PAGE TWO
ARE MSC: rC'it TLY,
MONDAY. JAN. 22. 1945
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Fifty-Fifth Year
- s
Edited and managed by students of the University
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WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND:
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CHICAO -BOSTN LOS AN ES . SA FRANCISCO
NIGHT EDITOR: AGGIE MILLER
Editorials published in The Michigan Daily
are written by members of 'he Daily staff
and represent the views of the writers only.
twvesigt-H11i
ONE OF THE greatest threats to democratic
institutions is found in the many subver-
sive groups functioning in America.
If they were officially exposed to public in-
spection today w great'service would be paid to
democratic ideals. However, the motion made
by Congressman Joseph E Rankin at one of
the opening sessions of the present Congress
to make the "Dies" Committee permanent tends
to make one suspicious.
Principally because of all the men left in
the House since the timely departure of Mar-
tin Dies himself, Rankin is the worst one to
call the ghost of the old committee from its
tomb.
A group which would drag into the light all
sorts of totalitarian machinations, all kinds of
organized disloyalty to our democratic ways-
covering all the different brands: fascism, naz-
ism, and communism-is what we need.
The old Dies Committee never did the job
it was set u to do. It had no sense of reponsi-
bility, and had only the vaguest notions of
what constitutes evidence. In its blundering
efforts to obtain publicity, it directed its activi-
ties principally against trade unions and New
Deal forces.
Its methods were so haphazard and under-
handed that the public was inclined to think
well of its victims, whether they happened to
be liberals, Socialists, Communists, or fascists.
$ome of the worst elements in the country
were the beneficiaries of this curiously re-
fracted credit.
The Rankin motion was passed by the old
combination of poll-tax Democrats and reac-
tionary Republicans. If these elements in the
House succeed in their determination to dictate
the make-up of the new group, we shall probably
see the organization of another committee of
witch-hunters.
A committee which will investigate and com-
bat all totalitarian agencies would be highly
approved by all democratic-minded Americans,
but the establishment of a permanent group
which will center its activities on liberals, and
trade unionists in one inclusive amalgam of
fascists and communist can only be looked
upon with distaste and contempt.
-Aggie Miller
Vandenbe' g
HE AMERICAN PUBLIC, generally, and the
pres alike have attached singular import-
ance to the foreign policy utterances of Michi-
gan's Arthur Vandenberg last week and have
come to the conclusion that the worm has turn-
ed and that we can look for better things ii the
future.
At the same time, the confirmed interna-
tionalists among us hurriedly bring to the
front Senator Vandenbergs former isolation-
ist mutterings and set forth the maxim that
a leopard doesn't change its spots and neith-
er does an isolationist.
But even with this mixed reaction, there seems
to be some merit in the fact that Senator Van-
denberg-a potent force in the Senate-has felt
the conviction to make, such a definite state-
ment on a most vexing problem.
By DREW PEARSON
WASHINGTON-When AFL President Bill
Green and other AFL Leaders left the White
House early this week they were very secretive
about what they had discussed with F. D. R.
However, here is the inside story of what hap-
pened. It indicates that up until three days
before he was inaugurated President of the
United States for his fourth term, Roosevelt
still was struggling with the thorny problem of
whom to appoint Secretary of Labor.
Accompanying Bill Green to the White House
were AFL Secretary George Meany and Harry
Bates, head of the powerful construction work-
es union. Seated with the President, Green
told him that the entire AFL executive board
had been carefully canvassed, was unanimously
behind Dan Tobin of the Teamsters' union for
Secretary of Labor.
"That's fine, Bill," replied the President,
"But can you get Phil Murray to go along
on that?"
"Mr. President, we want someone from
the ranks of ahor, and Tobin's the man for
the Job, whether Phil Murray wants him or
not," answered Green.
I'll appoint anyone who has the unanimous
backing of the Labor movement," replied the
President. "Francis wants to get out, and I'd
like to let her go if we can all agree on some-
one to replace her."
Green agreed with F. D. R. It was doubtful
if Phil Murray would go along on Tobin's selec-
tion. The AFL leader then asked Roosevelt
who else was in line for the job.
