The evening world. Newspaper, May 24, 1920, Page 18

ESTABLISHED BY JOSEPH Ciorin, 5, Company, Nos. 53 to 6 Fark Row. New Tork. THE DIRECTING POWER. HE vote was forced through by strong-arm methods, and without a roll-call, by men never attend meetings.” is was the disgruntled comment of one of the leaders of the Central Federated Union the decisive defeat administered to the ex- last Friday by the more conservative who repudiated C. F. U. support of an nt Labor Party and reaffirmed support of _ F. of L. political policies. n who never attend meetings” are a force to reckoned with in labor circles. This faction is all too often disregarded both by the extremists and ; nts of sane unionism. day night’s meeting was typical of much re- activity in labor organization. In the last lysis, the men who “never attend meetings” hold ‘Palance of power and are the real directing in unionism, tr J. Brady, who led the fight Friday, was bably right in saying, “The real labor men are ‘a majority here, and to-night they showed it.’”* ‘ men who are representative of the great mass of organized labor will not be found following he devious lead of extremists after they sense the a in the path. They are for sane, construc- » statesmanlike action. The most serious re that can be brought against them is that they attend meetings.” of the biggest tasks facing organized labor is ng its membership to a realization of its im- Extension of industry in America has raised organ- Jabor until it is almost an arm of government ‘ ly a mighty force in national affairs. n labor ought at least to regard itself as. fiously as other elements of national life regard it. ‘must measure up to its new responsibilities. must prove representative of itself. se organized labor is important, members ve duties, The most important is to attend ngs and take a constructive interest in election F representatives and formulation of policies, to 21 against “boring from within” and misrepre- atative leadership. America will have nothing to fear from an organ- a on of labor in which the “men who never attend yeetings” throw off their apathy and take over gtive direction-of labor affairs. ts THE END OF CARRANZA. a fortunate thing for the de facto Govern- of Mexico that blame for the killing of nza fell upon no revolutionist. lie movement which overthrew Carranza polit- has derived a large part of its credit from its ince of ne*dless bloodshed and its professed e to be regarded as a moral revolt. Gen. Ybre in his reply to the message which an- nounced Carranza’s death, takes no pains to conceal $ Opinion of the thirty-two officers who made their escape when they should have defended the President's life. irranza is dead. ‘With him dies, it is to be the worst of the Hidalgo spirit, the irritahle iness and suspicion which made dealing *xico during his regime a prickly business, dliness with the United States may or may the basic policy of his successors, at least there is fair promise that the Presi- F Mexico will no longer be the strongest influ- persuading Mexicans that Uncle Sam has and a tail. THE. INDEPENDENT VOTE. DER the caption, “What Does It Mean?” the Evening Mail says: ‘This week's instalment of tls Literary poll of Presidential preferences which the total vote up to 1,360,919 shows that 730 Democrats have made their mark in Republican column, while 25,730 Republi- ns we made their mark in the Democratic ‘It would seem that seven Democrats look the party fence to every Republican does the same. Digest’s figures are a remarkable commen- the size of the Independent vote and its nce in the coming campaign. voter in every six who have expressed their e has gone outside the party in which he claims minal membership. he Digest poll also shows where the Indepen- t ote has been. It lists itself as Democratic it has been the force behind Wilson liberal- 1 essivism, : more significant is the distribution of Presi- ferences of the 182,730 nominal Demo- express preference for Republican candi- than 45 per cent. of the Democrats who over the fence” have their eyes focused on entitled to the use for republication to M6 oF nos otherwise eredited in this paper é common with what has always been regarded as “Republicanism.” If the “Old Guard” fs able to get any consolation out of the Digest poll, it s welcome, Whether 1920 is a “Republican year” or Demo- cratic depends on the Chicago and San Francisco conventions. The Independents have no sympathy with either “Old Guardisin” or “Bourbonism.” —_- Impressions to the contrary, the Old Guard can- not “nominate a yellow dog and get away with it,” )| If the Literary Digest figures mean anything. * DOOMED? 