Evening Star Newspaper, January 27, 1937, Page 9

Sit-Down Key in Strike Dispute David Lawrence. Attitude of Secretary of Labor Is Deemed Veiled Defense. BY DAVID LAWRENCE. EADLINES and statements were not “in the interest of peace” a few days ago but administration officials now are beginning to use them to fight the battle in the court of public opinion over the automobile strike. ‘Through conferences with the press, official and un- official disap- proval now has been voiced on some phases of the pronounce- ments of both sides in the motor strike con- troversy, but, in the course of § such comments, § an amazing piece of information has been re- leased by the Secretary of Labor, namely, a veiled defense of “sit-down” strikes. Miss Perkins told the press that the legality of “sit-down” strikes had not been determined and she referred in effect to them as relating to some abstract legal concept. Her viewpoint is that “sit-down” strikes are some- | thing that really are legalistic ques- tions and hence should be side- tracked in a negotiation of a settle- ment of the strike. But the truth is the “sit-down” strike is the paramount question at issue. It transcends all others. Either the plants that have been seized by the “sit-down” strikers be- long to the stockholders of General Motors, or they belong to the strikers. Such a question is not one of legality or illegality in a civil sense, but of trespass, seizure and extortion within the meaning of the criminal law. Likened to Methods in Italy. ‘The General Motors officials who declined to go to Washington to at- tend the conference at the office of the Secretary of Labor could well have had in mind that they were not authorized to negotiate for the use of properties which had already been taken from them. When they get their properties back, they can accept | Miss Perkins' invitation. | If. in other words, it is proper for | @ group of employes to take posses- sion of the properties, it is also, by the same logic, proper for them to utilize those properties and begin pro- duction themselves, which is, after all, the same kind of confiscation that occurred in Italy and led to the strong-arm tactics of the Fascist dictator, who took control of both factories and workers alike. General Motors probably made a mistake in strategy in not going to Washington and making clear that it had nothing to negotiate until its| property was rightfully restored. The | corporation’s position would have been better had it agreed to attend | any and all conferences and had it also made its views clear at such con- ferences and given them thereafter | to the public. General Motors Mistaken. News Behind the News Flood Relief Discloses Nation’s Dependency on Red Cross—Permanent Federal Set-Up Held Doubtful. BY PAUL MALLON. EDERAL relief organizations have been given tragic opportunities F for demonstrations of their usefulness by the floods and droughts of the past year, but you may have noticed President Roosevelt called first upon & non-governmental charity, the American Red Cross, in this latest disaster. The Red Cross has a trained organization, experienced in many similar disasters of the past. The Government has not. It always co- operates. It lends various services and donates money. The main re- sponsibility, however, continues to rest upon the more efficient pri- vate charity. Some social-minded legis- lators have been thinking in private about amplifying the new social welfare depart- ment to create a permanent relief set-up around W. P. A. They want to put all relief responsibil- ity in the hands of the Federal Government, along with nearly every= thing else. It probably will not be done. Level-headed legislators generally agree it would be unwise because the private charity is probably much more efficient than the Government could be. * ok ok ok One unconquerable weakness in Federal handling of anything may be discovered in some of the figures which Administrator Hopkins gave the House Appropriations Committee the other day, just as the flood waters roared. He was testifying about the deficlency appropriation he needs. A Congressman asked him how much propaganda he put out during the last presidential campaign. Mr. Hopkins submitted an accounting of printing expenditures by his organization which told the story in numbers. It showed that during the first six months of last year, his printing bill was $368,731, but during the five months before the election it amounted to $666,846. In other words, it doubled during campaign time. * ok ok Mr. Hopkins' amazing big-heartedness was also disclosed in the same testimony. Apparently he is furnishing relief not only to the unem- ployed, but to the poor old United States Senate, whose assets are unlimited. The relief administrator said he had