Evening Star Newspaper, December 21, 1936, Page 11

& Fascism Seen In Monopoly By Labor Lewis’ Strategy Might Lead Him to Indus- trial Dictatorship. BY DAVID LAWRENCE. HE new technique in labor war- fare is gradually reaching its I climax. Instead of the old technique of a general strike, with the possible danger that public opinion would react on union labor’s popularity, the new strategy is to tie up several industries by picking out the Achilles heels, 50 to speak, of modern pro- ductive processes. The battle lines between the au- tomobile manu- facturers and the John Lewi s unions would be readily discern- ible to the pub- lic if & general strike were called in all the auto- mobile plants, but the men themselves might vote to continue operations, despite the efforts to persuade them to go out on a sympathy strike. Nowadays, however, labor doesn't need to call any sympathy strikes. The aggressive leaders of a unioniza- tion drive start out to put pressure on employers in some small piant or se- ries of plants making vital parts or accessories. Thus, the plate-glass ‘works in various parts of the country are tied up. Or the factories that make auto brakes are subjected to the strike technique. Gradually the major plants are paralyzed and work stops unless employers surrender. The union leaders tell the public its all a simple matter of collective bargain- ing, that these economic weapons are necessary in order to get better wages and working conditions. Significance Deep. On the surface, it would appear that there must be much in the union argument. Why, it is asked, do not the manufacturers recognize the unions and be done with it? After all, it is contended, collective bar- gaining is here to stay, the principle is even recognized by Federal statute and the trend of the times is toward unionization anyhow. But the proposition is not as easily disposed of by such a rationalization of the issues. These go far deeper and involve something more than the question of who shall represent the workmen in their negotiations with employers. The paramount issue is whether management must surrender a part of its control without getting in re- turn a corresponding sense of respon- sibility. If the labor unions just want recognition, they can get it tomorrow from almost all of the so-called non- union industries in the country, in- cluding steel. Responsibility Is Key. The executives of such businesses are not stubbornly trying to inter- fere with the making of their own profits just for the doubtful pleasure of refusing the men an abstract right or privilege. Certainly the economic loss suffered by a tie-up of an indus- try is much more ruinous to the man- agement and stockholders than it is to the workmen, especially since the Federal Government now finances strikers when they get to the end of their strike-fund resources. Why then do not the industrialists yield? They would in a minute if the labor unions would agree to ac- cept corporate responsibility so that| the leaders would be responsible and the unions would be responsible for the contracts and the activities which they carry on. The usual answer to this made by the labor leaders is that they can always be prosecuted under the com- mon law and that incorporation of labor unions is not needed. The truth is labor has such a po-| litical influence and control these days that local prosecuting attorneys and even the Federal attorneys doi not, except under the pressure of an David Lawrence. THE EVENING STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C., MONDAY, DECEMBER 21, 1936. News Behmd the News New Deal Command Drops Cry Against Supreme Court for Other Tactics. BY PAUL MALLON. E high command here seems to have dropped the soft-pedal upon eriticism against the Supreme Court. Interior Secretary Ickes, for example, gave out g peculiarly- worded statement after the couri sent the Duke power case back to the lower courts without a decision. He denounced the power com- panies for thus delaying the decision, but said nary a word about the court. He asserted the powerites were holding up $50,000,000 of P. W. A. employment projects by their technical legal tactics, although the court had taken the action causing the delay. It sounded significant. ‘What happened on the inside was even more significant. It seems that Ickes' young lib- eral lawyers in P. W. A. were hot against the court action. They wrote a confidential memo to him outlining an attack upon the court and pointing out the harm wrought by the delay. They suggested he issue it in his own name. He re- vised it to apply to the power companies instead of the court, and then gave it out. * %% Practical Methods Favered Now. The incident illustrates a growing unannounced sentiment among New Deal authorities. Most of the top liberals have come to the con- clusion they are not going to accomplish their purposes by curt attacks, or, in fact, by constitutional amendments. They are looking for other, more practical, methods, such as the step now in progress in the National Labor Board case against the steel companies. The ides behind that case, of course, is to help John Lewis organize the steel industry and thus to effect maximum hours and minimum wages without legislation, court reorganization or constitutional amendment. In as much as returning Southern Democrats in Congress