'S NEW YORK to sink to the level of a fiftfi-rate port? : ‘That is a question which ought to be uppermost Just now in every adult mind that professes to be interested in the future of this city. ; The best brains in New York—and there are some good ones available—ought to be concentrated on the answer. It is no longer a questioN of what may or might happen. It is a question of what is happening. In the face of facts and figures like those which Martin Green is now presenting in The Evening World, it is folly to deny that the other Atlantic ports of Baltimore, Boston, Philadelphia, Norfolk and Savannah are already outting big slices out of the foreign trade of the Port of New York, It is estimated that 80 per cent. of the export freight which would normally pass through New York is now being diverted to other ports, Is it to be wondered at that these other ports are spending millions of dollars on harbor and dock improvements which they are pushing to swift com- pletion in order to retain this trade? Cannot Baltimore well afford $50,000,000 for new piers and warehouses and $2,000,600 more for harbor dredging when commerce is slipping away from the obsolete harbor facilities, the clumsy and costly transfer methods, which have made the Port of New York a back number? This is fair and legitimate competition. No re- vision of preferential freight rates can keep trade from falling away from a port that fails to keep up with the times. “New York possesses the most wonderful natural water-front in the world.” That’s a fine/ pld saying and a true one, But Nature never gy ranteed that the Port of New York should retain emacy on its natural advantages, regardless of far it let itself fall behind in mod- ern port improvements. Here’s another instance of how too much self- complacent prating about New York as “the wonder city of the world”.can leave New York with the “wonder” while other cities get the business, The idea that in a great post-war revival of world commerce a lion's share was bound to come to New York merely on the strength of this port's name and past prestige is marked for explosion. Commerce is already steering away from New York, and other more progressive American ports are welcoming it with open arms and making plans to hold it, 4 All this could have been foreseen, It was fore- seen by the few to whom “Port Improvement” has seemed something more than a vague proposition good any time the next fifty years, There ought to be in existence and active at the Present moment a powerful board made up of the most progressive, expert and far-sighted men the great City of New York could summon, That board should be developing the Port of New York with all the authority and money this munic- tpality could supply—and by the Port of New York we mean a great harbor area and water frontage which takes in the New Jersey shore and includes the co-operation of New Jersey in modernizing port facilities of which the Jersey terminals constitute an essential part. New York's present Municipal Administration has not had the brains or the will to grasp this need. Unless compelling pressure comes from an intelli- gent citizenship awake to the danger, New York's prestige as a port is doomed, Official initiative is lacking. Will a million citizens resolve themselves into a committee to demand action before it is too late? Save the Port of New York! A far larger circle than one made up of New York newspaper men will feel the loss of Gustay C. Roeder, for thirty-four years a reporter for The World. One of the sharpest and most able probers that ever dug into dark places where truth and justice were needed, he was at the same time the most genial and companionable of men. Hig keen eye twinkled kindliness and humor. His friends were legion. Much of his work, ineluding his vivid descrip- tion of conditions in Germany during 1915 and 1916, will rank among the best reporting of this generation, ‘There are few corners in his own or any other Profession in this city where some one will not Nowhere to Go but Back! Copyright. 1920, Ry Tas Prone Bublanid Co (The' Now York Krening World) ,. By J. H. Cass gl i Gs el as, eth 7 ribs * area hundred? There is fine mental exercise and a lot of satisfaction in trying to say much in few words. Take time to be brief. —— “Work or Jail.” ‘To the Editor of The Drening World: Allow me to suggest a way to speed up production in this country of ours, Editors all over the country are putting the blame on the poor labor- ing man’s shoulders. On any week day, in any city in the United States, you can see hun- dreds of thousands of men and boys and women just idling away their tume. Go to a ball game, go to a matinee in any theatre, and you will eee why our country is lagging in production. Go to @ racetrack and see thousands aad thousands of men and young men gambling openly (which is.