Editorial: Ahead of schedule
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Background of news –
Dewey and foreign policy
By Bertram Benedict
Second of two articles.
Thomas E. Dewey as President might find the Soviet Union coy about cooperating with him, because of a speech Mr. Dewey made in New York City on Jan. 20, 1940.
He said the Roosevelt foreign policy was largely acceptable because “broadly” it had followed the Republican foreign policy as carried out by Secretaries of State Hughes, Kellogg, and Stimson. But there had been one “most unfortunate departure.”
This was the diplomatic recognition of Soviet Russia, where “a godless government had raised up to a state creed the sterile doctrine of atheism.” The Communist government had seized and maintained power by murder and assassination. He said:
It is a perversion of government, abhorrent to the conscience of mankind.
The Roosevelt administration, in recognizing the Soviet government in 1933, had been “gullible.” We needed no partnership with Russia, no more “fuzzy-minded departures” from the established course of our foreign policy.
For revised Lend-Lease bill
This Dewey pronouncement for an isolationist policy vis-à-vis the Soviet Union seemed to be paralleled by Mr. Dewey’s original attitude on Lend-Lease aid to Britain.
After the administration bill to that end had been introduced in Congress, Mr. Dewey told reporters in Philadelphia, on Jan. 15, 1941, that it would “bring an end to free government in the United States and abolish Congress, for all practical purposes.”
But Mr. Dewey changed his mind fast. On the following Feb. 12, in a speech in Washington, he followed the example of Wendell L. Willkie in supporting Lend-Lease, and offered what sounded like a collaborationist credo:
I believe our party stands for all-out aid to the heroic people of Great Britain, because we believe with all our hearts and all our souls in rendering all possible aid to free men resisting tyrants who would enslave them.
Mr. Dewey explained that the original Lend-Lease bill had been unwise, but that the measure had been made less objectionable. It was true that in passing the Lend-Lease bill on Feb. 6 the House had added certain amendments which tightened Congressional supervision over Lend-Lease operations. The Republican representatives had voted more than 5–1 against the bill even as amended, so in supporting it, Mr. Dewey was opposing them.
Cooperation sentiment grows
As the months rolled on, Mr. Dewey progressed farther and farther from the keep-away-from-Europe philosophy he had expounded in his primary campaign in Wisconsin during March 1940.
In May 1942, he called for cooperation by the United States in post-war planning, and remarked that we could not hide behind the boundaries of geography. In the same month, he asked for the rejection of Rep. Hamilton Fish, outstanding isolationist, in the Republican primaries in New York.
In June 20, 1943, at Columbus, Ohio, he said the Republican Party must take responsibility for a post-war program of international cooperation. He endorsed the anti-isolationist resolution of the Republican National Committee at Chicago in April 1943, the resolutions of the Mackinac Conference of Republicans on post-war policy in the following September, and the Fulbright Resolution passed by the House in the same month.
Mr. Dewey’s most recent statement on foreign policy was ion Tuesday of last week. He said the United States must work with the British to keep the doors of Palestine opened permanently to Jewish immigration. He denounced by name Gerald L. K. Smith as a would-be “polluter of the stream of American life.” And he called for “a system of international cooperation.”
Millett: Bleached blonds have right to keep illusions alive by dyeing their hair
‘Freezing’ of false colors is justice; wartime burdens tax femininity
By Ruth Millett
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Taylor: Arab chieftain ‘favors’ British on oil pipeline
Does about-face in attitude toward U.S.
By Henry J. Taylor, Scripps-Howard staff writer
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Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
With 5th Army Allied beachhead forces, Italy – (by wireless)
One day I saw around with a tank crew, in emergency position just behind our frontline infantry. They had been there for eight days.
They hadn’t done anything. They were there just to help repel any attacks that might be coming. We keep lots of tanks located thus at all times.
This crew had its metal behemoth hidden around a small rise, half obscured by oak bushes. The men were cooking a pot of dried beans when I got there in mid-forenoon. They had coffee boiling as usual, and we drank coffee as we talked.