also are going on record privately against a constitutional amendment, there seems to be little prospect that the qilestion will be considered seriously, unless a new situation arises. An exception to the current trend of the well-informed was the action taken by the National Consumers’ League. It went on record for a constitutional amendment to permit, without question, effective Federal rand State labor and social legislation. Two officers of that league are Mrs. F. D. Roosevelt and Prof. Felix Frankfurter. * X % % ‘Washington Wage Law Decision May Cause Uproar. Excellent lawyers around the court are perturbed, nevertheless. They are convinced the court will have to hold unconstitutional the State of ‘Washington minimum wage law for women. Such action, they fear, will lead to a new liberal uproar. Their perturbation seems to be justified. The lawyer for the State of Washington admitted in the arguments that some aspects of the law were invalid under the Adkins case decision. His conten- tion that the case applied only to hotel chambermaids seemed to be somewhat weak-hearted. The issue involves a suit brought by a chambermaid to recover the difference between the State minimum wage and what was actually paid her. The lawyer argued the hotel business is public and subject to State regulation. * % ox x Cabinet Resignations to Be None or Few. No less an authority than the No. 2 man of the New Deal inspired those recently published predictions that there would be na resignations from the cabinet. However, he was speaking only about the other nine members, and not about himself. He would not comment about his own plans, which still call for his resignation January 1. The reason there will be few res- ignations is that “it would take a team of horses” to get any cabinet member out. They like it here. * X X x Chemists in the Agriculture De- partment conducted an investiga- tion of what wines may be drunk with certain foods, and prepared a pamphlet. It will never be of assistance to dining outsiders. Every one okayed it until it reached Agriculture Secretary Wallace. He pocketed it. * ¥ ¥ % More than one Congressman is taking inside steps to have At- torney General Cummings tone down his belligerent crime-catcher, J. Edgar Hoover. It seems that Hoover, by working hard at it, has made nearly every Washington authority a potential enemy. * % % The Supreme Court may be a frequent target for criticism from out- side, but never from attorneys appearing before it. That is, almost never. Assistant Attorney General Toner of Washington State told the court the other day: “I must confess that sometimes I read what your honors say without being able to understand the meaning.” He was not fined for contempt, the justices presumably taking the view that the fault lay with Mr. Toner. (Copyright, 1936.) tomobiles which use steel must Lewi: spread his warfare. And to tie up the | antee of profits to the coal industry auto industry he must needs get con- | at the expense of the consuming pub- trol of the glass industry. In a short | lic. It is the firit stage of fascism, time Lewis could become the indus- and, if John Lewis should get control trial dictator of the United States.|of the basic industries of America, Once he is in control of the wages of | the public may insist on a form of millions of workmen, he not only has | Government intervention to protect | control of their votes at the polis, but | the public against both labor and | he can dictate terms to management | capital, then come in logical sequence and owners who then come under his | the usual attributes of fascism with control very much as did the group } restriction on individual liberty and of coal operators when he offered them | on the freedom of the press, the Guffey act. | (Copyright, 19386,) outraged public opinion, or in ex-f treme cases only, attempt to prose- cute labor unions or their leaders. The statutes and laws are there, but criminal proceedings are seldom be- ' gun. It is the possibility of col-, lecting civil damages that would in-, troduce real responsibility for labor's | acts. | Relations Often Pleasant. Union labor, in many instances, gets along splendidly with employers. | & ‘Thus, many of the American Federa- tion of Labor unions enjoy the finest kind of relations with their employers and there is among them the great- | est fidelity to the observance of con- | Buy Now and Save! tracts. | & But the interjection of the John ! § lewis idea of labor warfare, whereby | & whole incGustry is to be put at the | mercy of a single leader of labor, ! means a virtual monopoly over the lives of the workmen. Since public opinion has been un- willing to allow captains of industry to maintain monopolies, it might be assumed that public opinion would not tolerate monopolist practice on the part of labor leaders either. But labor has had enough influence at| ‘Washington and in various State gov- ernments for three decades past to | secure the passage of laws specifically exempting labor unions from the operations of anti-trust or monopoly statutes. In Great Britain, no such analegous exemptions exist. Labor unions are responsible to public control, espe- cially as to what they do with their| finances. Likewise, a general strike or a strike in sympathy may be de- clared unlawful. It is clear that !.hel strikes now being undertaken