Evening Star Newspaper, October 21, 1936, Page 11

Party Switch May Strand Negroes Swing to New Deal Cculd Bring About Desertion by G. O. P. BY DAVID LAWRENCE. ITTSBURGH, Pa. October 321. —Are the Negroes of the United States being “taken for a ride” in this election, and will they be ditched by both parties when the campaign is over? Having heard on my trip in sev- eral States of the switch in the Negro yote from tradi- tional Republic- an to the New Deal party, I de- termined to seek out some of the Negro leaders and have a talk with them about the trend and £ t h e underlying £ reasons for. their shift. I find that the Negroes, whose vote has always been taken for granted by the Republicans, have been assiduously cultivated by the New Deal for three years, that the Negro press is pre- ponderantly pro-Roosevelt and that the Republican leaders in the pivotal States are waking up to the situation and trying desperately to recapture their lost allies. When the Negro vote is distussed, it is hardly separable from the so- called “relief” vote in many States. In fict, the New Dealers have been very generous with “relief” jobs. After election this will most certainly be trimmed down. The Negroes will then have to look to private employ- ment. May Undermine Initiative. David Lawrence Will they encounter hostility when |< they go looking for work? If the outcroppings of radicalism from the Negro leaders continue, the impres- sion will be developed that the Negro is aligning himself with those ele- ments in America which seek to un- dermine the very system of private nitiative from which employment must come when “relief” ends. One leader—Robert L. Vann, editor and publisher of the Pittsburgh Cour- ger, largest Negro weekly in the coun- try—told me he fully expected the Negroes to join a third party move- ment in 1940 with other “Progres- gives,” from which, in this instance, 1 infer he meant “radicals.” It is to be noted that a Negro is running for Vice President on the Communist ticket this year. During this campaign Vann, who used to be a special assistant to At- torney General Cummings, is the right-hand man of Chairman Farley and is in charge of all Negro activi- ties in Pennsylgania for Mr. Roose- velt. Vann told me that the Negroes had split 50-50 in the 1932 election, but that this year they would be 75 per cent for Roosevelt. He did not expect either Michigan or Ohio to go for Mr. Roosevelt, but he thought mos of the other States in which the Negro vote was a factor would be found on the Roosevelt side. Negro Registrations. He gave me the figures of regis- tered voters among the Negroes as follows: Pennsylvania, 177,000; Illinois, 218,- 000; Ohio, 200,000; Michigan, 134,000; Missouri, 150,000; Indiana, 78,000; ‘West Virginia, 67,000; New York, 287,- 000; New Jersey, 141,000; Maryland, 165.000. There’s a total of 1,617,000 Negro wotes registered, and they could easily become the balance of power in some of these States in a close election. Jim Farley has been busy for some time lining up Negro support. Here is how Vann says the Negro press of the country is divided: Supporting Roosevelt — Pittsburgh (Pa.) Courier, circulation 174,000; Afro-American, 170,000; New York Journal and Guide, 24,000; Amsterdam News, 16.000; Philadelphia Independ- ent, 14,000; total, 298,000. Supporting Landon—Chicago De- fender, circulation 50,000; St. Louis Argus, 15,000; Kansas City Call, 16, 000; total, 81,000. Now, of the 177,000 Negro votes in Pennsylvania, two-thirds are concen- trated in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, and that's where the New Deal leaders are counting heavily on their gains to carry the State for Roosevelt. 44,000 Switch Involved. If, as Vann claims, however, the Negro vote was split evenly in 1932 and now has gone up to 75 per cent, it means a block of 44,000 votes that must be subtracted from the Repub- lican side. If two-thirds are in Pitts- burgh and Philadelphia, it means that about 29,000 votes must be added to New Deal totals in the two big cities. This can hardly be enough to swell the Allegheny County vote to a 75, 000 majority or to cut the Philadel- phia Republican vote down to the splitting-even point, both of which are counted on by the New Deal man- agers. I think, moreover, that the 75 to 25 division. is rather optimistic. The Negro preachers, most of whom are Republican because they do not trust the Southern-dominated democracy in Congress to help their brethren, are doing a lot of speech-making on the dangers of throwing overboard the Re- publican party that has befriended them ever since the Civil War. Incidentally, in all the border Btates where I have been I have noted & deep-seated resentment among Bouthern Democrats over the fact that the Northern New Dealers have played up to the Negro vote. On this point I asked Vann a question: “Do you expect the Southern Demo- erats in Congress to help you pass anti-lynching legislation?” Sees Eventual Victory. “I believe,” he replied, “that the Democratic leaders of the South are with us, but they cannot approve anti-lynching legislation yet because the ‘poor white trash’ down there won't let them. But it will come. Look at the way the Negroes are reg- istering in Alabams, Florida, Vir- ginis, North Carolina and Tennessee.” Vann thought that eventually the power that the political Negroes ac- quired in the North