lent 14 persons from his W. P. A. personnel to the La Follette Civil Liberties Investigating Committee of the Senate. Their total annual salaries amounted to $40,000. To the Wheeler Railroad Investigating Committee of the Senate he lent 12 persons, whose annual total salaries amounted to $21,340. Mr. Hopkins obviously thought this was a political thing to do. You know, he must get his appropriations from the Senate and the House. However, it may prove to be less political than he thought. The Senate furnishes limited funds for its investigating committees and may not relish the idea of a few Senators dealing with Mr. Hopkins on the side. 0 * K X K There seems to be so much Federal relief going on that Mr. Hopkins does not know about all of it. For example, he was asked how Mr. Roose- velt financed the European trip of that special commission sent abroad last Summer to study the co-operative movement in England, Sweden and half a dozen other countries. “Was it done through the transfer of your W. P. A. funds to the Federal Surplus Commodities Corp.?” asked Representative Tabor, one of the few Republicans left alive after the disaster of November 3. “Oh, no,” said Mr. Hopkins, “it would not be that.” He promised to look up the facts. The record of the testimony then carries a note, which apparently gives the result of his search. It says merely that “the Federal Surplus Commodities Corp. sent a small group to Europe for the purpose of studying co-operative enterprises,” etc. * kX X Unhappy Harry is the most pop- ular congressional whipping boy in the new order since Tugwell de- parted. Those who are in the know within his organization do not blame him personally. They rightly blame the system. Hopkins, they say, has held politics, personal favoritism and inefficiency within reason. An irregular Republican who was one of his State administrators has ence in W. P. A. during the last campaign. He says the only political pressure from Hopkins was against playing politics. Even Farley made no requests in this particular area. This administrator feels that most of the politics in W. P. A. is the result of State situations. The worst of it, as he sees it, is that the administrators chosen in Washington are not always the type to remove State and city political machines from relief influence. (Copyright, 1937.) But there is another mistaken im- | other property owners in America, | eral commerce and could be enjoifed. pression which the General Motors|and the end of property rights may | have developed, | be foreseen. people apparently namely, that they must appeal to the Federal authorities or to the unioa | Picketing was originally illegal, but, even today, picketing which forcibly | coupled with a conspiracy physically leaders to get their property back. There appears among well-informed | lawyers a universal belief that a sit- It is true, as Miss Perkins says, that | down strike is not only illegal from the | viewpoint of State law. but, when The truth is this task falls whoily | restrains anybody from entering a| to prevent the flow of goods into inter- within the jurisdiction of the authori- | plant is illegal. Local authorities, in- | state commerce, it is also & violation of ties of the cities and States where the | fluenced by political or other con-| Federal law. plants are located, and all efforts io | siderations, sometimes refuse to en-| Until, however, these questions are get the properties back to their own- | force the laws against illegal picket- | brought to an issue, the negotiations ers must needs be directed to the | ing, but tHat does not make the acts| on collective bargaining will take a custodians of law and order in the of violence or physical restraint any | secondary position. If the Mayors or more valid. The Supreme Court of the United | by the exercise of the police power of | various localities. sheriffs or Governors refuse to give Once the prop- | erties are restored to the owners, either the properties back to the owners by | States has held in one of the famous | the States or cities, then negotiations evicting all persons who are unlaw- Coronado cases that a conspiracy to fully holding any of the plants or any | prevent the shipment of goods in inter- portion of them, then an entirely dif- | state commerce—in that instance, coal fundamental issues of what union shall | represent the workmen arranging ferent situation confronts not only | from mines closed down by striking | scales of wages and hours. the automobile companies but all | miners—was an interference with Fed- (Copyright, 1937.) TON, D. C, THE 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. WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27, 1937 This Changing World Trial of Traitors to Stalin May Lead to a Blood Purge in