The Omaha guide. (Omaha, Neb.) 1927-19??, October 06, 1945, Page 7, Image 7
EDITORIAL - COMMENT 1$ COM®®® w Lf ERIC HASS WEEKLY PEOPLE Released by Calvin’s News Service Speaking of “full employment” and “sixty mill ion jobs”, down in Memphis, Tennessee, the Inter national Harvester Company is rushing to complet ion a big new plant for the production of mechanic al cotton pickers. Within a year or two, the plant will be in mass production. I do not yet know what the size of the labor force will be, but the plant will probably employ many thousands. And it will use up raw materials that represent the prod uct of an additional few thousands. I can almost hear the economic myth-peddler saying: (‘See! Technology doesn’t cause unemploy ment. Technology MAKES jobs V” There is no gainsaying that the mechanical pick er WILL make jobs for a few thousands. But what it is going to do to the jobs in the cotton fields is what the atom bomb did to the population of Hiroshima. By a conservative estimate, 1,500,000 workers whose main source of livelihood is hoeing and picking cotton will be displaced by this single invention alone. And some have put the figure as high as 5,000,000. The Department of Agriculture warns that this is not something coming in the re- , mote future. It will probably start on a large scale next year and not later than 1947. Within five to ten years cotton picking will be as mechaniz ed as the U. S. Cavalry. The mechanical picker will conquer the last great stand of hand labor for the reason that it can pick a bale of cotton for a fraction of the cost of hand picking. Economists of the Clayton-Anderson Company say the mechanical picker will do the job for $5.26 a bale, including $2.04 in depreciation on the machine. At prewar wage rates, it cost $14 to pick a bale by hand, and at current wage rates, $35. In these figures any one can read the doom of the field hand. Do people who casually assure us of “full employ ment” under capitalism consider developments like this? They do not! Even men like Henry Wallace repeat the nonsense that increased productivity per worker is the way to more jobs and higher wag es. Yet, any one who thinks two minutes knows that the only reason new machines are installed is to displace labor, and that, when workers are dis placed and glut the labor market, the price of labor power (wages) goes down. Virtually all the workers to be blitzed by the mechanical picker are Negroes, and' the remainder (in the Southwest) are mostly Americans of Mexi can descent. Precious few of these will get .jobs running the new machines. Miraculously, cotton picking will become a “white” job, and white work ers will get the few jobs it provides. This is al ways the case when dirty and toilsome jobs are mechanized. Instead of a blessing, the mechanical picker will bring a blight to the South (or to that part of the South that performs useful labor) that will make even the boll weevil seem beneficent by comparison. The tendency is marked even among the advo cates of “full employment” to put these dire events to-come out of mind. Indeed, in the speeches and articles and books of those who claim unemploy ment can be solved within the present system, there is scarcely a word on the future effects of technol ogy on employment. The result is that they are preparing a plan as inadesuate in holding back the flood of peacetime unemployment as a sand dyke would be in holding back the overflowing Missis sippi. In his great work, “Capital", Karl Marx quotes John Stuart Mill as saying: “It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet made have light ened the day’s toil of any human being.” In his comment on this, Marx adds: “Mills should have said, ‘of any human being not fed by other people’s labor’, for without doubt, machinery has greatly increased the number of well-to-do idlers.” And so it has. For the workers, instead of being a bless ing, it has been a curse. Privately owned, it has been used by its owners as r highwayman uses his gun-to extract a tribute from their victims. Surely, it is plain that society cannot go on forev er with this kind of “progress”. It is “progressive ness” which, like that implicit in the atom bomb, “progresses” from catastrophe to catastrophe. Surely, it is plain that the great mechanical devices, so big with the promise of abundance for all, must become the collective property of the workers who run them. If this is not plain now, I think it safe to say that for millions of workers the mechanical picker will make it so. VICTORY FUND AND COMMUNITY CHEST ■ iij.jiiMii iniimi -iuiji_,1 Nation Can Head Off Postwar Crime Wave Quick Reconversion Can Prevent Era of Lawlessness, FBI Chief Says; Expects Vets to Demand Order. By BAUKHAGE News Analyst and Commentator. WNU Service, 1616 Eye Street NW, Washington, D. C. Will there be a postwar crime wave in the United States? That question was put to the man who will have to deal with it if there is one—FBI Director J. Edgar