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v Jm Robinson Rallies the Democratic National Convention.
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V ^ SUMMARIZES THE WORLE
SUMMARIZES THE WORLD'S WEEK
• Vwlmi Mtvaow Uaioa.
Falls 'Face to Battle'
W HEN Sen. Joseph T. Robinson
of Arkansas dropped dead of
a heart attack in his apartment
across from the United States capi-
tol, the President’s
plan for securing
new appointments
to the Supreme court
bench, even in its
amended form, died
with him.
That is the belief
of close observers in
Washington. For
“Joe” Robinson was
the President’s tow
er of strength in the
legislative branch of
the government Ho
had served the Democratic party
well in the senate since 1113, and as
the majority leader in the upper
house since 1932.
Joe Robinson’s Job it was to keep
a smooth balance between the con
servative democrats, largely of the
South, and the more radical mem
bers of the party from the North,
and West so that the objectives
of the New Deal could be turned
out of the legislative milL
Robinson never fought harder
than he did in his last battle. As
he worked hard and long in an
attempt to get the “compromise’'
court plan passed, often raising his
voice and exerting himself mightily
in senate arguments, it was ap
parent to his colleagues that he
was not well. Sen. Royal S. Cope
land, the only phyaician in the sen
ate, had several times asked him to
calm himself lest he hasten his
own death.
While the senate was adjourned
for Robinson’s funeral, administra
tion leaders sought to rally support
so . the court bill could be passed,
even without the late senator’s lead
ership. But the opposition forces
were equally determined to take
advantage of the psychological as
pect of the senate following Robin
son’s death—the desire to effect a
peace, finish the session’s business
in a hurry and get away from the
capital.
The forces opposed to the bill
believed that when the issue came
up again they would be successful
in recommitting the substitute bill
to the Judiciary committee, an ef
fective way of killing it The indica
tion of opposition greater than had
been expected in the house of rep
resentatives was another factor
pointing to the eventual fall of the
bill.
Another battle was hot long In
getting under way: to decide who
the new majority leader of the sen
ate should be. Conservative Dem
ocrats were anxious to wrest a
measure of control from the White
House by backing Sen. Pat Harri
son of Mississippi, who has been
faithful to the President, but is
fundamentally conservative. The
more radical senators backed Al-
ben W. Barkley of Kentucky, Dem
ocratic national convention keynot
er, who had been Robinson’s as
sistant as floor leader. Another pros
pect was Sen. James F. Byrnes of
South Carolina, but it was believed
his strength would eventually be
transferred to Harrison.
Another thing that had Washing
ton guessing as a result of Robin
son’s death was the vacancy on the
Supreme court left by the retire
ment of Justice Willis Van De-
■> vanter. Robinson, it was generally
believed, was to have received the
appointment.
Struggle In the Senate
'T'WELVE Democratic senators
A and one Farmer-Laborite were
believed to hold the fate of the
administration’s substitute for the
original bill which would increase
the number of Supreme court
justices to IS. The administration
was certain that the bill would re
ceive at least 38 votes, with 48
necessary to a majority since Sen
ator Robinson's death. Forty-three
definitely committed
it Thirteen were stffl un-
(Wash.), Brown (N. H.), Caraway
(Ark.), Duffy (Wis.), Johnson
(C<fto.), Lewis (111.), Murray
(Mont.), Overton (La.), Pep
per (Fla.), Russell, Jr. (Ga.) and
Wagner (N. Y.). Lundeen (Mina.)
was the Farmer-Laborite.
The substitute for the original
Ashurst bill provides for appoint
ment of one new justice each year
to every justice remaining on the
court after reaching the age of
seventy-five yearly
New Sino-Japanasa Conflict?
W AR between China and Japan
was believed almost inevitable
as hopes of settling a new outbreak
of hostilities by diplomatic means
faded out. The fight
ing ensued as Jap
anese gendarmes at
tempted to take over
the policing of Yu
anping and Luhow-
kiao, two villages in
the Peiping area,
near Marco Polo
bridge. This, the
Japanese said, was
provided for in the
North China truce.