& crime), and wasting pre- clous time (which is also a crime, but not forbidden by law). My suggestion is to start a slogan, “Work or Jail,” such as we had dur- ing the war in “Work or Fight."" JACK DIAMOND, Jamaica, L. ¥., Ma 21, 1920. Physictans’ Fees, ‘To the Baitor of The Brening World: So the anti-profiteering furore has spread so that attacks are made on profiteering doctors! Probably, despite his “position to know the injustice of physicians’ fees.” Eugene Pratt never peyson- ally gave much serious thought to the struggle a doctor must undergo before he becomes safely planted on a firm base. For ‘his sake as well as for others may I volunteer some in- formation? With very few exceptions all can- didates for the degree of M. D. must be graduates of a four-year academic high school} ‘Then they are given the pleasure of a two years’ struggle in & pre-medical college, in the mean time putting themselves in debt due to tremendous expense and inability to earn enough to cover it. Then fol- low five years of medical college and hospital, and last but not least a few years to establish a practice, Does not Mr. Pratt think a physi- cian entitled to $2 a visit for the pleasure of being called out of a the- atre at the most interesting part or away from his meal before he can sate his hunger? ALFRED 'T, SALZMAN, Ph, G. Brooklyn, Ma; 1920, What Americaninm Ien't, ‘To the Yalitor of The Brening World, Read your “Forum” column and became interested in reading J. B. Simpson's letter asking for an edi- torial on Americanism ‘The people elect men to represent them in Albany, but one man, a Mr. Sweet, overrules many thousands of voters and removes these members. The Constitution was not made for Sweet nor any one of his calibre, That is Americanism for you, ‘ Mr, Palmer, who is also looking fur a feather in his cap, is always diseov- plots and counterplots, If he Scadlaten toe tiest tase & manac why doesn’t he arrest them? ie knows where they are, 0 he «aya, Mr, ROM EVENING WORLD READERS What kind of a letter do you find most readable? Isn’t it the one that gives you the worth of a thousand words in a couple of | Palmer, where are those profiteers you | promised to get? Why don't you arrest those Reds? Stop bluffing. Don't be a fourflusher. Don’t teach us your ideas of Americanism. Congress spends billions a year on Preparedness, but balks at giving the “boys” a bonus. Of what good wiii your ships and guns be if the people become disgusted with your sneaky, underhand methods and refuse to fight tor you? The same Congress paid $30 a month to soldiers to give up their lives fo: a glorious cause, while stay-at-homes | recelved $100 per week and worked in comparative safety. The worker is! still making big money and has his| old job, while the soldier only has| beautiful promises and lungs fuli cf| gas. Why didn’t you draft your working | army, Mr, Crowder, and pay them also | $20 per month, preventing the profiteer from making millions out of bloud- shed? Now after you created ‘hese fougers You aqueal that you can't tnd em. Of course we understand that you must not serve the people, otherwise the same fate would befall you as d.d the Socialists, but don’t forget tuat you are teaching us Americanism in & most bitter way. ¥ New York, May 21, 1920, Comfert for Women. ‘To the Editor of The Breaing World: I take a great delight in reading the different opinions of readérs pub- ished in The Evening World, and am writing this to take exception to the many letters appearing recently against ladies crossing their limbs in the subway and surface cars. Most men will always be seen seated with crossed legs, so it must be a comfortable position or they wouldn't do so. Why should these few prudish men who have written these letters try to force ladies to abandon a comfortable position for one of forced posture? Iam not a lady but I desire to see the ladies have exactly the same privileges as we have. There are some men who will stare at a lady if they can see four inches above her ankle, but thank goodness we are not all in that class. RBPAD! New York City, May 21, 1920, Discard the Collar, To the Extitor of ‘The Brening Work | I am opposed to a union for white collar men because I know that it would but serve as a