Hoo ver. He threw the answer back on me—and on a lot of other people in these United States. Here it is: Whether we have a postwar crime wave in the United States depends on how well we as a nation can re convert. If we do have a period of lawlessness, it will in all probabil ity be led by teen-agers. The re turning veteran has it in his power to make or break Such a crime wave. That’s not beating around the bush. Let’s look at the facts, dis turbing though they may be, as the FBI director laid them before me. After the last war, he said, there grew up a lawlessness from which the United States has never been entirely free since. When the gang-, ster era of the 20s and 30s was final ly broken up there was some de cline in criminal tendencies. Never theless, just before World War II began in Europe crime was still very much with us—in fact, the United States had 11 times more cases of murder and manslaughter than England and Wales. With our entry into the war, crimes increased, the emphasis on type changing from crimes against property to crimes against the per son—murder, assault, rape and the like. On V-J Day a major crime was being committed every 23 sec onds in the United States. One per son in every 22 in this country had been arrested at some time or other. in taking life and appropriating property that does not belong to them? Vet a Deair e Orderly Community On this subject, Director Hoover issued an emphatic “No!” Here is his reasoning: “Of course, soldiers are trained to kill—but so are we of the FBI and so are police officers. Blit no man of the FBI has ever been arrested for a crime ot violence. There will be criminals among the returning vet erans, it is true—criminals who will operate more efficiently than they would have if they hadn’t had army training. But these are the men who probably would have been crim inals anyway if they had remained civilians. After all, the army is only a cross-section of the American peo ple. Of course, the real criminals never got into the army—their rec ords were too bad. “I expect the returning veteran to be a big help to us in combatting crime,” Hoover went on. “The boys who are returning from the battle fields have seen so much of destruc tion, horror, disease, the dangers of dictatorship that they are anxious to see their communities get back to normal, peaceful ways. They are more interested in their homes and civil affair*. They want law and or der over here.” The FBI expects the veterans to be a major influence on the crim inal tendencies of the teen-agers. “If the big brothers and fathers coming back settle down into jobs or go back to school, they can show the younger boys and girls how to be good citizens. The youngsters look up to these men as heroes—they can be a strong influence on them.” But the responsibility for leading the teen-agers aright does not rest solely on the veterans—nor alone on the agencies of law enforcement. “The question of crime among our youth cannot be pawned off on a few juvenile courts, overburdened juve nile bureaus, and the local police,” Director Hoover declared. "These agencies can help materially, but the big job is getting every parent, busi ness man, school teacher, salesman, farmei, mechanic, housewife, and every other forward-looking citizen to knuckle down to the two-fisted realization that this is their job and it is up to them to do something about it.” But no matter what is done to try to meet a crime situation that now has a potentiality for great evil in this country, there is one thing which Hoover believes will deter mine in the long run whether it will be law or lawlessness from here on. “Whether or not we have a post war crime wave will depend in the last analysis on how we as a nation convert to a peacetime basis,” Di rector Hoover announced emphati cally. “You can’t divorce econom ics from crime. Although it is true that having money does not neces-, sarily prevent a person from com- ! mitting a crime, not having money is a definite cause of it. When peo ple are out of work, there is a great- 1 er chance for them to get into trou ble than when they are employed.” • • • “If the Republicans don’t look out, this guy Truman is going to pick up some votes right out from under their noses, he’s so darned human," a political wiseacre whispered to me at the Press Club party for Byron Price. We were watching the President mingle with the guests, obviously enjoying himself. Just then a colleague of mine on the weekly press came up. His face was wreathed in smiles. “Guess what,” he exclaimed. “I just said to the President ‘I’m from Kansas City’ and what do you think he said? ‘That’s a suburb of a cer tain city, isn’t it?’ ” < And my friend, who has been a Republican since he can remember and especially so in the last 12 years, is beginning to think that “this guy Truman” is all right. When the party was breaking up the President was heard to observe with a broad Missouri grin that he was having as good a time as he did when he was at the Press Club last. That time he was still vice president and his picture was taken playing the piano with movie star Lauren Bacall perched atop it. New Crop of Criminals Teen-Agers Perhaps the most ominous single factor about the picture with which we start the postwar years is that the most frequent criminals in the United States today are boys and girls 17 years of age. Director Hoover explained why this has come about, These teen agers have been maturing in a pe j riod of great political, economic and social upheaval. As they were en tering the critically formative years for them in the beginning teens, fa thers and big brothers, to whom they might have looked for guid ance, left home to enter the armed services. Mothers frequently had to take jobs which kept them away from home, leaving boys and girls to their own social and recreational devices. Frequently, families pullid up roots and moved to teeming indus trial centers in other parts of the country where jobs could be had in war plants. Normal living was im possible under such overcrowded conditions. There was a general spirit of wartime abandon which im pressionable youth was not long in catching—lack of discipline, lack of personal responsibility, became the accepted thing. A “war hero” at titude developed in many of those too young to “join up.” Then teen-age boys and girls found that because of the manpower short age they could stop school and take jobs where they would make more money than some of their elders did before the war. Coming suddenly onto what seemed sudden wealth, and of their own making, found them unprepared to use it wisely. “We have been developing a gen eration of money-rich and charac ter-poor Americans.” While we had our attention on the far-flung battlefronts the foundation was being laid for one of our major postwar problems on the home front. There is another condition that has been a breeding ground for law lessness during the war, according to Hoover, and which may spread if crime detection and law enforce ment do not keep ahead of it. “Gangsterism has been showing signs of revival during the war,” he said. “There have been gang wars in places where they used to thrive. Hijacking, shakedown rackets, black markets and bootleg have been on the increase.” Therefore, the groundwork has been laid for a new era of Dillingers. Then there are the burning vet erans. Because of their peculiar training, will they present a new band of criminals efficiently trained BARBS ... 6y Baukhage | Christmas is coming—yes it is. It will be here before your package to your soldier is there unless you mail now. Wrap securely—address prop erly. * • * In 1940 this country had less than 13% million men in what is con sidered the productive age group of 45 to 64. It is estimated that in 1970 there will be over 18% million. When the German armies left Hol land each soldier was permitted to carry 75 pounds only. Any more was confiscated by the Hollanders. But they wouldn t have had much chance to loot anyhow because the German civilians left the Netherlands ahead of them and left very little behind that wasn't nailed down. • • • The latest is canned sandwiches. Industry Takes Kindlier View of Oldsters Because of their generally fine performance while "pinch-hitting” during the wartime labor shortage, older workers will find employment i opportunities much broader in the l postwar era than in prewar years, i Northwestern National Life Insur ance company found in a survey. Hard-and-fast age limitations ex uding in the prewar era were pretty ■Vroughly broken down during the war and will stay broken in many fields, although most large concerns will conduct their most intensive re cruiting in the 20 to 30 age group. Many employers who have had un satisfactory experiences with irre sponsible young employees during the wartime labor shortage express a definite preference for older work ers, who are loyal and very depend able. VtecM&me ^(yum R&pxvUe/i in WASHINGTON By Wolter Sheod WNU Correspondent WNU Washington Bureau, 1616 Eye St., N. W. Doctors’ Lobby Fights Socialized Medicine happens, or what does not .■«FFen here in Washington ofttimes gives cause for wonderment if congress, if leaders in the fields of economics, of agriculture, indus try, labor, social relations, etc., actually know what the people are thinking, what the people of the na tion want or need. It is easy for persons down here in the nation’s capital where events happen so fast and with such farreaching effect, to lose the "common touch.” And the cause for most of the blindness and the out-of-focus per spective is self-interest and the self ish activities of various pressure groups. At the present time, there is a tremendous lobby functioning against the extension of the social security act to include medical care and hospital insurance and other protective features for low income groups. This lobby is spearheaded by an organization known as the National Physicians