According to the
HlrehJte assertions of the
Japanese war office, Chinese soldiers
fired upon the gendarmes and opened
up with trench mortars against the
Japanese contingent at the Yuanping
station. This action allegedly com
pelled the Japanese to make a night
assault, costing 30 lives, in order to
occupy the towns of Lungwangmiao
and Tungshinghwan. It was said
the Chinese troops had also ad
vanced into these points.
Officials of the Hopei-Chahar coun
cil claimed the Japanese moves
were in open violation of the truce.
They further accused the Japanese
of conducting night army maneu
vers, using real bullets instead of
the blanks ordinarily employed in
maneuvers. As Emperor Hirohito
and Premier Fumimaro Konoe con
ferred with military leaders and the
cabinet, the Japanese people franti
cally prepared for the war that
loomed.
China’s Nanking government gave
orders to Gen. Sung Cheh • yuan,
commander of the North China
forces, that his army was not to re
treat for any reason, but was to be
prepared to make the "supreme
sacrifice” to hold its position until
Gen. Chiang Kai-shek should arrive
over the Peiping-Hankow railroad
with 50.000 fresh troops.
As the fighting continued in the
Peiping area, with no hope of an
effective compromise on the two na
tions’ demands, war seemed the
probable result
Although an agreement was re
ported to have been made between
local Chinese and Japanese authori
ties at Tientsin, settling the dispute
to the satisfaction of both, the na
tional government at Nanking has
continued to insist that no agree
ment reached locally would be
observed.
—V—
Mrs. Roosevelt's Taxes
W HEN Representative Hamil
ton Fish (Rep., N. Y.) sought
to demonstrate the unfairness of the
tax invasion investigation commit
tee, he demanded
that the committee
investigate the i n -
come of the wife of
the President from
radio broadcasts,
charging that she
was not paying a
cent of income taxes
upon those earnings.
She had turned over
$39,000 to the Amer-
_.. . ican Friends Service
Kep. Fish committee, a Phila
delphia charity, kept $1 per broad
cast for herself and paid nothing
whatever from her radio earnings
to the government.
Assistant Attorney General Rob
ert H. Jackson replied for her, ex
plaining to Chairman Dough ton of
the congressional committee that
the bureau of internal revenue had
advised Mrs. Roosevelt she need
pay no tax ee the
S ANTA MONICA, CALIF.—
After a president has been
re-elected it's certain that some
inspired patriot who is snuggled
close to the throne will burst
from his ceU with a terrible yell
to proclaim that unless the
adored incumbent consents
again to succeed himself this
nation is doomed. v
Incidentally, the said patriot's
present job and perquisites also
would be doomed, so
h e couldn’t be
blamed for privately
brooding on the dis
tressful thought. You
wouldn’t call h i m
selfish, but you
could call him hope
ful, especially since
there’s a chance his
ballyhoo may direct
attention upon him
as a suitable candi
date when his idol Irvin S. Cobb
says no to the prop
osition. He might ride in on the
backwash, which would be e v e n
nicer than steering a tidal wave for
somebody else.
Political observers have a name
for this. They call it "sending up
a balloon." It’s an apt simile, a
balloon being a flimsy thing, full
of hot air, and when it soars aloft
nobody knows where it will come
down—if at all. It lacks both steer
ing gears and terminal facilities.
There have been cases when the
same comparison might have been
applied not alone to the balloon
but to the gentleman who launched
it.
So let's remain calm. It’s tradi
tional in our history that no presi
dent ever had to go ballooning in or
der to find out how the wind blew
and that no volunteer third-term
boomer ever succeeded in taking
the trip himself.
HAT are the secret ambitions
Modem Prairie
W E’RE certainly returning —
with modern improvements—
to prairie schooner days when rest-
lees’Americans are Uving-on wheels
and housekeeping on wheels and
having babies on wheels. Only the
other day twins were born aboard
a trailer. And—who knows?—per
haps right now the stork, with a
future president in her beak, is flap
ping fast, trying to catch up with
somebody’s perambulating bunga
low.
