St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 28

i 1 in; ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, FRIDAY, JUNE 12, 1931. PAGE 2G THE UNITED STATES AND REPARATIONS. Alanson B. Houghton, former Ambassador to Ger many and Great Britain, speaking at the commence ST.

LOU IS POST-DISPATCH Founded by JOSEPH PULITZER Veeember 12. IS71 Publiihei by The Pulitzer Publishing Company Twcljtk Boulevard i Olivt Street ment exercises of the Carnegie Institute of Technol-ogy, warned of world chaos unless all the great nations aid Germany in her present crisis. He declared, as Chancellor Bruening told England a few days be fore, that Germany's collapse "must not be regarded THE POST-DISPATCH PLATFORM as impossible cr perhaps far removed." "I want you to realize," he said, "that 12 years after the war the situation Is not improving-and may be changing for the worse. Germany, I am inclined to or 4.8 per cent, from 1930, as compared with the 17 per cent decrease for all products. The assurance of good crops in the central region gives hopes for further revival in grain and livestock shipments.

Jt WHAT "PROTECTION" REALLY MEANS. It seems certain that the tariff will play an Important part in coming political discussions. It will undoubtedly be raised in the next Congress and be an issue in the election of 1932. Few public spirited citizens, whatever their views on the tariff, would disagree with the proposition that it is a problem calling for the best thought of the American electorate. One thing, however, which hampers clear thinking on the tariff is the very word used to describe a system of high tariffs "protection." Tariff beneficiaries have played artfully upon this word to further their interests.

Is it not the function of the Government to protect? We protect our citizens from robbers, our buildings from fire, our workers from insanitary conditions, our children from disease. Are the prosperity of the American farmer and manufacturer, and the standard of living of the American worker, not worthy of protection against the competition of cheap foreign goods? Thus runs an argument familiar to every American. It sounds plausible, and its insidious appeal has won probably mil believe, has been pushed about as far as she can go. His statement that the United States' relation to Germany's finances was comparatively trifling, however, was misleading. "Even if we remitted the payments now coming to us," he 6aid, "the action would I know that my rellrement will vike bo difference In Its cardinal principles; that ft mill always fight for progress and reform, never tolerate Injustice or corruption, always fight demas-oft-ues of all parties, never belong to any party, always oppose privileged classes and public plunderers, never lack sympathy with the poor, always remain devoted to the public welfare, never bo satisfied with merely printing news; always be drastically Independent! never bo afraid to attack wrong whether by predatory plutocracy, or predatory poverty.

JOSEPH PIXITZEU. April 10, 1907. have little, if any, direct effect upon existing world conditions of depression and unemployment." That is true of Germany's direct obligation to the United States, which, as explained on this page on June is inconsiderable. But it is not true of the sums lent by us to the Allies, which are enormous. The payments due on these sums are made by the Allies, who in turn collect from Germany the sums that Germany owes to them.

Hence, Germany's bankruptcy will af LETTERS FROM THE PEOPLE lions of votes. fect nearly all of the obligations of the Allies to the United States. The Allies cannot pay to us what they A brief analysis of this type of argument, which underlies much of the present support of "protec are unable to collect, because they are all, possibly excepting France, in serious financial straits. Justice Hughes and the Supreme Court. To the Editor of the Post -Dispatch: rrt he Post-Dispatch has voiced the tion," will show that it is based on a completely false idea as to the nature and benefits of trade.

It as The former Ambassador is wise in suggesting that J- pleasure of all liberals in the recent relief must come to Germany by the action of all her sumes that the foreigner who comes to sell us goods is a thief in the night, against whom the state should creditors. But the inevitable conclusion forces itself upon us that other nations either will not or cannot do thi3 unless the United States still further reduces their burdens. The argument commonly advanced by those who protect its people. But in fact he is the merchant, bringing products that foreign countries can produce more cheaply to exchange for American goods which our resources and our industrial organization enable us to produce more cheaply. Instead of taking work from Americans, foreign trade gives Americans the chance to work in those lines in which our country is most efficient.

We cannot sell unless favor such action on our part is a sound one. We were either in the war or out of it. If we wish to consider that our entry into the war was a mistake and that we are -now in the position of ordinary mon we buy, and the higher the tariff, the less we can buy ey lenders who advanced cash to the Allies when it was needed and now insist upon its payment in full, and the less we can sell. It is against the spirit of progress represented by trade, and not against our only question is that which faces any other creditor, the question whether our debtor has enough money to pay and can be forced to do so. But if we consider that the war was our war, we must credit thieves, that we are "protected" by high tariffs.

