Evening Star Newspaper, September 14, 1936, Page 11

* flood - control 35,000Landon Victory Seen in Vermont Anti-New Dealism and Admiration for New *Coolidge,” Factors. Today's dispatch deals with Ver- mont, the fourteenth out of the 40 States being visited by David Lawrence in his nationwide survey of the trends of political sentiment. BY DAVID LAWRENCE. ONTPELIER, Vt, September 14.—While the eyes of most New Eanglanders are turned as a matter of academic in- terest at the Maine election today, the so-called rock-ribbed State of Vermont remains as staunchly Re- publican as it was four years ago when, notwithstanding the landslide for Mr. Roosevelt, the Green Moun- tain voters gave Mr. Hoover a 22,000 majority. I was particularly interested here to inquire not so much about the electoral vote, for that seems as- sured, but the tide of {he voting. Dees Gov. Lan- don seem stronger than Mr. Hoover was four years ago? This was the question I asked well-in- formed persons. The concensus seemed to be not only here, but in other parts of the Btate visited, that Gov. Landon is strong enough to increase the Hoover majority of 1932 from 22,000 to about 35000 as a minimum, and that it might go much higher. In the heyday of Republican tides, the 1928 election, Hoover carried the State by about 46,000, so it may be Jjudged how strongly a 35,000 victory for Gov. Landon would indicate a return of those Republicans who strayed in 1932, Dislike New Deal. Reasons for the rise of the Repub- lican tide have more to do with djssatisfaction over New Deal policies than with Gov. Landon's pronounce- ments though, to be sure, Vermont, which was the native State of Calvin Canlidge. is bound to admire the @aui yuauues in Landon — the “Kansas Coolidge”—as were exhibited by the man who with similar lack of drama or emotional effort presided over the destinies of the United States from 1923 to 1928—admittedly the most prosperous era in American history. There is in Landon’s appeal to New England as exemplifi 1 by his speech at Portland, Me., Saturday night, something of the same simplicity which characterized Coolidge's public addresses. It is best classified as quiet dignity—a lack of dependenge on oratorial or elocutionary effects, but & reliance on common sense and fundamental Americanism. Mr. Coolidge would have been a poor radio speaker had the radio been in such widespread use when he was a candidate for the presidency in 1924 as it is today. Mr. Coolidge, more- over, would have declined to try to change his personality to fit the cam- paign. Style Wins New England. So Landon, by insistence on retain- ing his own character or role, so to speak, and refusing to try to imitate some other personality on the air, is winning votes in New England, where they understand both forthrightness end common sense. It is natural to find, however, here that the anti-New Deal sentiment is much stronger even than the pro- Landon feeling. That's because of the enormous Government spending pro- gram, so little of which has touched ‘Vermont. This is one of the States which is among those that received the least from the Federal Govern- ment, but is going to pay among the ‘top group of States. For Vermont by thrift and enterprise has invested her savings and pays large Federal taxes. Vermont is today enjoying a rela- tive degree of economic prosperity. There is a feeling here that things would be better but for the Canadian reciprocity treaty and the A. A. A. program. The former has opened up competition in dairy products for which this State is famous, and the latter has served to increase the prices of grains needed for feed. The Democrats have not yet begun to put on a campaign of organization, though the Republicans have been in- lensifying their organization work here for more than a year. Perhaps the New Deal is ready to concede Vermont, anyhow. (Copyright, 1936.) UNIFORM FLOOD CONTROL IS URGED Groups in 31 States Ask Develop- ment on Lines of Na- tional Act. By the Associated Press. BINGHAMTON, N. Y., September 14.—Officers and regional representa- tives of the United States Flood Con- trol Federation recommended yester- day continuation of the national flood control policy under the general out- lines of the 1936 flood control act. Representing flood control groups 4n 31 States, they decided in an in- formal two-day conference that the United States Flood Control Federa- tion should present to Congress and the Legislatures of the various States » program of State and national leg- islation broadly predicited upon the following points: 1. Uniform State laws in so far as compatible with constitutional lim- Itations in the various States. 2. Opposition to any politically ap- pointed Government body supplant- ing the corps of United States Army engineers in the prosecution of the Federal flood control program in the United States. 3. Divorcement of the Army engi- neers from interference by other agen- cles of Federal Government. 