So it's a fitting moment to revive
the story of early Montana when
some settlers were discussing the
relative merits of various makes of
those canvas-covered arks which
bore such hosts of emigrants west
ward. They named over the Cones
toga, the South Bend, the Murphy,
the Studebaker and various others.
From under her battered sun bon
net there spoke up a weather beaten
old lady who, with her husband and
her growing brood, had spent the
long years bumping along behind an
ox team from one frontier camp to
another.
“Boys," she said, shifting her
snuff-stick, 'T always did claim the
old hickory waggin wuz the best
one there is fur raisin* a family tax."
• • •
Pegs Verses Statesmen.
ITS confusing to read that poor
A decrepit Jim Braddock, having
reached the advanced age of thirty-
four or thereabouts, is all washed
up, and, then, in another column,
to discover that the leading candi
dates to supply young blood on the
Supreme court bench are but bound
ing Juveniles of around sixty-six.
This creates doubt in the mind of
a fellow who, let us say, is quite
a few birthdays beyond that en
gendered wreck, Mr. Braddock, yet
still has a considerable number of
years to go before he’ll be an agile
adolescent like some senators. He
can’t decide whether he ought to
join the former at the old men’s
home or enlist with the latter in the
Boy Scouts.
• • •
Quiescent Major Generals.
COMETHING has gone out of life.
^ For months now no general of
the regular army, whether retired
or detailed to a civilian job, has
talked himself into a jam—a rasp
berry jam, if you want to make
a cheap pun of it.
Maybe it’s being officially gagged
for so long while on active service
that makes such a conversational
Tessie out of the average brigadier
when he goes into private pursuits
and lets his hair down. It’s
as though he took off his tact along
with his epaulettes. And when he
subsides there’s always another to
take his place.
You see, under modem warfare
the commanding officer is spared.
He may lead the retreat, but never
the charge. When the boys go over
the top is he out in front waving a
sword? Not so you’d notice it By
the new rules he’s signing papers
in a bombproof nine miles behind
the lines and about the only peril
he runs ie from lack of exercise in
the fresh air.
May be. * view of what ee often
v e
Washington. — This article shall
be devoted not to politics nor to
_ affairs of the gov-
ruturm erament of the na-
Leadera tion exclusively
but to the future—
the future leaders. It shall be, to
that extent, a discussion of funda
mentals about which I think there
can be no controversy.
First, let us take a quick survey.
In the Capitol building of our own
nation there is raging a bitter de
bate between two schools of political
thought. The question is whether
there shall be a law passed that will
give to the President of the United
States the power to appoint addi
tional justices to the bench of the
Supreme court when and if present
sitting members reach the age of
seventy-five and refuse ,to retire
from active work.
In Spain, a bitter political war
fare moves on apace. It is over the
question whether Communism of the
Russian sort or Fascism of the Ital
ian brand should be the dominant
influence in the government of that
nation.
In the Far East, along the Rus
sian border, troops of the Japanese
emperor and of the Russian dicta
tor, Stalin, glared at each other.
Their controversy also involves po
litical bases. That controversy also
is complicated by economic condi
tions. It is a powder keg.
Back in Europe, we find a dicta
tor, Hitler by name, persecuting
citizens of Germany almost without
end. A political question there is
involved aiiJ it is complicated deep
ly by religion and race. Hitler and
his minions seek to destroy, first,
the Catholic church and, second,
the Jews.
Somewhat set off by the great
Alps, although woven intricately in
to the whole picture, is another dis
torted and disturbing condition. In
Italy, Mussolini, having moat of hie
people under his steel boot, is now
preparing for new crusades. He has
ordered all steel producing units
in Italy to increase their produc
tion to the maximum so thvt war
material will be available. Musso
lini wants more territory; he wants
to expand the influence of Fascism
and he wants to build a gigantic
world power in a military way with
Rome as the center and with him
as the head.
