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Two potable Victories
VICTORY is an inspiring thing.
When it coanes on the front of struggle
for democracy, its effect is like an elec
tric current. It throws new light upon
old issues. It generates new energy, it
stimulates new forces.
Two such victories have come in
the struggle of Negro America to
enforce the Constitution. These are
victories which flow from the New
Deal. They are victories which rebound
to the credit of progressive America,
as a whole. True, they are victories
for w'hich the Negro people are, in
particular proud.
On the other hand, comes tne vic
tory through the New Deal Supreme
Court. The Oklahoma Registration law
by which Negroes were disfranchised,
has been declared invalid by the high
est court of the land. The Supreme
Court is becoming an agency for the
extension of democracy. What a won
derful chanJge has been wrought in
this institution! Long has the Supremo
Court placed a protecting arm around
“Democratic Primary Laws,” Grand
father clauses, or other maneuvers,
whereby democracy has been defeated
and Negroes denied the vote.
Now this court comes to the fore.
It is again the wleapon for progress
that Jefferson and Lincoln sought to
make of it. It is again expressing it
self against the feudal program of the
Southern landlord, a program Presi
dent Roosevelt called ‘akin to fascism.’
BOTH of these victories will have
far-reaching effects upon the struggle
to protect and extend democracy at
home. Both will strengthen the New
Deal forces. Both will draw the Negro
people and the great progressive
stream, now rising, closer together.
This is certainly but a small part
of the rewards of these forward steps.
The approach to these victories
difffered. The Miami case was won in
the streets. Courageous men and wom
en defied the masked gangs of Big
Business. It was the employment of
mass pressure, carried out in order to
win and exercise a legal right.
The highlights were courage, love
for law and justice, the willingness to
fight, and if necessary, die for these
things which progressive America
holds more dear than life itself. These
are the chief characteristics of the
action carried through by Negro
Miami.
A WAVE of admiration and hap
piness cannot fail to sweep through
those who love liberty. In Miami, the
“law” was in the hands of those whose
respect for hooded gangs is greater
than their respect for “law and order.”
Miami in the black skin stood on the
Constitution. Reaction in Miami “lied”
on the Constitution.
The Oklahoma victory was won
ifl the courts. But in this case, tho
court was only reflecting the will of
the people. The court was the expres
sion of the peopled demand for a new
day.
tit '• »
Both victories flow then, from
the people. The first, directly, and
through mass action. The second, in
directly. Both forms of action are
necessary to democracy.
On the basis of both victories,
thousands will be enheartened to go to
the polls. On the basis of both victories
that section of the white South which
has been disfranchised through the
“poll tax” will be enheartened to fight
against this method by which Big
Business steals votes.
And people will see each other
more clearly. Those who descried mass
action now see its value. Those who
may have spoken disparagingly of the
courts now see that the courts can be
a weapon protecting the people’s rights
when they are in the hands of the
“friends of the people.”
Deep in our hearts, we should re
joice at the further clarity of these
two victories, won in battle, bring to
the struggle for democracy. A pro
found understanding of how progress
is won through struggle is the result.
And can you not see the indomita
ble spfrit qf the Negro people and
their inexhaustible optimism, as re
flected in these victories?
Defeats lie behind us. Some defeats
are ahead. But there is ultimate vic
tory where there is unity.
--0O0
RAILROADS ON PARADE
One of the exhibits at the great
New York World’s Fair has almost
literally “laid ’em in the aisles.” That
is the exhibit put on. by America’s
railroads, under the title “Railroads on
Parade.” It is not only an industrial
exhibit, but a revue, complete with
music, story and dancing, and it has
met with the overwhelming praise of
cynical dramatic critics, as well as the
general public.
It’s a fitting thing that the rail
road show should be outstanding at
the fair, for the railroad industry has
been outstanding in American history.
It wasn’t much more than 100 years
ago when the first steam locomotive
a tiny, show, uncertain thing compared
to the splendid roaring monsters that
serve us today, was put in service. And
men are still living who can remember
when the Golden Spike was driven at
Promentory, and the two great oceans
were linked with spans of steel.
In that brief century which has
been the life of the railroads, this na
tion has come from a relatively poor,
undeveloped country to its present
position of world leadership in indus
try, in finance in commence, in the
arts, in all that makes a civilization.
And there is not a single achievement
in which the railroads have not played
a part—and, very often, a dominant
part. It was the railroads that made
possible the winning of the West, and
the establishment of great cities, farms
and industries in a once barren land.
It was the railroads that made possible
the development of our great Eastern
industrial centers, which give jobs to
teeming millions and swiftly and eco
nomically serve consumers thousands
of miles awajy. It was the railroads
which immensely broadened the mar-,
ket for the farmer, to the extent that
a citrus fruit grower in the South can
sell his wares in Chicago, and a potato
producer in New England find buyers
in the Southwest.
Robert Coleman of the New York
Mirror, writes that the railroad show
at the fair “deserves a 21 gun salute.”
There can be no limit to the salute the
railroads deserve for their enormously
important role in building this vast
nation of ours.