When tank men are out like this, 10-in-1 rations and K-rations are brought up to them at night by jeeps. They do all their own cooking, and sleep in the tank for safety. They aren’t supposed to smoke inside the tanks, but everybody does. Some crews even burn their little cookstoves right in the driver’s department.
A tank and the territory around it are a mess after five men have lived in it for eight days. The ground is strewn with boxes and tin cans and mess gear. The inside of the tank looks as though a hurricane had hit it.
This tank had everything in it from much-handled comic books to a pocket edition of the Bible. You found old socks, empty tobacco cans, half cups of cold coffee. The boys used the top of the tank for table and shelves, and this, too, was littered.
But all this disarray doesn’t keep it from being a good tank, because this crew holds the battalion record for firing its entire ammunition load in the shortest time.
Sleeping in tank not too comfortable
Sleeping five nights in a tank isn’t too comfortable, for space is very limited. They spread their blankets around the interior, sleep in their clothes, and nobody gets completely stretched out. The worst spot is around the gunner’s seat, where the man really has to sleep halfway sitting up, so they take turns sleeping in this uncomfortable spot.
After they’ve stayed at the front eight to 10 days, another company relieves them, and they move back a couple of miles, dig in, then clean up and relax for a few days.
These medium tanks carry a five-man crew. This one was commanded by Sgt. Speros Bakalos, a short, nice-looking ex-truck driver from Boston. Once, the tank he was serving in was hit, and his tank commander’s head shot clear off.
The driver is Sgt. Oscar Stewart of Bristol, Virginia. They call him “Pop,” because he is in his middle 30s. he used to work for the state highway department.
His assistant driver is Pvt. Donald Victorine of Crystal Lake, Illinois. He, incidentally, is a friend of Capt. Max Kuehnert, whom I knew in Tunisia and whose baby I had the honor of naming Sandra, though Lord knows how I ever thought of that one.
Toughest-looking soldier Ernie ever saw
The gunner is Cpl. Bud Carmichael of Monterey, California, and his assistant is Pvt. George Everhart from Thomasville, North Carolina.
Carmichael’s nickname is “Hoagy,” after the famous composer of Star Dust. This Carmichael used to be a pipefitter for the gas company in Monterey. When I saw him, he hadn’t shaved or washed for a week. He wore a brown muffler around his neck, a roll-stocking cap on his head, unbuckled overshoes, and was altogether the toughest-looking soldier I ever laid eyes on. But he belied his looks, for he was full of good nature and dry wit.
A few days later I saw the same gang again, and the other boys were saying that after I left that day they talked about me. I’d remarked upon meeting them that I’d gone to college with the real Hoagy Carmichael, so this “Hoagy” told the boys that if he’d been thinking fast, he would have replied:
That’s funny, Ernie. I don’t remember you. What seat did you sit in?
The men cook in a big aluminum pot they took out of an abandoned house, and on a huge iron skillet that Carmichael got in barter for the equivalent of $20. They call it their “$20 skillet,” and are careful of it, even washing it sometimes.
Carmichael has a photo on the barrel of his gun inside the turret – a dancing picture of Carmen Miranda and Cesar Romero. He says it gives him inspiration in battle, and then he grins until his eyes squint.
OWI’ll tell the world –
Lucey: Stark drama of mail order catalog is example of propaganda method
Stockpile for psychological warfare is not all quite that fanciful
By Charles T. Lucey, Scripps-Howard staff writer
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Pirates return to Muncie base
Final practice slated; Cuccurullo shines as Bucs again whip tribe
By Dick Fortune
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Cards’ mediocre pitching worries Billy Southworth
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Knows his stuff –
New ‘Voice of Experience’ is psychologist
Is lunacy expert at New York prison
By Si Steinhauser
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Ex-soldiers get old rank if reinducted
Non-coms must take refresher course
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Servicemen ruled out in bargain votes
Can cast ballot on return to civilian job
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Votes to keep Roosevelt in sought by CIO
Two million ‘needed to assure election’
By Fred W. Perkins, Pittsburgh Press staff writer
Washington –
The most definite statement so far of the CIO’s main political aim in this year’s election is presented in the current publication of the United Automobile Workers, whose president, R. J. Thomas, is a member of the CIO Political Action Committee.