committee, with headquarters in Chicago. Every effort is being made by this opposition to defeat the provisions of the new social security amend ments, all in the face of the wants, needs and desires of those for whom the benefits are intended. Labor is solidly behind the new social securi ty proposals and a survey just com pleted by the department of agricul ture indicates that this same con cern is voiced by farmers the coun try over. Hospital Insurance The survey shows that more than four-fifths of the nation’s farmers favor more public med ical clinics in rural areas, and more than three-fourths want to subscribe to some flat-rate pre payment plan to cover possible hospital bills and the cost of doctors and nurses for them selves and their families. This is the hospitalization insurance feature of the new proposals. The answers to the department survey indicate that farmers gen erally are conscious and concerned about the need for better rural med ical and health facilities. They are aware that farm youth, 18 and 19 years old, showed the highest re jection rate in the selective service for physical, mental and education al defects of any occupational group ... 41 per cent, compared with an average of 25 per cent for other groups. Many factors, the survey shows, contribute to bad rural health . . . the shortage of medical and sanita tion facilities and the lack of physi cians, dentists and hospital serv ices. Many of these rural folks are in the low income groups which would be reached by the new amendments, since in 1939, approxi mately 3,000,000 out of the 6,000,000 farms in the country produced less than $600 worth of farm products. The records show that out of the 3,070 counties in the country, in 1940 there were 1,200 counties contain ing a total of more than 15,000,000 people, which had no hospitals at all. And there were only about 1.800 counties with any organized pub lic health service, and most of these inadequate. According to the estimates of the surgeon general of the United States, there is need now for some $2,000,000 in hospital construction which would provide for 1,000,000 jobs including doc tors, nurses, technicians and as sistants to keep them going. Medical Care Wanted Animal husbandry, consolidated schools, roads and bridges, soil conservation and crop insurance, agricultural experiment stations, vast agricultural laboratories and many other material objectives are fostered through governmental help for the benefit of the rural areas. Many, many farmers, how ever, believe that assurance of medical and hospital care for them selves and their families are more important than building roads, con structing dams or saving soil, and that no price is too high for a healthy, vigorous and productive people. The statistics show that although the death rate from all causes for the last several decades has been lower among rural people than ur ban folks, deaths from some pre ventable diseases such as typhoid, diphtheria, malaria and pellagra tend to be more numerous among rural people. Moreover, the death rate has been going down rapidly in the cities, but relatively slowly in the rural areas. '• The records show that folks in the rural areas are ill oftener and for longer periods than city people. Under the social security law there are now 36,000,000 insured workers against unemployment. There is no insurance for farmers either for unemployment, old age or survivors’ insurance. The new act would extend these latter two pro visions to include farmers, pro fessional people, domestics and others not now covered by the law. U. S. INCOME: 1944 Peak Figures compiled by the depart ment of commerce show that total income payments to individuals in the United States in 1944 rose to a new high record of $148,090,000,000 The largest percentage of this total, or $19,345,000,000 went to individu als in New York state while the smallest percentage, or $196,000,000 went to people in Nevada. The amounts differed among the various states because of the size of the pop ulation oer caDita income ! The Omaha Guide ! __ A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER ^ Published Every Saturday at 2)20 Grant Street ' OMAHA, NEBRASKA—PHONE HA. 0800 (Entered as Second Class Matter March 15. 1927 at the Post Office at Omaha, Nebraska, under lAct of Congress of March 3, 1879. 1 C* C' Gallow jy, Publisher and Acting Edtlct ^ All News Copy of Churches and all organiz ations must be in our office not later than 1:00 p- m. Monday for current issue. All Advertising ,Copy on Paid Articles, not later than Wednesday noon, proceeding date of issue, to insure public ation. SUBSCRIPTION RATE IN OMAHA \ ONE YEAR .. $3.00 | SIX MONTHS .$1.75 [ THREE MONTHS $1-25 SUBSCRIPTION RATE OUT OP TOWN ONE YEAR . $3 50 SIX MONTHS . $2 00 National Advertising Representatives— INTERSTATE UNITED NEWSPAPERS, Inc 545 Fifth Avenue, New York City, Phone: — [ MUrray Hill 2-5452, Ray Peck, Manager --WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS__' CIO Strives to Maintain High Pay Level in Postwar Industry; Act to Spur Building Activity — .