in the auto industry with the purpose of tying up the larger units of produc- tion would be clearly held unlawful under the British labor disputes act. in Great Britain, there will be none till the public realizes the extent of the economic damage which is being permitted to a small group of labor leaders in the name of “collective bargaining.” Public opinion will be aroused some day when the full implications of what is happening comes clearly into view. Thus, John Lewis has achieved & virtual monopoly in the coal flelds. He dictates wages and hours and that means he dictates prices. He has the cost of coal up to such a point now that substitutes come into com- petition. Likewise, steel companies that own their own ocal mines must be got under Mr. Lawis’ control or he cannot manage to keep selling prices of ccal up. - - From cosl to steel and then to su- SALE LANGROCK AND OTHER FINE Suits, Topcoats, Reversible Topcoats and Overcoats Were $40, now $32 Were $45, now $36 Were $50, now $40 Were $55, now $44 Were $60, now $48 Were $65, now $52 Were $70, now $56 Were $75, now $60 Camel's Hairs and Chesterfields Not Included USE YOUR CHARGE ACCOUNT BROS. SALTZ e e iy o ol 1341 F STREET N. Wo The latter law was a virtual guar- | tI'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, althou, themselves an h such opinions may be contradictory amon; directly opposed to %’he Star’s. y a We, the People New Deal Threatened With Responsibility for “King- fish’s Chickens” in Delta. BY JAY FRANKLIN, NE of the first laws of political conquest is that the victor inherits—in addition to the well-known spoils—all of the woes of the vanquished. Roosevelt “took” the Huey Long machine: now the Kingfish's chickens are coming home to roost. Henceforth, the New Deal must assume responsibility for all of the “economic untouchables” of the deep South, whose misery and hopes formed the fuel of a great political up- heaval in the lower Mississippl Valley. Politics not having served the pur- pose of the croppers to make “every man a king,” from now on it will be a race between curative administration and social hatred, if Roosevelt is to fend off catastrcphe in the rich delta region, where the top-soil is 40 feet deep and the top-dog finds that it pays cash dividends to sweat farm labor as even the old slavers never dared work their humarr chattels. By order of Roosevelt, Blackstone of the Tenant Farmers Union was invited to become a member of the President’s Committee on Farm Tenancy, after Wallace had originally proposed to omit representation of the croppers. This is the administration’s first open recognition of the social struggle in the cotton belt. Shortly previous to this event, the conviction of an Arkansas pianter for violation of the Federal anti-slavery laws held out hope that “involuntary servitude” based on social subterfuge was also under attack from ‘Washington. These are brave steps for an administration which owes its exist- ence to the solid South. They are necessary steps. A South- ern business man who nas just re- turned from & trip through the delta country reports a real danger of social revolution in Huey Long’s hand-rolled “empire.” Here is what he reports: “Because the deita is as much a slave colony as Java, Borneo or India, I clipped some news items: “1. Legislature refuses to investigate sale of 200 tax-delinquent farms a day. to determine how much land is involved, who is buying it. “2. Doubt whether enough money to finish out school year. “3. $75,000 additional voted Na-| tional Guard to help enforce ‘law and | order’ bills. “4. The plantation outfit cleared an admitted $700,000 net on | this year's crop. “5. The croppers on E's co-operative never travel alone . . . they meet their ‘friends’ secretly.’ “I think there is a real chance for revolution in these three States— Arkansas,Louisiana and Mississippi— because they have underneath them the one thing I've never found before | in my life, even in coal towns—a deep, savage and barely controlled hatred.” Here, then, is the explanation of Southern haste in pushing the Bank- head farm tenant bill for immediate action on a billion-dollar scale. Re- sponsible Southern statesmanship is| alive to the danger—much more so than is the New Deal leadership, to whom the share-cropper situation is | only one of & number of difficult prob- | lems which must be studied, made the subject of slow, cautious experi- mentation, and gradually soothed | into a solution. | Governments are nearly always | from six months to six years too late | | in dealing with matters of importance | and the tenant situation in the South is no exception. Since the panic | OF MODERN ESTATE GAS RANGES ONE OF THE - .. BIGOEST SAVING EVENTS OF THE SEASON SALE reduced the price of cotton and Hoo- ver'’s Farm Board failed to peg it, the South has been on a dog-eat-dog basis. Wallace’s Triple-A helped a little, but made no real change in Southern Society. Huey Long saw the chance, leaped at it and respond- ed to the pressure of the desperate masses of “economic coolies” in the delta. The following he won 8o swift- ly, and the fantastic nature of its de- mands: should have taught the rest of us that there was something ssvagely wrong about the state of the deep South. i Roosevelt fought Huey Long snd, after the Kingfish's assassination the New Deal captured the Long machine. This means that Roosevelt has now inherited the problems for which Long offered a solution and the grievances which made Long’s solution poliitcally attractive. The New Deal must deal with this situation far more ener- getically than is contemplated at the Department of Agriculture if the South is going to escape grave dangers during the next few years. (Copyright, 1938, ACROBATIC BURGLAR ROBS MILLS HOME @. 