Corpus Christi Caller-Times from Corpus Christi, Texas • 4

i Washington Commentary Editorials Features Saturday June 2 1945 The Thrill of a Lifetime Letters From the IPcople Cfforpus dhtfetiCffallcr People Forced To Lire in Slums hy Developers Whose Only Interest Is in the High Profits Such Property Makes Available Local Man Says iseKKusTVaies oeswa Gcn'Ml oiTGoieav sm' in GojN4 cc Geu'avb eisEMHowe Nfcu oo-r A Amk 30 Nbu 6C WTTCm GCC WHIZ' BOTTOM Gte WHIZ Tlie People Should UBe Informed Sft aC4 won't improve until we force these people's children to go to school As Mr McCracken says no one should be given the right to build slums if it adversely allecls the economy and health of the community 1 want to congratulate the builder of the San Diego Addition also the Community Chest agencies their officers and workers for the fine work they're We all should get behind these agencies 100 per cent and do our part to make Corpus Christi the healthiest city in Texas Let's contact our city charter members and suggest and help them write a city charter that will benefit the city as a whole JOE GARZA (807 Waco Street) Time for a Change Editor the Caller: Ruth Reese may be perfectly correct in her contention that the health insurance provisions of Senate Bill 1161 are all wrong and ought nut to become law She fails however to give any Indication that she is aware of the underlying reason for this and a lot or other moves in the direction of what Dr Morris Fishbcin sometimes correctly and sometimes wrongly rails socialized medicine Tlie rcaxiii is that medical costs are rising dangerously near the point at which lawmakers believe the public is likely to rise up in anger She says that she has talked to her doctor about the insurance proposal and that his comments were partly profane Perhaps she has not received his bill yet She says she thinks somebody is trying to put something over on the American people as if she didn't know that the physicians and the hospital for lo these many years have been taking the American people for a more and more thorough cleaning An illness or operation of any seriousness these days usually wrecks the finances Of a family of moderate income There is a reason for group medicine a Editor the Caller: About three months ago I wrote a letter to the editor that appeared in this column for which 1 am grateful In this letter 1 expressed the hope that whatever party was elected to head our city would change or amend the city charter to provide for the annexation or that area west of Port Avenue south of Agnes north of the San Diego Addition and extending west to the Old Airport Road Of course considering the conditions that exist there this would have to be done without the vote of the people that live there 1 just wish that every citizen who had the welfare of our community at heart would hat read the column of May 27th Mr McCracken for the nth time reminds us of the seriousness of slum areas just outside of city limits a problem we can not afford to neglect much longer 1 just wish that every citizen of Corpus Christi would see that new mushroom addition being built north of Morgan Street and close to the airport Visit these little one room house see how these iieople live under what conditions It isn't their fault no not by a long shot it's the poor economy under which these people are forced to live The slum promoters of Corpus Christi are lew but powerlul Just investigate: Just investigate the profits that are derived from slum promotion the lerirs price and size of the lots and the number of foreclosures In spite of the fact that there is no sewerage no drainage no electricity no garbage collection and in some cases three or four houses to one water hydrant they get outrageous prices for pitifully small lots by selling on surker-bait terms Of course such places abound with outdoor privies It is hard for me to understand how these slum promoters can sleep at night They are largely to blame lr Corpus Christi deplorable distinction of having one of the poorest public health records in the state Just investigate the literacy and health problems of our city and see for yourself Remember a germ has no respect for person It can strike your loved ones as well as mine even if we do live several miles Iroin such an aica It's our problem as well as theirs and it i sT-'1 t'l iV'i Bfp Lon Mnur ho it supposed to represent all the people in this legislative district er at least keep all informed and work for the advantage of the majority seems to have some explaining to do Messer like Rep Augustine Celaya of Brownsville has endorsed legislating in secret Our representative says he knew all the time that Celaya'a amendment to the local and uncon-teited red fish limits lull would abolish the Coastal Division of the IVh flame and Oyster Commission as art independent agency Moreover he says that if an attempt to restate the coastal division ever comes to a vole he will vre