- Released by Western Newspaper Union._ (EDITOR’S NOTE: When opinions are expressed in these columns, they are those ol Western Newspaper Union’s news analysts and not necessarily of this new’spaper.) . Facing tough winter in war-torn Austria, Viennese scratch for future provisions. At left, woman is showrn picking up stray grain in harvested field, while at right another woman is pictured carrying home wood found in shelled forest. LABOR: Seek Peace Armed with emergency powers, Secretary of Labor Lewis Schwellen bach moved into the troubled indus trial front, where CIO demands for appreciable wage boosts threatened to retard the reconversion program and jeopardize stabilization policy. Schwellenbach faced no easy task, what with the strategic oil, au tomobile, farm equipment and steel unions striving for wage readjust ments to bring 40-hour-a-week pay up to wartime overtime levels, and major producers bucking the de mands in the face of rigid price con trol. In all instances, CIO demands for substantial wage boosts were predi cated on the claim that the big com panies had made sizable wartime profits and could use the money to defray part of the increases until peacetime production could be re established on a volume basis. While oil workers already had walked out of midwest refineries in DEMOBILIZATION: Point Cut Asserting that no man would be kept just to maintain a big army, Gen. George C. Marshall revealed a stepped-up demobilization program providing for a further decrease of discharge points to 60 on Novem ber 1 following the October 1 slash to 70. At the same time, the total necessary for officers was to be cut to 75. Marshall reviewed demobilization plans at a meeting with 300 con gressmen at which he also affirmed receipt of General MacArthur’s es timate of an occupation force of only 200,000 for Japan by next summer. Though MacArthur had reduced his estimate, Marshall said, General Eisenhower’s figure of 400,000 for Germany remains the same. • Declaring that the present rate of releases has been determined solely by the availability of discharge fa cilities, Marshall said that all G.I.s without useful army work would be freed within three to four weeks. With the exhaustion of high point men by late winter, the arrrty may further alter its demobilization pro gram by releasing all men with two years of service. a striKe mat tnreai ened to spread and imperil the national fuel supply, princi pal interest con tinued to center in the troubled auto mobile situation, where the United Automobile Work ers headed by R. J. Thomas laid plans POSTWAR BUILDING: Lid Off With removal of all building con trols, government agencies bent themselves to the task of speeding up construction and at the same time keeping costs within bounds to head off an inflationary boom dur ing the reconversion period. As experts looked for the erection of 500,000 private dwellings next year and a peak of 800,000 in 1948, officials sought to increase the sup ply of scarce building materials, per mitting wage and price boosts and priorities to break bottlenecks, if necessary. Inventory controls also were to be strengthened to prevent hoarding and creation of artificial shortages. At the same time, OPA announced that it would tighten price control over building materials to counter act heavy demand, while federal credit agencies prepared to discour age loose financing in a market booming with home needs and pros pects for high postwar employ ment. R. J. Thomas for enforcing their demands for a 30 per cent wage increase by walking out on individual companies and leaving their competitors free to in vade their markets. In assuming command of a labor department strengthened by the in clusion of the War Labor board, war manpower commission and United States employment service, Secre tary Schwellenbach planned to pro ceed slowly before exerting emer gency powers, first exhausting ordi nary procedure. PACIFIC: MacArthur Disputed Taking sharp difference with Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s declaration in Tokyo that only 200,000 American troops may be needed for the Japa nese occupation. Pres. Harry S. Tru man feared for its effect on army demobilization plans and Acting Secretary of State Dean Acheson said that at this time it was difficult to forecast the eventual size of the force. Basing his estimate upon the Japs’ wholehearted effort at co-operation with his command, MacArthur’s latest figure of 200,000 was a sharp reduction from the 400,000 recently projected and the 900,000 at first thought necessary. In making his statement, MacArthur said that the Japs’ execution of his dictates through their governmental frame work relieved the U. S. of establish ing an elaborate military authority to perform the same tasks. RETAIL PRICING: Absorb Increases Declaring that up to now retailers have. not been squeezed