Soviet Republic. BY CONSTANTINE BROWN. informed quarters, to a blood purge in the Soviet republics; and if ConsPirators, P SYChOIOgy TH! present trial of the traitors to Stalin may lead, it is believed in Trial in Moscow Illustrates How Completely Men Can Be Dominated by Party. BY DOROTHY THOMPSON. HE trial in Russia plainly baffles all the correspondents who are reporting it, even those who have known, intimately, for years some of the defendants. Mr. Wal- ter Duranty apparently believes that it is & bona fide process, and that the defendants who, like their predecessors several months ago, admit every- thing including their own abased sinfulness, are telling the trutl ‘They were pa ticipants in a prodigious and blackly treason- able plot to over- throw the Stalin government, even at the cost of dividing parts of Russia with Ger- many and Japan. Mr. Duranty listening to friends whom he has known for a decade throwing away their lives on the witness stand can only refer us to Dostoevsky for an ex- planation. It is Russian! But I do not think that Dostoevsky explains the behavior at this trial, for I have encountered the same sort of mind in Germany, among Nordic Nazis, in France, among the Communists and Faccists, and even in the United States. It is not specifically Russian. When men live their whole lives in an atmos- phere of conspiracy it does something to their souls. The scale and standard of values, familiar and accepted by most of us, are rejected by the revolu- tionary. Personal truthfulness, for instance, does not exist as a criterion Dorothy Thompson, even one’s own. Patriotism, honesty, i may be resumed with respect to the | fastidiousness regarding means, are all outworn bourgeoise conceptions, to a revolutionary of whatever creed. One of the most poignant recollections of my life was an evening that I spent in | Moscow, 10 years ago, listening to the soul-searching of a beautiful and talented American girl who was about to join the Russian Communist party and enter its service in the Orient. As she described, with full consciousness, what the step meant, I had the feeling that I was listening to a novice about vinced of the truth and righteousness of the Communist idea. But the service to the fulfillment of that idea meant that she was to put herself, body, soul and spirit, at the bidding of its leaders. Its discipline was inexorable. If the party said: Lie! she would lie; if it said: Steal! she would steal. If it said: Murder! she would murder. Her own will, her own standards, were to be abandoned forever. Her obedience henceforth was to be blind. Men Not Own Masters. understand what is happening in Mos- cow, as I could not understand my lovely friend 10 years ago. Three of more or less well. I have passed many pleasant hours in their company—in London and Geneva, in Moscow and in | Washington and New York. I have | talked with them about novels and | poetry, about the drama and music, | about politics and economics. All of them are able men, two exceptionally brilliant men; on one level of con- sciousness and behavior we were citi- zens of the same world. But only on one level. These men were not their own masters, as no member of the Trotzky group, no member of the Fascist party in Italy and no member | of the Nazi party in Germany is his own master. 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Relieve coughs due 1o eolds with HALL'S EXPECTORANT, the plessant cough syrup. n with KEYS NOSE At All Goed Druggists MILBURN'S CAPSULES ON SALE AT PEOPLES DRUG STORES AND OTHER GOOD DRUGGISTS of conduct, nor does respect for life, | to enter some religious order based on | black magic. She was fanatically con- | Let us say then that we cannot | the men on the stand I have known ! wake up to the realization that it is | Communist or Fascist revolutionary from us! He is a man who does not act like himself, because he has relin- quished the very foundations of his personality —the individual moral foundaticns. We cannot know what this trial really means because no cri- terior which we can understand is governing it. The defendants and the accused are both members of a secret order, or of two secret orders. And both are playing according to some esoteric set of rules. Perhaps the whole thing is a fake. Perhaps these men are pretending, or perhaps they actually are sacrificing their lives to build up some illusion with which to dupe the “bourgeoise” world—the illusion that Stalin has abandoned the world revolution and is massacring its Robesplerres. Or perhaps Stalin really is massacring the Robespierres. That is what Max Eastman would have us think. Per- haps he is right. Or perhaps, as Mr. Duranty seems convinced, this plot is genuine. That also is completely pos- sible, inside the revolutionary men- tality. The