The President replied he would like to ap-
point John Winant, now U. S. Ambassador
to Great Britain.
"But," he added, "He's too valuable where he
is.
In the end, Green, Meany, and Bates left
the White House convinced that Miss Perkins
would remain as Secretary of Labor. Mean-
while she has rented an apartment in New
York and has made all plans to leave.
Note-Chief CIO objection to Tobin is the
blast which the Teamsters Union magazine
leveled at the PAC after election. Tobin also
refused to go along with Phil Murray's pet
project of banding the AFL and the CIO with
the rest of the world trade union movement
in .a big new world labor federation.
Criticism of Britisih, ..-
Q1QST FREQUENT questiois fired at the new
-State Department executives were about
the British. ,Some lecturers said they detected
a growing resentment against the British, so
they asked various questions about lend-lease,
British competition during the war and so on,
even including the sale of British bicycles to
Mexico.
Dan Acheson, after patiently answering some
of these questions, remarked:
I'm surprised no one has raisel the ques-
tion of the three cases of machetes. The wires
have burned un over those machetes, which a
British firm found left over in a warehouse.
Manuactured before the war, machetes were
sold by the British in Central America. We
never heard the last of them."
At one point Samuel Guy Inman and Julian
Bryan, lecturers on Latin America, were pepper-
ing Nelson Rockefeller on the existence of Jap-
anese colonies in Brazil.
"Yes, there are 200,000 to 300,000 Japanese
in Brazil," the new Assistant-Secretary for
Latin America admitted, "but you might also
ask about the 2,000,000 Germans in Brazil."
At this point, Don Bolt, another lecturer on
Latin America, asked:
"Isn't it true that the leisurely Brazilians
want the Japs, who work three times as hard
as the natives, to remain in Brazil? They
are a great asset, and that is why Brazil has
never declared war on Japan."
"The point," replied Acheson, "is well taken."
Appeasing Argentina-...
Samuel Guy Inman tried to pin Rockefeller
down on whether he planned to recognize Ar-
gentina, but he ducked giving a definite answer.
Iinally, Inman followed him out of the room
and at last got a definite answer.
"Yes, we're going to appease Argentina,"
Rockefeller admitted, "and we're going to catch
hell from the left-wing groups for doing it."
Many lecturers felt the new State Department
officials were not too frank and actually gave
them little information, but they appreciated
On Second Thought . .
By RAY DIXON
CONTRIBUTING to the March of Dimes drive
is a good idea on both first and second
thoughts.
Poliomyelitis is hard to say and hard to
spell, but it's a lot harder to have.
Don't forget, we began fighting the social war
against disease long before we began the poli-
tical war against the ideologies and cruelties
of Germany and Japan.
In a sense, this war against infantile paraly-
sis is more important than the war against
Hitler because it picks on little kids.
the spirit of the hush-hush occasion and felt
the conference was worth while.
Hoover's Gag ,. .
CONGRESSMAN George Bender, of Ohio, who
may be that state's next governor, lives at
the Mayflower Hotel in Washington. The other
night he was eating in the grill when a waitress
came over and handed him a printed card. It
read: "The management desires that you leave
the premises at once. Please go quietly,"
Bender was about to call for the manager and
tell him he was a long-time resident of the
hotel. Then he heard someone laugh. Behind
him was G-Man Chief J. Edgar Hoover.
A close friend of Bender's, Hoover had tip-
ped the waitress to present the gag to the
Congressman. Apparently Hoover had some
of these gag cards given him for Christmas to
play practical jokes on his friends.
(Copyright, 1945, by the Bell Syndicate. Inc.>
I'D RA THER BE RIGHT:
National Service -
By SAMUEL GRAFTON
NEW YORK-The national service issue is a/
crisis of confidence. It is the kind of issue
on which a government could fall in Britain.
If Congress refuses to pass a national service
act, or a reasonably accurate facsimile, it will
thereby announce that it does not trust the
administration with the power to distribute our
labor resources where needed to fight the war.
Under our constitutional system, an admini-
stration so rebuked must continue unhappily in
office. It must go on fighting a war after it
has been denied the administrative tools it says
it needs.