4. Agreement that first attention of _the Federal Government in the inter- est of safety and economy is in ef- fectiveness of positive and immediate works, rather than methods which are “indirect, uncer- tain or deferred in effectiveness.” David Lawrence, Music School Head Quits. PITTSBURGH, September 14 (#). «=Dr. Frank J. Brosky resigned yes- terday as dean of the Duquesne Uni- wversity School of Music, because, he said, he found it “impossible to work with the present administration.” THE EVENING STAR, WASHINGTON, D. €. MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1936. News Behind the News President’s Trip Is Held Good Job of Not Campaign- ing—Spanish Embassy Fears Fall of Madrid. BY PAUL MALLON. RESIDENT ROOSEVELT is not campaigning yet, but his associates thought he did &5 good a pdlitical job of not doing it on his Southern trip as when he was not doing it on his drought trip. Both, they thought, were revealing examples of the unexampled Roosevelt technique. Here's the close-up picture, as the back-seat drivers caught it down South. The presidential motorcade from Asheville to Charlotte , . , The route carefully selected through the mill districts, advertised widely in com- munities which had never seen a President , . . The President in an open car with a substantial hat for waving . . . Mill hands, farmers and their wives, toting two or more babies, lining the route all the way . .. Rain pours. The top on the presidential car goes up, but it is put down again at the towns. The President dons his raincoat. With the top up, he leans out and waves , . . The crowd refuses to be rained out for this road show of a lifetime. If they cannot find shelter in doorways, they stand out without covering, and let it pour. Finally into Charlotte. Newsmen, knowing Presidential luck, have already prepared dispaiches saying the rain stopped for the presidential speech, so they can rush these to the wires jast when it does stop. But it doesn’t . . . Right on up to the stadium, into the stadium, up to the speaker’s stand, it continues. The President appears, his clothing soaked, rain on his smiling jace. The audience is soaked. Then it stops . . . the President speaks about green pas- tures and still water, working in little interpellations about the water, the red clay roads thereabouts, homely stuff to fit the locality. “I have spent so great a part of my life in the Southland.” “You commonsense men and women.” “Millions of our fellow Americans.” “You and 1.” .. . Newsmen note a rainbow in the sky. There is some suggestion that it may be the handiwork of the W. P. A. ... They talk among them- selves: “Great stuff ... perfect ... you can’t beat it.” . .. Thus, to the train, on the train and back to the White House, where an announcement is made that Mr. Roosevelt will open his campaign in a speech to the New York State Democratic Conyention at Syracuse, September 29. * kX % Nothing like the complete evacuation of the Spanish Embassy has ever happened on Embassy row here before. The diplomats made up their minds apparently at the same time, packed and disappeared. Only two waiters remained behind when a photographer called the other day. The custom is that, even after a change of Government, such as occurred in Madrid last week, the incumbents stay until their successors are chosen. Apparently the mysterious reason why they fled was not that they had lost sympathy with the reor- ganized government, but that they saw the handwriting on the wall. One attache informed a friend he did not expect his cabinet superior in Madrid to be alive in three weeks. He, for one, expected the fall of Madrid before the rebels that time. * ok k% ‘The railroads are understood to have reached a decision privately last week to press their petition against the constitutionality of the I. C. C. decision lowering fares, despite all the good it has done them. But they also decided not to increase fares, even if they won. The erplanation is that there is a question of constitutional authority involved, and the railroads do not dare to let this I. C. C. order stand as a precedent. The railroads believe the I. C. C. had no right to jeopardize the property of stockholders and that question may reach the Supreme Court. Incidentally, the railroad business is now so good they will probably be short of equipment within six months. * K K % Father Coughlin may deny it until doomsday, but the Osservatore Romano, which has been attacking him, is a Vatican publication. It is pub- lished by a corporation in which the Vatican owns most of the capital stock. On no occasion has it ever failed to represent the Vatican view- point. Catholic authorities here explain the peculiar situation by saying it proves the contention that the pope lacks influence outside of Church matters. As long as Father Coughlin’s bishop continues to be behind him, the Osservatore can asseverate without effect. (Copyright. 