The Brooklyn Eagle (May 29, 1944)
3,700 PLANES BLAST NAZI AIRCRAFT PLANTS
U.S. fliers strike from west, north
Other Allied bombers attack objectives in Berlin area
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3,700 PLANES BLAST NAZI AIRCRAFT PLANTS
Yanks within sight of Rome
Battle foe 16 miles from city as Nazis try counterdrive
By Eleanor Packard
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Fighter planes in Burma using effective rockets
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Ponape bombed again
Washington (UP) –
Medium bombers strafed Ponape and Makin Islands in the Carolines east of Truk, while other U.S. aircraft continued to bomb defense installations at the remaining Japanese bases in the Marshall Islands, the Navy announced today. The attacks took place on Friday.
Newsmen predict Governor Dewey has 50–50 chance with FDR
By Joseph H. Schmalacker
Albany, New York –
Governor Dewey’s White House qualifications and prospects, the question of his press relations and other subjects were put under the microscope here today in a poll of newspaper correspondents who have reported his activities since he assumed office Jan. 1, 1943.
Eight overall questions were submitted confidentially to 26 of his newspaper associates on Capitol Hill by John Mooney, legislative correspondent of the Albany Knickerbocker News. Twenty-three replied.
The 1944 national campaign’s $64 question – Dewey’s chances against President Roosevelt – found none of
However, most of the writers believed Dewey would poll a larger popular vote than Wendell L. Willkie received as the 1940 GOP nominee, thereby establishing an unwritten consensus that a Roosevelt-Dewey race would be a closer one, possibly of the photo-finish variety, than the campaign of four years ago. While none of the correspondents would predict Dewey’s election, their combined opinion is that his chances of defeating Roosevelt range up to 50%.
The correspondents stated they were convinced Dewey would be nominated and that, in fact, he is practically the nominee now.
Most of the replies expressed belief Dewey’s age (he is 42) was an asset rather than a liability for the Presidency. The dissenters said, “Age is important from the dictatorship angle. Age, experience, temper a man, make him less impetuous, more tolerant.”
With three exceptions, all the correspondents declared Dewey’s record as Governor has been a good one, although some assorted adroit publicity and headlines had overemphasized certain features.
In the critical category, it was said Dewey “neither pioneered nor advanced social legislation,” and that he had been fearful, rather than forceful, in certain respects. One objection raised was that he was “opportunistic” and “dictatorial.”
The correspondent’s consensus, with a few exceptions, is that Dewey has maintained press relations ranging from “friendly” to “cordial.” Three replies objected Dewey was not sufficiently frank and free at his press conferences.
Among the Republican Governor’s presidential assets, the poll listed: His records; his buildup; that he symbolizes the vast body of anti-New Deal sentiment and political philosophy; public acceptance of his current views on foreign policy; his showmanship and radio personality; his appeal to women voters (an important factor this year); his own vote-getting ability as Governor of New York, pivotal in the national picture; the pronounced GOP trend with Dewey riding the crest of that wave; “untainted as a politician,” and because his silence to the day of his nomination will make it possible for him, if he can do it, to make the issues of the campaign rather than to trail always on the defensive.
His major weaknesses in the national arena as seen by the reporters: His vacillation; past statements, and present inexperience in foreign affairs; “certain pressure and lobby groups behind him;” his reckless audacity; “all his talk about the tired old men will go out the window when they begin to show him the tricks he doesn’t know;” that he is not intimately known to any of the major figures on the international stage; President Roosevelt; the war.
Dubinsky backs Roosevelt for another term
Boston, Massachusetts (UP) –
President David Dubinsky of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (AFL) endorsed a fourth term for President Roosevelt today.
Addressing 800 delegates representing some 305,000 members at the Garment Workers’ 25th Annual Convention, he called for government cooperation with industry in providing employment “for the great many millions who will lose their jobs on the day of the final armistice.”
Praising the New Deal as a “progressive national administration,” he said “Franklin Delano Roosevelt must and will be reelected President.”
He said:
Those who raise the cry of dictatorship expose their lack of faith in our government and in the democratic processes of government.
The Pittsburgh Press (May 29, 1944)
Roving Reporter
By Ernie Pyle
London, England –
The good news from Italy has been tinged with bad for some of us who still have strong roots and half our hearts in that cruel battleground.
