Evening Star Newspaper, October 6, 1929, Page 52

THE EVENING .STAR With Sunday Morning Edition. WASHINGTON, D. C. SUNDAY.........October 6, 1920 THEODORF W. NOYEES. ...Editor S The Evening Star Newspaper Company Business Office: Chicago Office: European Ofic Rate by The Evening Sta The Evening end (when 4 Sunda. Carrier Within the City. tar .. .45¢ per month Sunday Star s 60c per month 5¢ per month Stay y y Star .. = Sc per cop: Collection'made at'the end of each month. | Orders may be sent in by mail or telephone NAtional 5000. Rate by Mail—Payable in Advance. Maryland and Virginia. 1 yr., $10.00; 1 mo., 85¢c 1 yr. $6.00: 1 mo., 50c 1 yr. $4.00: 1 mo. 40c All Other States and Datly and Sunday..l yr..$12 Daily only . ‘1 yrl $8.00; 1 Sunday only Fri. $500 Member of the Associated Press. The Associated Press is exclusively entitieq to the use for republication of all 1ews dis- atches credited to it or not otherwise cred- ted in this paper and also the lacal rews published herein. All rights of publication of special dispatches herein are also reserved. Canada. 00; —_——— Investigate—What? The Commissioners’ investigation of grand jury charges against the Detec- tive Bureau's conduct of the McPherson case has apparently run up against a stone wall. Policeman Allen declines to testify. Only two of the twenty-three grand jurors invited to appear before the in- vestigating board have appeared. Inspector Shelby and Lieut. Kelly, neither having been formally summoned hefore the investigating board, have re- tained counsel and through counsel have notified the board that they expect to be informed of the charges against them and demand the right, as Amer- fcan citizens, to defend themselves ‘n public against those charges. What is there to investigate? Before attempting a hasty answer to this question, certain facts are to be re- membered. One is that a young man has been indicted by a grand jury for the alleged murder of his wife. But in the eyes of the law he is still presumed to be in- nocent and is Yet to be tried. When ne enters the courtroom his life will be at stake. Twelve jurors, on the basis of evidence presented at the trial, will de- cide whether he is guilty or not guilty. None of this evidence has been pub- licly revealed. When it is revealed the jurors will not only hear it and weigh it against the life of the accused, but the public will hear it and weigh it against the charges that the Detective Bureau erred in reaching and defending its own decision that the death of Mrs. McPherson was & suicide. Is anything to be accomplished in ad- vance of the trial, before all of the rumors and theories and charges and counter charges that have marked this deplorable affair are brought out into the open and, stripped of sensationalism and hysteria, examined under the cold lighit of truth? The grand jury refuses to be investi- gated, thus stopping at the source one | important element in the Commission- ers’ proposed investigation. Allen refuses to be investigated, thus damming another flood of informa- tion that might be received by the in- vestigators. Shelby and Kelly do not refuse to appear before the examining board, but are they not right in asking that charges be placed against them, so that they may defend themselves? And is it right and proper, in ad- | vance of the trial, to seek to retrace all the steps already taken by the grand jury? Suppose the Detective Bureau were found guilty. Would not that in- fluence the jurors who will sit in the McPherson case? Suppose the Detective Bureau were found not guilty. Would that not influence the jury? Postpone this investigation until the trial is held. Wait to examine the evi- dence turned up by the Department of Justice experts—trained men, unbiased, skilled in the work of crime detection. ‘Withhold prejudgment or pretrial of the Detective Bureau until the evidence is at hand and presented in the court- room. If there is evidence then, the Com- missioners themselves may draw it up to support charges against the detec- tives. These charges may then be placed before a proper tribunal. In the meantime Shelby and Kelly are on hand, and will be available when the time comes to judge them. ' —————————— Some of the officials concerned in investigation of the McPherson case are, no doubt, still convinced that a great deal of anxiety and agitation might have been avoided if the fre- quent explanation “suicide” could have been utilized at the outset to quiet the entire matter. = e Now that the Ringling Bros. have assumgd proprietorship of all the big circus Interests, * Ticiency” will possibly prevail and call in a business doctor to amputate the wages of clowns and barc- Back riders. ——————————. Road-Hoggishness. The drive on road-hogging being un- dertaken by the Maryland State Police in connection with the opening of the Laurel racing season might well be emulated in the District as a matter of general traffic control policy. Thirty- £ix persons were arrested and fined near ! Savage yesterday for failing to keep to the right, passing over the line in the middie of the highway and other in- fractions. The road at the point where the majority of arrests occurred has just bLeen widened to forty feet, thereby aggravating the offense of failure to keep as near the right-hand side as possible. Washington has many streets more than forty feet wide, yet the “road-hog- gish” motorist persists in driving, at a slow speed, almost in the center and re- Zuses to give-way for overtaking vehicles. ‘Washington’s trafic has increased to a point that demands police attention to practices of this sort. Time and again slow-moving center-of-the-street drivers retard traffic’ and promote congestion ‘where otherwise it would not exist. It is uhfortunate that “failure to keep to the right” is so often regarded as & trivial offense. Road-hoggishness can be an exceedingly serious matter even when traffic is moving slowly as it does .on city. streets -and the results of an wecident generally are not as far-reaching as those on country roads at high speed. # Motorists behind the road hog are in- went until they had ten, whom they neing our variably irritated by his tactics and are likely to throw caution to the winds in an endeavor to pass him. This results often in scraped fenders and sometimes in collisions. Besides wiolating - & regulation that appears In the traffic code of practically every State and city in the United States, the road hog is simply an incon- siderate, discourteous and potentially dangerous type of motorist. His atti- tude is not to help others, but to help himself. He is oblivious to the fact that he is inconveniencing and menacing others who have just as much right to the highway as he has and who fur- thermore adhere to the rules of driving that