FOUR
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Fifty-Fifth Year
WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND:
Clark Drcws 'Brass Ring -
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31
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NIGHT EDITOR: ARTHUR J. KRAFT
Editorials published in The Michigan Daily
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Proposed Federation
TWO Central American presidents, elected to
succeed dictators who were overthrown, met
recently to make a fresh attempt at an old pro-
ject-federation of the five Central American
Republics. They were Juan Jose Arevalo of
Guatemala and Salvador Castaneda Castro of
El Salvador. The two presidents announced
that the setting up of a temporary Federal
Council in Santa Ana, El Salvador would be
the first move and would be followed by the
appointment of technical commissions to work
out the details. Removal of customs barriers,
creation of a single banking system and aboli-
tion of immigration restrictions are the primary
matters to be settled, but it is hoped that even-
tually political federation will evolve. However,
both governments declared that they would
preserve their political sovereignty.
The success of this venture depends upon the
attitude of the other Central American coun-
tries. President Somoza of Nicaragua is re-
ported to have said. he would resign his of-
fice if necessary to bring about union, but the
Honduran Government is expected to label
the plan communistic. Costa Ricans fear the
loss of the real democracy they have now and
may resist for that reason.
It is always encouraging when a movement
for reform is instigated and supported by the
people concerned. This effort on the part of
two, possibly three of the Central American
powers, is encouraging to those who have long
held the ideal of a united Central America.
Even if complete federation is not achieved,
mutual adjustment of those economic prob-
lems which they share will be advantageous.
The United States, as the largest of the Ameri-
can republics, cannot and must not force Central
American federation, but it is our responsibility
to use our influence to direct these peoples
towards closer harmony and cooperation. A.
good start is being made.
-Alice Jorgensen
Recip rocal Trade
TfHE administration-backed Trade Agreements
Act extension has been passed by the House
of Representatives and is awaiting action by the
Senate. This bill, which gives the President a
great deal of latitude in negotiating reciprocal
trade agreements, is of the utmost importance.
Not only does it manifest that the Good Neigh-
bor Policy is more than a meaningless term to
be bandied about, but it indicates that the Unit-
ed States does cooperate in commercial rela-
tions with foreign nations for mutual benefit.
News commentators have predicted that the
Trade Agreements Act will have a rough time
in the Senate. It is unfortunate that some of
our illustrious Senators have apparently failed
to notice the value of the Trade Agreements
Act to the United States, and the respect and
By DREW PEARSON
WASHINGTON.-Today, Drew Pearson awards
the brass ring - good for one free ride on
the Washington Merry-Go-Round - to Tom
Clark, new attorney general of the United States.
When Tom Clark was called to the White
House and told by President Truman that he
was to be the next attorney general, he was so
surprised that he stared to walk out one of
the big French windows in the executive office.
"I guess you're a little flustered," laughed
Truman, "The door's over there."
Only 46 years old, Clark had been planning to
step out of the Justice department for more than
a year and go back to Dallas, his home town,
to practice law. His elder brother was killed in
an airplane crash and the family wanted Tom
to come home to carry on the family law firm.
Long Line of Lawyers
OF THE FOUR cabinet appointments Tru-
man has made, public attention unques-
tionably has focused more on this than any
other. The new attorney general happens to
come from a long line of lawyers beginning
with his great grandfather, William I. Clark,
solicitor of the British government of Ireland,
who came to this country in 1737. The next
William H. Clark was chancery judge in Jack-
son, Mississippi, and a Confederate general,
killed in the Battle of Altoona, Ga. His son,
another William H. Clark, was treasurer of
Mississippi for 40 years.
Despite this impressive line of ancestors, Tom
himself is an easy-going, unpretentious person
whom, when you first meet him, you wouldn't
suspect of being one of the'most important mem-
bers of the Truman cabinet. He talks as if he
had all the time in the world and as if nothing
worried him at all other than getting home to
go sledding with his two children - where you
will always find him on snowy Sundays.
Politicians Lick Chops
UNQUESTIONABLY, Clark's appointment is
the most important shift in the Truman
cabinet. The attorney general of any administra-
tion can make or break it - as Harry Dougherty
once demonstrated. Anti-trust cases, affecting
the dividends of great corporations and the pros-
perity of little business, can either be started or
smothered in the Justice department. Income
tax cases, affecting the powerful city machines
of Chicago, New York, Boston, Jersey City - the
machines which nominated Truman at Chicago
-can be prosecuted or protected in Justice.
Along with the Interior department (in charge
of public lands and oil), it is the greatest poten-
tial boodle-bag in the government.
Already some of the politicians are licking
their chops and sniffing the boodle. For in-
stance, W. T. Burton, Louisiana oil operator
who was mixed up with the old Governor
Leche-Huey Long gang, has been under indict-
ment on his personal income tax for $578,958
and on his corporate taxes for $135,839.