The name of Roderick MacDonald means nothing to you in America, but it meant much to many of us who marched with the wars in Tunisia, Sicily and Italy. For Mac was one of our bunch – a war correspondent – and he was killed the other day at Cassino.
Mac was a Scot. His family emigrated to Australia and he was schooled there and eventually went to work for The Sydney Morning Herald. He left Australia in 1941 and followed the wars in China, the Near East and all through Africa.
We first knew him in Tunisia. Just after Tunis fell, he came down with a savage recurrence of malaria and spent three weeks in a hospital. Finally, he got strong enough to get back to Algiers during that peaceful interval between Tunisia and Sicily.
During that time, our public-relations section was set up in a camp on the sandy and gentle shore of the Mediterranean, some 20 miles outside of Algiers. That’s where I used up six weeks of peace – one of the grandest six weeks of my life, just lolling in my tent, eating well, working a little, reading a lot, mostly loafing and being wonderfully warm.
Roderick MacDonald sent word that he was in a hotel at Algiers, and I got a jeep and went and picked him up. He was so weak he couldn’t even carry his bedroll. We brought him out to camp and put him in the tent next to mine.
For days he lay listlessly, with strength enough only to get up for meals. The sun was broiling and he would strip down to his shorts and lie there in the hot sand, baking his body a sleek brown. Gradually life began to flow into him again his face filled out, the glaze left his eyes, and the famous MacDonald smith and MacDonald barbed retort began to return.
Mac had everything to live for, and he loved being alive. He was young, tall, handsome, brilliant, engaging. He had a sensitive mind, and he would have been a novelist had there been no war.
Among Americans he was the best liked British correspondent I have ever known. With his Scottish and Australian heritage, he understood us. He would kid the pants off us about the way we talked, and mimic our flat pronunciation in his yarns. He in turn took the same razzing about his Oxford accent.
He had never been in America, but it was his one ambition to go there.
Like most correspondents, Mac felt that he had to write a book. He had it about two-thirds finished when he came to our camp to recuperate. During the latter days of his stay, when his strength had returned, he tapped away belligerently on his little typewriter, cussing the day he ever started the book, resenting the deadline his London publishers were heckling him with. But he did finish it.
The day I arrived in London from Italy, I went into a bookstore, and I noticed Mac’s book. I bought it just because I knew Mac, and brought it home and put it on the table, but never did read it.
Now I will read it. What an ironic world, that only the compulsion of death makes us do for our friends – in more ways than merely reading a book – what we should have done while they still lived.
I suppose my best friend in Italy was Lt. Col. Ed Bland, a dive bomber squadron leader. He was tall, blond Westerner of 28, who looked much older than he was and who had the open honesty and good humor of the West. Word has just come that he has been shot down.
Probably the story has been told already in America, for Ed was popular with all the correspondents. The letter that brought the word to me said this:
Ed was strafing about 30 feet above the ground when a small shell set his plane afire underneath. Ed didn’t know it until his wingman radioed him. Then he climbed to 1,500 feet and bailed out.
The wingman said his chute didn’t open till he was 200 feet from the ground. There was a great deal of shooting, and one theory is that it was directed at him, but majority opinion ruled differently and the boys believe he is OK.
Wick Fowler of The Dallas News was a close friend of Ed’s. We used to sit around indulging in idiotic talk and Ed was always talking about how funny it would be to telephone Rome for hotel reservations and throw the German into a panic.
After I left Italy, Ed’s oil line stopped up one day on a mission near Rome and he was certain he would have to bail out. Later, he told Wick that while he was in trouble and sure he’d have to jump he got to thinking about that telephone idea and had to laugh at himself.
And now that he really has bailed out, Wick sends along this thought in a letter:
Ed’s time was short at 1,500 but I have a hunch the telephone idea came to him again on the way down.
If Ed did call up Rome for reservations, I hope the Germans gave him the royal suite, for he’s the best there is.
Völkischer Beobachter (May 30, 1944)
US-Drohungen mit Moskau –
Schweden soll um jeden Preis gefügig werden
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Fünf US-Terrorbomber in der Schweiz notgelandet
Wie amtlich gemeldet wird, drangen am 27. Mai mittags von verschiedenen Orten der nördlichen Schweizer Grenze mehrere amerikanische Bombenflugzeuge in den schweizerischen Luftraum ein. Fünf von ihnen mußten infolge Beschädigungen notlanden.