fresh impetus to the upward trend of the H. C. L. and might precipitate and make more fearful the final crash which will in- evitably come. If these W. C. men are dissatistied with their present Jobs, the manly Fn nnn nnn nnn neato AAPA RADAR NIRA RA AAA thing to do is to get out, enter some other ficld and discard the white col- jar if necessary. It is not fair either to their empl r ves to growl and D ‘ UNCOMMON SENSE day. truth, to do on a crowded avenue. tition. go down rather than up. When you enter a race, last. place is extremely difficult. although she had excellent plished her purpose. that you are going up, and will go, spicuous, practically free field. before you get there, jail or the poor house, where themselves, Life is always a competition of some kind. to go to the top we find hundreds of others going the same way—all trying to cut in ahead of us, as a chauffeur tries By John Blake (Copyright, 1920, by John Blake.) THE EASIEST WAY. “I'm either going to be the worst artist in America or the best,” observed a youthful maker of pictures the other “You'll have more competitors if you try to be the worst,” said his boss, thereby uttering a great and important If we seek If we are headed the other way we find not hundreds but thousands of competitors. What the baseball writers call the cellar championship is not easily attained, There is always too much compe- Human beings are so constructed that they prefer to therefore, don’t try to finish It can be done of course, but attaining the very last Yvette Guilbert, the famous French singer, determined to be known as the homeliest woman in the world. But equipment she never accom- Make up your mind when you begin your life's work you will probably get there. Make up your mind that you are going down, and down you But you will never go down far enough to be con- Success means distinguishing one’s self. And it is hard to distinguish yourself in a crowd. Pick the upward route, work hard and, although you will find many competitors, they will drop out one by one as the job becomes more difficult, leaving you at last a Pick the downward route and your competitors. will increase by the hundreds as you travel. tom place, which is the only one that will get you even the attention of your fellows, is likely to be well occupied long , And the very bot- And even when you get there, although you may have made yourself conspicuous, you will probably be either in very few people really enjoy the efforts of thelr co-workers and employers to keep the machinery of business going forward progressively. Let them also consider the drastic rules and regulations which the member of @ union has to contend with, Personal initiative counts for naught, and their own identity be- comes lost in a maze of index cards, only brought forth when there is @ question of dues and 6o forth. Then the union methods of bull- dozing are & matter of common knowledge. An instance: Recently there walked into the store of a gro- cer in my vicinity, who is not a union man, three “walking dele- gates” smoking three fat cigars and gazing ~ He the nly. ‘These men, by way, are support a few moments to the investiga- tion of the grocer’s bread bin, much to his amazement, they coolly informed him that he could not continue to sell a certain brand of bread, that it did not bear the union label ‘and hence was taboo. I was glad to learn that he suggested that they locate the hole in the wall left by the builders for the purpose of es- caping. And they did. But, sad to say. every union man ix the neighborhood is forbidden to deal with him under penalty of a fine. So the long arm of the union reaches even to outsid- ers, it appears. I hope the white collar men will place patronizingly, | come ponder well before deciding to be- coe i | 1879, Handed Out Books to Famous Americans in _ 41 Years in Library Carl H. A. Bjerregaard, Seventy-five Years Old To-Day, Selected Ameri-~ can Histories for Roosevelt; Gree ly, Admiral Peary, Mark Twain,’ Howells, Rockefeller and Morgan, Have Consulted Re‘erence Books‘ in His Room. ‘Q7AARL H. A. BJERREGAARD,, Chief of the Readers’ Section of the New York Public Library, will celebrate his seventy-ffth birth-* jday to-day probably with a hard® : day's work at the duties he has fol-* |lowed for the past forty-one years, Born in 1845 in the little town of: ‘Frederica, Denmark, the feudal seat! of his viking ancestors, Mr. Bjer-‘ |regaard has had a life of wide in-‘ | terests. As @ young man he served in the Danish Army in the Schleswig-! |Holstein War in 1863, acted as a |#cout and spy und