would enable them to compel Southern Democratic lead- ers to change their attitude toward legislation beneficial to the Negroes and toward the extension of the voting privilege. I asked Vann whether he thought that the Republican party, if aban- doned by the Negroes in the North, might seek to make & new alignment {tself in the South. He said he wasn't afraid of such a development. I can’t help feeling, after a survey of the political elements that sur- round the Negro’s situation in Amer- {ca that, when he turns away from A |4 THE EVENING STAR, WASHINGTON News Behind the News Those Who Expect Roosevelt Swing to Right Advised to Read Detroit Speech Again. BY PAUL MALLON. HERE is a popular notion that President Roosevelt, if re-elected, will ease down and swing to the right. The absence of promises in his campaign speeches has encouraged that general belief. The Pres- ident has suggested nothing new from the stump except a long- range crop insurance farm program. If you want & tip on this from the inside, read the Detroit speech over again. In it you will find such significant hints as: “There are a thousand and one things still to be done . . . There are many problems not yet. solved . . = It is not enough that we have ended the days of 1932 ... It is not enough that we have saved many homes and put thou- sands of people to work . .. The automobile industry and every other industry still need great im- provements in their relationship to their employes . . . Certain steps looking toward that end (spread- ing of the work) have been taken, but they are not sufficient .. . Mr. Roosevelt did not say what would be sufficient. Nor did he men= tion any of the 1,001 things. The simple truth is he has the purpose, but not the program—that is, not yet. Presidents, in their first terms, usually live for re-election. In their second terms, they live jor history. At least, they are subject to these highly important considerations. ‘The few around Mr. Roosevelt who really seem to understand him know he has not been wholly immune to usual requirement of the first four fyears, and do not believe he will be different from most Presidents in their second terms, Consequently, they expect him to do anything $xcept swing to the right. .. The program to carry out his purpose, they say, will be subject pri- marily to circumstances. The biggest circumstance to be considered is Congress. It will be more conservative and less amenable to White House discipline. (THe last Republican canvass is said to have indicated a Re- publican gain of 71 to 84 House seats, which is probably too high by 25 per cent or more, but, nevertheless, an indication.) Another circumstance is the Supreme Court. The size of his majority, if any, also may determine, to some extent, how he chooses to move, One thing is clear. He is getting through the campaign without heavy promises and would have complete freedom of determination. Certain presidential advisers were dismayed that the President chose to say so much at Detroit, Some of those phrases were not in the original drafts of the speech which he took with him on the train. They say the enthusiastic crowds he met along the way imparted some of their enthusiasm to him and he wrote,in a few ertra paragraphs under the ezcitement of the campaign traveling. . « e v Some of these current stories about changes to be expected in the cabinet, if Mr. Roosevelt is re- elected, come from a lofty author= ity; in fact, no lower than National Democratic Chairman Farley. He told some of his friends, off the record, who would probably be dropped from the cabinet, and he mentioned at least three names. All it really means is that this is what Farley would like to do. He would have done it long ago if he . had been running the cabinet. But it really does not mean the changes will be made. Another of Mr. Roosevelt’s campaign health secrets is that he sleeps in corn flelds. ‘Not actually out between the rows, of course, but in the air-cooled comjort of his private car, drawn up for the night on railroad sidings adjacent to any handy fleld of corn. His Western schedule was arranged, so that he spent about siz hours nearly every might somewhere amid the murmurs of the tassels, thus avoiding the customary lurching and bolting associated with overnight travel. Thus, also, he avoided spending more time than necessary with the local politicians. The long-talked reorganization of the White House secretariat is now a lively post-election possibility. A prospective press secretary has been broken in on Mr. Roosevelt's last two trips. He is Chairman Eugene Leg- gett of the National Emergency Council, former Washington correspondent of a Detroit paper. The present press secretary, Stephen T. Early, is planning to retire January 1 into a private job, win, lose or draw. (Copyright, 1936.) AT LEAST THREE the Republican party as a whole for | taken for a ride in the 1936 election. alliance with only one-half of a polit- ical party in the North which has little influence in changing the view- |in the position of being a pivotal fac- It is always dangerous for any racial or even religious group to place itself point of the Southern wing on these points, the chances are the Negré vote will find itself marooned, and with less and less political influence in the coming years. May Be Stranded. After election the Negro will be abandoned by the New Deal party because it will wish to placate if pos- sible, some of its Southern brethren, while the Republicans, who have al- ways felt a kindly attitude toward the Negro, may find—if the election re- reason for fighting the Negro's battles in Congress. turns go against them—Iless and less | tor, because elections come and go and resentments are built up, which the Negro particularly cannot afford to | see increased in the competitive world of business and employment, (Copyright, 1936,) Chelouche Mayor of Tel Aviv. TEL AVIV, Palestine, October 21. (Palcor Agency).