1936.) SPawisuI DiPLomaTs HE opinions of the writers on this page are their own, not necessarily The Star’s. Such opinions are presented in The Star’s effort to give all sides of questions of interest to its readers, although such opinions may be contradictory among themselves and directly opposed to The Star’s. THEY’RE DOUBLE-MELLOW THEY’RE DOUBLY FRESH THEY’'RE DOUBLY GUARANTEED PRIZE CROP TOBACCOS + 2sacxers DOUBLE CELLOPHANE = 4 Cottonin Need of Answer to Problems Advent of Picker, Status of Workers Demand Readjustments. BY DOROTHY THOMPSON, RECENT demonstration of the Rust cotton picker again served to remind the country that in the great cotton belt of the South we have an urgent social and economic problem. The cotton picker is not yet, according to wit- nesses, perfected. It does a clums; and untidy job. But when one of the Rust brothers said that the cot- ton picker was a better machine : for the purpose than the original ; Ford, compared to the modern * motor car, he probably told the truth. One may certainly expect to see a cotton picker perfected. And if and when it is, there is & Dorothy Thompsen. general consensus of opinion that the social troubles, which are already bad enough, will be deepened. For the cotton economy is a peculiar one. It grew up on slavery; it continued after a lost war, the problems of which have never to this day been liquidated. Cotton was one of the two main crops in a country ruined by war. The share-cropping system, which has been the theme of so many novels, plays, articles, and recently of a March of Time movie, was the at- tempt of that ruined and defeated economy based on slavery, to readjust itself to the post-bellum world. It is difficult to find an enlightened planter in the South who will defend it as a good system. Competent farmers will tell you that it would be infinitely more profitable for them to work their land with hired labor as machinery. But many hundreds of thousands of white men and Negroes are at work in the system, and the displacement of any large fraction of them without program for their rehabilitation would confront the country with a very se- rious social problem. For the share- croppers are already discontented, al- ready they are one of the most fertile soil for agitation. The cotton share- cropper belongs to a real agriculture proletariat, and if we can trust his- tory—and read the message of cur- rent events in Spain—an inflamed and desperate agricultural proletriat are the most violent of all rebels once aroused. Greatest of Cash Crops. ‘There are many facts to the prob- | lem, and one of them is the state of | cotton itself. Cotton is the principal crop on a fourth of all American farms. Cotton accounts for a ninth of all the acreage planted on all parts of all farms in the United States. And taking into account the seed crop for the mules that cultivate the land, cotton is responsible for one-fifth of | the total crop acreage in the country. It is the greatest of all our cash crops. Cotton and cotton seed combined, normally produce one-fourth of the total cash farm income. And cotton is a dying crop, declining because | American cotton growers are losing | both their domestic and foreign mar- kets. The American public consumed 7 pounds less per capita in 1935 than 1t did in the period between 1910 and 1914, and this in spite of the growth of industrial uses for cotton. These facts suggest that there will have to be during the coming year drastic readjustments made in the cotton economy. And those readjust- ments will have to be made regardless of whether a liberal conservative or radical Government is in power. It they are not made for lofty humanitarian reasons, they will have to be made from motives of the cras- sest self-interest and self-preservation. The whole country is gradually awakening to the danger and waste- fulness of single-crop agriculture, de- pendent upon a world market, and, in times of economic depression, upon Government aid. There are good sys- tems of agriculture and bad systems, and the best system is the one which assures the farmer his own living from his own land, with a cash crop on the side. One needs only to com- pare the farm economy of Vermont with that of the Mississippi Delta. The white population of Vermont is from exactly the same Anglo-Saxon stock as that of the delta. But in the Northern Mountain States, where the land is relatively poor, and all up and down, where there is a short season and terrific Winter climate, where everything has to be wrested from an unwilling sofl, the independent small farmer with the tiny and well-painted house, a capaclous barn and a prodigious self respect and inde- pendence, is the rule. In the delta, where the soll is the richest on earth, the precipitation favorable, the sea- son almost continual, the average person on the land lives under con- ditions which would horrify the Ver- monters. Group Attacks