promote frictionless movement of traffic. A few arrests and convictions of Washington's flagrant offenders would very probably bring about an im- provement in local conditions. syl The Sale of the Ships. The Fleet Corporation and the Ship- ping Board, which controls it, have been charged by Controller General McCarl with selling ships to irresponsible buy- ers, with selling ships and other material at prices which were only a small per- centage of the cost and with bad busi- ness judgment. It is due to the Fleet Corporation and the Shipping Board that they have opportunity to state their side of the case before attempt is made to judge the matter. That opportunity they will have, fortunately, through an inquiry which President Hoover has set |In motion. He has directed the Attorney | General to make a study of the report of the controller general in all its aspects. An inquiry by the Senate has been requested alsg by Senator Fletcher | of Florida, ranking Democratic member of the Senate commerce committee. The charges that ships have been sold to private interests at exceedingly low prices by the Fleet Corporation and the Shipping Board, which really con- trols the former, are not new. They have been made again and again. The prices for which the ships have been sold are known. There has never been any secret about the matter of prices, ! nor any attempt to conceal these prices. | The Shipping Board, it must be as- | sumed until it is proved otherwise, has | done its level best under very difficult circumstances to dispose of the fleet | which the Government acquired during | the war at the highest prices obtainable, The task with which the bagird was con- fronted following the war and the great slump in shipping thereafter was one of the most difficult of the post-war prob- lems. The policy adopted by Congress was (o foster the development of a privately owned American merchant marin>, adeqr-te to carry much of Americ: overseas commerce. It was obvious that if such a merchant marine was to be | developed, the Government must dis- pose of its great merchant fleet. It could not develop a privately owned merchant marine and at the same time run shipping lines in opposition to the private lines. But that was not all. The shipping business was suffering frors the fact that there was too lit- tle business and too many ships. Further, Americans had deserted the seas. They had been willing before the war to have their commerce carried in ships of other nations. The war de- veloped conclusively the unwisdom of neglecting & merchant marine. But it was necessary to interest Americans in shipping. and above all, to divert Amer- ican capital into the shipping business, ‘With such handicaps to face, the Shipping Board was necessarily forced to djgpose of ships, if it disposed of them at all, at low figures. The con- troller general in his audit and report may have vesy largely the bare fig- ures in mind, and not the reasons which forced the board to sell as it has done. In large measure, the whole matter revolves around a question of business judgment. Either the Ship- ping Board had to keep the ships and operate them, possibly at a loss to the Government, or it had to sell them at a loss to the Government. The direction of Congress was to build up a privately owned merchant marine, if possible. That was also the attitude of the Coolidge administration. The McCarl report, however, charges that the Shipping Board and Fleet Corporation sold to irresponsible con- cerns, and that the Government has sustained losses because the accounts have been bad. It also makes the charge that favoritism was shown in at least one instance as between bid- ders. Doubtless these matters will be given consideration in the “inquiry which has been started by the Presi- dent, and also by the Senate, if it makes an investigation. The Shipping Board, acting in ac- cord with the legislation enacted by Congress, has at all times done its best to aid in the development of an American merchant marine. For that it is to be congratulated. Further, it has been successful to an extent which was not believed possible in some quar- ters. The shipping “game” is a hard game at best, with the keenest com- petition. It would bz a distinct mis- fortune if anything prevents American shipping from going forward. —————— ‘The United States Senate has under- taken to give advice on many matters. Any expert suggestions it may have to offer about the District of Columbia Police Department will undoubtedly be heard with respectful interest. e The Remedy for Prison Revolts. Colorado State officials, aided by rep- resentatives of the Federal Department of Justice, are now beginning an in- vestigation into the revolt of prisoners at the State penitentiary at Canon City, which resulted in eleven deaths and destruction of property estimated at half a million dollars. The first point of inquiry is to determine why, by whom and where the outbreak of the prisoners started. It is believed that the prisoners who began the rioting are now dead, victims of their own guns or those of guards, or possibly shot by one of their own number in the last stand. It may therefore be that there will be no pun- ishments, although probably a number of the convicts who actually participated in the fighting after it was begun have survived the melee. It is now stated that the break started Thursday noon in the prison mess hall whesgone of the convicts, James Pardue, seized a guard’s gun and shot him dead. Then he and four others, ringleaders, seized several unarmed guards in the hall and began & march through the prison, pickingsp other guards as they v % THE SUNDAY" STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, OCTOBER 6, 1929—PART 2. held as hostages. - Some of these were later killed when their demand for com- plete freedom was denfed. § ¢ “LIFE’S S The point of particular interest is fhat | | at the outbreak of the revolt the prison- ers had no weapons. In some of the cases of prison insurrection, notably those that occurred during the past Summer, weapons were smuggled in fo the inmates in preparation for their break. In one case a machine gupn found its way into the hands of a prisoner. At Canon City it would seem that the convicts watched their chance to get & gun and took it, at the cost of the life of a guard. ‘Later they raided the prison arsenal and armed theéms! selves, 1 ‘The seizure of that one gun cost’ twelve lives and half a million dollars’ Isuch a thing may happen in any prison where armed guards are in close com- munion with the inmates at times of large assemblage. The question arisec whether there was only one armed guard in the mess hall. Had there been others prepared and quick-witted enough to fire when the first selzure was made the