Wirksame deutsche Luftangriffe gegen englische Ziele –
Erfolgreiche Abwehrkämpfe in Italien
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155 Terrorflugzeuge in 48 Stunden
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U.S. Navy Department (May 30, 1944)
CINCPAC Press Release No. 425
For Immediate Release
May 30, 1944
Saipan Island in the Marianas was bombed by Liberator search planes of Fleet Air Wing Two and Liberator bombers of the 7th Army Air Force during daylight on May 28 (West Longitude Date). Moderate heavy caliber anti-aircraft fire was encountered. Twelve enemy fighters attacked our formation. Two fighters were shot down and two were damaged.
Shumushu Island in the Kurils was bombed by Ventura search planes of Fleet Air Wing Four before dawn on May 27. Meager anti-aircraft fire was encountered.
On May 28, enemy positions in the Marshalls were bombed by Mitchells of the 7th Army Air Force, Ventura search planes of Fleet Air Wing Two, Dauntless dive bombers and Corsair fighters of the 4th Marine Aircraft Wing, and Navy Hellcat fighters. Runways, barracks, anti-aircraft batteries and other defense installations were hit.
CINCPAC Press Release No. 426
For Immediate Release
May 30, 1944
Ten officers and enlisted men of the Submarine Forces, Pacific Fleet (SUBPAC) were presented awards for distinguished performance of duty by Adm. C. W. Nimitz, CINCPAC-CINCPOA, in a ceremony at Pearl Harbor on May 30.
In presenting the medal awards, Adm. Nimitz said:
During thirty months of war in the Pacific our submarine forces have penetrated far into Japanese home waters; have cut heavily into the available tonnage of Japanese shipping; and in so doing have probably made more unsung heroes than any other branch of the naval service. The numerous men of distinguished valor who are to be found in the submarine forces receive little public recognition because details of submarine operations cannot be made public for good reasons of military security. It is possible, however, to confer medal awards upon those who have particularly distinguished themselves in undersea warfare, while the dramatic exploits and achievements which make these awards so richly deserved must remain untold until after the war.
One of the major reasons why Japan’s once grandiose plan for conquest of the entire Pacific has gone glimmering is the enemy’s inability to maintain control of the sea lanes which he must use to take supplies to his military outposts and bring supplies to the Empire. From the beginning of the war our submarines have challenged that control, and the western Pacific, which normally would be dominated by the enemy, is instead a No Man’s Sea in which our submarine forces are daily increasing their interference with and interruption of Japan’s wartime commerce and the movement of men and munitions. That our submarines will be joined sooner or later in these intrusion tactics by our surface forces and aircraft must be expected by our enemy.
Our submarines have sent more than two and a half million tons of Japanese shipping to the ocean floor, and are sending a very considerable quantity of tonnage into Japanese shipyards for repair, which ties up repair facilities and resources which the Jap needs for other purposes.
This steady attrition of shipping space available to the enemy is slowly and surely sapping his strength.
In accomplishing these results the submarine forces have demonstrated skill and daring, and have shown a noteworthy capacity to learn new tactics and new methods of getting the best out of their versatile weapons.
In recognition of recent outstanding achievements by twelve of your number, I now have the pleasure of presenting individual awards. In presenting these awards, I am simply acting for the President of the United States. If it were possible, our Commander-in-Chief would derive the keenest pleasure from pinning these medals on you himself.
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Address by Ohio Governor John W. Bricker
May 30, 1944
Delivered at the Governors’ Conference, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Our representative system of government has responded amazingly to the crisis of war. The dictators have said that the democracies were decadent. They had proclaimed to the world that a free people could not be welded together into a strong, united and determined nation. American ingenuity has belied their accusations.
We have built, almost overnight, the mightiest Army and Navy in the world. American industry and agriculture, in spite of burdensome restrictions, have worked a miracle of war production. The American people are actuated by a single-minded determination to win this war. There is every evidence that we are now ready to strike decisive blows both in Europe and in the Pacific.