After a mistrial, Burton, together with two
other defendants, S. W. Maxwell and L. Brown,
last year offered to plead nolo contendre - in
other words not contest the case and with no
strings attached. However, present attorney gen-
eral Francis Biddle recommended jail sentences,
the judge also let it be known he intended to
impose jail sentences; so the defendants with-
drew their nolo contendre plea.
However, on May 30, just seven days after
Tom Clark's appointment as attorney general,
the tax-troubled gentlemen from Louisiana
moved to continue their trial beyond June 4,
and in so doing made this extraordinary state-
ment indicating the politicians' faith in Tom
Clark.
loodle Hopes liang igh
THEY SAID:
"On May 23, 1945, President Truman appoint.
ed the honorable Tom Clark of Texas as Attorney
General of the United States, to succeed the
honorable Francis Biddle of Philadelphia, effec-
tive June 30; that Mr. Biddle has been the in-
cumbent of that high office during most of the
period of this case and your defendants feel that
he has acquired perhaps unconsciously a point
of view about this case and about conditions in
Louisiana generally which make it very hard to
obtain from him an impartial and unprejudiced
attitude looking to a fair and reasonable solution
of this six-year-old controversy. .hd
Defendants further feel that with a new ad-
-ON SECONDI
By Ray Dix" xj
THE VETO POWER issue has finally been
solved by the Big Five at the San Fran Clan
and people all over the world are happy that the
issue is not going to mean vetomaine poison-
ing for world peace hopes.
e e :
ministration coming into that high office, there
is now a reasonable expectancy that during the
next several months a reinvestigation by the
Justice department of the whole Burton affair
can be applied for and obtained .. .
However, in the oinion of this observer,
who has watched Clark close-up and carefully
during a period of years, the "friends" are
going to be bitterly disappointed. Somewhat
like Harry Truman, from whom nobody ex-
pected much, Tom Clark has real ability to
accept heavy responsibility when it comes, and
handle it with honesty, forthrightness and
vision. That is what Washington has needed
recently-more diversification of responsibility
and more building up of new men.
(Copyright, 1945, by the Bell Syidiete. Hi, c)
I'D RATTHER BE RI(GHT:
San Franciso Notes
By SAMUEL GRAFTON
NOTES ON SAN FRANCISCO: 1. Is there any
argument at all for the Russian position that
members of the Big Five on the security council
ought to have a veto power over discussions?
It seems absurd to Americans that a single
nation should have the right to forbid the
security council to talk about a given issue. What
sort of security council will it be if its members
must keep mum on any question that has been
made taboo by one nation's vote? It is easy
to pile up the eloquent arguments; one nation
should not have the right to censor the whole
world, etc.
2. This is a typical Anglo-American approach
it is moral, it is constitutional, it is theoretical;
it is preoccupied with questions of form; it has
everything in it that has made us great con-
stitution-writers. But (as nearly always) we
forget that the Russians view these questions
in terms of content, not form. In terms of
content, the Russians are keenly aware of
Senator Vandenberg's idea that the new world
organization ought to be allowed to review any
existing situation, even old settlements, and
ancient faits accomplis. The new world organ-
ization might alr6ost at once find itself pre-
sented with demands for a review of the cases
of Lithuania, Latvia, Esthonia, etc.; if the
original Vandenberg idea were carried far
enough, the organization might very quickly
become a court in which Russia was on con-
tinuous trial.
The Russians, as I say, view these matters
operationally, not theoretically. We regard the'
veto on discussions as a moral issue. The Rus-
sians are fighting Vandenberg.
:3. The Russians believe that organization of
the world for peace may easily degenerate into
organization of the world for war. They foresee
a possible future time when there may be rightist
governments in Britain, the United States,
France and China, and when the world organiza-
tion may become not only a continuous anti-
Russian forum and court, but also a power in-
strument, mobilizing anti-Russian sentiment on
a world scale under the head of morality.
Capture of the world organization by anti-
Russian forces is at least theoretically possible.
The Russians do not forget that they were the
only nation ever thrown out of the old League.
The world organization, thus captured, would be
more valuable than an army to the anti-Russian
forces of the world, for a decision of the security
council-is the only conceivable moral basis which
the people of the west might accept as justifying
the war against Russia.
E VIEW the world organization as an or-
ganization, period. The Russians look at
it functionally and wonder what it could be
used for. A veto on discussions limits the
possibility that the world organization could
become anybody's power instrument. The
key fact here is that Russia is the only com-
munist country in the world; that bare fact
equips her with a certain set of fears, which
she cannot give up. It is idle to tell her to
stop being afraid; that is like telling a red-
headed man to go brunette; he can't even
though he be disposed to cooperate. The re-
sulting situation, and impasse, are not solely
of Russia's making, they are part of the
common predicament of mankind in our day.
4. The problem i as pervasive as the weather,
and as inescapable, and an easy taking of sides
does not solve it. Russia's fears are, in a sense,
our problem, too, because they stand in the way
of world organization. We have never accepted
this universal view, and the history of this con-
ference has been a history of the hot and hasty
taking of sides, and then of later regret, for
nothing shows up an error faster than for it to
win a victory. It is when we try to put the error
triumphantly into operation, that its weak-
nesses show up, and the hour of dismay arrives,
as in the case of the admission of Argentina.