In a country conducted according to a par-
liamentary system, a legislative majority which
voted against a national service act would
then have to form a new government, and take
over the management of the war, and try to
prove in practice that the war could be won
without this legislation. Under our more
rigid forms, Congress can give in to organized
pressures, deny the administration the weap-
ons it demands; and then look the other way
while the war goes on. Congress, in effect, is
allowed to hit and run.
THE ISSUE is confidence. The issue is notj
coercion of labor. The advocates of a "vol-
untary" system are fudging. If the word "vol-
untary" means anything, it means that a man
has a right not to work at a war job if he doesn't
want to. It means he has the right to look
a government manpower official in the eye,
and say placidly that he prefers doodling to
making munitions.
But none of the labor or management wit-
nesses who appeared before the House Mili-
tary Affairs Committee asserted any such
right. They know in their hearts, as does
the overwhelming majority of Americans, that
a man really needed in a war job ought to
work at it. They propose to make him do so
by a variety of means, by management-labor
conference; by public exposure; by denial of
alternative employment, which means by star-
vation; by union agreement, by closing down
non-war ulaits, etc., etc.
The mysterious "freedom of choice" which
they are defending shrinks while you hunt for
it; it does not really exist in war-time, and
even its advocates don't really believe in it.
That is why it is correct to say that the
issue is not coercion of labor; it is simply not
an issue that a man fit for war work should do
it; the issue is confidence, that the administra-
tion can be trusted to do, wisely and fairly,
what it is alternately proposed shall be done
by a grotesque melange of public and private
agencies.
"WORK OR FIGHT" has been offered as a
substitute for national service. "Work or
fight" seems to offer a kind of choice, to pre-'
serve a certain voluntarism. You can work
or you can fight. But here, again, the proposed
freedom of choice is a fake. Since it is pre-
cisely those men whom the army has listed as
physically unfit to fight who are to be offered
the choice of work or fight, the choice is unreal;
"work or fight" means "work or work," or else
work or go to jail." The more you hunt for
the mysterious freedom of choice which is be-
ing defended by opponents of national service,
the less you are able to find of it.
A national service act means "work ori go
to jailY for anyone, man or woman, whose
services are needed by the war effort; and in
our hearts we know this is right. If we dodge
and twist away from this solution, it is not
because of any considerations of civil liberties;
it is because of a crisis of confidence; it is
because labor does not yet trust its own gov-
ernment, and because management fears to
set a precedent for controls; and so both try
frantically 'to invent some private coercion,
for coercion, they know, is needed. -
Actually we would gain certain freedoms were
we to adopt national service; freedom from
doubt as to whether to stay on a war job;
freedom from fear of each other as we learned
that the thing could work; freedom for the
serviceman from suspicion and distrust of
his own people back home. These be freedoms
too.
' (Copyright, 1945, New York Post Syndicate)
£ ie
IN REPLY to Mr. Sylvan M. Ber-
man's indiscriminately abusive at-
tack on Poland in last Saturday's
Daily, may I suggest that you re-
print John Chamberlain's review of
Jan Karski's "Story of the Secret
State," the current Book-of-the-
Month Club selection. Similar re-
views of this account of the Polish
Underground's unremitting struggle
against the Nazis appeared in The
New York Times and elsewhere.
And if Mr. Berman is honestly
interested in the truth about Po-
land's culture, her democracy, her
steadfast refusal to appease Hitler
and her right to survive "as a
strong and ndependent Poland"
(in Stalin's perhaps cynical phn-
ase), then I should be glad to
suggest further ways of informing
himself.
I make no blanket-defense of Po-
lAnd. But for all her pasi shortcom-
ings, including the problem of anti-
Semitism, I would remind Mr. Be-
man that in Poland's om history
there has never been a blot any
worse than the tragic race riots in
Detroit the summer of 1943. Yet
would Mr. Berman therefore declare,
as lie did of Poland, that the United
States is "naturally bent toward
Fascism" and not "worthy of being
a Free State?"
Here is Mr. Chamberlain's review.
