America at war! (1941–) – Part 4

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Mrs. Luce to rip CIO-PAC tonight

Women will elect Dewey, she claims
By Kermit McFarland

Here to pitch into the CIO Political Action Committee and its alleged Communist “infiltration,” Mrs. Clare Boothe Luce, the Republican “glamor girl,” today predicted that women voters will carry the election for Governor Thomas E. Dewey because: “They want an efficient administration from here out which will bring the boys home the quickest and get them jobs the fastest.”

Mrs. Luce, who speaks at a Republican rally in Syria Mosque tonight, said that after 11 years of failing to keep us out of war and 11 years of unemployment, “there is no hope that Mr. Roosevelt will disclose himself as a better administrator in his declining years than he was in his prime.”

The demure-appearing but sharp-tongued Congresswoman from Connecticut said she has been hurling three questions at the Democrats in her five-day speaking tour of the Midwest, but “nobody answers the questions.”

Here are her questions:

  • Would wise statesmanship have prevented this war in the 10 years before the war began?

  • If America’s entry into the war was inevitable after 1939, why didn’t the President tell the American people so? If it was not inevitable, why are we in it?

  • If the answer to the last question is because we were attacked, why were we attacked if we were truly neutral and trying to stay out?

Then she added another question:

Did the President say in 1940, after Dunkerque, that the Axis war on the world was a “foreign war” or did he not? The answer is that he said it, again and again. But did he believe 11? If he did believe it, where was his vision? If he didn’t believe it, why did he say it?

Mrs. Luce said she was “just asking the questions,” and not, as Congressman Mary T. Norton (D-NJ) charged yesterday, telling “half-truths.”

Speech to hit PAC

She said:

But nobody will answer these questions. All they say is that you are dealing in half-truths, or they don’t like the way you do your hair, or women don’t have any business in politics anyway.

Mrs. Luce said she will devote her speech tonight to the CIO Political Action Committee and “Communist infiltration” into the PAC.

She said the news from Bridgeport, Connecticut, in her home Congressional district, that a PAC chairman had quit because the PAC campaign against her was “un-American,” indicated that “the PAC is going to have a considerable surprise on election morning.”

Women will settle decision

She said:

I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it hasn’t done more to alienate the working man than all the Republican logic and other reasonable argument can do.

Mrs. Luce said she was “quite sure” women voters will decide the election.

She said:

Six of every 10 voters are women. They ate responsible for the increased registration.

I think they will vote Republican because they don’t bother with superfluous questions and extraneous matters, the wav men do. They don’t clutter up their minds with so many details. They get right to the heart of it, and the heart of it is that they want an efficient administration which will bring the boys home the quickest and get them jobs the fastest.

I think they also are very anxious to have a little honesty in government. I don’t think they are so swayed by complicated matters like inflation, or sustaining the currency or other affairs which are very important.

First Lady comment refused

Asked by a lady reporter looking for a “woman’s angle” to compare her travels with those of Mrs. Roosevelt, Mrs. Luce replied: “I never comment on Mrs. Roosevelt.”

Later, she broadened this to include all women in public affairs. She said:

I never comment on other women in public affairs. I don’t think it does the cause any good. Men have an unrestrained impulse to call it a catfight, or a hairpulling contest.

Answers Wallace

Mrs. Luce said she noted that Vice President Henry A. Wallace also was asking three questions, to the effect that the voters should decide which man could best win the war, which could best win the peace, and which could best provide employment after the war.

“If I were he,” she said, “I wouldn’t go around asking those questions. I can answer him.”

She said an “efficient administration” would best win the war, that Mr. Roosevelt had failed to keep the peace, and that until the war came along, he had failed to solve the unemployment problem.

“This war saved his goose,” she said.

Mrs. Luce said she wouldn’t accept a challenge to debate Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes over “microphones at 10 paces.”

She said:

Mr. Ickes in private life, some of my friends find, is very interesting, but in public he has the soul of a meat ax and the mind of a commissar. I have no intention of debating him.

Dewey here Friday

In her speech tonight, Mrs. Luce will precede by four days the appearance here of Governor Dewey, who speaks Friday night in Hunt Armory.