revolt would have been nipped at the first stage, with & mini- mum loss of life and probably no destruction of property. This desperate affair at Canon City will probably eon full investigation demonstrate the necessity of the utmost rigor of discipline in handling prisoners. The inmates of the penitentiary, most of whom are gunmen with small regard for human life, are potential murderers, with few exceptions. In every penal in- stitution are men who are utter despera- does, willing to stake their own lives in a break for liberty on the slender chances of escape. No matter what the prison rules or the practices of adminis- tration may be, they are always ready to attempt a dash for liberty. The pity of it all is that these men will put all their fellow inmates in jeopardy. At Camon City the ringleaders fired the cell buitd- ings and hundreds of the prisoners might have been burned to death, would have been, in fact, had the outbreak oc- curred at any other hour than that of the midday meal. Doubtless recommendations will be made by both the State and the Federal officials looking to the raising of safe- guards against a recurrence of such a happening. There will be no security in any institution unless the fact is recognized that every inmate is & pos- sible murderous rebel against the law and sgainst his confinement. e Humane systems are advocated for the management of prisons. Moral suasion js valuable up to certain limits. It cannot prevent outburst of the mob spirit, which is & latent terror in every corner of civilization. ———r e One of the younger German states- men, Stresemann was old in experience and fitted to be a companion in thought and action, even with the veteran Hin- denburg. | ———— President Hoover and Premier Mac- Donald will go fishing together, As i lute candor, there will, of «course, be none of the traditional fish stories. R e It becomes evident that Ramsay Mac- Donald will be as popular as the Prince of Wales, and in some respects equally influential. R e Success is assured to the MacDonald visit if the confident expectation is ful- filled that the diplomatic program will | prove as suceessful as the menu card. b = A successful lobbyist is one who man- ages to be influential without flauntin his prowess in high-power salesmanship. o SHOOTING STARS. BY PHILANDER JOHNSON. Cordiality. We've splendid decorations. Perhaps you've noticed that Each doorway 'mongst the nations Has “Welcome” on the mat. From combat we are shrinking; For Peace we're standing pat— ‘When no one will be thinking Of “going to the mat.” Keys of the City. “Did you give our distinguished visitor the keys of the ecity?” “In a polite, metaphorical way,” answered Senator Sorghum. “But judg- ing from the ease with which robberies are committed, I should say that most of the keys of the city are in the hands of the underworld.” Jud Tunkins says a successful poli- tician starts by being a good talker and winds up by being a great magazine writer. Veiled Antipathy. My laundryman to me has shown " A scanty share of deference— He held aloof, till I made known My banker for a reference. My laundryman has long pursued A Chinese plan pictorial. His ticket, maybe, might be viewed As Mughhouse editorial. “Come Fly With Me.” “Did he ask you to fly with him?” “Yes,” answered Miss Cayenne. “But he may have been only suggesting & pleasure trip. He is an aviator.” “It is the privilege of youth,” Hi Ho, the sage of Chinatown, on making the same mistakes that ancestors have made for centuries.” The Final Ostentation. If I win riches by and by, Tll have to be content To show unto some curious eye A graveyard monument. “If every man that talks polities,” said Uncle Eben, “had to know all he was talkin® about, dar would be a heap. more silence.” — e tima: Modern Melodrama. Prom the Waterbury Republican. The incident of & New York Central conductor being reached by radio just in time to permit him to save the -old homestead by paying off the mortgage opens up & new field for melodrama brought up to date. 3 Checks and Costs. Prom the Haverhill Evening Gazette. budget. BY THE RIGHT R i Bishop of ) 3 ‘Text—"I, the Lord thy God, will hold thy right hand, s"ying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee.”—Isatah XI1.13, In the background of every life there is the consciousness, quite undefined, that, there is a power not of themselves | that guides and .directs the destinies of life. It may be a very simple, unformed mg childlike faith; it may never take. ‘the form of an expressed conviction; it ‘may have no relation to creed or dogma or-organization, yet it persists in spite of our frailties and weaknesses, our apostasy and cold, indifference. ~This conception runs the gamut of life the ;:l‘ld over. Darwin found it in his tagonian savage, and in one form or | snother it discloses icself in the most | advanced and civilized races. One some- times wonders what life would be with- out this deep-seated feeling of assur- ance. In childhood we repeat the sim- ple prayer taught us by our mothers: “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep; If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.” It was such a prayer that Rudyard Kipling murmured as he emerged from & deep coma after a grave iliness. A finer emphasis upon this recognized se- curity is found in the great prayer, &lven to men by Christ himself, which commonly called “the Lord's prayer.” He sought to emphasize the idea of a Father who unfailingly cares for the concerns of his children. It is a prayer of sublime trust and confidence, as well 8s of complete submission to the will of the great Father. Repeatedly, in the course of a long and intimate relation with men in grave crises in their lives, I have heard from lips- that rarely prayed earnest and importunate appeals to God for succor and support. When the shadows fell and the night of fail- ure and disappointment was at hand there came the inevitable cry: “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou alone hast the words of eternal life.” ‘Whether we put it in the form of a creed or disclose it in fixed habits of devotion, nothing is more comforting and consoling or reassuring than an un- failing trust in Him who, through the prophet of old, said, “I the Lord thy God, will hold thy right hand, saying | unto thee, ‘Fear not; I will help thee.’” ‘There is certainly something within us that clamorously cries out for divine ECURITY” EV. JAMES E. FREEMAN, D. D,, LL. D.,. W ashington guidance and directi #nd support. ‘The great World WaP gave freshened expression to this dependence and trust of which we speak. I have been with the boys in the training camps when the hour came for embarkation; I have seen loving and solicitous tathers and mothers bidding a long good-by to those who