-- —. L 1 ’#
„ * * i
SPENDING DRUNK MUST END
It a recent address, Senator Pat
Harrison made this very apt observa
tion on present day government fiscal
policy: “I received a postal card the
other day, and penciled on it was this
wholesome expression: ‘You can no
more spend' yourself into prosperity
than you can drink yourself somber.’
That fellow had something. While I
have never been so unfortunate as to
visit one of the Keeley institutions, I
am told that the practice to effect the
cure is to make the patient sick at first
by too much drink and then to continue
the treatment hy a gradual tapering
off into sobriety. We have experienced
in Washington an excess of the initial
treatment. The time is ripe for taper
ing off.”
Certainly the (theory that it is
possible to spend a nation into pros
perity has been thorough exploded by
nofw. We have tried it for seven years,
and basic conditions are about as bad
now as they were at the worst of de
pression, and unemployment about as
high. And the hard facts, gathered
from generations of experience, dem
onstrate conclusively that a debt rid
den and tax ridden nation is likewise
a depression ridden nation.
Senator Byrd of Virginia, another
Congressional advocate of economy
and fiscal sanity, recently said, “We
have never enjoyed prosperity or sub
stantial business expansion when the
total tax collections—local, state and
national—exceeded 12 per cent of the
national income.” Today something
over 20 per cent of our national income
is being collected in taxes. And 30 per
cent of our national income is being
spent by government, the difference
being represented by deficits which are
added to our all time high public debt,
We can have economy when the
people really want it—when selfish
sectional interests which demand more
and more money for their pet projects
see the folly of their ways. The nation
is heading for tax delirium tremens
unless it tapers off soon.
---nOn
BREATHING SPELL
Most of us have found out by now
that we have been wrong all along if
we went by slogans and labels, such as
the Scotch are dour and parsimonious
the Chinese are peculiar, the Germans
are stodgy, the Spaniards are gay, the
Irish are light-hearted, the Americans
are tomahawk wielders and the French
are penny pinchers. Contact with re
presentatives of all these and other
peoples brings home to us the truth
that all nationals are pretty much the
same and have their due quqtas of
good and bad moral and habits.
We are thinking particularly of
the French people, who are reported to
be returning to the authorities, in ever
incrasing numbers, the recently dis
tributed gas masks for which they
were to be charged $2 each. During the
last few days the rush to return gas
masks by Parisians has become so
great as seriously to hamper routine
business at the police stations in
charge of this work.
This strange procedure can hardly
be set down to the proverbial French
thrift. Surely not one of those who
turned in the gas masks values his or
her life at less than $2. So we must
come to the conclusion that this minor
incident in the life of Paris is better
evidence than can be brought by all
the international commentators in
support of the reassuring belief that
the war scare in Europe has passed
for the time being.
For a while, anyway, the tension
in wtorld affairs has been relaxed. Oth
er news now takes over the front page.
The refusal to pay $2 for safety indi
cates there is no immediate fear of
menace against safety and that the
people of one country in the center of
the European cauldron are busy about
other things.
——-0O0
BIGGER ANI) BETTER
That old time favorite, In the Good
Old Summertime, has an especial signi
ficance this summer, with the nation
starting on the road to economic re
covery.
It is not apparent at this late day
what inspired the composer to write
the roundelay with its joyous lilt and
elation, but if he were to w rite it today
all the world would understand and be
in sympathy with him. Artificial in
spiration from a jug of cider would be
superflous.
A business superstition as old as,
if not older than, the summer song
maintained that wrhen summer came in
the window' business flew' out the door.
The “summer slump” was a reality to
the business man because he believed
in it and did nothing to stop it.
Ths summer is a living refutation
of that superstition. Instead of slump
ing, business is experiencing a rebirth,
a revival. Summer is making business,
not killing it. It cannot take all the
credit, but no one is in the mood for
quibbling over such trifles at such a
time.
It is a good old summertime when
people are returning to work, when all
lines of retail business report appre
ciable sales gains, when the building
industry gets its first substantial taste
of business in years and when money
starts to flow again.
--0O0
Where The Sun, Sand and Water Meet
Measure the coastline of America
—over 12,000 miles of it. Multiply
that by 4,000 and you have the num
ber of people within easy riding dis
tance of a spot for ocean bathing—for
fun and frolic on the ever changing
sand.
People young and old come with
but one desire—the kiss of the sun,
the tang of salt water and the caress
of a summer breeze on their skin.
Today the beaches are crowded.
The “seashore” is just another name
for vacation. But once upon a time only
a very few pejople patronized the
beaches. That was before printing had
gone to work—before printing had
built resorts and filled them with visi
tors—before printing told the joy and
fun of it—the cost of it—how to gd
there and what to do when you ar
rived.
People want action, life and living,
when printing tells them how and
when and where to fulfill their de
sires; printing spells profits in three
dimensions—for the buyer, the seller
and the printer. Right now printing
can sell vacations to millions—plus
everything that will make the vacation'
a thing of joy.
-ouo
Success is easy. Just go where a lot
of people with money are idle and set
up some kind of quack.
* * *
Another nice thing about devoting
your life to the service of others is
that you never are out of a job.
♦ * *
There are two kinds: those who
hate anything that injures the coun
try and those who make money out of
it.
* * *
No wonder conversation is a lost
art in America. You can’t converse,
without somebody who will shut up
and listen. g *