The rally tonight will present a long list of Republican speakers and will include entertainment and what Republican County Chairman James F. Malone described as an “old-fashioned” political parade through the aisles of the hall.

Governor Edward Martin will introduce Mrs. Luce.

Following her speech. Scheduled for 9:30, which will be broadcast over a statewide radio network, Governor Dewey’s address in St. Louis, to begin at 10:00 p.m., will be tuned in for the Syria Mosque audience.

Other speakers

The speaking program at tonight’s rally will be opened by Mrs. Nelle G. Dressler, vice chairman of the Republican County Committee. Other speakers include Mrs. Margery M. Scranton, Pennsylvania member of the Republican National Committee; Mrs. Edna H. Carroll of Philadelphia, vice chairman of the State Committee, and Mr. Malone.

Republican State Chairman M. Harvey Taylor will introduce Judges J. Frank Graff and Arthur H. James, candidates for the Superior Court; Justice Howard W. Hughes, candidate for the Supreme Court: City Treasurer Edgar W. Baird of Philadelphia, candidate for State Treasurer, and Rev, James R. Cox of Old St. Patrick’s Church.

PAC chairman quits, charging unfairness

Bridgeport, Connecticut (UP) –
Chairman Daniel Hannon of the Political Action Committee of the CIO Brass Workers International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers local here resigned today. charging the PAC campaign against Congresswoman Clare Boothe Luce of Connecticut was un-American.”

Mr. Hannon also charged that a voluntary contribution of $1 collected from each union member for the PAC was “unfair.”

Edward C. O’Brien Jr., president of the local, said the executive committee would meet to select Mr. Hannon’s successor and that the work of the local PAC organization would go on despite his stand.

2845

Girl helps seize fugitive Nazi

Cincinnati, Ohio (UP) –
The FBI disclosed today how a young woman assisted yesterday in the capture of Cpl. Werner Ruch, an escaped prisoner of war from Camp McClain, Mississippi.

Ruch escaped six days ago. He made his way to Cincinnati where he appeared yesterday at the home of a woman he had known while he was an exchange student at Wittenberg College, Springfield, Ohio, in 1935.

He asked for food and help. The woman, whose name was not disclosed, asked him in, gave him food and while he was eating telephoned the FBI.

Heavy cruiser launched

Camden, New Jersey –
The heavy cruiser USS Macon was launched yesterday at the Camden yards of the New York Shipbuilding Corporation.

2846

Lucille Ball divorced

Hollywood, California –
Actress Lucille Ball was divorced today from Desi Arnaz, Cuban actor now in the Army, on her testimony that an argument over his “extravagances” led to their final separation.

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‘Battle of cash’ cheats Nazis of war goods

Program helped set stage for Allied drive

…

2848

CBI soldiers want chance to fight Ann ‘boy fashion’

Many G.I.’s support Army newspaper’s attack on Hollywood entertainers

…

30,000 soldiers return monthly

…

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GOP leader hits Hillman, Browder

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania (UP) –
James M. Tucker, assistant Republican national chairman, yesterday accused Sidney Hillman and Earl Browder of planning “the total annihilation of all and everything American.”

Mr. Tucker told a Young Republican meeting:

In this election, we have witnessed the dying pains of a great political party when Mr. Roosevelt gave the word to “clear everything through Sidney.”

Mr. Tucker said:

There is no question now that Hillman and Browder and their Communist PAC have taken over the Democratic Party. They are the chief witches who are brewing the broth which they hope to feed to the American people. That broth is the total annihilation of all and everything American.

Only election of a Republican President and a Republican Congress will stop “the policies of spend, waste, borrow and tax, which have been repeated over and over,” Mr. Tucker said.

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Ex-embassy aide denied appeal

High court turns down mother’s plea

…

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California GOP unit for Roosevelt

San Francisco, California (UP) –
Repudiating Governor Thomas E. Dewey, an organization of California Republicans today came out in “vigorous support” of President Roosevelt for a fourth term.

Led by Bartley C. Crum, San Francisco attorney and for several years, Wendell Willkie’s California leader, the recently-formed club dubbed itself the Republicans for Roosevelt and set up Western headquarters here.

Mr. Crum said:

None of us found it easy to make this decision, but all of us can make no other choice.