What "protection" does is to give a subsidy to some producers at the expense of other producers who our former allies with honesty in their present point are more efficient or whose production is more suited to American conditions. Perhaps it is desirable to of view, which is that for a long period after our entry into that war, while we were mobilizing and decisions concurred in by Mr. Chier justice Hughes. Ut-spite his liberal leanings as Governor of New York, he became a candidate for President by the support of the Tory-Eastern-Standpat wing of the Republican party. He later became the head of the Cabinets of both Harding and Coolidge, without any visible uneasiness in that dubious company, or public expression of disapproval.

And finally he accepted the nomination to return to the bench from President Hoover. It was inevitable that the liberals of the Senate, both Democrats and Republicans, would fear his return and oppose his confirmation. The Constitution-olatry that holds a secular document as sacred, despite its flexibility in the hands of the Justices of the Supreme Court; the popular belief that has grown up that the Supreme Court alone has the final power of interpretation over not only the executive and legislative branches of the Federal Government, but also over the states in matters not only legal but often executive and political, and the fact that the Judges rule practically for life without any necessary restraint whatever from popular opinion and will all these factors make the Supreme Court In many varied matters an almost absolute dictator of an otherwise democratic republic. It is generally recruited from aging, buc-cessf ul lawyers with a natural tendency to conservatism, biased by court practice for wealthy clients. The Supreme Court was the last stronghold of the waning power of slavery.

It may become in the future the last stronghold of an antisocial capitalism being restrained to social uses. Despite the importance of the cases decided, I fear liberals must not be too hopeful of the Chief Justice's renewed ive such subsidies under certain conditions, but that is an issue which should be decided on its own mer its. One of the most vicious features of our so- called "protection" is that it subsidizes, in an under training our soldiers to fight, they were protecting our lives with their own. We were furnishing money, they blood. We were taking notes for our loans; they were sacrificing lives for which there was no accounting.

And they are now srpporting by pensions and by dole the dependents of 5,000,000 of the dead, where our loss in lives was only 126,000. And as to the wounded, their list mounted to nearly ours to 234,300. hand way by money taken from the pockets of the American consumer, industries that the public would never consent to subsidize by a direct bounty raised through taxation. 'gspSa As virtually every American believes in protec What Europe is calling for today is a revaluation tion in the sense of fire or police protection, to put the tariff issue to him as a choice between supporting or opposing "protection" is much like asking the of human life, a definite acceptance the principle that we were in fact participants in a war in which our money shall no longer be more sacred than famous question, "Have you stopped beating your wife?" The tariff can be discussed in its true light their lives. Dr.

Nicholas Murray Butler says the WHERE GERMANY IS BEING DRIVEN. if the public will realize that the issue is not "pro war debts cannot be paid and must be charged to tection," but whether some Americans are to be taxed profit and loss. Whether that is entirely true or not, in order to subsidize other Americans. Good argu Regulating Highway Transput. ments can be advanced for subsidizing certain indus progressivism.

His enhanced prestige is tries, at least temporarily; but once the halo of the word "protection" can be dragged from the brow of the tariff, the way has been prepared for an intel making Germany the sole debtor has brought her to a perilous pass. For us to ameliorate that burden may be the means of helping her out of the chaos into which Mr. Houghton fears she is about to sink. Apparently the time has passed for considering if the Allied nations would only apply their remissions to more armament. We are faced by necessity.

From Railway Age. THE interests of the ef rr.ar. facturers and operators of -wej trucks and of shippers are volved in the question of regulanun ci ligent discussion of the issues involved. a danger. Even as Governor, Mr.

Hughes opposed the amendment'legalizing Federal income taxes. The utilities and other giants have not yet been tried in his court. Stone and Roberts have not served long. The only dependable liberals are still Bran-dels and Holmes, one nearly SO and the other over 90 years of age. L.

E. Rolla, Jlo. Can Japan Save China? China faces perils of Communist conquest and destructive civil war, Frenchman v.rites; unable to defend herself, only mandate by Powers to Japan to restore order can preserve nation; views Nippon as wrongly suspected by western pacifists of imperialist designs vhen she desires only peace; assails Nanking regime as tyrannical. Dr. A.

Lcgendre in Mercure de France, Paris; (Reprinted from Living Age.) IN DARKEST TENNESSEE. Tennessee stands pat. An effort to repeal its anti- riers by highway, but the real is s. evolution law failed in the House of Representatives to the interest of the public. The National Automobile Chancer Commerce has filed with the Commerce Commission a memorar.l'jra posing "the imposition of more f-' ernmental control over comn.cn truck operation," on the grounds that by the convincing vote of 5S to 14.