against restoration The least Messer could have done regardless It Started With Reports from Guam indicate that American Superfortresses and long-range Mustang fighters hae already blasted and burned Tokyo to an extent that makes Pearl Harbor look like a tea party Jut imagine an area three times that of the City of Corpus Chrixli laid waste by explosion and fire delivered in five major raids It certainly looks as if the Japs at lai are getting what they asked for and the end is not yet in The Air Corps probably is hoping that air power alone can knock out our Asiatic enemy The Jrp hav been promised a worse pounding than any part of Eutope ever experienced Des- (Gasoline Pinch of his personal view on the merits or demerits of an independent coastal division was 'to tell some of his constituents what was going on and see to it that there was a public hearing Celaya justifies his action by pointing to precedent and to previous and uncontested legislation by which Corpus Christ! allegedly benefited Precedent la no justification for continuation of an undemocratic practice The Caller wants certain thingr for Corpus Chriti But we want to get tlietn fwnly even if it takes as much time as redistricting Redislrictuig and other reforms will roine Among tliose reforms certainly should be a new state constitution with a specific prohibition against local bills secret committee hearings and all the other for secret special interest legislation Pearl Marbor a pite great difficulties of distance and supply a good start has been made But the European War proved that individuals can stand almost anything So in all likelihood it will take the 17 Navy and the Army which already are doing jobs equal to those of the Superforts although less spectacular to finish the Japs olf Nevertheless a nAlion that was shocked by rear! Harbor cannot help but get a lift every time there is a news report that the superbombers have destroyed another Japanese city The work of their brave crews possibly will not be final but it certainly contributes toward the inevitable outcome 31ay Continue Sail Francisco Notebook By ROBERT JACKSON A conspicuous figure in the early days of the San Francisco Conference has been out of the limelight in recent weeks Secluded in hi hotel suite atop Nob Hill he has been working on the preamble to the charter which the United Nations Conference is framing He is Jan Christian Smuts field marshal inuiw nf ih Union of South Africa HRankin EBIocks Needed Mcforins By RAY TUCKER The most conspicuous example of the evil of the seniority system on Capitol Hill is John Rankin's chairmanship of the House Committee on V0ri4 War Legislation He has generated so many personal feuds and so much ill feeling within this group that he himself doubts whether hearings on sorely needed reforms can be concluded in the near future Although veterans of the present struggle will suffer seriously unless the system of handling their difficulties is overhauled the tousie-haired man from Mississippi resents all efforts at improvement He has delayed action on many measures designed to ameliorate deplorable conditions Instead he devotes most of his energy to denouncing impartial critics and to enactment of a bonus proposal that will cost many billions of dollars He has blocked an effective investigation of hospitals despite evidence of overcrowding shortages of personnel and equipment neglect of the occupants When an independent inquiry was proposed by advisers of the late President Roosevelt including Mrs Roosevelt and Bernard Baruch he instructed congressmen to visit institutions in their districts thus tipping off the management to the imminence of an inspection For years he showed no interest in Rep Edith Nourse Roger's bill creating a separate Bureau of Medicine and Surgery But when the idea gained popularity on the basis of recent revelations he assumed the sponsorship of the movement Unfortunately the professional soldier organization the American Legion Veterans of Foreign Wars and Disabled American Veterans play along with him He has done them many minor favors during peacetime years when his committee was a comparatively unimportant unit and now they are returning the compliment But unless his colleagues destroy his czaristic control by outvoting him on major measures the plight of millions of former fighting men may become a national scandal Hrotcdrr That extra gallon of gasoline recently promised to civilian motorists may not be as easy to obtain a it was first imagined Already Mid-Continent refiners have warned that it will be a real effort to produce the extra gasoline which the Office of Price Administration and the Petroleum Administration for War haa said would be allowed civilians The shortage of gasoline is serious and in rases refiners are foiced to from other refiners in caes where gasoline is Too oil leaders think the current smaller petroleum needs for military service probably is a