Problem. But cotton will remain under what- ever paying conditions, the chief cash crop of the South. And to find a stable and expanding market for that crop is a matter of the greatest public importance. A group of planters, business men and cotton farmers in Memphis, headed by Mr. Vance J. Alexander, are attacking the prob- |lem from a new angle. They propose that cotton shall step out of its agricultural mentality and apply to| its problem the same technique which has made other industries prosperous. They propose to found a cotton re- search foundation, for the purpose of engaging practical science to find new uses for cotton, The interesting thing about the proposed cotton research foundation is that it will be, if it succeeds, a | co-operative adventure in scientific research, undertaken and financed, not by business men or great corpo- rations, but by farmers. It is pro- posed that the permanent fund be created by a universal tax, which cot- ton farmers put upon themselves. The tax would be very small—probably 5 cents a bale on cotton, and 5 cents | & ton on cotton seed. Since the greater | | part of the crop is grown by farmers | who produce only two to five bales, | the average contribution would be | only 20 cents to $1 a year. But it| has been estimated that in a very few | years’ time a permanent fund would | be established, the interest from which | | would finance large and important | laboratories. There are many co-operative agri- cultural organizations amongst the farmers of this country, but most of them promise the farmer an im- mediate and visible return in the form of better prices and more effi- cient marketing. If the farmers of the South are actually willing to tax themselves for a more distant goal, to pay scientific brains to concentrate on their problems, they will have dis- played amazing enlightenment, (Copyright, 1936.) THEY'RE DOUBLE-MELLOW...with the delightful flavor and fragrance of PRIZE CROP tobaccos; the choicest of home-grown and imported leaf. THEY'RE DOUBLY FRESH. Every package is wrapped in two jackets of the highest quality moisture-proof Cellophane. Proof against dampness, dryness, dust and every other foe of cigarette goodness. D czette MetlozOl We, the People Concessions of “Tories” to Craft Unions Held Lone Hope of Defeating Roosevelt. BY JAY FRANKLIN. E HE history of political democracy has always shown that conserva- tives are forever blind to their own larger interests until too lats, and that their last minute concessions, no matter how sincere, are invariably suspected as a stupid trap by the radicals whom their stubborness has embittered. Evidence of this process is given by the latest report from the Spanish rebel headquarters at Seville, where the Fascists announce the end of capitalism, the doom of large fortunes and the nationalization of all industries. Ezcept for the desperate resistance of the Republican loyalists, it is doubtful that a movement supported by the wealthy landowners and by Juan March, the richest man in Spain, would ever have an- nounced suech & program of conflscation and communism. It is also doubtful that Senor Largo Caballero’s radical government at Madrid will believe a single syllabe of these Fascist promises. Instead, they will conclude that the re- bellion is on the down grade and redouble their efforts to suppress it. * x k% Our own labor struggles are, on the whole, pretty mild affairs, especially when compared to the wholesale horrors of the Spanish civil war, but our own Tories fol- low the same conservative pat- tern and make no concessions until forced to—when it may prove too late. The only hope of a successful conservadive party in America lies in a fusion of independent business men, successful farmers and skilled laborers, The Republican party acts as if it consists of only the first of these three groups. ‘The extraordinary proposals for State socialism in agriculture, which the Cleveland convention indorsed, are admittedly designed to win the wealthier farmers over to the Tory camp. (For some reason, known only to the Republicans, they believe that it is possible to establish State socialism in agriculture and to maintain ruthless individualism in in- dustry.) * * x % , How well the Republicans have succeeded in their attempt to lure the well-to-do farmers will not be known until election day, but there is little doubt that the New Deal will be staunchly backed by the poorer farmers, the tenants, the croppers, the underprivileged day laborers and the disinherited reliefers. Any schoolboy could tell the G. O. P. that the Republican campaign is doomed without the support of skilled labor. Semi-skilled labor, as repre- sented by John L. Lewis’ outlawed Committee on Industrial Organization, common labor and relief labor are for the New Deal. Skilled labor is also for the New Deal and will remain in the Roose- velt camp, unless the big industrialists and international bankers