• e •
Through many years residents of
Washington and visitors to the capi-
_ tal of the nation
Budding have gloried in a
for Futura greensward that
borders the Poto
mac river within the District of Co
lumbia. It is a Justl/iatnous park,
made more beautiful by such state
ly structures as the monument to
George Washington and the great
citadel of beauty erected to the mem
ory of Abraham Lincoln. And, to add
to this beauty is the vista acroas
the river where stands in grandeur
the beautiful home that was the
residence of Robert E. Lee—main
taining throughout the years the
respect that a nation has for a great
military leader. It reposes, or seems
to repose, in peace and quiet as do
the thousands of men who rest in
the hillsides of Arlington National
cemetery.
In this peaceful setting for ten
days, more than twenty-six thou
sand boys—the leaders of the fu
ture—were congregated in a Na
tional Jamboree of the Boy Scouts
of America. Tents were everywhere.
Uncounted boys in the khaki shorts,
which is their uniform, flitted about
the city or held various maneuvers
or staged dramas of the ages in a
great arena. Among them was a
sprinkling, and the number was not
more than a sprinkling compared to
the boys, of the scoutmasters and
mature men who constitute the lead
ership of this great army of youth.
I hope I may be forgiven for inter
jecting here an expression of my
personal feelings. It has been my
lot to work hard from the time I
put off swaddling clothes. The work
I have done and the experiences I
have met had a tendency to make
me callous, somewhat cynical. But
I must confess that on half a dozen
occasions as I wandered through
this tented city, I gave thought to
my own boyhood and to two boys
for whom I am responsible, I felt
a swelling of pride, a satisfaction
of heart, that I live in a nation
which has given me the right to
liberty and progress.
Moreover, there came to me the
thoughts of the future of my own
two boys and the millions of others
just like them— future leaders of a
nation that holds forth such possibil
ities as are best evidenced by the
encampment of those twenty-six
thousand then within the range
of my vision.
• • •
Then, no tribute to these future
leaders of our nation and to the
nation which brad
them can ar will
tm Want be
Or Jaaaea E Wee
the keenest medical minds said he
could not live and if he did live
would be a hopeless invalid.
But Dr. West was made out of
the same mold from which came
the founders of our nation and from
whom, as founders, the traditions
and the methods known pow as the
American way have grown.
It was Dr. West who devo
indeed, dedicated his life to the or
ganization and development of the
Boy Scouts of America. It is now an
organization of more than two mil
lion boys and there are some six
million who can be called alumni
because they have grown too old to
remain in the ranks of active Boy
Scouts.
I mentioned earlier that this was
an army of peace, an army devoted
to the maintenance of American
traditions. No better proof of this
need be given, if any were needed,
than the notorious fact that rep
resentatives from the three total-
iarian states—Italy, Germany and
Russia—are missing from the en
campment. In two of those states
the Boy Scout movement has been
superseded by a dictator’s decree
which forces regimentation and mil*
itarizing of the youth. They are
being trained for war. Happily most
countries still pin their faith to the
virtues summarized in the Scout
law—the boys promise not to die
but to live, not to cringe but to
blossom, by holding themselves ev
er trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friend
ly, courteous, obedient, cheerful,
thrifty, clean, and last but not
least to maintain a reverence for
God.
So, I think I can be pardoned for
the feriing I have that in this en
campment lie the seeds of a con
tinued free America, waiting the
time to take root and bloom into
manhood. It is from these and from
these alone that we can hope to
maintain in our beloved nation a
political system which warrants
neither Communism nor Fascism;
which desires liberty and peace and
which challenges the cockeyed theo
ries that government must care for
the people rather than the people
care for their government.
It seemed to me, therefore, to be
something of a sour note that the
National Youth administration
which set up a hideous looking, box-
Uke structure near the center of
the capital city from which litera
ture could be distributed to the Boy
Scouts. This structure looked for
all the world like a soft drink stand
at a cheap carnival and I. per
sonally, resented the action of Na
tional Youth administration officials
who ordered its construction. I felt
this way because the National Youth
administration is predicated upon
the very theory that I have just
condemned—a theory that govern
ment must serve as a fatter for
everybody and that it must lay
down rules to which all must sub
scribe. It is the nearest thing te
the regimentation that is going on in
nations under dictators that exists
in our government today.