—Moshe Chelouche, | member of the Tel Aviv Municipal | Council, was elected at a special meet- ing of the council yesterday to suc- ceed the late Meier Dizengoff as mayor of this all-Jewish city of 150,000. Thus is the American Negro being | Dizengoff died September 23, BIG POLITICAL | RALLY/ TO-NITE 8:30 HOWS THE % How’s it going? It's a run- away! FREE STATE way out in front with its DEPEND- AIILITY plank. No getting away from it—folks like a beer they KNOW is aged all year! D. C, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 21, 1936. ¢1'Hl 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.. On the Record W. P. A. Seen Erecting New Philosophy of Society in Conflict With Tradition Here. BY DOROTHY THOMPSON. F THE clear aim of this adminis- tration had beén to get people back to work inside the established economic aystem, it would not have erected a different and a separate system, a kind of ghostly common- wealth, in which to isolate from the main stream the unemployed workers. For that is what the W. P. A. is. It is a little world of its own. Its members are catalogued and registered, regi- mented controlled. They are em- ployed according to standards directly at variance with all other standards of employment. Their wages are de- termined by quite different measuring rods. They live completely outside the econémy in which the rest of us for better or worse work and live. Beside this fact all the other charges against W. P. A. are relatively unimportant. 1In a mass of more sensational features of cost, mismanagement, political cor- ruption, charges and counter-charges, we overlook what is by far the most important long-time aspect of what the W. P. A. is doing! It is educating & working population to a society which is fundamentally different from the one in which the majority live. * ok % % ‘The economic system in which the majerify’ of us live operates under the much-excoriated profit motive and with certain rules. The main rule is , that each man is paid according to “ his abilities. Tam perfectly ready to admit that from the most lofty standard men are often paid in adverse ratio to the services which they render soci- ety. But under the profit motive those services are what society is ‘willing to pay for. Berotty Themoew. 1t 1 willing to Clark Gable than it is for the Nation's most distinguished scientist, but it also will pay more for Clark Gable than it will for an incompetent ham, and if it does not err in judgment, more for a distinguished scientist than for a mediocre one. Certainly in the world of work it will pay more for a man with quick eyes and hands and fine skills than for a yokel whose only asset is his muscle. This world of competing abilities is the world in which we live, and so far the burden of proof against it is certainly on all other systems, for the nations operating under it have produced great material and spiritual values, and what sort of values another system will pro- duce is a matter for faith and specula- tion. The W. P. A. has set up, over against this, a world which operates on an entirely different principle. It is not s new principle. It is one which was enunciated long ago, by the early Communists. Its princple is, not to each according to his abilities, but to each according to his needs. I say it is an old Communist idea. It is not the new one. Working Out the Scale. ‘When a man goes on W. P. A. his ‘wages are not determined by his skill. Oh, I know, he is placed in & certain category of labor; he is paid 40 or 50 cents or $1 an hour, according to the “prevailing rate of wage” in his pro- fession or trade, but this is actually only a pretense. For whatever hourly wages he may get, he is allowed to }earn only a stipulated sum weekly. And what that sum is is predicated by his needs. If he is a common REINER DISTRIBUTING CO., 1073 3lst St. N.W. (WEst 2929:2930), TUNE IN!..."THE MAN IN THE STREET”... WRC...TURSDAY AND THURSDAY ... 745 PM. § laborer, working at a wage similar to that of another common laborer, of the same skill or lack of it, he may earn twice as much as his comrade, not through any superior work, but through the fact that he has a large family and has to pay a high rent. 1f, added to that, some of his family are ill, or bad managers, it is the duty of his employer—the Government—to assume that added burden. It is a very unflattering comment on the conditions of work which have existed in some private industries that there are men and women who actually are attracted to this system. ‘What is the effect of working any length of time under such conditions? ‘There is & widespread complaint that the W. P. A. workers loaf on the job; that they do not give an honest hour’s work for the “prevailing rate” with which they are compensated. But if this is so, must