The earth did not evolve, but was created in six days. Contrary testimony in the rocks, in plants and animals, and FLOOD NEWS FROM BROADWAY. J. J. Shubert has returned, says the Broadway gossip column of the New York Times, from St.

Louis, where Municipal Opera "annually takes place in the open summer air, the Mississippi permitting." From this learned comment, we judge that news of the 1927 flood at last has penetrated to Gotham, in man himself, is false. Darwin, Lamarck and Huxley are impostors. Their followers are a deluded multitude. That is Tennessee's story. Officially, the State has learned nothing since this law was put on the books or since the Scopes trial brought down upon it the amazement and ridicule of the civilized world.

though in rather garbled form. So this for the benefit of Broaclwayites interested in facts about for eign parts: The opera, being farther from the river Hooter's Pica I'ades Under Analysis. To the Editor of the Fost-Dls patch: rTT HE number of comments In this col-umn on the President's Valley Forge platitudes is certainly encouraging and indicative of a general awakening or the people. Mr. Hoover's patriotic plea will not stand analysis.

When exposed to the light of simple logic, it loses Its appeal. Certainly there is no similarity between President Hoover's sit-tight attitude and the spirit of '76. If our citizens of today had more of the red blood which flowed through the veins of the soldiers at Valley Forge, we would have already found a way out of this sad economic crisis. President Hoover is just kidding us all. himself included.

Plutocracy does not want to see manifest the Epirit of '76. WILLIS D. AYLESWORTH. ernmerUal interference with prhai- should not be extended," anj u.at ir. regulation is not desired by be in the interest of shippers or the eral public.

The interest of the public is to fcv, nC class of traffic handled by that iify can handle it the most econoii'L nYy. inferences in service considered. Government policies aid highway earners: take traffic from the railways. It. wo-' be in the public interest for to i taken from them by other other agencies could render as pc--i tw at a lower total cost than the ra better service at as low a total v'.

Subsidizing of highway carri'r than the width of Manhattan, has melody as usual no matter what the river does, and never requires rafts for spectators. Perhaps somebody tried to tell Broadway how the River des Peres used to invade the dressing rooms, and the cable report was slight taxation oi private motorisTs ani i eral public for the benefit of these v. ship by highway and in the l1- to tl railways of earnings from traffic hi'-h ti could handle at a lower total cost thari can be handled on the high-' s. 0 viously, it is contrary to the pubii- for highway transportation to be vjtfciitr'-with the result of both increasing taxation and unwarrantably OUR RESPONSIBILITY FOR ALIENS. The killing at Ardmore, of two Mexican students by a deputy sheriff is likely to cost the United States a pretty penny.

Claims have been filed by the Mexican Government for indemnity and will undoubtedly be paid unless it can be shown that the students, one of whom was related to President Ortiz Rubio, were guilty of serious law violation. It is a principle of international law that nations are responsible for reasonable protection to aliens while they conduct themselves in accordance with the laws of the land. Last December, speaking on this point, Solicitor Hackworth of the State Department said: The alien is supposed to accept the laws and institutions which the residents of the country find suitable to themselves and assumes a relationship toward the state of his residence generally referred to by writers as "temporary allegiance" (The state should) afford aliens means of redress for injuries which must not be less adequate than those afforded nationals of the We paid Italy a $25,000 Indemnity for the lynching of 12 Italians in New Orleans in 1S91, after diplomatic relations had been severed in protest. The Italians 'were killed by a mob while they were in jail in connection with the murder of a New Orleans Mayor. For acts of violence against Chinese in the Northwest, we paid several hundred thousand dollars.

Perhaps if there were some way of forcing the locality in which an act of brutality toward aliens occurs to foot the bill, we should have fewer incidents of this nature. I i the earning capaciiy of the "Reminding the commission fit rJ regulation had been enacted to y. t'ct ti shipping public from arl ur fair treatment," counsel for the Natio" Automobile Chamber of Commerce fl lar" that "the testimony of shippers ir.Jf'.4-clearly the absence of any netd protection from highway carrf'T. Passing or the Gigolo. To the Editor of the Post-Dispatch: OW that, the gigolo industry has A gone into bankruptcy, we may be able to turn on our radios without getting an ear full of "Just a Gigolo." In the city of New York alone, some 2000 of these whoopee loafers may have to go to work.