by price control, OPAdministrator Chester Bowles reiterated government pol icy that dealers would have to ab sorb any increases in manufacturing costs in the reconversion period. Rejecting a plea of a retailer group that such absorption would be uneconomic and unfair, Bowles said that dealers’ markups were not reduced during the war, and records show that profits soared under in creased volume and lower operat ing costs. Whereas the profit mar gin of department stores stood at 1% during the 1936-’39 period, it reached 12 per cent in 1944, he said. ' Under OPA’s pricing policy for manufacturers for the reconversion period, some increases will be per mitted to allow for higher labor and material costs. Profit margins will be held to half the industry-wide average for larger businesses or prewar levels for smaller firms, however. In seeking to offset expectations that Mac Arthur’s announcement might lead to speedier demobiliza tion, President Truman declared the program was not dependent upon occupation needs. Speaking for the state depart ment, Acting Secretary Acheson as serted that the ultimate size of the occupation force will depend upon the scope of the job of eradicating the whole Jap war-making econ omy. NAVY: Tivo-Ocean Dimension A two-ocean fleet almost five times the size of the pre-Pearl Harbor force was proposed by naval chiefs at a hearing of the house naval commit tee. Under the proposal advanced by Secretary of the Navy Forrestal and Fleet Admiral King, 300 ships would remain in active duty and another 100 would be kept in ready reserve. The remaining 680 vessels would be laid up but maintained in sea-going condition. A total of 500,000 enlisted men and 58,000 officers would be needed for the 300 active ships and planes and 815,000 to man the en tire fleet. For implementation of U. S. de fenses, the navy recommended es tablishment or retention of major naval bases for the Pacific in the Aleutians, Hawaii, Canal Zone, Guam, Saipan, Tinian, the Bonin Volcano island group, the Admiral ties and Philippines. Atlantic posts would include Argentina in New foundland, Bermuda and Trinidad. ATOMIC TEST: On Battleship Even while plans were being mapped in Washington, D. C., for the postwar fleet, naval officials pre pared to carry out a test of the atomic bomb’s effect on surface ves sels 500 miles off conquered Japa nese shores. Target for the experiment, which might eventually lead to a redesign of surface vessels as followed Billy Mitchell’s test bombardment of the Virginia in 1923, will be the Jap battleship Nagato, with its 14-inch steel armor plate. Although the restyling of warships after Mitchell’s successful experi ments led to their strengthening against air attack, they have re mained vulnerable to underwater at tack. So far, reports on atomic bombings have indicated the main force of the explosion is up and out, but naval chieftains also would like to determine any underwater effect 16th Child Her Biggest _ The mother of 15 children, Mrs. Francis Strohl’s 16th child was an 18 lb. baby girl. The infant was one of the heaviest delivered, with a 25 pounder born in 1916 topping the record. 38 years old, Mrs. Strohl is a resident of Lawton, Pa. LONG FLIGHT: Across Great Circle Approximately 25 hours and 43 minutes after taking off from north ern Japan, the first of three giant B-29 bombers glided onto the sprawling Chicago airport, to be shortly followed by the remaining two after a 5,995 mile experimental run. With three top U. S. air force com manders in the planes, the original plans called for a non-stop run to Washington, D. C., to test the great circle route and attendant weather in the far north. Because of strong headwinds during the early stages of the flight necessitating increased use of gas, however, the B-29s decided to land in the Windy City for refueling. Though traveling 5,995 miles in a long journey which took them over Kamchatka, Alaska and Canada be fore reaching the U. S., the Ameri can airmen led by Maj. Gen. Curtis E. Le May fell 1,100 miles short of the record non-stop flight set by two Britons flying from Egypt11 to Australia in 1938. WAR CRIMES: Try Nazis Charged with systematic starva tion and neglect of internees at the notorious Belsen concentration camp, 45 Nazi men and women tried to fight back at their war crimes trial conducted at a British military court in Lueneburg, Germany. In seeking to defend themselves, the accused followed the line that most of the 40,000 prisoners in the camp were all habitual criminals, felons and homo-sexuals. Britons taking over the camp upon the Nazi collapse claimed that their experi ence showed it was not necessary to use force to govern the internees. In first seizing the camp, *fae Brit ish counted 13,000 dead, an i another 13,000 died later because 1heir con dition was beyond treatment, med ical officers charged. Though sup plies were obtainable in the imme diate vicinity of the camp, no ef [ fort was made to procure provisions.