were nearest and dearest to them I have witnessed scenes that were dra- matic and touching in the extreme, but I do not recall a single instance where there was withheld from the de- parting son the word of, hope and assur- ance that God would be with him and keep him in all his strange and perilous ways. All the boastfulness that grows out of self-confidence disappears on such oc- ‘culuns. We may be very practical and hard-heagled and unemotional when the | sun 1s at meridian and “life flows along like a stream”; in the hour of our suc- betray to those about us a capacity to take care of ourselves, but the strong- est and most self-confident bend before the winds of adversity and become as children again in their outreach for divine support and comfort. Owen Wister was certainly right when he said, “You cannot pay too high a price for the finding and keeping of your own soul” It was his unfailing conviction that the greatest of consola- tions in life come from the recognition of the fact that there is something more to Iife than material possessions, something more to strive for than suc- cess and emoluments and .the praise of men. In our modern day we too fre- quently hear it said that Christianity and the Christian Church have broken down and that men no longer are re- | sponsive to their appeal. As a matter { of fact, in those places where opposition |is sternest to all that Chrisiianity and th> church stands for, its influence grows and its adherents increase. The demand for God is one of the uncon- querable passions of the human heart, |and the old revolutionist in France was | right when he said to his colleagues, “If we take away the God of the people '(odly they will invent a new god to- morrow.” Upon our coins we grave the words, “In God we trust,” and in our legal | documents the recognition of God's sov- ereignty is clearly written. We may grow careless and unresponsive to those refining influences that proceed from | organized religion. We cannot, if we would, divorce ourselves from secret | belief that God is identified in a vital oy with the deep concerns of human e. Sir Esme Howard and Minister Massey| Have Facilitated Mr. MacDonald’s Visit BY WILLIAM HARD. Among the indirect and undesigned preparations here for the present visit of Prime Minister MacDonald, 2 high place must be accorded to the charac- ters and careers of the British Ambas- sador, Sir Esme Howard. and the Ca- | nadian Minister, Mr. Vincent Massey. They have been here now for some time and their personalities, as revealed in the course of the hospitalities which they companionably offer and compan- ionably accept, have done much to re- move from the minds of the American officials a certain traditional expecta- :.nm of British diplomatic “sharp prac- ice.” It is wholly impossible to suspect either Sir Esme Howard or Mr. Massey this occasion is to be marked by abso- | of “sharp practice” or of anything ukln! to it. Nature made them straightfor- ward, and observation of the world has taught them the practical value of their natural bent. They are too sophis- ticated, too afrived, to fall into the use of that tricky dealing which is cheap be- ;l:llsue childish and foolish because ul Nokok k ‘The diplomacy of Sir Esme and Mr. Massey has had not a trace4n it of that doubleness and deviousness which in the best motion pictures is supposed to characterize the best diplomat. The; have been simple, frank, open, direct and, in a word, honest, although on sec- ond thoughts perhaps one duplicity i could be charged against them. In trying circumstances they have outwardly com- pletely kept their tempers and, no mat- ter what their feelings might be, have never betrayed any irritation whatso- ever against this country's institutions or methods. Since that duplicity, if it be such, has been of advantage to all concerned, it can reasonably be forgiven to them. They have been highly instrumental in giving to the relations between the United States and Great Britain and be- tween the United States and Canada a degree of tranquillity which the imper- sonal circumstances of the case did not always in themselves contain and con- vey. They are complete refutations, both of them, of the theory that in these days of transoceanic cables and of wireless communications there is no further need, in an important way, of personal diplomatic representatives. No cablegrams, no wireless messages, could ever have given to this Capital City the impressions of fidelity, of loyalty, of re- liability, that have been sunk deep into it by the personalities of Sir Esme and of Mr. Vincent Massey. ko Each of them, as it happens, has an- cestral links of personal interest in the United States. Mr. Massey's father’s fam- ily passed into Canada from the British Isles through the United States, in which for some time it resided. His mother’s family likewise came from tne British Isles to the United States, but remained here. It has been a dis- tinguished family among us, producing the Bishop Vincent of the Methodist Church who founded our Chautauqua movement, and the Dr. George E. Vin- cent who has been the influential presi- dent of the Rockefeller Foundation. Mr. Massey’s mother was Anna Vincent. From her ‘surname Mr. Massey derived his given name. Through her, as well as through her father’s family, he is al- most as much Anferican as Canadian or British. In fact, Mr. Massey, psychologically, is an extremely curious study. He somehow very American, very Canadian and very British all together. He is in- tensely, nationalistically Canadian, with a vivid belief in Canadianism as a dis- tinct entity in the world .of interna- tional affairs. He is, at the same time, a graduate of Balliol College, Oxford, England, and the husband of an Eng- lishwoman and a vigorous champion of the validity and desirability of the “im- perial” connection between the various distinct parts of the British common- wealth of nations. He, finally, is so in- termingled with the past and present affairs of the United States that Amer- icanism could almost be said to be his “third nature.” He is an odd case of a man with & most unusually complicated “multiple personality” in the field of international relationships, and only his extraordinary candid capacity for just ! and exact dealing in all directions could keep him in one bodily plece. He has been a successful business man as well as a scholar, and he is fully able to indulge himself in the . beautiful pictures and in the interesting musical performances which add to the | attractiveness of the very spacious es- tablishment which he maintains. His greatest charm, though, is the wholly inexpensive one of the book in which he has copled out large numbers of poems that have pleased him. * ok kK Sir Esme Howard's assoclations