Stern reality and the depression in the night club racket have put a crimp in another post-war custom indulged in and supported by foolish women. Police records show that many of these feather-footed "boy friends" were scheming criminals. Some were well known to the law to have been procurers. Others have been trailed and trapped for mysterious jewel robberies. Music hacks and sweet-scented crooners who write and sing songs of this type should be corralled with the gigolo buzzards and the whole aggregation relegated to the rubbish heap.

james Mcintosh, Hot Springs. Ark. CHINA is in a state of complete decay, and the prospect of the Bolsheviza-tion of this enormous nation seems an only too immediate possibility. What is the best counterpoise to the growing menace of Moscow? Japan, without a doubt. That nation alone can erect an effective barrier against the Bolshevist assault on China.

But Japan cannot proceed successfully unless it maintains itself solidly in Manchuria, which is like a little fort protecting Northern China and Korea. Through Manchuria, as far as the frontiers of Japanese Korea, the Bolsheviks are extending their power along the Chinese Eastern Railway. China wants this railway, but what can it do in the face of Moscow, which is more Czarist in Asia now than it was under the Czars? Moscow's attack on Northern Manchuria represents a permanent menace to Japan. Bolshevist Russia is installing itself and digging in all along the Chinese frontier, seeking mastery over China's communications and strategic centers. Japan is on guard against this dangerous neighbor In 1910 it annexed Korea, which is an advanced bastion protecting the Japanese archipelago.

It has also established itself in Southern Manchuria by means of the railway Inherited from Russia after the war of 1904-05. It has constructed a railway of great strategic value running from Antung to Mukden. Recently Japan has also built a railway in Western Manchuria which is to join the Chinese Eastern Railway at Tsitsihar. a railway that annoys Moscow very much, since it will allow a body of troops to cut that great railway to Vladivostok. China is incapable of holding Russia in check in Manchuria and thus of protecting Korea.

Only Japan is able to do this, and in protecting itself it is protecting China. Moreover, there is no doubt at all that Japan is assuring world peace by blocking the assaults of Moscow. To the west and south we see China, immense China, always suffering from revolution and upheaval since the Republic was installed in 1912. In spite of Washington, which has given Nanking firmer support than has any other capital. China keeps on drifting, looking for some new equilibrium it will never find as long as it remains in the clutches of the Kuomintang.

Japan wants peace In China and an improvement in the economic situation, which ha been greatly damaged by civil war and by the Nanking Government. But Tokio can well be reproached for its weakness toward Young China, even when its own considerable interests are at stake. The only energetic action Japan has taken was it intervention at Tslnanfu in Shantung when tha Japanese colony was threatened with a general massacre. But Tokio, always anxious about foreigu opinion and above all about American opinion, withdrew its troops from Shantung at a' time when they would have been abla to make an imposing impression on all the Chinese factions. Civil war could have been stopped.

stabilization might have begun and perhaps the unfortunate Chinese people would have been at peace-Why did Japan not profit from this unique opportunity? The reason is that all the little religious and pacifist groups in America have always opposed Japan. All the Socialist committees in Europe and all our leagues for the rights of man raise their voices in denunciation of Japanese imperialism, ignoring its real aims. Tokio dares not brave the abuse of these noisy professional It bows and submits. What is the result? Every informed European familiar with Chinese affairs predicts the same thing continued anarchy, fratricidal war. bloodshed, misery, famine.

Moscow gaining a new and important triumph in the heart of Central China. a Is it not strange that these -mic humanitarians are interested only the most questionable element in Chir.c, in young politicians without plans or consciences, tyrants who know how to talk the jargon of democracy and thus spread illusions about themselves? The common, despoiled masses, massacred by traitors and bandits, are not considered at all. None the less. Japan continues to defend the cause of peace, and by occupying certain strategic positions in Manchuria has happily been able to paralyze up to now the most dangerous plans of Moscow, which have often been put in motion with the assistance of the Imprudent Young. China movement and with the indirect aid of the great American Republic, whose hostility to Japan has been made all too obvious in recent years.

The United States ought to recognize that the present social order in the world cannot last and that peace cannot be established unless Japan is backed up in its resistance to Bolshevist barbarism. Does America, in paying court to Young China, want to repulse Japan and compel that country to ally Itself with Moscow and Berlin? Suppose the great Towers had had the" courage to give Japan a mandate to reestablish order in China. A whol em of civil war, massacre and ruin would have been avoided. Millions of poor Chinese, chiefly peasants, would not have died in battle or from starvation, and the economic crisis would be less acute throughout the world. But if such a mandate had been given to Japan, think of the clamor from the professional pacifists and Christian democrats, especially in America.