He emphasized that the Republicans for Roosevelt Committee was in formation before Wendell Willkie’s death.

Willkie funeral to be tomorrow

Rushville, Indiana (UP) –
Final services for Wendell L. Willkie, one of Indiana’s most illustrious sons and the 1940 Republican presidential candidate, will be held tomorrow afternoon at the Wyatt Memorial Mortuary at Rushville.

The services had been delayed so that Mr. Willkie’s only son, Lt. (jg.) Phillip Willkie, could attend. Lt. Willkie arrived in New York Saturday night from naval convoy duty and tonight he, his mother, Mrs. Edith Wilk Willkie, and 20 friends and relatives will leave New York in a special car attached to the Pennsylvania Railroad’s Spirit of St. Louis passenger train. They will arrive here tomorrow morning.

Dr. George Arthur Frantz, pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church of Indianapolis, and Rev. C. V. Reeder, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Rushville, will conduct the services.

Eight tenants from Mr. Willkie’s extensive farm holdings near Rushville will act as pallbearers.

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Pravda scores Dewey’s stand

Moscow, USSR (UP) –
The political observer of Pravda, official organ of the Soviet Central Committee, charged today that Thomas E. Dewey, Republican presidential nominee, was injecting the Polish question into the campaign and was “supporting claims of Polish imperialists.”

In charging that Polish reactionaries in the United States were using the election campaign for their machinations, Pravda said:

We are not surprised by the low, provocative activities of the Polish clique which is not trying to make Poland a peaceful country but a focal point for trouble and all possible adventures.

It should be pointed out that certain political leaders in the United States, instead of unmasking these provocateurs, not only give them full support but pour oil on the fire.

Of the same character was Dewey’s Pulaski Day speech. Dewey, quite in tune with the clique, spoke in support of Polish imperialists.

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3,216,613 register in New York City

New York (UP) –
Registration in New York City for the November election totaled 3,216,613 at its close Saturday night, 173,847 under the record for the 1940 presidential election. But registration for military ballots may raise the total to 3,551,741, a 161,281 increase over 1940.

Both parties claimed an advantage on the basis of the figures.

In St. Louis, Governor Thomas E. Dewey, Republican presidential nominee, said he was “quite happy” about the heavy New York City registration and did not subscribe to the theory that the situation was to his disadvantage.

Military ballot registration figures could not be determined accurately because of considerable duplication, which will be eliminated only as the ballots are tabulated after election.

Paul E. Fitzpatrick, Democratic state chairman, said the registration was “exceedingly gratifying” and “indicates a Roosevelt plurality in the city of around a million without the soldier vote.”

Arthur H. Schwartz, Republican state campaign manager, expressed confidence that the city’s expectable Democratic majority would be sufficiently reduced to assure a Republican victory in the state. He based his relief on the fact that the Borough of Queens, carried by Wendell L. Willkie in 1940 and expected to return a plurality for Governor Thomas E. Dewey this year, was the only borough to maintain its 1940 registration figure.

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Absentee ballots dropped by parachute

Paris, France (UP) – (Oct. 14, delayed)
Absentee ballots are being dropped by parachute to U.S. paratroops isolated in Holland and there and on other fronts voting in the presidential election is going on at “foxhole level.”

Col. Thomas R. Kerschner, theater coordinator of soldier voting, said parachutists were dropped with the ballot cargoes to ensure delivery. Several young officers have been killed in the line of duty, he added.

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Negroes’ strides cited by Hillman

New York (UP) –
Sidney Hillman, CIO Political Action Committee chairman, told a Negro audience last night that Negroes under President Roosevelt “have made greater strides” toward first-class citizenship “than in any other period in American history.”

Mr. Hillman, speaking before the St. James forum, charged that Governor Thomas E. Dewey’s method of dealing with “troublesome problems” was “stalling” and ignoring measures leading to alleviation of racial and religious discrimination and improvement of Negro housing problems.

The PAC chairman said the Republican Party has not “dared to attack the PAC because it supports Roosevelt policies. It has preferred to attack PAC because I, its chairman, was born in Lithuania which, according to Republican leadership, makes me a second-class American citizen, if not altogether un-American.”