with this’ country go back; in the memory of his family in England, to stranee incie dents occurring at. the time of our Revolutionary War. Sir Esme was born on an estate in the north of England which, at ‘the time of that war, was the property of the head of the Howard family, the Duke of Norfolk. Sir Esme opened his young eyes on that’ estate to two farms bearing American names. One was called “Bunker Hill.” other, after a distinguished American Revolutionary -hero, was called “Put- nam.” Also, and even more astonish- The | prior figures, | ingly, there was a stretch of woods on | that estate called “Jefferson.” All these | names had been bestowed upon the ob- Jects bearing them by the Duke of Nor- folk, who owned the property in George | Washington's days. The duke was a willful man who was for George Washington and against George III in the little personal dispute then in progress between them. George 111 proceeded, at one time, to take away from the duke all of the detachable | honors that he had ever granted him. | The duke was unperturbed. He contin- |ued to assert that Washington was right and that the King was wrong, and | he covered his estate in the north of | England with names intended to per- | petuate his convictions. It was not likely that a boy growing up in such surroundings and with such precedents behind him in his family his- | tory could regard Americans as entirely | ‘rebels” or entirely “foreigners.” Esme did not. He has served Britain as diplomat in Italy, in Germany, in | Crete, in Austria, in Hungary, in Swit- zerland, in Sweden. Bearing one of | Britain’s most _distinguished names, he | also served her as a private soldier in the Imperial Yeomanry throughout the |Boer War. He had in his bearing a | great dignity and a great familiarness which seem” both separated and com- bined. He is extremely devout and has a gentleness and sweetpess never quite so completely reached except through | religion. In him the lion and the lamb, | the soldier and humanist seem easily to | co-exist. He has his moments, how- ever, of human earthly pride. They do not come from any feat of diplomacy. They come, wholly disarmingly, when he is able to claim and prove that he | has written another limerick! | Without these two men—Sir Esme and Vincent Massey—Mr. MacDonald's | visit here would not be wafted along on_such smooth wings. _ 2 | (Copyright, 1829.) | ————— Farm Mortgages Increase, But at Retarded Rate BY HARDEN COLFAX. Board were (aclng.the Senate commit- tee on agriculture and forestry in a hearing looking to a report on their nominations to office, the Department of Agriculture last week maqe public estimates indicating that the mortgage debt on farms of the Nation is in- creasing, but at a retarded rate. It has been usual for the department to estimate farm mortgages each five years following the agricultural census. The current report attempts to show the situation as of January 1, 1928, and is based on replies to questionnaires re- ceived from more than 22,000 farm owners and from bankers and country officials, the data thus obtained being applied to figures of the agricultural census of 1925 and tested against the census of 1920 also. The estimate of farm mortgage debt in 1920 was $7,857,700,000. In the lean agricultural years from then until 1925 it leaped forward to $9.360.620,000. The estimate issued last week places the to- tal at the outset of 1928 as $9,468,- 526,000. * K Kk ok mates show an increase in farm mort- gages of $1,502,920,000 between 1920 and 1925 and one of $107,906,000 from 1925 to 1928, or an increase of $1,610,- 826,000 between 1920 and 1928. An op- timistic view may be had by noting that the annual increase in the five-year pe. riod, 1920-25, was an average of $300, 585,000, whereas in the three-year pe- riod, 1925-28, this had slowed down to $35.968,000. In the eight years from 1920 to 1928 the average increase was $201,353,000 annually. Thus, while the mortg: debt continues to climb, the rate of progression is being retarded strongly. A darker aspect, however, may be obtained by analyzing these mortgage estimates, together with estimates of the value of farm lands and buildings. Value estimates were $66,316,000,000 in 1920, $49,467,000,000 in 1925 and $45.- 582,000,000 in 1928. In other ‘words, mortgage debt has increased, while the value of the assets on which the mort- | gages are based has decreased. In 1920 the proportion of mortgage debt to value was somewhat less zfun 12 per In the distressing farm period |from then until 1925, with debt in- i creasing and value decreasing, the pro- | portion leaped to 19 per cent. The 1928 | proportion is above 20 per cent; but | here again the figures emphasize re- tarding growth in the percentage. This latest mortgage debt_estimate indicates spotted conditions. The Mid- dle Atlantic and the Mountain States, to consider groups, show decreases in farm mortgages under both 1925 and 1920. The New England States and the West- North -Central States, as groups, had aggregate mortgages on farms in 1928 higher than in 1920, but lower than in 1925. * kW Exactly half the States, according to the analysis of this latest estimate and e eatevans Daing Ighes crease arm m ges, g ler in 1925 than in 1920 and higher m”l than in 1925. They are Connecticut, | cent. i |18 5 cess and power and affluence we may | gation of alleged offenses against the | ‘While members of the Federal Farm | New York, himself a physician, called Analyzing these statistics, the esti- | pog Capital Sidelights BY WILL P. KENNEDY. John Edgar Hoover, who represents the United States Department of Jus- tice in making a new investigation of the mystericus McPherson case, which the local Police Department -called “suicide” and the Federal grand jury has called “murder,” is one of those effi- cient officials in the Government service whose advantement proves that' “you * don’t need ‘pull’ in Washington.” His job in the Department of Justice cial assistant to the Attorney Gen- eral and direttor of the Bureau of In- vestigation, William J. Burns’ old job. ‘This man Hoover 16 years ago was & messenger. in. the Library of Congress, and after e had studied law nights he entered the De) ment_of Justice 12 years ago as junior file clerk at a salary of $990. He now receives $7,500, having climbed up to the head of bureau that has an annual appropria- tion of something like $2,000,000 and a personnel of 600. He has general charge of the investi- aws of the United States, except coun- | terfeiting and prohibition. He directs also the work of the special agents em- ployed in detecting crimes and colloct- ing evidence for use in proposed or | pending suits or prosecutions. * ® ok X ‘The 200 survivors of the 3d United States Volunteer Engineers who served in the war with Spain under Col. David DuBose Gaillard, who bullt the Gaillard Cut of the Panama Qanal, are receiving an interesting souven?