0. P. Leader's Bed Room Is Rifled of Jewelry and $380 in Cash. By the Assoclated Press. WOODBURY, N. Y., December 21. —An acrobatic burglar broke into the bed room of Ogden L. Mills, Repub- lican leader and former Secretary of the Treasury, at his home here early yesterday, and stole 8880 in cash, a | $150 gold watch and chain and a $175 gold cigarette case. ‘The only clue to the burglary, com- mitted during a howling gale, was a pocket knife found on a one-story extension of the house. The burglar left behind jewelry of considerable value in Mrs. Mills' adjoining bed room. A mile-long private driveway leads to the Mills home, in West Central Long Island. The burglar had to ascend a tree, climb out a long branch | touching the house and work his way along & narrow ledge to gain entry. | He cut out a window screen at the | end of this route to get inside. Harold R. King, Nassau County po- lice inspector, was convinced the same man stole a $400.000 pearl necklace and about $100.000 worth of other Jjewelry from the William Robertson Coe home at Mill Neck, Long Island, | last June. WINSHIP IN GEORGIA MAN TRAPPED IN TREE By the Associated Press. Governor General of Puerto Rico Visits With Relatives. MACON,, Ga,, December 21 (#).— Blanton Winship, Governor Genera! of Puerto Rico, arrived in Macon yes- | terday to spend the Christmas holidays with relatives. ‘While here he will visit his sisters- in-law, Mrs. Isaac Winship and Mrs. Herring Winship. j After Christmas, Gov. Winship h‘ expected to go to Washington to confer | | was 2 pm. before two boys watching This Changing World Eden, the Prognosticator, Says World to Follow Peace. BY CONSTANTINE BROWN. HIS is Christmas week and an optimistic note is sounded by moet governments in regard to the future of the world. Anthony Eden, the youtkful British foreign secretary, who has analyzed with such brilllant accurateness the Ethiopian situa- tion, who assured the world that Mussolini won't be permitted to conquer Abyssinia and rushed the British fleet to bring I1 Duce to his knees, is forecasting now peace in the world. He infcimed members of the House of Commons that they may enjoy their Yule pudding without fear that another war will break out soon. Mussolini 1is equally cheerful. After having obtained the con- trol of the Eastern Mediterranean, he announces that there is no real reason why there should be hence- forth any oconflict with Great Britain. He deprecates the idea that Itely wants to conquer the Balearic Tslands. And he speaks the truth. But, of course, if Franco wishes to place those im- portant strategic points at Italy's disposal, Mussolini will not refuse them, It is rude to turn down gifts from friends. Even the Chinese are imbued with the Christmas spirit. They still talk about Chiang Kai-shek being set free shortly and of punish- ing—mildly—Marshal Chang, his captor. Everything will end peace- Jully, they say, while the Japanese are sharpening their swords. It is only Moscow, Berlin and Tokio who keep silent. They have no Christmas. : * % k% ‘The murderous international ecivil war continues to take its toll of thousands of lives every day in Spain. Franco's forces have been strengthened by German and Italian mechanized forces. The German and the Italian contingents have.not yet reached the firing line. On the Loyalist side, the French are trying their latest pursuit planes successfully. They exceed in speed and light armament the heavy German bombers to such an extent that every time they go up, the enemy planes avoid combat. All the bombers which have been brought down recently— at the rate of four a day—have been the victims of the French pursuit planes. It's an interesting and instruc- tive dress rehearsal which is be- ing staged near Madrid these days. * % % % A new neutrality bill to avoid foreign entanglements and possi- bly discourage war will be intro- duced by Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee McReynolds in the House soon after Congress reconvenes, It probably will be the first important bill presented to the Congress. The main feature of this bill will be an embargo on credits to all beiligerents, regardless of whether they are debt defaulters or not. This provision is likely to discourage would-be warring nations, if they know that they cannot borrow mowey in this country. The chances are that the bill will pass with an overwhelming majority. While there are many representatives who would have balked on an embargo on raw materisls such as oil, copper, cotton and wheat, it is doubtful whether there will be a single one opposing the lending of Ameri- can money to belligerents. The bill will provide the placing of such a credit embargo immediately after the war has been declared officially. OHIO MAN PRESIDENT BY FLOOD IN JERSEY| OF SURGEONS’ CHAPTER Mile-Wide Stretch of Lowlands U. S. Branch of International| Covered Rain Raritan River. as Swells College Is Formed at Meet- ing in New York. By the Associated Press. SOMERVILLE, N. J.. December 21.