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Gracie Allen Reporting

By Gracie Allen

Hollywood, California –
Well, so far as gentlemanliness and good taste is concerned, I should like to call your attention to the political campaign between Fala, the President’s Scottie, and Canute, the Great Dane belonging to Mr. Dewey.

In spite of the fact that the title for first dog of the country is at stake, both of them have scorned to play politics. Just think how many votes they could get by such cheap devices as, say, kissing puppies, or promising other dogs a bone in every pot.

In fact, being dumb animals, they’ve pulled a couple of political boners. I understand that Fala almost bit Truman, and Canute once growled at Bricker.

So far, there is no indication from Hollywood just which way Lassie is going to throw his support.

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Counties await state ruling on soldier ballots

Policy on voiding some votes undecided
By Robert Taylor, Pittsburgh Press staff writer

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania –
Many of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties are looking to the state for rulings and advice on whether or not soldier ballots should be invalidated because of technical irregularities, surveys in the state have indicated.

Both in Western Pennsylvania and in other parts of the state, county officials holding thousands of military ballots for tabulation Nov. 22 have indicated they will await state rulings on whether they should throw out soldier ballots because of certain irregularities.

The state has issued some informal and “purely advisory” rulings, to settle particular points of law, but thus far has issued no comprehensive guide to aid County Election Boards in putting into effect the policy of the state administration and Legislature of giving the soldier vote law a liberal interpretation.

Must make own rulings

County election boards will have to make rulings themselves on such questions as whether ballots marked with a checkmark instead of an “X” or ballots certified by a non-commissioned, instead of a commissioned officer, should be counted or thrown out.

While boards generally have announced the willingness to do everything possible to facilitate the soldier vote, challenges of defective soldier ballots are a prospect in close local elections, and State Election Bureau heads have estimated 21,000 ballots may be thrown out.

Legally, the state has no right to make rulings binding on the county election boards. It has been pointed out, however, that a detailed statement by the state administration would help the county boards in following out the purposes of the Soldier Vote Law and clarify their work, avoiding conflicting decisions in various parts of the state.

Await state rulings

The number of inquiries by count officials to the State Elections Bureau and the number of counties which reported, in a poll conducted by The Press, that they would await state rulings on some points of law, indicated the counties will accept state advice.

The state ruled, informally, that ballots sent in by soldiers killed before Election Day are valid and should be counted, and that ruling was reiterated by Governor Martin and made formal when reports were circulated that the state would invalidate such ballots.

The state has also ruled that men discharged from military service but still in military hospitals cannot vote by soldier ballot, because their civilian status has been resumed. It was ruled soldiers must be 21 years of age by Nov. 8 to vote.

Marking causes problem

Another informal ruling was that ballots must be marked with an “X” as required by the State Election Law, and that other markings would invalidate ballots. This ruling was challenged by a number of counties, and there is a likelihood of varying local rulings on the point.

The soldier vote will not be counted until Nov. 22 – 15 days after Election Day – and most county boards are deferring their rulings on defective ballots until that date. In event of a close election in Pennsylvania, which could be decided by the soldier vote, wholesale challenges of soldier votes and conflicting rulings by county boards could cast doubt on the final election results.

Censored ballots questioned

Many boards are uncertain what to do with ballots which have been opened and resealed by military censors. One county alone – Luzerne – has 231 censored ballots. In other cases, ballots lack the voter’s signature or affidavit, or the certification of his officer is defective.

In nearly all cases, county officials, receiving ballots with apparent technical defects, have made an effort to get another ballot io the soldier and avoid any challenge of his vote.

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All is forgiven!
Truman to Lewis: Come back home

UMW head urged to support Roosevelt

Los Angeles, California (UP) –
Senator Harry S. Truman, Democratic vice-presidential nominee, today invited President John L. Lewis of the United Mine Workers to reconsider his support of the Republican presidential ticket in the November election and back President Roosevelt.

“I think the best interests of Mr. Lewis’ organization would be served by the Democratic Party,” Mr. Truman said in reply to a news conference question asking him to amplify a remark he made yesterday that the Democrats would accept Mr. Lewis’ support if Mr. Lewis would “come back and be a good boy.” […] told that Governor Thomas E. Dewey had “read Lewis out of the Republican Party,” and added, “I didn’t want him to have no place to go.”