This main aim is to assure reelection of President Roosevelt, or the triumph of another “progressive Democrat.” This hardly will be a surprise to politicians, but the fact has never been officially stated up to now.
The “secret” comes out in an explanation of why “CIO Political Action Committees must round up a minimum of two to three million votes to assure a close but certain margin of victory.”
Cites 1940 vote
This is why, according to the UAW analysis:
The President had 27 million votes in 1940 as against about 23 million for Willkie. Roughly seven million men in the Armed Forces might vote for the President or a progressive Democrat, according to Gallup Poll estimates. The deduction of the soldier vote would have the following effect: Democratic 20 million as against Republican 20 million.
If only a few workers who have moved to new communities and states for war jobs vote, the Democratic vote would be further reduced. The vote totals might then be Democratic 18 million as against Republican 19½ million. That’s why an additional two to three million new votes must be found to guarantee election of a progressive candidate.
Unless the CIO Political Action Committees can scare up this many additional votes, the prospects for a Democratic victory are not bright.
Soldier vote bill criticized
The union’s figures are based on its contention that “at this point, Congress has virtually disfranchised the soldier and sailor.” That is disputed by advocates of the soldier vote bill which Congress enacted, with the President withholding his signature.
The big auto workers’ union, said to be the largest in the world, urges its members to continue efforts to assure voting in the armed services, and also to:
Get workers who have moved to new cities to register and vote. There are from five to 10 million votes involved here.
Induce people who never voted before to register and vote. In 1940, from 10 to 20 million eligible voters stayed away from the polls.
Farm bloc rapped
A reason for the importance of the armed service vote, according to the UAW paper, is that:
Thanks to the lobbying effect of the misnamed farm bloc, a large percentage of draftees are from the metropolitan centers. Far more enlisted men come from the cities than from the rural areas, and cities are normally more Democratic than the rural areas.
The CIO Political Action Committee has been under attack from two Democratic Congressmen, both of whom are described by the CIO unionists as Southern “poll taxers.” Rep. Martin Dies (D-TX), in a report of his investigating committee, criticized the CIO Committee as being subject to Communistic influence.
Wants inquiry reopened
Rep. Howard W. Smith (D-VA) has a request pending before Attorney General Biddle for a reopening of an inquiry into his charge that the CIO Committee has violated the War Labor Disputes Act prohibition of union financial contributions in connection with national elections.
Rep. Smith today said that he had turned over to Attorney General Biddle files which he contends warrant a grand jury investigation.
Biddle criticized
Mr. Biddle informed Mr. Smith last week that the investigation of the committee which Mr. Smith had requested had shown no violation of the section of the Smith-Connally anti-strike law which prohibits political contributions by labor organizations.
Mr. Smith criticized Mr. Biddle’s failure to send an investigator to his office to examine “evidence” which he had on file.
Senator Guy M. Gillette (D-IA), declaring that the Hatch Act limiting campaign expenditures had “a hole in it big enough to drive a team of horses through,” asked for immediate hearings on his bill limiting personal contributions to $10,000 a year.
Door left wide open
He said the present $5,000-a-year limit on contributions to national committees left the door wide open to individual donations to state and county organizations.
Another provision of the Hatch Act, limiting total presidential campaign expenditures to $3 million for each party, Senator Gillette found “wholly ineffective.”
Senator Gillette said he heard that legislation to “patch the holes” in the Hatch Act would drive political contributions under cover, adding:
If we don’t pass something this presidential year, the Hatch Act regarding political contributions will be a dead letter.