-Carlton F. Wells
By JOHN CHAMBERLAIN,
Harper's Magazine
THE COURAGE of the Polish un-
derground is the collective hero
of Jan Karski's "Story of a Secret
State." Karski's document is a hair-
raising adventure story., a horrifying
chronicle of Nazi bestiality and a
paean to freedom; it is also a com-
plete refutation of the theory that
the "London Poles" represent "reac-
tion" in contrast to the "progressiv-
ism" of the "Moscow Poles." Karski
himself was a courier who risked his
life to keep the underground in touch
with Paris and London; and if he
did it for "Ilandlordisin" or 'anti-
Semitism," then all modern history
is nothing but a semantic blab.
When Poland was invaded in
1939 Karski was a gilded young
man without any idea of what
made history tick. But he learnedI
fast,'first as a soldier in a defeated
army, then as a refugee from both
the Russians and the Germans.
Inducted into the underground by
an old acquaintance, he developed
a phenomenal toughness. On one
occasion the Gestapo caught him
and tortured him unmercifully. But
even the most accomplished Nazi
sadists got nothing out of him, and
he made an almost incredible
escape.
Five years ago many American
liberals were horrified by Hitler's
invasion of Poland. Today some of
these same liberals are saying: "I
have no patience with the Poles.
What difference does it make where
the Polish boundary is drawn? Sta-
'lin doesn't tell us what to do about
Mexico; why should we tell him what
to do about the Curzon line?"Well,;
I personally had no solution for the
Polish question in 1939, and I still
have none. But if the war began for
the freedom of Poland, the sort of
people whom Karski represents cer-
tainly do not meitdesertion. The
underground described by Karski has
maintained an inter-party democ-
racy under the most trying condi-
tions. Socialists have got along with
aristocrats, laborites with peasants,
and the Polish Quisling has yet to
appear on the stage cf history. The
Poles may have had their pre-1939
anti-Semitism, and the heritage of
Pilsudski may have been anti-demo-
cratic. But since September of 19391
the record of the Poles, even the
"London Poles," has been a shining
example for all of Europe.
Karski doesn't take ideological
sides in the struggle between the
London Poles and the Moscow
Poles. He is for Poland. After
reading his book it is impossible toI
escape the conviction that the fate
of his nation is the test of a right-
eous peace, no matter what the
"realists" may say,
I tsHO IS THIS that would dare
infer that friend Rosenberg is an1
isolationist? He preaches to us and1
proves most emphatically the need
for cooperation with Russia and int
return he is told that he is blind andt
deaf, ignorant or dishonest for fail-
ing to see the danger in our strong-c
est ally, Russia. He tells us that in!
the interest of peace in our time we
must promote national unity and he
is told that he is not facing facts.
He offers us evidence of our need!
for friendship with Russia-traces
every step by fact and logic. This
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IN RETROSPECT:
Laboor Uions Progres
rj HE AMERICAN public rarely
hears about labor and labor un-
ions unless a union goes on strike.
Immediately all newspapers blast out
with banner headlines against unions
and strikes. Sometimes these feel-
ings are justified, but often as not
the guilt lies among management
ia tier than labor.
Nevertheless there are many
events that occurred among labor
unions in 1944which are of gen-
eral interest. Very few of these
have been printed although they
have been reported.
Among these are:
1. A survey by the CIO Depart-
ment of Research and Education
shows that in 201 out of 328 indus-
trial plants, fewer war workers quit;
their jobs in 1944 than in 1943. In
only 25 cases was the quitting rate
appreciably higher; of these, 14 in-
volved women only.
2. Philip Murray, president of
the CIO, has recently sent a letter
to Attorney-General Biddle de-
manding immediate retrial of the
26 seditionists whose trial was dis-
continued upon the death of Fed-
eral Judge Eicher.
3. Racial discrimination was re-
pressed when the Supreme Court
unanimously held that a labor union
under the Railway Labor Act may
not enter into a contract which dis-
crminates against Negro employes.
The union concerned was the roth-
erhood of Locomotive Firemen and
Enginemen.
4. Sewell Avery, finding the labor
problem a bit tough, sent out several
thousand labor - recruiting letters
which were supposed to go to house-
wives. However, the mailing list firm
made an error, and the first answers
received expressed the regrets of a
railroad president, a sculptor, and a
poet.