Senator Truman will deliver the first major speech of his campaign trip tonight, addressing a Democratic rally in the Shrine Auditorium from the same platform on which Governor John W. Bricker will address a Republican rally two days later. Governor Bricker was scheduled to pass through here late today en route to San Diego, where he speaks tomorrow.

Invading a critical state in which most political observers have been conceding an edge to President Roosevelt, Senator Truman arrived yesterday after a 2,000-mile trip from New Orleans. He leaves tonight for San Francisco.

Murray hits GOP labor policies

Trenton, New Jersey (UP) –
Philip Murray, president of the CIO, says Governor Thomas E. Dewey and Governor John W. Bricker are attempting to “confuse” the nation’s workingmen, and he is unaware of “a single, solitary thing that Mr. Dewey has done for labor in his public life.”

Speaking at a “Phil Murray Day” outing sponsored by seven locals of United Steelworkers of America yesterday at the state fairgrounds. Mr. Murray said that Mr. Dewey “in his recent campaign trip to California praised the Roosevelt labor laws and social reforms, but Governor Bricker, his running mate, now traveling on the same circuit, condemns the labor and social reforms of the President.”

Praising the CIO’s Political Action Committee as a “thoroughly American institution designed to present facts to the people of the United States in an educational way.” Mr. Murray added:

I assume responsibility for its creation and am proud of the wonderful job it has done in all parts of the United States.

Mr. Murray said that “big money interests and isolationists” are backing Mr. Dewey.

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‘Battle of the Statler’ –
Officers blamed in affidavits

Remarks called ‘unrepeatable’

Washington (UP) –
Affidavits of witnesses to the celebrated “Battle of the Statler” will show that the fisticuffs started when the two naval officers involved made “unrepeatable remarks” about President Roosevelt, Drew Pearson asserted in his radio broadcast last night.

One of the officers, LtCdr. James H. Suddeth, 33, of Greer, South Carolina, denied Mr. Pearson’s statement. The other, Lt. Randolph Dickens Jr., 23, of Bradenton, Florida, could not be reached immediately for comment. Lt. Dickins, a battle fatigue patient at the Bethesda Medical Center at the time of the fight, has been released for active duty and now is in Bradenton on leave.

Officers blame Teamsters

In their account of the incident, the only detailed story given thus far, the officers contended that at started in a hotel corridor the night the President addressed an AFL Teamsters Union banquet when several teamsters demanded to know if they would, vote for their commander-in-chief and were told it was “none of your business.”

Mr. Pearson said affidavits by two women – Mrs. Frank Lee, wife of a Washington bank vice president, and Mrs. Helen V. Roland, a stenographer – would show that the officers were actually the ones who wanted an answer to that question.

‘Grabbed by arm’

Their statements, he said, were that “long before the fight started they [the women] were peacefully going to the powder room at the Statler when one of the naval officers grabbed Mrs. Roland by the arm and demanded to know how she was going to vote.”

Mrs. Lee and Mrs. Roland declined to discuss Mr. Pearson’s statement, referring all inquiries to Joseph A. Padway, general counsel of the AFL. Mr. Padway said his office had obtained some affidavits for the Senate Campaign Expenditures Committee but that he did not know their contents since he has been out of town.

Mr. Pearson said the committee, which will meet Wednesday to decide whether to conduct a formal investigation into the fracas, has other affidavits showing that “the naval officers were making unrepeatable remarks about their Commander-in-Chief.”

‘Going to have new one’

“When they were reminded, they were talking about their Commander-in-Chief,” he added, one of them said:

“To hell with the Commander-in-Chief, we’re going to have a new one in January.”

He said the affidavits relate that the officers were “quietly asked to leave but persisted in staying” and that during the ensuing fisticuffs, one of them “was rushed into a nearby phone booth, kicking and biting. until the Shore Patrol arrived.”

Chairman Theodore F. Green (D-RI) of the Senate Committee has declined to discuss the affidavits, explaining that the committee will have to consider them first at Wednesday’s meeting.

Naval officers called sober

Washington (UP) –
In a story relating to the disturbance involving members of the AFL Teamsters Union and two naval officers on the night President Roosevelt addressed a union banquet at the Statler Hotel. the United Press on Oct. 12 erroneously attributed to Fulton Lewis Jr., radio commentator, a statement to the effect that hotel Officials had said the officers were intoxicated.