®. Luther Ely Smith of St. Louis, who served as lieutenant under Col. Gaillard, conceived the idea of sending the year- books of the survivors' organization to James A. Hess, one of the survivors, ' who worked with Gaillard on the canal | cut and who is now at Pedro Miguel, | Canal Zone, working for the United | States Government on locks operation, who has mailed them to the survivors, bearing a stamp carrying the portrait | of Col. Gaillard and postmarked from | the scene of his great engineering achievement. Mr. Hess is & brother of George W. Hess, director of the United States Bo- tanic Garden, and is now a visitor in the National Capital. Ameng the noted survivors of that famous engineer outfit is Maj. Gen. Edgar Jadwin, who re- cently retired as chief of engineers, United States Army, and who was also commissioner of the United States Sol- diers’ Home, a member of the Federal Oil Conservation Commission and a member of the National Capital Park and Planning Commission, which has developed the most stupendous plan ever attempted for embellishment of any capital city. He was lieutenant colonel of the engineer company under | Col. Gaillard during the war with Spain. Another s Col. C. W. Sturtevant, who was _appointed by former President Coolidge as a member of the Mississippi River Control Board. ‘The survivors have erected a memo- rial tablet to Gaillard at the Gaillard Cut, and at the ceremony of unveiling | the tablet Mr. Hess spoke for the old | engineer regiment. * % % % Frank H. Punk, who nearly twoscore years ago was famous throughout the country as & member of the Yale foot ball team, who is best known through- out the agricultural section as the originator of Funk's famous seed corn, and who some few years ago held the purse strings for the National Capital as chairman of the subcommittee that drafted the appropriation bill for the District of Columbia, is trying to stage a comeback. Mr. Funk has announced himself as a candidate for congeu “at large” from Illinois, that State having two seats in the National House in addition to those | from the 15 ocongressional districts. Mrs. Medill McCormick, who now occu- { ples one of these “at large” seats, has announced herself as a candidate for the Senate. The other “at large” seat is occupled by former Gov. Richard Yates, who claims that while he was a boy Lincoln patted his head. Mr. Funk’s father was in Congress in the years 1893-95. He has had a long and varled career in public life—na- tional, State and local—and served in_the House from 1921 to 1927. He’is the grandson of Isaac Funk, who settled in Funks Grove in 1824, lns family having been among the earliest settlers in Illinols and prominent in farming, live stock, banking and politics for more than a century. Mr. Funk owns and operates a famous 2.200-acre farm, 312 miles long and a mile wide, which he runs on scientific lines. One of his special hobbies is the Ben- jamin Funk School, named for his father, which is located on his farm on land donated by him, the plant includ- ing playgrounds and agricultural experi- mental plots. This school has 6 teach- ers, 125 pupils, 3 inclosed busses for transporting the children, cottages for principal and janitor, a large audito- rium and a three-year high school course. This rural school, which is 5 miles from the nearest town, now serves as a model for other districts. * kK “Lest we forget.” On_Thursday Senator Copeland of attention of Congress to the fact that it | was the seventy-fifth anniversary of the birth of Gen. Willlam C. Gorgas, “whose :’nolnutry of science was an international on.” He went to Cuba during the Spanish War to combat yellow fever, and left the island in 1902, practically free of that disease. ‘Through a systematic campaign against the mosquito he virtually drove | js malaria and yellow fever from the Isth- mus of Panama, thus contributing largely to the completion of that dream of centuries—the Panama Can: It was Gorgas who took the Walter Reed theory of the transmission of yellow fever and gave it practical appli- cation, and a new world of productivity was made available to the human race. In 1914 Gen. Gorgas became Surgeon General of the Army, and during the World War he organized a system of strict physical examination of all mili- tary applicants. Under his supervision more than 7,000,000 young men were examined, of whom 4,500,000 were in- ducted into the service. Never before was a physically finer army put into the flc‘l;:ly ogxbtlrt&l,e. L‘r‘nd lne‘\lfler before was a DS ke thsiconl cundltlon.p S orgas memorial laboratory has been established in Panama, in yWhicl’l & concentrated and constructive effort to outlaw disease is being made. It symbolizes the new spirit of interna- tional co-operation in the attack ‘upon |e | the universal e thent nemy of mankind—dis- ©Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, - consin, Minnesota, Maryhndf"lfimvxfi. West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, "Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, Kanasa: Lot oy L asioot AT 3 na, lahoma, Texas, Oregon and California. Er Seven States, however, may boast of lower farm mortgage totals in 1928 than in either 1930, or 1925—Massachu- setts, New York, Pennsylvania, Mon- tana, ldaho, Colorado and Arizona. New York and Idaho recorded increases between 1920 and 1925, but cut off sufficient in the following three years to more than overcome the increases in those flve years, while the other five States recorded a progressive decrease since 1920. There are five more States which in 1928 still showed farm mortgage totals under those of 1920, but in which the 1928 aggregate was greater than that in 1925—New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, North Dakota and Dela- ware. ‘Twelve other States have begun to reduce their farm debt totals, accord- ing to this latest estimate, the figures being higher in 1928 than in 1920, but lower in 1925. Thor are Maine, New Jersey, Iowa, Missouri, South Dakota, Nebraska, - Kansas, Wyoming, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada and Wi n. Research experts of the Bureau of Agricultural Economics plan to compile and issue annual reports on the mort- situation hereafter, and it may be men ‘economists *will for thought in the fig- (Copyright, 1929.) » expected find much ures. Replanning Cities to Splve, Traffic ' BY FREDERIC ]. HASKIN. A fresh grapple with the problem of traffic congestion in cities and on the highways is to be attempted as the re- sult of the appointment of a special committee by Secretary of Commerce Pobert P. Lamont. The ccmmittee, which will hold its first meeting here on