We cannot safely predict the length of the war. But I think it is the part of wisdom, in developing our post-war plans, to assume that the Axis powers may see at any time that they have nothing to gain by further resistance.
We may suddenly be confronted by problems of converting our economy to peacetime production and providing jobs for our returning soldiers. There is much to do. Nothing would be more encouraging to the American people than some substantial progress in the solution of our fiscal and taxation problems. These problems have confused enterprise and dampened the spirit of our people for more than a decade.
For six years, I have attended these conferences. At every meeting we have been considering the encroachment of the national government on state and local authority. We have had to fight our own government to keep our own rights. At this time of crisis there should be complete unity of purpose in all segments of our governmental authority. On the federal plan, we have built and produced mightily. We are serving America’s best interests when we battle to maintain it. This issue of centralized bureaucratic power as against a larger degree of local autonomy cuts across our fiscal and tax policies.
In considering our fiscal policies I am guided by two basic objectives. The first is the preservation of our federal system of government. The truth is that the states are threatened by an ever-growing centralization of power in Washington. The threat is so serious that today we face the question whether the states will remain active, cooperative and equally sovereign members of our governmental system, or whether they will be reduced to provincial administrative units with little or no self-government.
Indeed, the issue reaches to the very heart of the American form of government. Shall government be kept close to the hands of the American people and ever responsive to their guiding will, or shall it be completely usurped by an already highly centralized national authority which is ever growing more powerful? Shall the people preserve home rule or shall they sit passively by while it is being strangled to death? This is the issue to which the people must be constantly alert. To settle it, there must be a sweeping change in many current philosophies of government.
My second objective is that we must devise a system of taxation and adopt a scale of rates that will revitalize our entire economic machinery. To that end we must provide the necessary incentives for investment in industry and for production by management and labor. Before the war, our economic machinery was virtually on dead center because of unbalanced budgets, severe taxation and the overwhelming threats of higher taxation and restrictive legislation.
If government is to encourage, rather than hinder, full production and high employment, it must devise a system of taxation for the long run, not for the short pull. It must understand that frequent changes in fiscal policy throw our economic machinery out of gear and cause confidence to give way to misgiving and uncertainty. Government also must understand that if risks are to be taken, there must be a fair balance between opportunity for reward and hazard of loss.
In order to grasp fully the immediate and far-reaching significance of state and local fiscal policies, it is necessary to bear in mind certain trends which have been changing our public fiscal policies.
From the founding of our nation until the early 20th century, ours was essentially an agrarian economy. Most individuals felt far removed from the federal government – even from state government. Their governmental relations were primarily with the township or town and the county.
The federal government was concerned mainly with foreign relations, especially foreign commerce. At home it had the job of maintaining a small army and navy and improving internal waterways. Its financial requirements were easily met by indirect taxes, largely customs, and a few internal revenue duties of a sumptuary nature.
With the closing of the geographical frontier and the rapid growth of cities, the Machine Age was upon us. Soon a wider view was taken of interstate commerce. More businesses were held by the courts to be carrying on interstate commerce and hence came within the purview of Congress.
Thus began the more minute federal regulation of business which involved the organization of new federal agencies and the expansion of old ones. This led to the search for new sources of revenue. The income tax amendment was ratified in 1913 and immediately a new federal tax was imposed. World War I brought death taxes to the federal system. The Depression of the ‘30s saw the introduction of many more new taxes, such as those on payrolls, and the extension of old ones.
These developments had an adverse effect upon state and local governments. Confronted with their own increased financial responsibilities resulting from the Depression, they found their tax resources being cut into very severely by the revenue demands of the federal government. Nevertheless, they have continued, without forethought, to go along with a trend which, if continued, will lead to the loss of their financial independence. Our federal system is founded upon the necessity of maintaining strong, independent state and local governments. They cannot be destroyed without also destroying freedom. As Dean Pound said:
All experience shows that a domain in continental extent as always been ruled as an autocracy or as a federal government.
Or as Woodrow Wilson was moved to say:
The history of liberty is the history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it. When we resist… concentration of power, we are resisting the processes of death, because concentration of power is what always precedes the destruction of human liberties.