faced an Austrian jfiring squad when captured, Later jhe became an officer of intantry in }sarrison town, but gave up his com- mission and came to the United States in 1873. Here he worked as a teacher and lecturer until he became | associated with the Astor Library in Knew Many Famous Men, Mr. Bjerregaard, sitting at his desk in the reading room of the library on the third floor of the 424 Street side, smiled to-day when a reporter suggested that the quiet library was a strange place for a man Who had had so many adven- tures in hig youth, “I have found plenty of interest here,” he said. “Do you know that if you should take the names of all those quiet, studious men at the tables yonder they would read like extracts from ‘Who's Who in America? Most every prominent man and woman in America has come through these doors to look up some point of interest during my years here, I often think of New York City as a great highway from which: all roads lead out into the world, It is like the Appian Way, along which We see the whole world pass by. “I remember, in the 80's, how the late Theodore Roosevelt ‘came to study at the old Astor Library. Day and night he would read American history, only that. He soaked him- self in the subject; knew it thorough- ly and. still studied on. Admiral Peary came here to study before his last Successful dash to the Pole. Gen. Greely of the ill-fated Greely ex- pedition studied here also, Mark Twain and William Dean Howells both haunted the library, “Business men come here; both Rockefeller and Morgan have been here. There are inventors, artiste, doctors, scientists, writers, poets, students, business men, soldiers—th whole world come to us here, m What Is Read. © “Every one comes here for a preo- tical reason, And they read odd things. The city directories are wide- ly read; by people looking up miasing relatives, by lawyers, detectives, busl- ness men compiling business Hsts. The telephone directories of distant mid- western and westcoast cities are often called for, Books on American his- tory, Americanization and Buglisk grammars are always in demaad. Americanization is a great function of the library, and we always try to make foreigners speak English in ask- ing for books, and encourage them in learning our language and customs. They want to learn, too. I have essen young Japanese students sitting here and writing poetry in English by the hour, just to acquire facility in the tongue. Has Written on Philosophy. Mr. Bjerregaard has written many ‘books on the inner life, often called reysticism. He is a close student of the Oriental philosophies, although he decries the sham Orlentalsm that haa become widespread throughout the country. He was one of the leaders in the Greenacre Movement in Boston, and among his books are “The Inner Life and the Tao-Teh-King,” a book that the Emperor of China despatched a messenger from the Chinese Lega- tion at Washington to precure, and “The Great Mother.” He has lectured widely on philosophy and mysticism, Americanization in the Library, “There is much that will interest @ man here,” said Mr. Bjerregaard in concluding the interview, “but the Americanization I have’ spoken of ts the finest thing of all. The greatness of the Nation depends on the educa- tion of its people, and it is a wonder-f ful sign that all the peoples who come to us from foreign lands are so aux- jous to learn all about the history, language and customs of thelr new country. Their study is indefatigable. They come early in the morning and siay until the last thing at night. Men and women come to study here dur- ing their vacations, They want to learn more, to increase their store of information, to develop new ideas. They are not boy and girl students, they @re men and women, many of them well educated in other lands, who want to absorb Americanism. To see them here and to ald them is one ot the greatest pleasures of this work.” ——__—.——-- Tobacco From Sumatra, i Arrangements have been com pleted in Singapore on behalf of a large tobacce-producing com- pany of Medan, Sumatra, for the shipment of the balance of the 1918 tobacco crop, the value of which is stated to exceed $25,000,000, It is ewpected that 22,500 tons of the product wif have deen shipped to Holland by the end of December, 1919, e e's The Hair Net in Chefoo. Up to the middle of May, 1918, the production of hair nets in Shantung Province and the de mand abroad increased greatly, and although the cost of prow duction slightly advanced, the cost of nets to the ultimate consumer declined greatly unt nets in the United States re Vu