not there be & reason for it? May Adjust Selves to Law. There is a reason for it, and the reason is inherent in the system. This is made work, and the workers know it. It is done not because there is a crying demand for the work but because there is a desire arising out of a sort of sentimental morality to make people work for what they get, even if what they get is necessary to keep them from starving and their condition no fault of their own. The compensation if predicated by the need. That is the law of the system. And if that is the law, should we be surprised if people adjust themselves to that law? Is it not the intelligent thing to do? If & man is rewarded according to his needs, regardless of his abilities, will he not, by the sim- plest law of self-preservation increase his needs and decrease his abilities? Russian communism saw that with complete clarity and, being engaged in the serious and heroic task of re- building a vast nation, introduced into state work the strongest kind of com- petition, with suitable rewards for | superior effort. A nation cannot exist,-in the long run, divided into two sorts of work societies. For men will be attractea to one or to the other, and tne men in one will resent the disadvantages to be found in the one and tne aa- vantages to be found in the otner. Antagonisms will grow; resentments will increase; society will be split. The men on work relief will ask— they are already asking—why they are not allowed to sell the products of their toll in the open market. But the men who are working in the open market, in & competitive system. will oppose every attempt in that direc- tion. They have already opposed all such attempts. Does any one who has his wits about him question that so- cial antagonisms are growing in this country? That they have grown pro- digiously in the last three years? One can shout that this group or that is to blame—accuse the Economic Royalists—that's & new name for rich Republicans—or look for & Red under every bed. But a wise statesman is far less interested in fixing the blame than in alleviating the tension. (Copyrisht, 1936, New York Tribune, Inc.) We, the People Ifs a Return to N. R. A. or States’ Rights, With Unemployment as the Crisis. BY JAY FRANKLIN. HE New York Herald-Tribune professes to be extremely shocked by the statement of Gov. Esrle of Pennsylvania that Roosevelt has promised new legislation to regulate hours and wages in industry. Every one knows that, once the election is sut of the way, the road will be open for & new frontal attack-upon the unemploy- ment problem and that, if necessary, we shall take the Supreme Court opposition in our stride. ‘The economic necessities of 125,000,000 Americans mus§, in the I run, become paramount to the legal opinions of nine elderly ggutiemen. Already the conservative spokesmen for high finance are opening their attack upon the manifest destiny of the American people. Walter Lippmann, in & column entitled “The Two Faces of the New Deal,” praises the Roosevelt administration for its recovery measures, but professes to regard its reforms as dangerous and unnecessary. “There is,” he writes, “another series of measures. Their premise has been that the system of free enterprise has broken down, not temporarily in 1931-1933, but permanently, and that henceforth the productive labor of America has to be centrally planned and centrally directed.” “The greatest good fortune,” says Lippmann, “that ever befell Mr. Roosevelt was on the days when the Supreme Court destroyed N.R A and A. A. A..." = "nutltl. R. A. and A. A. A. were not the whole of this part of the ew Deal” Lippmann continues. “The spending program, though it WaeUme need not have been, has been so ? administered as to become the = cause of an immense centralization of power and an aggrandizement of the Federal Government. . . . These funds, which are pouring out through States and local gov- ernments, are purchasing an atti- tude of compliance with Feaderal power which could not be exercised . directly under the Constitution. . .. It was unnecessary, and centraliza- tion by purchase is a dangerous thing in democracy.” . * kb X 5 Col. Frank Knox went farther when he shouted at an Ohio audience, ‘What business is it of his (Roosevelt's) whether you or I balance our budgets?” . The best answer to Col. Knor's question, as to Lippmann's gloomy analysis, was written by another gentleman who also bears the name of Walter Lippmann. This forgotten man wrote an article entitled “The Permanent New Deal,” which was published by “The Yale Review” in its June, 1935, issue. “A radically new conception of the functions of government was established in the Autumn of 1929, writes this other Walter Lippmann, “the unprecedented doctrine that the Government is charged with respon- sibility for the successful operation of the economic order and the main- tenance of a satisfactory standard of life for all classes in the Nation * * °. “Not until his (Hoover's) time had any American President assumed this specific responsibility with all the expansion of the functions of government which it necessarily implies. Yet when the change occurred, there was almost no comment.” _ Mr. Lippmann then argued that government which intervened on the downswing of the business cycle must also strive to control the upswing, and he noted the elements of Mr. Hoover's 