It is true that now the states and local governments generally are in a relatively good financial position. Many states have accumulated surpluses. This present condition has resulted from more efficient and economical operation of state and local governments. It also resulted from the rise in the national income which started in 1939 and which was accelerated by the war in Europe, the defense program and, finally, our war production. Notwithstanding this condition, however, we should not be oblivious of the underlying currents which are inevitably washing away the very foundation of our state and local governments – their traditional financial independence. The time has come for the adoption of fiscal policies which will preserve that financial independence.
Attention should first be directed to the mainstay of local governments – the property tax. This has been severely reduced by the purchase of more and more land by the federal government, thus withdrawing it from the state and local tax rolls. As of June 30, 1937, it was estimated that total federal real estate holdings, including the public domain, were 395,000,000 acres. This was more than 20 percent of the total area of the country. If taxed at local rates, this federally owned property would have yielded some $91,000,000. That amount exceeds all collections from property taxes in 1939 in 34 of our 48 states.
Since Pearl Harbor, there has been, of course, further substantial acquisition of land by the federal government and its instrumentalities. The Defense Plant Corporation, for example, by December 1943, had acquired more than 10,000,000 acres and 20,000 city lots.
To make up the loss in revenue, instead of permitting the states and local governments even a limited exercise of their own taxing power, the federal government devised the scheme of “payments in lieu of taxes.” Adherence to this policy will help to destroy the financial independence of local governments.
Appropriate authorization for the local taxation of federally owned property, with proper restrictions, would help to maintain their financial independence. Even more important, all this property acquired for the conduct of the war, not needed for our permanent post-war military needs, should be returned to private ownership as soon as practicable after victory, thus restoring it to the local tax rolls.
The next threat to state and local governments to which we should direct our attention is the recent expansion of what might be termed the subsidy theory. This means that more and more functions of government heretofore locally administered and financed are becoming centralized. Changes in economic and social conditions obviously require, from time to time, a reallocation of governmental functions. But this should be done only when such a change results in greater benefit to the public at large with no loss in democratic control of the revenue raising and spending activities of the government assuming such function.
In 1932, federal subsidies to the states amounted to $217,000,000. By 1937, the figure had more than doubled. In 1941, it was more than triple, reaching $744,000,000. But this is not all. In 1941, in addition to the $744,000,000 granted to the states, over $95,000,000 went to local governments. Of all taxes collected in the United States in 1932, the federal government’s portion was 22 percent, leaving state and local governments 78 percent. In 1939, before World War II started, the share of state and local governments had dropped to 62 percent of all taxes, the federal government’s share having jumped to 38 percent.
Make no mistake about it, the most effective way to abolish the independence of state and local governments, and with it home rule in America, is by taking away their financial independence.
Coincident with the centralization of more and more of the taxing power in the federal government and the increase of federal subsidies to state and local governments, a similar trend has been going on within the states. There has been a steady expansion of the state taxing power with increased subsidies from the states to local governments.
It is perfectly natural that extension of the subsidy program should have some support from state and local officeholders. It is always more agreeable to a local official to have money to spend for the benefit of his constituents which he gets from the state capital or from Washington than it is to have to raise it by taxing his constituents who elect him. The same may be said of state officials with respect to federal grants. But we must realize the implications and results of this trend. State and local governments become a sham and a pretense if they cannot support themselves and must go to another government for handouts.
An excellent illustration of extending the subsidy theory info more and more fields has been the recent proposal of the federal government to subsidize the public schools of the nation. By dangling federal money before the eyes of the public schools, a very attractive lure is presented. But the difficulty is aside from the loss of financial independence, that there results a proportionate surrender of the states control over their educational systems. When an effort is made to change the government of a country, one of the first steps is to take over the education and training of the youth of that country. This is what Hitler did in Germany. I am opposed to the dictation of our educational policies from Washington.
The question then is: What is to be done in the face of these trends? I offer three recommendations.
First, it is essential that the strictest economy in government be practiced. This applies particularly to the federal government. Unless federal expenditures are limited to absolutely essential items, it is inevitable that the federal government must ultimately preempt the entire field of taxation, leaving nothing for state and local governments, have repeatedly pointed out that we may expect no substantial curtailment of federal expenditures until we abolish our present bureaucracy and return to a responsible cabinet government. There is a limit to the tax burden which our economy can bear.