men on trial assert that they belonged to the Trotzky revolu- tionary group. War Breeds Revolution. ‘War is not something to be avoid- ed. War is inevitable and desirable as the most certain breeding ground for revolution. Lenin and Trotzky did not admire the Germany of the Kaiser, with which in 1917 Russia was at war, but that did not pre- vent them from conspiring with Ger- man military leaders and getting themselves smuggled into Russia with German aid. The Germans sent them to Russia to get Russia out of the war, and they did it, in order to make Rus- sia Bolshevik, in which they also suc- ceeded. At Brest Litovsk they paid the bill, by leaving the Germans and !Austrian.s in occupation of the whole | Ukraine and by handing Germany | outright the Baltic provinces of Ruse | sia. Trotzky, who negotiated that | treaty, was perfectly cold-blooded about it. “Your turn will come next,” he was no doubt saying to the Ger- | mans silently, as he put his signae | ture on the treaty. “What we lost by war we will rewin by revolution.” | Only that particular quotation is not {from a Communist but from a Ger- man Nazi! The business of the revolutionary is to upset the world and strike in the reshuffling process. It is entirely pos- sible that Communist revolutionaries should conspire with Nazi revolution- aries. * x x % | When we turn from the account of this trial to the speech of Leon Blum we again breathe an air in which we | feel somehow safe. Not because M. | Blum has a social and economic the- | ory with which we are all agreed, but | because M. Blum speaks as a Western comprehend. But is there any re- sponsible power left east of the Rhine, except in a few weak. small nations, which speaks his language at all? On that question hangs all our peace. (Copyright. 1937.) { CIENCE wins your fight!. .. No matter what luck you've had be- fore in restoring natural brilliance to teeth, try the amazing effect of IRIUM, the new scientific remedy for dull teeth, contained in Pepsodent alone of powders. For IRIuM makes Pepsodent a remark- ably active tooth powder. At the very first brushing, it speedily loosens the dingy film on teeth and floats it away like magic. IRIUM is a totally new kind of foam- ing ingredient which actually ban- man, according to criteria which we | ever the Soviets decide on a blood purge, the one which occurred in Germany two and a half years ago will appear as a child’s play. It is not impossible that as a result of the present trial there should be a widespread anti-Semitic wave throughout Russia. ‘When the present regime was established in Russia, the Jews were on top practically everywhere. Many were not recognized because of their Russianized names; but none the less, with the exception of Lenin, the great majority of the revolutionaries who established the Soviet regime were Jews. Stalin is a Caucasian worker. Unlike Lenin, he has only a scant education; like most Caucasians he is a nationalist and an anti-Semite. Under his administration most of the Jews have been eased out of office. With the exception of Litvinoff, there are only few men of that race who hold prominent positions; and this 15 more or less natural in a country which is gradually becoming nationalist and militarist. ‘The Jews have seldom been in favor of these two doctrines. * ¥ ¥ ¥ At the present trial the leading defendants are Jews; Radek is a Jew and so is Romm, the former correspondent of the Izvestia in Washington. Trotzky, who has become now in the eyes of the Soviet people the arch- traitor, is, of course, a Jew. The Russian people have been anti-Jewish ever since Russian history is known. Pogroms were organized often during the Czarist regime to cover up a distressing internal corrupt stiuation. Jews were frequently charged by the Czars’ advisers as the principal cause for Russia’s sad economic plight. This time the Soviet government seems to be more afraid of political discontent and is claiming that the Jews are at the bottom of all the present trouble. The Moscow trials show from the testimony of the defenders that ‘Trotzky has been dealing with the Soviet's enemies, the German and the Japanese governments, to yield parts of the republic for the overthrow of the present regime. This seems likely despite the ferocious anti-Semitism of Hitler. After all, the Reichsfuehrer himself did not scorn Jewish financial support when he was fighting to establish Nazism in Germany. And since the Russians are basically nationalistic, regardless of whether the profess communism and internationalism or not, it s not impossible that the betrayal of the Jews might lead to another pogrom. % o x ‘The admission of the defendants that the Reich wanted to separate Southern Russia from Moscow bears out what is known in certain quar- ters to be the