October 10, plans to take up every aspect of the traffic problem and, if pos- sible, submit a perfected code which, it is hoped, will be useful in standardizing traffic regulations in American cities and highway rules throughout the States. handicap. No one can walk down the street of a city of even moderate size in this ountry ithout becoming acutely | aware of the existence of a grave traffic | problem. The advent of the automobile | in such appalling numbers has lent a new aspect to urban life; even on cou try roads the hastening .motor ci present problems. In this connection it is interesting to note that European city planners and architects as well as traffic experts have devoted perhaps more study to the problem than Americans, despite the fact that, as yet, no European city has as many automobiles as any American city of cquivalent size. Out of these studies has grown the conviction thll‘ Lack of uniformity now is a| the traffic problem in cities never can be completely solved by formulating model codes, no matter how clever in | essence or how faithfully enforced. | Cities themselves must be reconstituted | before congestion may be brought under | control. ! ‘Two important criteria for what | should be done have been accepted by some of the foremost world experts: one | taken from America, the other from Europe. Great cities, it gradually is being conceded, must adopt the Ameri- can idea of building skyscrapers both for business and residential purposes. On the other hand, the European idea of straightening and widening streets | and clearing out whole areas must be | generally adopted. It is recognized that the world is be- | coming urbanized to an astounding de- gree and that there is not the slightest indication that there will be any abate- ment in the trend of population toward cities. Further, motor cars are pouring from the factories faster each year and the pegple are finding the purchasing power to put them into use. In these circumstances it seems in- | evitable that there must be a complete remaking of our present cities and that future ones must be designed along | wholly new lines. | Washington's Traffie Problem, Washington, of all American cities, long has been regarded as the be planned. its site. No old streets had to be ab- sorbed into the plan. A city was cut; out of whole cloth, as the saying runs, without amything to hinder rfect street development. One of the mdmg engineers of his time, Maj. I'Enfant, was_appointed by Gen. Washington to do the work. That the plan of Washington was as | excellent as a city plan could be for the | time at which it was drawn is conceded; | that it is & poor plan under modern conditions is equally obvious. In the original plan the City of Washington was dotted with circles for a military reason. Maj. I'Enfant knew of the street fighting in the French Revolution, the days of the barricades. Therefore, | he planned these Washington circles with streets and ‘avenues converging u) them so that a Government, by planting artillery in the circles, could command, lengthwise, several streets at | st Open country was selected for | once and keep them clear of. mobs, The circles, therefore, were expressly de- signed to impede the movement of bodies of rioting men, of ‘mobs. How perfect the theory was has been re- vealed by the fact that the circles now effectually impede the movement of au- tomobile tr: ‘They have pecome & nuisance, constituting the chief single traffic problem of the National Capital. This is an example of how modern traf- fic conditions call not alone for better rftl'uhtlonl, but for the redesigning of cities. * Under Napoleon III Baron Hauss- man redesigned many of the streets and avenues of Paris. the principal idea of the remaking being the clea: ing away of obstacles and straighten- ing and widening of thoroughfares. Although at that time the automobiie | had not appeared to congest traffic, Baron Haussman's work has greaty simplified modern traffic problems in those parts of Paris where it was done. New Kinds of Skyscrapers. Since the World War the City of London has spent milliors of pounds in clearing away obstacles and in widening streets. It is a difficult task, sometimes, for authorities to achieve their pus in such reforms. For a long e a statue of Eros stood in Piccadilly Circus, in the West End of London. It was removed during the improvement of the Circus. Such a storm of sentimental protest arose that, although it is frankly conceded that the statue is very much an im- pediment to traffic, it had to be ordered back. Such phases must be passed through in all such replanning, but that the obstacles must go seems in- evitable. Concerning the type of bufldings which cities must adopt there is at least theoretical agreement that the skyscraper is a necessity. London has very strict regulations Kkeeping the height of bulldings low. This, it is claimed, must give way to the Ameri- can plan, But improvements are suggested on the American plan. Construction should be regulated so* that the huger buildings should be spotted about rather than grouped in any single 1liutrt.fl'. Some New York office buildings have 120,000 people going in and out of them daily. Where they are placed too closely together the congestion becomes acute, An interesting suggestion along this line is that office bu‘ldings, and other great city structures as well, should be built on stilts. Assume building occupying a city square. On each cor- ner would rise a structure which in reality would be but a leg of the whole building. The entire first story would be left open—a whole city biock for movement of traffic or_ carefully reg- ulated parking space. From the four corner legs bridgework would cross, having the effect of roofing in tne entire square. Then the bulk of tne main building would rise over the whole. Given a large number of down- town buildings constructed according to this plan, substantial acreages of entirely clear space would be availabie on the surface for the handling ot traffic. In general, the new planning must contemplate the widening of principal arteries. For large cities ex- perts declare that there should be 18 lines of trafic at least, 9 in each direction. A reform to which traffic congestion may bring the automobile industry 1is a drastic reduction in the size of automobiles. Cars over a certain size would be prohibited in congested sec- tions. French and English automo- biles are, in general, much smaller than American cars. For example, 1,000 French cars of the Citroen make or English cars of the Austin make could occupy the same space on the streets which now afford room for only 500 Lincolns or Packards or other large cars. Then, too, trucks would be per- mitted in congested sections only dur- ing certain hours. Fifty Years Ago In The Star | In the revival of business which fol- lowed the serious financial depression Lively Stock Speculation. 