• • •
Cabled dispatches from Russia in
dicate again that the dictator, 6ta-
„ lia, is determined
Hamoy Hand to rid the Soviet
mi Stalin of anyone and ev
eryone who may
be opposed to him. The official an
nouncements of the so-called Soviet
government tell of the “liquidation’'
of numerous individuals who have
objected to Stalin’s tactics or who
are seeking to revise the Soviet
system. “Liquidation" in Russia
means that those individuals were
executed by a firing squad. A dead
man can cause no harm to the as
pirations of a dictator.
The Stalin administration ar
ranges for the "liquidation" of its
opponents by coercion of confes
sions and this is followed up by
what the Soviet calls a trial in a
court of justice. The courts of jus
tice are owned and controlled by
Stalin; they decide as they are told
to decide and there is no such thing
as an impartial court in Russia be
cause the government owns the
courts and names the judges who
are to do the government’s bidding.
Private advices from abroad seem
to show that there is a very serious
uprising underneath the surface in
Russia. Thousands of Russians have
grown tired of having one man de
termine whether they shall live or
die and they yearn again for a
system of courts which will de
termine their guilt or innocence in
accordance with honest evidence
presented, and not in accordance
with the way the governing clique
wants justice administered.
As the Russian judiciary is con
structed under the mailed fist of
Stalin, courts are a farce. Without
such a court structure, however,
a dictator could not perpetuate his
own power. He must have control
of the courts in order to carry out
under the guise of law all of the
■ and hatreds that
m at free people
those who serve us, par-
WS'
ticularly those whose occupations
are mechanical or lonesome enough
to allow their minds to drift often
into the realms of fantasy?
Walt Disney is an example. Born
in Chicago ih 1901. his first job was
as a mail carrier there, at the age
of sixteen. As a little boy he liked
to draw, and he liked to draw ani-
mals; but the famous creator of
ickey Mouse had to make a living
delivering mail. He had no chance
to express his creative genius un
til after the World war, when he
obtained a job as a commercial
artist in Kansas City. In his garage,
he experimented with animated
newsreels called "Local Happen
ings." which he sold to Kansas City
moving picture theaters. He fol
lowed these with a series of fairy
tales for local clubs and church
gatherings.
This modest success prompted
him to try Hollywood, where ha
started in an unpretentious little
building far from the big studios.
Thera ha created “Oswald, the
Rabbit.” but after making 36 sub
jects. ha and his backer separated.
The backer owned the rights to
“Oswald, the Rabbit” which is still
being shown in the theaters, and
Disney eras left without his most
promising character. Out of this
adversity was born "Mickey
Mouse” and the "Silly Sympho-
Today. Walt Disney employs a
staff of artists to draw his charac
ters but he is. himself, the voice of
Mickey Mouse
• • •
PICTURE MAGNATE WAS A
PEDDLER
I TS fun for the young man who
was born to be president of his
rich father’s company: a month In
the shop, a month clerking, and
then general manager But consid
er the discouragement and heart
aches of the boy too poor for an
adequate education, too poor for
nourishing food or decent clothing,
too poor to meet people with influ
ence That such boys, possessing
only courage, ambition and brains,
can still rise m America la this
country's strongest defense against
fascism and communism.
William Fox was born 117V In
fulchva. Hungary, son of a small
shopkeeper who extracts-' teeth as a
•ids-line. The family moved to
America when William was nine
months old. and settled in an East
Side tenement district of New York
city His first job was at the age of
nine, when his father, who was out
of work, made stove blacking in
their small tenement and William
peddled it from door to door in the
neighborhood. Later he sold candy
lozenges at the Third Street dock
and at Central park on Sundays.
At the age of fourteen, he was
forced by poverty to quit school.
He obtained a job in a clothing firm
and rose to be foreman in charge
of lining cutting, at the magnificent
salary of $8 per week. To augment
his earnings, he bought umbrellas
and peddled them in front of thea
ters on rainy nights. With $1,600
savings accumulated through many
privations, he started a cloth ex
amining and shrinking business,
when he was twenty-one, and at
tha end of the second year invested
his profits in a nickelodeon or flvw-
cent motioa picture
five years later ha
CFMJ.
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