Second, the states working together, the local governments working together and the two groups working with the Congress should take immediate steps toward appropriate segregation of tax bases, preserving appropriate fields of revenue for the national, state and local governments. One of the most serious problems confronting not only national, state and local governments, but especially the taxpayers, lies in overlapping tax bases. Our tax structure now is only a planless patchwork held together by nothing more substantial than political expediency.
Third, whenever state governments reach the point where their revenues may reasonably be anticipated to exceed necessary demands for any material period of time, instead of increasing local government subsidies, they should repeal such taxes as will best open fields of revenue for local governments. During recent years, the present administration in Ohio, after paying off its inherited deficits, has been confronted with the constant demand from local governments that the state’s surplus be distributed to them. It was my position last year that had we not been confronted with the uncertainties of war and the necessity of providing for a much-needed post-war building program, we should have launched upon a state tax repeal program, rather than one of increasing subsidies to local governments.
Of equal importance to the establishment of fiscal policies to maintain financial independence of state and local governments is the shaping of those policies so as to aid and encourage rather than stifle and suppress American private enterprise. Sound governmental fiscal policies, national, state and local, are the foundation stones of a stable economy and American prosperity.
There is need for further cooperation between the states in extension of reciprocity provisions in tax statutes. In view of recent decisions of the Supreme Court, two or more states may now tax the same income, the same inheritance or the same property. The necessity for appropriate reciprocal legislation has become more pressing in order to avoid this form of double taxation. While in a sense multiple taxation has existed for many years, it is my position that there is no justification for the imposition of such inequitable double taxation as I have mentioned. Appropriate reciprocal legislation will also relieve not only business, but individual citizens from double taxation arising from questions of domicile.
I am convinced that constructive work along these and other similar fines will aid rather than hamper business, to which we must look for high employment. But if this program is to be effective, the federal government also must do its part. This means that recent fiscal and tax policies of the federal government must be completely overhauled.
The federal government should balance its budget at the earliest possible date. That would give more jobs than all the made-work the Government could possibly plan. Simplification and stability of tax laws are desperately needed. We are given little encouragement along this line now. Adherence to the principle that the taxing power exists primarily for the purpose of raising necessary revenue and should not be used as an undercover method of effecting social changes is also necessary.
Moreover, there is a vital need for a sane and constructive federal tax policy that will stimulate incentive and encourage venture capital. Federal taxes should be reduced as soon as possible after victory. Such action would enable business to map out constant fear of changes, and to provide jobs for all who wish to work.
The recent Baruch-Hancock report went even farther. It said: “Until it is definitely known that post-war taxes are to be reduced, the launching of new enterprises and the expansion of existing ones will be deterred.” Accordingly, it recommended “that a post-war tax law be drafted now, during the war, and put on the shelf to go into effect at the end of the war.”
This proposal points the way toward the kind of federal tax policy that will be needed for reconstruction and rehabilitation after the war. In my judgment, the pre-war federal policy of spend, waste, borrow and tax will wreck American economy if continued in the post-war period. A nation which builds its financial house upon shifting sands of deficit financing in peace times cannot survive as a nation.
Nor can such a nation be a powerful influence in world affairs. The United States must help solve such problems as currencies, credits, air rights, markets and international trade. So long as the world is inflicted with discriminatory trade agreements, quotas, cartels, exchange wars, barter systems and the like, there can be little assurance of an enduring peace. Collaboration between nations in solving world economic and monetary problems is just as necessary as collaboration in solving world diplomatic and political problems.
But for all these purposes America must be strong. To be strong, to be influential, to be helpful in the world, we must, above everything else, build our own house upon the solid rock of financial solvency, equity and justice. Our power to help others will be dependent upon the degree in which we strengthen private enterprise and preserve individual opportunity.
Let us then remember, as the guiding principle of domestic policy, that our state and local governments, as well as the national government, are essential to our federal system. The strength of America stems from the practice of representative government in the towns, the cities, the counties and the states of this nation. When state and local governments become paralyzed, the door is open to every form of absolutism and every form of demagogy. When local responsibility is destroyed, citizenship atrophies and dies. But when state and local governments flourish, when men and women practice representative home rule, the foundations of the Republic are secure. The more the history of the Republic is written at the crossroads and the less at the Capitol, the freer we shall be.