2= CoR and, 50 years ago, a rapid increase in specula- tion in stocks. The New York stock market was, in fact, so active that some concern was felt, as attested by the fol- lowing in The Star of October 1, 1879: “The growth of the speculative move- ment in stocks and certain classes of early seventies of the bonds has been so extraordinary that! thoughtful observers begin to look upon it with some uneasiness. The events of the year have all helped the situation and now at the beginning of the tenth month the craze is so fully developed that all sorts of stocks, those which are: unknown and those known to be worth- less are bought without hesitation. Specie resumption; the refunding of 5 and 6 per cent bonds into 4 per cents; the large crops in this country and de- ficlent harvests throughout Europe are among the favorable events which have fostered the speculative craze. The vast demand upon this country for food supply has had a marked effect in keep- ing up the ulative boom; though the speculative frenzy has reason for its ex- tence and though there is nothing apparent at this moment to warrant the opinion of its early abatement, it is well, in the belief of New York financial authorities, for purchasers who pay for what they buy not to count upon the present flood tide holding many years.” * * * The following letter printed in The Star of October 2, 1879, shows that the a waste water, which recently Water has been the subject of Waste. discussion in the District, was a half century ago a matter of concern to consumers: “It appears from Col. Casey’s report for the past year that on the 24th of June the quantity of water passing into the mains from the reservoir was increasing. This report gives the dis- charge for each 3 hours of the 24, be- ginning at 6 a.m. The figures are about 3,322,000 to 3,486,000 gallons in each 3 hours except after midnight. From midnight to 3 a.m. the quantity passing into the pipes was 2,624,928 gallons. From 3 a.m. to 6 a.m. it was 3,175,249 gallons. Probably the least consump-. tion was in the hours between 1 a.m. and 4 am. At that time most people are asleep and there is the least actual use of water. But if we take this least use, as shown by Col. Casey's interest- ing’ experiment, at 875,000 gallons per hour we find that at a time when no man in the whole city needed water the B incharsiag In-tovs, 875,000 ghlons and discl 4 wn 875, allo) m oz)mur,uwhuh w;n th_e‘_ ;lfie hg{g '.:,1.- ,000 jons per day. e i e~ livery, fi‘;e and waste on that 24th of June was 25,947,642 gallons. “At the time of most active domucfi of 1,162,000 gallo: rate of 27,888,000 gallons. this the rate of discharge is usefully using water, 21,000,000 gallons per “day, and we find the o&roblb\e use- ful consumption to be 7,000,000 gallons per day, 58 gallons a head for each of the 120,000 people. “Where does the 20,000,000 gallons a day thus apparently wasted so far as relates to human use go to? Does it not escape through some open leak or un- closed stopcock into the river? It would examine the sewcrs and actual useful consumption of the water, something of the wanton and unneces- sary waste, and something of the, exist- last century there was | . 'This and That By Charles E. Tracewell. ‘The amiable and enthusiastic Capt. Boggs, balf-year-old kitten, threw him- in this country in the | self at the back of our favorite chair one of his periodical outbursts, which are becoming more and more frequent as he grows up. Boggs is growing in so many ways at once that he is becoming something of a nuisance. - His alley ancestry crops out at every paw. When he casts his long-tailed person at a chair it means that the bottom of it will come off shortly. What Boggs claws, he claws. There is no half-way with Capt. Boggs. Swinging beneath the cushions, scooting along on his back, he imbeds these ag- gregations of sharpest claws deep into soft material. Rip! Rip! Rip! takes a felinely flendish de- light in all this work. Pure play. he calls it. but his play is worse than some cats’ denmc‘ue:h * - We fear that it is his alley ancestry which is to blame. Just where, in his long line, he got his desire to purr vig- orously, and to gain the approbation of human beings, we do not know, but there is no questioning who is respon- sible for that large frame, that hefty chest, those long legs, those big paws. Boggs' father goes down the alley every morning, just as the first touches of dawn tinge the . A black and white fellow, too, his distinguishing mark is a black cap which/fits down over his eyes. His son’s cap does not come down so far, and leaves plenty of room for a white blaze, in which the single black spot on the end of his nose shines like a diamond in the sky. The sire of Boggs treads the alley on soft l’“" ever alert to movements high and o His greatest fear is mankind. Human beings mean uplifted brooms, hard kicks, threatening hands and in- imical voices. Now and again he touches noses with his son, looks at him proudly, and goes his way. “The true breed, the e breed,” he purrs, in one of his rare moments of satisfaction. He does not drive his son away, as he does other cats. * ok Xk X s A true house cat since birth, Capt. Boggs nevertheless longs for the free- dom of the alley, where sharpness of claw, quickness of movement, bulge of chest, mean something. = In the house these sterling qualitles are only a nuisance. They cause him to leap onto the kitchen range, barely escaping a good ulnulng..l They impel him to jump grandly, chair to mantel, l: the risk of tearing down pictures and vases. In the plenitude of his strength Capt. finds time to annoy Jack gg:a.. stri) ld h'oc:L The uAthuk merel leral Boggs. first the latter tried to induce Jack to play with him, but as he has grown lary day by day he seems to have deter- mined to force Spratt to notice him. He secures this notice I:ly mkaanl plunge at the older cat and attempting to bite his white neck. We are con- vinced that does this with the s, but Jack Spratt does So far he has contented himself with hissing vigorously; the time will come, however, and shortly, when he will have to adopt more strenuous measures, for Capt Boggs is growing in pep, power end impudence every day. The mark of the alley cat shines through his civilized manners. In his little black eyes, round and peering, lie ph:tg dlfi.mi e ud)mehow senses H!; and action afar, and means to reacl them in good time. Let his father beware, for a new mas- ter is at hand, a civilized -uz‘.mn- m':.'n‘;d b:::.hv‘o:uhm,mmky to mea Tea and tear, ready to fight, to yowl, o if need be. . Boggs of the: Marines is on his wasl ence of undiscovered leaks.”