temporary thing Because of the longer distance to the Pacific battle areas and the scheduled increase in tempo oil men believe the armed forces will scion be using as much petroleum as they were when the war was being fought on both points All in all the prospects for a vacation by auto-mohile-evcn if tires were dont loojf bright for this summer Washington Calling American Honor Thomas Mann Ureal Author and Champion of Democracy Who Came From Same Germany That Produced Adolf Hitler and Kasi Tyranny at the conterrnce But he is more than that He is the one living link connecting the present gathering with a less-auspicious one which convened 26 years ago in Versailles For Marshal Smuts is the only delegate at the Conference who was a delegate also at the historic meeting where the conven-ant of the League of Nations was adopted (There were numerous others in San Franc -co in one capacity or another who were present at Versailles Walter Lippmann for but Smuts is the only person who was a delegate at the two conference! Far past the three-acore-and-ten mark Marshal Smuta is an imposing and dramatic figure Slender and erect he appears the very epitome of the military man in nis neatly-pressed and much-decorated khaki uniform His small snow-white goatee accentuates the rosy pinkness 01 his complexion One of his aides Is authority for the information that on his first Sunday Tn San Francisco he took an eight-mile walk That might not be so much of a feat in Texas or in South Africa but to those familiar with San Francisco's hills it looms a a prodigious accomplishment The aide said that the venerable marshal took such walks regularly at home and he simply said that he saw no reason to change his habits in San Francisco Our neighber Dr Exeqeicl Padilla Mexico's foreign minister is a phrase-maker too Pleading for the admission of Argentina he acknowledged by inference that it was a Fascist government but he said it had divorced itself from the sentiments of the people of The entire debate Including the final Tate on the question of admitting Argentina to the Conference lasted exactly 95 minutes The best headline the West Ceast newspaper produced during the Conference was smeared across the front page of the Chronicle in two lines of box-car type the day the Conference opened Francisco Is Host to History Today" What the foreign correspondent wero cabling home was a continual mystery to the American newsmen with so many big stories kicking around in the first few weeks of the Conference A Chinese reporter voiced earnest pleas for a copy of the text of a little speech which' a Navy public relations officer made to a group of newsmen and in which he said that for the Navy there would be no V-Day until the Japs were crushed The somewhat perplexed PRO finally gave the Chinese his file copy of the speech which he had nog intended to distribute to the newsmen naturally assuming none would want it We bumped into the oriental reporter In the hotel that night and out of curiosity asked him what he had done with the speech I cabled it to Chungking" he said as if surprised at our stupid question An off-hand remark ef Molotov's provided one segment of the press with copy for days and days In a press conference discussion of the Polish issue he called attention to the fact that neither India nor the Philippines were independent although both were represented at the Conference and added we all look forward to the time when the voice of independence will be That brief quote ftirnished one writer from Bombay with a text for thousands of words A week later he was still writing profound pieces on the Russian attitude toward freedom for India It took a good two weeks for the members of the delegation to break themselves of the halbit of saying when they meant only this country They had been advised that the representatives of the other countries in the Americas did not like it and they tried conscientiously to say instead with our diplomats and businessmen But any indication that domestic Communists are again in- terfering in our foreign policy' through propaganda with certain groups especially radical labor units will provoke resentment here and make President task far more difficult It is the fear of just rtih a development that led the House to create another on a permanent basis Members recalled that before Russia became involved in the war in June of 1941 the principal enemies of our national defense preparations were the Communists Not until after Moscow was attacked by Hitler did the Soviet sympathizers abandon their campaign of stirring up disunity among the Allies It may be that Harry Hopkins can persuade the Russian dictator to issue a public disavowal of Browder's resurrected movement The reemergence of Earl Browder threatens to complicate the administration's determined attempt to reach final agreement with Russia on all the international problems which have strained relations between the two