who are backing Landon make terms with the skilled workers of the craft unions. *x % x So far there have been no signs of Republican willingness to pay this price for victory. Apparently the G. O. P. scheme is to ease Mr. William Green out of the presidency of the American Federation of Labor, which should be made easier by the fact that Green was bamboozled into suspending his own union from the federation. Then Mr. Matthew Woll, or some other reactionary red-baiter, will be slipped into Green's place to regiment the federation into the Republican camp. All this, however, cannot be accomplished at once—probably not before 1938—and the issues are being decided here and mow. By 1938 the G. O. P. may find the federation entirely reorganized and Mr. Woll may be no longer with us. If the Republicans want to win now they cannot do less than to compel the private business men and manufacturers who constitute the party’s backlog—including the Iron & Steel Institute and the auto- mobile magnates—to engage in = real collective bargaining with the Gop o A. F. of L. craft unions. * x % x Instead of playing labor politics, the G. O. P. appears to be play- ing politics with labor. Instead of advocating the “closed shop,” shorter hours and higher wages— ie, giving skilled labor what it wants — the Republicans are fomenting a fight within the ranks of organized labor. Instead of meeting the demands of labor, they are raising the threadbare scarecrow of “‘communism” and are relying on a rabble- rouser like Father Coughlin to weaken Roosevelt’s hold on the come mon workers and the underprivileged. This game shows that the Tories do not consider victory worth having except on terms which would destroy our social unity and poison our industrial relations. Perhaps they have already abandoned hope for 1936 and are planning their counter attack for 1940—but four more years is a long wait and, by the time they are ready to make a real concession, it may well be too late, (Cop: 1938.) Headline Folk and What They Do Minneapolis Putlisher Is One of Gov. Landon’s Ace Supporters. BY LEMUEL F. PARTON. REDERICK E. MURPHY of Minneapolis, jousting with Gov, Landon in the Maine tourney, is one of the Governor's ace cards in the farm regions. As the publisher of the Minneapolis Tribune and as the owner of a 5,000-acre farm, he has pioneered diversified farming 2 . in the Northwest &, with such success that he has be- come not only a leading agrono- mist but a power- ful political force in that section. A vigorous support- er of (Gov. Lan- don, he has no Old Guard affilia- tions and is in the dead center of the picture of liberalized Repub- licanism which BB Basle. wilen Aller White and his colleagues present to the country. When Mr. Murphy tells the country it can add cubits to its stature by tak- ing thought, he speaks with authority, as that is just what he did. Suffering an injury of the spine at 18, he de cided, at the age of 48, than an effor of will could and would remedy his stooping posture, the doctors having failed. He straightened himself out. and he says agriculture can do the same. In 1921, when agriculture was all but sunk, he engaged and paid an expensive staff of agriculture experts | to diagnose and prescribe the agrarian | flls. Then he flared out their findings in his newspaper. He sent out scout to find and organize successful farm- ers, not the losers, maintaining that you can build success only out of suc- | cess material. The resulting scientific | diversification of farming buttressed the Northwest against the depression years. Mr. Murphy was one of President Roosevelt’s three representatives at the International Grain Conference at Rome in 1933. Never an obdurate partisan, he has announced his read- iness to co-operate with the admin- istration in any possible way, but now strings with the Republicans. His huge farm at Femco, Minn,, is an agrarian laboratory. It is by such localized, intensive, scientific inquiry that the farmers will win, says Mr. | Murphy, and not by the opposite ex- treme of widely generalized, federal- ized effort. After his graduation from Notre Dame University, he entered the me- chanical department of the Tribune owned by his elder brother. (Copyright, 1934 ) ART EXHIBIT SCHEDULED PITTSBURGH, September 14 (#) —The artists of the world will display their masterpieces in Pittsburgh be- ginning October 16. The date—for the opening of the 1936 international exhibition—was announced by officials of Carnegie Institute tod: INNER JACKET OF "'CELLOPHANE" Opens krom the Top Q 119 West 40th Street. CELLOPHANE" Opens from the Bottom THEY'RE DOUBLY GUARANTEED. Smoke halfa pack of “Double-Mellow”Old Golds. If then, you're not more than pleased, mail us the remaining 10 cigarettes within 30 days of this date and we’ll send you double the price you paid for the full package, plus postage. 2 Established 1760 New York City Copyright, 1038, by P. Lorilland Co., Tne.