Mr. Lewis’ statement was that the officers were not intoxicated. The MBS commentator discussed the incident from Station KFRC, San Francisco, in part as follows:

The hotel officials who were present at the time tell me positively that the naval Officers were not intoxicated. One hotel official went so far as to say he was quite sure that neither one had even had a drink.

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GOP labor policy blasted by priest

Dewey ‘lies’ cited by Rev. Orlemanski

If Governor Thomas E. Dewey, Republican candidate for President, is elected, he and his backers will “throw out every labor law enacted under the present administration,” Rev. Casimir Orlemanski yesterday told a C1O-Citizens Political Action rally in Lithuanian Hall, South Side.

Father Orlemanski, pastor at St. Mary’s Church, New Kensington, recalled to his audience that he had led a hunger march on Washington when “millions of Americans were starving under the Republican administration.”

Charges Dewey lies

He charged that Mr. Dewey “lies” when he alleges President Roosevelt failed to prepare the nation for war.

Leo Krazycki, president of the American Slav Congress, urged his listeners “not to forget the misery and the empty bellies of the Hoover days.”

He said Republican attacks on Communist influence in the Political Action Committee was “Red scare propaganda" and an “old trick used against Lincoln 89 years ago when every lie and slander and all the muck was thrown at him.”

Murray message read

Frank Burke, district director for the CIO United Steelworkers, read a message from CIO President Philip Murray, in which he said:

Dewey and Hoover are hoping we will fail to vote in sufficient numbers to reelect President Roosevelt. Their only hope is a light vote… This means day-by-day and house-by-house work between now and Nov. 7. The people will win, but only if the people will vote.

The rally was also addressed by Democratic Congressmen James A. Wright and Herman P. Eberharter.

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Huge crowds greet Dewey in St. Louis

GOP nominee repeats ‘unprepared; charge

St. Louis, Missouri (UP) –
Governor Thomas E. Dewey was given a tumultuous welcome when he arrived in St. Louis today to open his bid for the nation’s farm vote in a major campaign speech tonight.

KDKA and KQV will broadcast the speech at 10:00 p.m. ET.

Thousands of cheering Midwesterners lined downtown streets as the Republican presidential nominee rode in an open auto to his hotel.

The New Yorker said he would “bring honesty to the national government” after Jan. 20.

He said:

That is the issue of this campaign: Whether we want to continue down the New Deal road or whether we want a new administration that will bring opportunity and jobs for all.

25,000 line parade route

The Dewey party was saluted with loud explosions of cannon firecrackers, and torn paper fell from the high office buildings when he reached the downtown section. Police estimated crowds along the parade route at between 25,000 and 40,000.

Governor Dewey last night issued a statement to accompanying newspapermen contending the White House reply to his campaign speeches confirmed his charge that the Roosevelt administration failed to prepare the nation for war.

He reiterated the charge he made at Oklahoma City three weeks ago as his response to the White House statement of refutation.

Roosevelt ‘admission’

The White House statement, issued Saturday, quoted parts of the Oklahoma City speech in which Governor Dewey traced to Army officials and administration spokesmen the authority for his unpreparedness charge. Each Dewey statement was followed by longer quotations, obviously designed to accuse the New York Governor of distortion.

Mr. Dewey said:

In this statement, Mr. Roosevelt confesses that every single statement I made in my Oklahoma City speech was exactly correct down to the last period and comma.

The record is dreadfully bad. It cannot be concealed by epithets or by hiding behind the symbol of the White House.

Three-part reply

The White House refutation of Governor Dewey’s charges was in three parts – the refutation of his Oklahoma City speech, a letter from Assistant Secretary of State Adolf E. Berle Jr., accusing Governor Dewey of “misquoting” him at Charleston, West Virginia, Oct. 7, and an explanation by Maj. Gen. Lewis B. Hershey, Selective Service director, of remarks on which Governor Dewey based charges that the administration “is afraid to let men out of the Army” after the war is won.

Governor Dewey’s response to Mr. Berle’s letter was to quote the State Department executive at greater length in an effort to show that the administration’s economic trend is toward Communism.