Allies in the last few months He has hinted that he may revive the National Communist Party which was disbanded in May 1944 on orders from Moscow His emissaries descended on the San Francisco Conference by the hundreds and they have established headquarters in the capital As always they have put concerns ahead of Washington's The State Department entertains grave doubt that Browder has bben given the green light by Stalin in the present crisis Joe" -has frequently expressed contempt for the American Communists in conversation Politics The charter preamble is likely to be an inspiring bit of prose if Marshal draft is accepted by the delegates without too manyv changes For the old warrior is a phrase-maker in the manner or his former enemy of Boer War days Winston ChurchilL Witness these samples from Smuts early statements at the Conference: can be no doubt that for us for the human race the hour has the peace-makers we the peace-builders dare not disappoint the hopes and prayers of a whole suffering us see to it that so far as it in its lies we shall call a halt to this pilgrimage of death this inarch to suicide of our until ultimately the distant frontiers are reached of that new that newer world where war will only be a dim far-off echo in our racial By MARQUIS CHILDS We here In America honored Thomas Mann on his 70th birthday This is in recognition of his stature as a creative writer of the very first rank Thomas Mann is now an American citien But he came out of Germany: out of the same Germany that has produced the honors of Dachau and Belsen I think it is important to remember that At least two of his most important works and Magic were published in Germany in the twenties There he wrote the first ef the novels dealing with the biblical story of Joseph the monumental work that was completed last year vith the publication of the the last of the series Thomas Mann left Germany when Hitler came into power He went into exile Of an old Hanseatic family long rooted in the Baltic port of Lueberk he went out to resist by every means he could the tyrant who had seized power over his native land A noteworthy series of shortwave broadcasts he made to the GermaiV people was published in 1943 under the title It is important to remember today that there were irary Germans who like Thomas Mann went out into the world to fight Nazi tyranny In 1933 not long after Hitler took over I visited Lueberk partly in order to see the scene ef and the birthplace of Thomas Mann Because of letters of introduction I was received in several homes and soon 1 found myself in a younger group sons and daughters of the leading citizens of the town They of course were not wearing brown shirti not yet But they made it perfectly plain that they believed in Nazism It was the thing for Germany they told me enthusiastically They weie courteous and after showing me the medeval houses and some of the other sights they asked me if there was anything in particular that I wanted to see I said yes I wanted to see the house that had been the setting for and 1 wanted to see the house where Thomas Mann had lived That produced an interesting reaction They were torn between pride in the home author whose fame had spread so far and disapproval of what they considered his disloyalty well take you said one of them finally like hi politics We don't like what he has 'done lately But we know that he is a great So we made a curious kind of pilgrimage Forgetting their recently acquired prejudices they told me much of the Mann family and the history of Luebeck German people might have needed this creative thinker who at one time enjoyed such widespread popularity amongst them Often the creative artist with his sensitivity to moods and attitudes forshadowa what la unforseen by more practical men During the troubled Twenties Dr Mann wrote a long short story called and Early that showed if anyone had had the sense to see it the disintegration of old patterns and old customs before the onset of chaos and barbarism Moral standards were disappearing The value of money had gone in the mad inflation tnat appears to have been part of the calculated policy of the masters of Germany The familiar world was dissolving while the older generation looked on helplessly It was almost a boast among middle-class and upper-class Germans that they had nothing to do with politics That was a vulgar business for those who cared for it Mann himself had admitted that this was more or less his attitude In this is a moral for us here in America Too many Americans have been indifferent or have assumed themselves superior to the business of politics which is everybody's business The complacent can't happen has an empty sound today At 70 Thomas Mann citizen of democracy has finished the great work of his life The story that runs through the five volumes of the Joseph novel is like a great river Now it is broad placid slow-moving Again as in the temptation by