Would there really have been any risk In confiding such a task to Japan? I do not believe so. That great people now aspires only to live in peace and to nourish its overabundant population. Obviously some compensation should be given in return for such an effort, chiefly recognition by the major Powers of Japan's special Interests and rights in the Western racific. There is, therefore, no oth-r policy at the present time but to support Japan in Its difficult labors. Or must we look forward to more irreparable damage? truck transportation Is subject to tV! effective possible regulation tint competition." It was "sharp ccrv.P'-'-''3 between the railways that causf 1 r-ra'.

and th othr fnrmt nf unfai- 1i.T:r.;nat!0 ly muddled in translation, to read "Father of Rivers" instead of "River of the Fathers." But the big sewer changed all that, "and the annoying little stream, torrents, smells and all, now is safely underground. If the "See America First" movement ever gets anywhere, maybe some adventurous Broadway denizen will journey out this way to see the Municipal Opera. Well, he needn't bring his water wings. STORY OF CAR LOADINGS. For many years the weekly computations of revenue freight car loadings were accepted as the most significant barometer of what the country's business was doing.

If merchandise was selling, the theory ran, most of it moved by freight, and the record of car loadings told the story. If grain, livestock and ore were being marketed, the shipments reflected the extent. Using this criterion for checking business activities of 1931, a considerable loss Is seen from the totals of 1930 and 1929. Figures for the last week in May, just issued by the American Railway Association, show 710,931 carloads, as compared with S60.064 for the same week in 1930, and 972,823 for 1923. This would indicate a 17 per cent drop in business from last year, and a loss of 27 per cent from 1929.

Railway Age points out that loadings now are down virtually to the figure for 1921. a year of severe depression, and calls this "a significant and even startling fact." However, additional factors now enter, altering the oracular character of car loadings from their status in other days. The railroads' steady loss of freight business to trucks and waterways causes their record of loadings no longer to tell the complete story. Even the carriers are able to find a ray of cheer in the report for the week ending May 30, though it showed a drop of 44.137 cars from the previous week. This shrinkage, amounting to 5.6 per cent, is explained by the Memorial day holiday.

However, the contraction for that week in 1930 wa3 8.6 per cent. The decreases from last year's totals grow steadily less week by week, and the downward trend of the second week in May which occurred in 1930 was not noted this year. -For the Middle West, there is encouragement in the way grain and grain products have been holding up. These commodities show the smallest decrease of any product from last year. The car loadings for the week ending May 30 totaled a loss of 1759, for the abolition of which the c-ei-a' to regulate commerce was -is abundant reason for believing tt is suiting In highway carriers today in every form of discrimination tbu tj.

act forbids the railways to pra' 1 hi. eVlnn. 1.1-1... omjTtl tail I1UW 3c JJlfcli -V READ IT AND WEEP. They're a haggard squad as they slumD awav from the eighteenth green.

Of merry quip, of airy persi Sonnet. To th Editor ef tho Poit-Discatch J- NOWING you not at all, you are. no less. Something akin to April, or a strain Of music with a haunting loveliness A drift of bells a whispering of rain. A gentle wind that, murmuring Xrom a cool.

Green depth of lonely valley, softly strums The weeping willows by a silver pool In forests where the moonlight never comes. tauon to secure in competition mal! shipper the same unfair that he formerly derived from raii-os criminations. If a revival of thce inations is in the public Interest. tinue to forbid the practice by ra'i'e-- The railways, under a policy o' fril treatment, could hold all but h- rr.or haul traffic in competition with existing means of land Mof of the traffic they are losing to o'rfr carriers is being lost because they ar- regulated without hp)nr nubsidii -2. flage, of kind-hearted, if rough, raillery, not a sign, not even a sliver.

One of them, of course, has the low score, but there's none of the old familiar fingerprints to Identify the victor. There isn't a strutter in the party. It Is a melancholy group. Failure has set its dark seal on every steaming brow. Not a word is spoken at least nothing for quotation.

And the terraces, balconies and piazzas the other carriers are subsidized tiw Tou are at one with every lovely thing circle, so to speak, of the nineteenth hole are comparably regulated. If 0 other means of transportation do r.ct Heva this, why do they defend and oppose regulation of other riar transnortatinn n-Vid failing to ftlff-' wrapped in the same deep gloom as envelops our four pilgrims. Joy has fled the fairways. Gayety Of rragrance, hue or melody; and thus Will you depart at length, remembering That of all earth I was idolatrous Remembering that, faithful or untrue. My dream was beauty's dream, and beauty you.

CARDINAL LE GROS. either subsidies or a reduction cf tion for the railways? nas rrom tne clubhouse. Down to the last man they all carry the badge of frustration. If "schizoldmanlc" means what we think It does, that's the word for them. Life is a total loss.

It's the new golf PARADOXICAL PURSUIT. the Lo Anrclcs Timva. IT IS strange how a man ill until she catches hirow.