I join in Mr. Walter Lippman's suggestion
that we by-pass this issue, let the security
council, like any other deliberative body, create
its own rules of procedure, and let us get on
with the business of living together. No ab-
stract moral argument can solve this problem;
for this is a case in which the more easily and
completely we win the victory, the more thor-
oughly will be convince the defeated that he
was quite right in his fears. A really thump-
ing triumph will remove his last doubts on the
point.
(Copyright, 1945. N. Y. Post Syntdifnate)
NEXT STEP:
Federation
O MATTER how successful the
world security conference 'at San
Francisco turns out to be, the suc-
cess of it will be limited by the type
of government that is being proposed
The proposed government will be
that of a confederation, with states
retaining absolute sovereignty, and
the "supreme" government will not
have the power to act upon the citi-
zens of the various states. The out-
come of all confederations is prac-
tically the same: they dissolve. No
confederation in history, including
that of the American colonies, lasted
more than a comparatively few years.
The basic reason why the Ameri-
can confederation failed was the lack
of central authority to control the
states. The chaos was eliminated
only by the present constitution.
This central authority will be lack-
ing in the proposed world govern-
ment. But almost no one proposes
that the world adopt a federal form
of government. It is not that the
merits of it remain unknown, but
that the world is not ready for such
a form of government.
The world is not ready for many
reasons. However, the basic reas-
on is that every nation, fromrthe
all-powerful United States to the
weakest of the weak, guards its
right as a sovereign state. Each
nation regards this power as its in-
herited right. Each nation will
protect that right regardless of
price. The classic example of this
occurred during the last days of
France, when, being -overrun by the
Nazi war machine, she completely
refused an offer by Great Britain to
unite into a single nation with com-
mon citizenshin. It refused the of-
fer, even though the country was
rapidly disintegrating, because it
regarded too highly its sovereignty.
Other factors for the refusal of
nations to band together include such
things as pride, prejudice, fear of
business competition, fear of losing
freedom, various other fears and be-
liefs. While these fears may at first
appear as minor handicaps that
might be overcome by rational think-
ing, they are as deep as man's belief
in God.
If you think that you are one of
thbse few individuals that does not
hold any of these. beliefs, ask your-
self a few questions like these:
Would you allow every man-
including the Japs and Germans-
to hold common citizenship with
you?
Would you be willing to eliminatea1
all tariffs?
Would you be willing to have
unrestricted immigration?
Would you be willing to have all
boundary lines eliminated?
Would you be willing to risk the1
fall of the American standard of
living?k
No, you probably wouldn't. There
is the whole case in a nutshell. The k
American people, like all other
peoples of the world, are simply not
ready for a federated type of world
government-and the peace that goes
with it.
Yes, the world is not ready for
peace. Peace cannot be established
in this world until all the political
subdivisions combine into one poli-
tical unit, a world federation. Onef
need not look very far to see why
peace and federation come hand in
hand. The history of the United
States shows only too well. States,
when loosely banded together under
a confederation soon found them-
selves in an almost hopeless mess.
Then they formed a federation-
with the amazing results still going
down on the pages of history. How-
ever for a short time, the United
States allowed the issue of states'
rights to show its ugly face. A civil
war resulted. Since the last shot of
that war was fired, the United States
has enjoyed peace and the hopes of
internal peace will remain as long as
our constitution is the law of the
land.
Bt the hopes of world peace
should not be thrown aside. For the
proposed worldsgovernment is only
a baby. It must Le given time to
grow up, to attain maturity. Ex-
perience will teach the men of the
world what not to do and what
to do to maintain a world federa-
tion.
This change into a federation,
which is a natural one, will not fol-
low a smooth course. Wars, bigger
and better, will be fought. But the
experiences of the past will teach the
future. Somewhere, in the dim fu-
ture, lies the government-a world
federation and, above all, peace.
But since this will take years,
probably centuries, the San Fran-
cisco Conference is one of the
many steps to the eventual. And
as a step in a required step-pyra-
mid of progress leading to a world
government, it is our obligation to
our future 4generations that they
might know the blessings of peace,
that we stick by the conference as
proposed with all the might that
we command. -Phil Elkus
By Crockett Johnson
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DAILY OFFICIAL BULLETIN,
Russia claimed that the
China were calling a halta
U. S., Britain and
to Yalta.
But then Hopkins hopped over to Moscow, had
a little talk with the Premier and succeeded in
ameliorating the peace de resistance.
Now that Stalin has stopped stalin' the
delegates can get to work.
* * * *
Meanwhile all Germany was divided into four
parts on D-Day plus 365 and the Nazis
finally got what they wanted--a separated peace.
BARNABY
Cotton Mather and I had Yeah! And everybody golve hirm the x
p. a. - s 1horse ulaCh! And that ruined MY -
T he poinMrs. Schwartz is making,
m'boy, is embodied in the Hegelian
You don't mind if! look
at it, do you, dearie? V