Fotiphar's wife in the sensuous setting of old Egypt it moves swiftly and turbulenlly We in America can be proud that Mann found a refuge among us and leisure and quiet in which to finish his masterpiece In a lecture in 1938 he proclaimed Coming Victory of This is one proof that it is here 'Copyright 143 by United Feature Syndicate Inc) Pacific ODcmocrafs Seek Unity Robert llannegan has taken full command of the political crew of Harry Truman's khip of state The end has come to the post-Farley period when the endorsement of a party Democrat was mine often a liability than an asset for a partisan patriot seeking a spot on the federal pay roll The length of a man's service around headquarters and the polling booths will mean more than the length of his hair National Chairman Hannegan had won FDR to this viewpoint just before the latter's death but Mr Roosevelt's acquiescence was due largely to hi desire to slough patronage problems in the post-war era Ills successor however is a dyed-in-the-wool partisan a characteristic of most Missouri Democrats While not subscribing to the spoilsman theory he believes firmly thst the workers should be rewarded and that members of the dominant regime should accept full responsibility And there are going to be plenty of jobs Many Rooseveltians have quit or are preparing to receive their walking papers The treasury has asked authority to name 5000 new Internal Revenue agents and that was once the national chairman's bailiwick Agriculture which will soon be headed by a good New Mexico Democrat will expand and so will OPA under tlie program which Rep Clinton Anderson has outlined Surplus Property and other reconversion agencies will need larger personnel Rebuilding the political machine Is a necessity a everybody President Truman seeks re-election FDR had allowed it to fall apart trusting to his vast popular following to return him to the White House Those millions may now go their different political ways and Mr Truman will have to depend on a straight partisan vote in 1948 ESad Nauheim Remembers sFraiiz TaUe My Word for Mi By FKANK COLBY As Democratic attorney general under Republican Gov Earl Warren Kenny is in a some- what unusual position But he is an unusual character and right wing factions of the Democratic furty putting them together into a poll- tical machine that will fly are centered in his offices in the state building in San Francisco Kenny gets around He is president of the National Lawyers Guild the liberal branch of the legal fraternity as contrasted with the older conservative American Bar Association He has been serving as a consultant at the United Na- lion Conference He was head of the California -delegation at the Chicago convention last year and bore the brunt of the New Deal and PAC effort to swing the Golden State delegation to Wallace or the vice-presidency Kenney was for Truman which counts him in good stead now He is acceptable to Southern California and Los Angeles because he was born there the native son of a native son He is 44 years old He was graduated from Stanford at 19 was a United Press correspondent studied taw at Southern California and at 29 was a judge Fight years ini the bench w-as all he could take so he resigned to run for stale senator and brat tlie and movement which he did in a campaign notable because he spent no money and made no speeches Another of his pet causes was to serve as president of the Crusaders Big hale hearty and easy to meet with big blue eyes a booming laugh and a thick light brown thatch he is easily the fair-haired boy of the California Democrats Where he goes from here is up to him His name has been bandied about as a candidate for governor in 1946 or as Democratic candidate for Hiram scat in the Senate On the other hand he is pretty happy where he is might be perfectly content to build his party machine and then run the darn thing Br PETES EDSON SAN California Democrats now think they have a formula which the rest of the country can follow to achieve political unity within the party As conceived by State Attorney General Robert Kenny it consists primarily of correctly indentifying what lie calls the and tlie politicians giving each its proper rule on the political stage and then making sure that neither steals nor spoils the act of the other The professional politician obviously is the party regular who works at politics all the time He is an officeholder or party official who keeps the machine running Crisis politicians on the other hand are the people who step out in politics only when there is a campaign or an election going on get all hot up uver issues or personalities put on the drives col lect and pay tlie campaign ex-I lenses get out the vote In the rrisis politician class would EDSON be such organizations as the PAC the and the Crusaders Both elements are considered necessary and when they work together they achieve political victory But when professional and