borders. How long can even a powerful nation such as ours withstand such tremendous odds? Our great wealth seems

. By Frederick C. Othman

Juke Box Makers vs. Cost of Melody

compose the music claim

ing on intermittently now since ’ last October before the House

to have gone down the drain, We've become a nation of appeasers, an easy touch, a nation of individualists forgetting our collective importance. We are being siphoned of strength through economic failure, just the way our enemies have planned. The heart of the nation saturated with useless bickering, investigations that have no real results, waste. Political positions, shrouds from which to operate underhanded methods of attaining individual gain. Whatever happened to men like Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln? We need many such men now, honest men with common sense, with a feeling of obligation to their country and to the thousands who have died fighting and believing in the world’s last stronghold of freedom and democracy. Perhaps deluge of mail upon W. would indicate that we are the government and Washington our representative. —Carl Heil, 5357 Ralston Ave.

‘How Come?’

MR. EDITOR:

Mayor Clark's big gripe during the past Span was federal “corruption.” Am 1 right? Now I notice in The Times, Page 8 on Feb,

6, fat Mayor Clark will appeal to federal offfe

cials for money to solve the éxpansion problems at Wier Cook Municipal Airport, How come? : Federal meddling follows “Tederal money. And how does the Mayor know that the money he wants won't be “corrupt?” ~Joe Blow, City.

of 8, under the inspiration of her grandmother, who

made to collect the .

that this is cheating. It's their music, even if it is embalmed in wax, and they want a share of every nickel dropped in,

They also want Congress to

pass a law, Rep. Joseph R. Bryson (D. 8. C.). already has written a pill which would pay to the writers one cent a week for every tune installed rack of the mighty box with

the red lights and the ear- _ shattering loudspeaker.

This could run into a good many millions. The juke-box fellows claim. it would. ruin em. ‘The composers retort that without their music, there'd be no juke boxes. This argument has been go-

any

* WHAT

_ Judiciary Subcommittee.

in the -

Sol figured the time had come to drop in. . A good thing, too. There in a poodle haircut and a handsome dress of yellow thecks was a pretty lady, who identified herself as Mrs. Josephine Moore -Profitt of Levittown, N. Y. When she's writing songs, she calls herself Silvia Dee. She's written a lot of ’'em, too, including “Chickery Chick,” “It Couldn't Be True,” “Stardreams,” “My Sugar Is So Refined,” “Laroo Laroo Lilli Bolero,” and the magnificent juke-box success of last season: “Too Young.” © Mrs. Profitt said she be-

gan writing songs at the age

UR BABY SHOE 7?

way can I recall . . . the things

9: you used to do . . . than simply just BY Soaing -

at . . . your little baby shoe . .. it back to- those gay years . . . when first you oh chanced to walk . , . it tings we golden mem- pe ores . . . of when you learned to talk beautiful my child . . . while in your orl you 1ay « » that vislons of your Joveliness : you ile baby shoo tor 1 0

+s» YOu

es this

wrote that tender ballad of the last century: “Put Away the Little Slippers,”"Baby’s Gone to Heaven.” Wherever Mrs. Profitt went, she heard “Too Young” being played on juke boxes. It even began: to make her feel old,

‘but she had the idea she could

put up with that on account of the profits. She even inserted a few nickels, herself. n n ” . SO YOU can imagine her surprise whén ASCAP, the American Society of Composers, Authors .ahd Publishers, told her none of the “Too Young” nickels would aid in her old age. Kind of made her sore. This testimony horrified the juke-box men. They claimed * Mrs. P. and all the other composers got ‘a pretty chunk of money when the records first were pressed. They sald if

x ‘they had to pay a cent for the privilege of png tunes, it wasn’t money, but the LY ae The Con, en could unger.

FRIDA

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60” tall, enamel hanger construct

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