1929-33 recovery program in terms which suggest that the true originator of the New Deal policies— N.R. A, A.A. A. and free spending included—was none other than Hoover. The program: *“(1) To counteract deflation by a deliberate policy of inflating the base of credit. “(2) To draw upon the Government credit in order to supplement the deficiency of private credit. “(3) To reduce the normal expenses of government but to incur extraordinary expenditures covered not by taxation but by deficit financing. “(4) To expand public works in order to create employment. “(5) To have the Federal Government assume the ultimate respon- sibility for relief of destitution where local or private resources are inadequate. ) To reduce the hours of labor while maintaining wage rates. “(7) To peg farm prices and encourage farmers to organize to cur- tail production. “(8) To organize industry with a view to adopting common policies in respect to wages, hours, prices and capital investment.” R Which is right? The Walter Lippmann who is now hunching for the election of Alfred M. Landon, or the other Walter Lippmann who wrote dispassionately of politico-Economic developments a year and a half before the campaign? Naturally, @ political commentator writes many things which should mot be used against him and reserves the right to change his mind, but this “Permanent New Deal” of the earlier Lippmann is at such startling variance with the current Lippmann's arguments that it is legitimate to poke a few Questions marks at him. For we are going back to N.R.A, or rather to those portions of N.R.A. which indicate the appropriate controls for American industry under modern conditions. (Oopyright. 1936.) “GOOD BREAKFAST TOAST MAKES MY HUSBAND'S WHOLE DAY BRIGHTER,” SAYS WASHINGTON WIFE. I “Believe me, my huse band was right when he said it’s not the price you pay for bread that deter- mines good toast—it's flavor and freshness and texture. That's why we all agree A&P Bread toasts perfectly, tastes bet- ter, and actually costs less.” 3 “Then one morning I served toast made of A&P Bread—and what a "difference! The children simply loved it. It made a richer, nut-like tasting toast—the most delicious breakfast we ever ate. It's A&P Bread for us from now om in our house.” 2 “For years my husband complained about the breakfast toast, and the youngsters would hardly touch it. It always seemed stale, poorly toasted. We tried many breads but every morning we started the day wrong with taste- less toast.” APIHREAL SWEDISH RYE % 9c—RAISIN i;10c AND OTHER VARIETIES Changing World Japan’s Airilne Excuse on Mandated Isles Flops in U. S. BY CONSTANTINE BROWN. HE new “commercial” airline between Japen and the mane dated islands in the Pacifie shows that the Japanese are not as resourceful as all that. They should have called it a line to de- velop tourism in the new Japanese territory. It would have sounded more plausible. ‘The native population in the archi- pelagoes is small, and backward. The people rare- ly travel from is- land to island, so much less do they intend to travel to the Japanese mainland. The | products of the § islands are also ° limited. The Jap- anese have been working hard to make them an » economic paying proposition, but - it will take an- other 40 or 50 years before a good system of transportation is needed for the export of the raw materials the islands will eventually produce. ‘Whatever may be taken out of that territory at the present moment can be transported in tramps or sampans. Had the Tokio leaders explained that they intend to make the Ladrones or any qther group into tourist ree sorts, our people would have swale lowed the explanation essier. Bu§ that would have meant that the man- dated groups had to be thrown open to visitors and they are still prace tically a closed territory. The new airline means s reply to Secretary Swanson's statement of two weeks ago, that we intend to fortify the Philippines at the expira< tion of the Washington naval treaty, on December 31, 1936. But while our fortification of the Philippines is still highly hypothetical—Congress must give the money for that purpose, and the Congress won'i be very lavish with funds for the Philippines—the Japanese military airline will become ~ soon an accomplished fact and thus increase our problems in case of a Japanese attack against that former American possession. There are two reasons why the Belgian government has decided to denounce its military agreement with France. One is that the internal sit- uation, the growing tensions between the pro-Prench Walloons, and the pro-German Flaemish people. The other is the fact that the Belgian government and general staff believe there is no actual danger of & German aggression in the West. They be- lieve that Garmany will attack Rus- sia and possibly Czechoslovakia. The treaty of alliance between France and these two countries forces France to Mr. Brown | jump to their rescue if she intends to honor her signature. —— Government officials of Chins will be compelled to pay an income tax. ~ I¥s truel AP Breod breod, o fostier broed. s flaver and textureare the result of ARP Bokers’ - ond baking the finest in- grodionts. And it costs you lass money. ForALP Bakeries offect great savings in manufacture end delivery. Thesp sav- ings are pussed on T you. Try a loaf today. We know you'll agree e batter bread for loss