crisis politicians work at cross purposes to achieve pet Isms and ends then things go haywire and the party meets defeat American political history in every state of the union has shown that professional politicians get defeated when they have been too tong in office when they become complacent then get fat and corrupt If however the professional politician ran keep the liberal and moral rightness which they develop when out of orfice and if they can keep their political crisis cohorts in line then their machine should have a better chance of survival It is in the building ef Jest such political machine as this that the California Democrats are now at work The man who is making a strong bid to become its presiding genius is this same Bob Kenney and there are few professional politicians in the stale who are challenging his opposition By KENNETH DIXON OCCUPIED GERMANY Far a long time Bad Nauheim Germany has been recognized as a varatinn spot with its mineral wells attracting visitors for general ions So soldiers of the 19th Corps were not paiti-rularly nirpused to find a IionI of world-known names in the hotel legislers when they took over occupation of tle resort In tne old registry of the Europaiher Hof Hotel the Yanks found the record of a young American couple and their son which was of particular interest It was back in 1890 that James and Sara Roosevelt first came to Bad Nauheim for a vacation with (heir young son Franklin When the Roosevelt's first visited Bad Nauheim they did rot slay at the hotel but with a frier Young Franklin spent a couple of weeks attending school but in 1894 the Roosevelt's returned and checked in at the inn which now is serv ing as a military hospital and headquarter of the 19lh Corps in this area Then young Franklin known as to his schoi mates settled down to serious and more extended study Classmates who still live here say he was bright ipiy lad who excelled in German mathematics and but was even belter in athletics and playground activities Teung chief instructor wa Chris-tan Rommershemn Another teacher who rente be i him today was Henry Wagner One of Franklin Delano's former classmates' Henrich Horn now la a bathhouse attendant who reminds the bathing GIs that he used to know their late president and that Used to take baths here Franklin Delano said Wagner in stilted but perfectionist English a very clever boy who spoke German Instructor Bommersheim died In 1934 after his former pupil had been elected President of the United States Franklin Delano became President of the United States of Wagner related Bommersheim his former teacher sent him a message of congratulations President Roosevelt who was very pleased thanked him and sent him a fountain pen as a sign of Vt gees without saying that every GI who has talked with Wagner has been on the lookout for this pen as a souvenir Bommersheim had one son a philosophy professor who was killed in an air raid in 1944 Presumably the son's widow has the pen but nobody seems to know what has become of her In 1933 17 of the late president's former classmates assembled at Bed Nauheim to pay tribute to him They cabled him word of their meeting and had a group picture taken which was bound in a leather covered album and pres-en cited to the President-elect a few days before he took office for the lint time by a doctor in Corpus Cliristi Texas that the correct English pronunciation of Rio Grande is Answer: for Rio is a corruption In Texas the river is often called But best usage in Texas is the Spanish: KEE-eh GRAlIX-day Rio Grande mesns Hence to speak of the Grande is re-dundanL From Los Angeles: Can you match this dangling construction from a local news item: studio spokesman announced that movie star Loretta Young will become a mother for the second time this Answer: In a recent column titled Walter Lippmann indited this classic: (the argument) is beginning to resemble the row between the two old boys on the park bench which broke Quite 'a hot seat I should think Or was it measles? Itfluwd kjr Thi Itell Syndicate Inc) READERS WANT TO KNOW Indianapolis: Dues Commander lessen pronounce his name with a flat ns in or a broad as in Answer Command Harold Stassen former governor of Minnesota tells in a letter that: broad A ST All-sen is the correct pronunciation from the Norwegian derivative and the flat sound as in the noun or might be mailed the English or American pronunciation and is equally correct Both pronunciations are used by my personal friends and However the Commander does not give his own preieroncs Sacramento: As 1 right in holding that there is a in Mrs Answer: Sorry no The word 4s from the Italian in which language has the sound of In English maraschino is pronounced: aiAR-ah-SKEE'nee the first as in Kansas City: 1 was once told So They Say We cannot support the thesis that because German leaders acted illegally therefore they should be treated President Robert Hutchins University of Chicago.