Asked about a reply to the Hershey disclaimer, Governor Dewey’s press secretary, James M. Hagerty, replied: “Just wait,” indicating it may be forthcoming in tonight’s speech.

Statement ‘dusted off’

Mr. Dewey charged that Mr. Roosevelt had used bis position in the White House to get widespread attention for the refutation of his campaign speeches.

Governor Dewey said:

Exactly the same statement was put out by the publicity director of the Democratic Party to its speakers 10 days before. Mr. Roosevelt has found it necessary to dust it off and issue it with the sponsorship of the White House.

Repeating his quotation of Gen. George C. Marshall, Gen. H. H. Arnold, Senator Harry S. Truman, the vice-presidential nominee, and Senator Alben W. Barkley, Democratic leader in the Senate, Mr. Dewey said:

Mr. Roosevelt’s failure to prepare this country and the resulting price we have had to pay is established out of the mouths of his own followers.

As I have said, I did not intend debating the tragic results of Mr. Roosevelt’s total failure of leadership. But the facts are even more clearly etched as a result of his statement of yesterday.

Berle letter ‘amazing’

Governor Dewey called it “amazing” that Mr. Roosevelt “should find it necessary to get his subordinate and close associate, Mr. Berle… to write him a letter accusing me of misquoting, dishonesty, and of having ripped a sentence from its context.”

Mr. Dewey went on:

Once again, the facts are very simple. Mr. Roosevelt and Mr. Berle again admit my statement that Mr. Berle said in a memorandum: “Over a period of years, the government will gradually come to own most of the productive plants of the United States.”

Other language cited

Mr. Berle claims he meant the opposite and cites other language in the memorandum, But he skillfully omits to quote the relevant language in the very same passage, from which I have quoted above. It reads:

If the country desires to make wealth creation a function of government [I personally believe it must do so in a larger measure than it has heretofore], the choice should be the considered choice of the country and not the result of a policy of drift.

The government’s ability to create wealth efficiently is denied by a good many people. It seems to me a good many of these attacks are unjustified, though I am frankly biased in favor of public ownership of certain forms of wealth.

Governor Dewey said the only conclusion he could draw is that Roosevelt is continuing the slippery tactics the New Deal has always employed.

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President lauded by La Guardia

Chicago, Illinois (UP) –
Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia returned to New York today after a brief invasion of the Midwest during which he announced that “President Roosevelt is going to win his second war for the American people.”

Mr. La Guardia said here last night that:

You know and I know the President is going to win this war for us. It is the second war he has won for us. He won one of the greatest wars ever waged – the war over hunger, suffering, starvation and hardship.

Mr. LaGuardia said:

When the history of this war is written by impartial men and women, it will be shown that the only man in the country who saw what was coming and did all he could within his constitutional powers to make the best of a bad situation was President Roosevelt.

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Green light to Wall Street hit by Wallace

Urges federal funds for unemployment

Gary, Indiana (UP) –
Vice President Henry A. Wallace said last night that full post-war employment cannot be maintained by “giving the green light to Wall Street.”

“That’s Taftism,” he told a rally sponsored by the Lake County (Indiana) Democratic organization. “That reminds me of the bird who flies with his head backwards, sees where he’s been, but doesn’t know where he’s going, and I suggest that bird might serve as the new symbol for the Republican Party.”

He said that although 80 percent of the job must be done by private industry, government funds should be used “if there is any indication of unemployment.”

Industry ‘mindful of dollar’

Charging that the job of converting to war manufacture was done by labor, government and “certain enlightened leaders of industry,” despite those who wanted to hold it back, he said: “Industry was very patriotic, but it also was very mindful of the dollar.”

In Cleveland, Mr. Wallace said:

Given the green light, industry would have gone on making automobiles and washing machines. You had to take industry by the scuff of the neck and throw it into the war.

PAC contributions

Touching on the controversy over contributions to the CIO Political Action Committee, the Vice President said industrialists have assembled millions of dollars to exert pressure against the administration, but at the same time call it “sinful for workers to contribute dollars to the Democratic campaign.”

What a travesty to convict the man who gives a dollar of Communism. It just isn’t true to say he holds Russia first and America second.