war plan of the German general staff in the event of a war with the Soviets. If the German war department was confident that a war with the Soviets would not be difficult, the reason is that it counted on the revolution of the Trotzkysts. The Ukranians, the Cossacks and the Georgians are none too pleased with the Moscow rule. They are believed to be in favor of a new system of autonomy under the wing of a western power, like Germany. And a war in which the Moscow armies would have suffered an initial defeat would have helped greatly the task of the revolutionaries to dispose of Stalin and his crowd even at the price of losing Southern Russia temporarily. The Mdiveni family is mentioned once more in the press: this time there is no question of a spectacular marriage but of a revolutionary in- trigue. ‘The Mdivani family has been split for a long time in a pro-bolshevist branch and a “white” branch. Back in 1921 when the Caucasian republic was independent and was being attacked by the Soviet forces from Azerbaidjan two Mdivanis were in command. The father of the boys with a spectacular marital career was commanding the “white” Georgian troops while their uncle was in command of the red forces. ‘The Japanese government is do- ing some house cleaning in Tokio in preparation for the next Olym- pic games. It has decided to change the advertisements in Eng- lish which constitute a “national shame.” And the government is quite right about it. It would certainly shock Amer- ican and British visitors to see signs which read as follows: “Head P Cutting” in the window of a bar- d ber shop. Or a sign for low-priced suits in one of Tokio’s leading depart- ment stores: “Please Try on Maid"; or what is even worse, in a ladies’ dress making establishment: “Foreign Ladies Has Fits Upstairs.” ‘ ishes film, leaving enamel far cleaner, far more radiant than other methods. Unlike soap in many dentifrices, IRIUM does not encourage deposits of film and tartar. 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When you remember that the mere hint that the Germans were meddling in Spain was enough to start the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 and that Hitler has been back- ing the Spanish rebels for six months without starting a major conflict, you | can understand why more fire alarms have not been turned in. The truth is that the British reck- oned that Spain would keep all the bad boys busy for at least a year. England’s Prestige Rising. Another dmportant factor is Eng- land’s rising prestige in the Mediter- ranean. The British Navy backed | down before Mussolini only because the lords of admiralty feared to lose s0 many capital ships as to encourage | Hitler to start a real Anglo-German | naval race on pre-war lines. The well- | advertised “‘Arab troubles” have since | given London an excuse to maintain and increase strong garrisons and air squadrons in Egypt, Suez, Palestine, Cyprus, Malta and Gibraltar, until today Mussolini’s shoe is on the Brit- ish foot and Italy is in London’s pocket. This means that Mussolini's alli- ance with Hitler is becoming more sentimental than practical and that Germany is becoming more and more lonely in her support of the Spanish rebels. Eden’s speech to the House of | Commons offers a way out for Hitler, | since the British have now set their | face against either a Fascist or & | Communist set-up in Spain. So the war scare is boiling down to the old sad question of “How much?” United States in Picture, Too. We figure in the situation very def- initely. If England opens up Central | Europe to raw materials and credits, | England returns to her old pre-war | position of middleman between North- | ern Europe and the world. This means the abandonment of the Ottawa agreements for “empire free trade” {and & return to freer world trade. The visit of Runciman of the Brit- | ish Board of Trade to the White House and the appointment of one of Prance's ace economic and financial | experts as Ambassador to Washington are reminders that we are expected to put up some of the raw materials in this little transaction—and some of the money, too. They will provide most of the “experience,” as before. If the big deal goes through, the war scare will be pushed into the background and the artificial com- modity boom which is hurting our markets and fleecing our consumers will settle down. | (Copyright. 1937. Register and Tribune 2 Syndicate.) ‘ MILLIONS HAIL IRIUM, THRILLING REMEDY FOR DULL TEETH! Pepsodent alone of tooth powders contains this amazing new scientific discovery for giving teeth thrilling luster with safety. Every brushing leaves a clean, whole- some tingle to rejuvenate your mouth, your sense of taste. Try Pepsodent Powder containing IRIUM. 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