| NEW YORK, December 21.—A The usually placid Raritan River ' United States chapter of the Interna- spread over a mile-wide stretch of } tional College of Surgeons, established lowlands yesterday, flooded many cel- | At Geneva two years ago, Was Organ- lars, forced the closing of bridges and | ized here Saturday night by more trapped a man in a tree for 12 hours. | than 60 surgeons coming from 20 Martin _Blomquist, 54, no home, | States. chose a shack by the railroad tracks| Dr. Andre Orotti of Columbus, |in which to spend Saturday night.| Ohio, was elected president; Dr. H. | About 5:30 am. yesterday he wu‘ awakened by water rushing across the | Of the American Medical Association, floor boards. He fled to a tree. It | fifst vice president; Dr. Karl Meyer, 'Chiulo. second vice president; Dr. P. H. Bland, Philadelphia, third vice president; Dr. Oscar Nugent, Chicago, treasurer, and Dr. Charles H. Arnold, Lincoln, Nebr., secretary. the flood saw Blomquist's frantic wav- ing and 5:30 before he was rescued. ‘The flood was caused by Saturday’s | heavy rain and began to recede late | yesterday. 1ufim would offer annual prizes to Part of the Duke estate. owned by | stimulate research in the fleld of E. Carey of Texas, a former president It was announced that the organi- | Headline Folk and What They Do Mistinguette Causes Stir by Threat to Print Life Story. BY LEMUEL F. PARTON. EARS ago Mistinguette con- fided to this reporter in Paris that it was a daily goat's milk massage that had made her legs the most beautiful in the world. They were then insured for $5,000.- 000, and now, as they bring her down the gangplank to New York, they carry only $70.000. That's quite a write-off, but they say that, at 69, Mistinguette is still the richest actress in Europe, topping all records of Yvonne Printemps, Josephine Baker and the Dolly sisters. It was quite & while before the war when she originated the Apache dance. Her press agent, hiking in- surance quotations on her legs, got her newspaper space for years. In the years of the grand razzle-dazzle, American tourists used to rush to see Mistinguette’s legs before seeing the Eiffel tower or Napoleon's tomb. In late years she has been running night clubs, although it was only six or eight years ago that she sank as a stage star. There i8 & good story in Mistin- guette’s career if some diligent investi- gator will disentangle it from goat's milk, leg insurance and the like. S8he was an extremely effective worker ir the French intelligence office in the war, and some day her connection with the Mata Hari case will make interesting reading. Also the story of how she got her young protege, Maurice Chevalier, out of a Verdun prison camp. There was a time when Lloyds wouldn't have banked 30 cents on her whole charming person, to say nothing of just legs. She says she’ll never tell, although, sometimes, mischievously, she lets on that she's going to spill all her secrets in a big book—causing consternation along the Riviera gold coast. Arriving in New York, she says she will marry & man with the initials B. P. Word from another source is that she is going to marry a well-to- do Cuban named Battiste. Her eyes are still green and smouldering and her hair copper-colored. If you run into the missing Chiang Kai-shek and can't be sure of how to address him, just call him John. That's what the Chiang comes to, in properly spoken Chinese, according to Dr. Arthur Hummel, chief of the Oriental division of the Congressional Library at Washington. It happens that, as Chiang was kide naped, this writer was reading that re- markable book, “My County and My People,” by Lin Yu-tang. He invokes & sympathetic understanding of China by the Western World and, in the view of this writer, Dr. Hummel has come nearer achieving this than any other | Occidental. Attesting this are his ad- | dresses before the Williamson Institute | of Politics, his lectures at the Uni- versity of California and Columbia and his other treatises and articles. A native of Warrenton, Mo., he was graduated from the University of Chicago in 1909, taught and studied in Chinese universities and became & | profound student of Chinese languags, history and literature, (Copyright, 1936.) . “Zenda"” to Be Filmed Again. HOLLYWOOD, December 21 (#).— Anthony Hope's 44-year-old story, “The Prisoner of Zenda,” will be with President Roosevelt mneermn‘j Mrs. Doris Duke Cromwell, was in- surgery and would establish an his- | filmed again, this time with Ronald Puerto Rican affairs. ”~ " o JOHN, IVE CERTAINLY HAD MORE TIME FOR SHOPPING SINCE YOU ' BOUGHT ME THAT NEW ESTATE GAS RANGE Wonderful is just the word for the way you'll feel with one of theseModernEstateGasRanges in your kitchen!Such advanced features as automatic oven heat control, automatic top light- ing,oveninsulationand smoke- less, high-speed broilers will work wonders in your cooking results ..and save you time and money as well! This great sale will soon be over. Better see these beautiful bargains SAVE *20 ON THIS RANGE Can be purchased, financed and installed during this sale for only $2.94 per month undated. | torieal museum of surgery. Colman in the lead. YES, AND THAT MEAL Yol COOKED LAST NIGHT...IN NO TIME AT ALL. .. 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