5. The Presbyterian Church has
declared that trade unions are
democracy's front line against re-
action and essential ,.to raising
standards of living,
6. Apparently seamen have to be
sunk before they can be considered
attacked and eligible for a bonus.
The American ship S.S. Felix Grundy
was attacked by Nazi planes while in
the port of St. Maxine, France, last
fall, and four soldiers were wounded
by strafing. The Maritime War Emer-
gency Board ruled that the attack
seems to be a little better than Mr.
Mills can do. In order to find proof
that we must disregard our needs
and turn against our ally, we must
dash madly to the library to search
for the dream of Peter the Great,
As far as following the ostrich
philosophy is concerned- it would
seem that it is more difficult to
accept as wrong the ideas of fear and
hate which we have been taught to
hold for Russia, regarding truthfully
with unbiased opinion the facts of
the situation, than it is to continue
this philosophy of terror for any
government that doesn't call itself
democratic and allow free enterprise.
When it comes to the choice of
denouncing Russia because Peter
the Great had big ideas, or cooper-
ating with her because our future
as a peaceful nation among peace-
ful nations is at stake-I would
choose the latter.
-Jeanne Tozer, '47
Ve'te ns-
bonus was not payable to the mer-
chant seamen aboard, because the
vessel was not in immediate danger
of destruction nor were serious in-
juries sustained.
7. In an address before the an-
nual meeting of shareholders, C. H.
Carlisle, presiden' of the Dominion
Bank of Canada, stated that work-
ers must look forward to "a lower
cost of living and a willingness to
receive lesser wages" in the post-
wa-r period, He also asserted that
unions must be prevented from in-
fluencing voters. Probably the in-
fluencing of voters in Carlisle's
opinion is the privilege of the fin-
ancial interests only,
8. 20,000 workers at the Sun Ship-
building and Drydock Corporation in
Chester, Pa., voted 5 to 1 for the CIO
Marine and Shipbuilding Workers in
a recent NLRB poll, rejecting the
company union which had petitioned
for the election.
9. The rebuilding of trade unions
will be the main concern of the Gen-
eral Workers Trade Union confer-
ence to be held in Bulgaria on Feb. 4.
The nationaldconvention of Italian
unions to take place' in Naples on
Jan. 28, will discuss the same subject,
10. The International Association
of Machinists, largest AFL union,
has voted to send its own delegate
to the World Labor Congress in
London this February. The resolu-
tion criticized the AFL for refusal
to send representatives.
-Betty Roth
Spain -_
A SPANISH Republican could, if he
wished, make a persuasive case
for Allied military intervention to
overthrow the Franco Government.
It is an enemy of the Allies and of
democracy, he could point out, with
ample- documentation. The Gestapo
practically runs Spain, he could de-
clare, on the authority of the veteran
appeaser, Lord Templewood (former-
ly Sir Samuel Hoare).
It is to the credit of an eminent
Spanish Republican spokesman, Dr.
Juan Negrin, that lie makes no such
appeal. He is convinced that Spain
some day will be free of Fascism
again, and will have a "stable, toler-
ant and progressive Republic." But
as for intervention of the Allied
powers- "No! Emphatically, no!"
The Republic's last Premier considers
the Spanish people fully capable of
expelling their dictator some day.
The new government. Negrin sees
clearly, will command popular re-
spect and possess stability only if it
arises by the will of the people, with-
out support of foreign bayonets-
The Allied countries can respect
this self-reliant stand of Free
Spain's spokesman. His attitude
strengthens the case for severance
of American diplomatic relations
with Franco.
-St. Louis Post-Dispatch
I Distinctions
A letter to the Post-Dispatch today
expresses the opinion that Sewell
Avery and Montgomery Ward are
"guilty" if the company is a manu-
facturer, not guilty if it is only a dis-
tributor. Though this distinction will
undoubtedly be one of the arguments
carried up to the Supreme Court, we
cannot believe it is the real point.
The real point is that Sewell
4
A.
-E
y
'I
BARNABY
By Crockett Johnson
'I
I'll see what's delaying them.
P AN TL._."__q 1
i A, nlAA-11-1 TL.-.
I I . . .