America at war! (1941–) – Part 4

Adm. Mountbatten may lose command in Southeast Asia

Stilwell hints at large-scale offensive soon against Japs in CBI Theater


Donald Nelson to return to China

He’ll organize War Production Board

Japs change mind on Tokyo ‘raid’

Enemy now calls it reconnaissance flight
By the United Press

Japs rush planes to Philippines

Mass for final stand on Luzon
By William B. Dickinson, United Press staff writer

U.S. casualties near half-million

Washington (UP) –
Casualties in the U.S. Armed Forces in World War II approached the half-million mark today.

The War Department announced that through Oct. 31, the Army had suffered 417,121 casualties. Navy, Marine and Coast Guard casualties through Nov. 1 totaled 70,571.

This gave an overall total casualty list of 487,692, an increase of 14,893 over the 472,799 figure reported a week ago.

The War Department said that 105,499, or nearly half, of the Army wounded, have returned to duty. The total casualties are divided as follows:

Army Navy
Killed 80,666 28,231
Wounded 229,212 228,441
Missing 53,622 9,421
Prisoners 53,621 4,478
TOTAL 417,121 70,571

Gracie Allen Reporting

By Gracie Allen

Hollywood, California –
Well, let’s have no more complaints about food shortages in this country. A German news agency has just announced that the Japs have created a “wonderful new food concocted of rotten wood, sawdust and starch, seasoned with sunshine.”

Now there’s a tasty little dish. Being naturally curious about new recipes, I decided to trey this one. But living in California makes it difficult. How long can I wait for sunshine?

The Germans go or to say that one week of this diet and the persons eating it… “No longer complain of hunger.” Guess why?

The Japs should have no shortage of rotten wood – sea water rots it quickly. But it must be a funny sight to see those Nip cooks in diving suits following their fleet around to do their marketing.

americavotes1944

Dewey warns Democrats of peril to party

Charges Roosevelt sold out to Communists

Baltimore, Maryland (UP) –
Carrying his campaign into borderline Maryland in an effort to win votes of old-line Democrats, Governor Thomas E. Dewey charged today that if President Roosevelt is reelected, “the Democrats would irrevocably lose their party.”

The Republican presidential nominee climaxed a seven-mile parade through Downtown Baltimore with a speech at the Lyric Theater before a rally of Republicans and Democrats-for-Dewey.

A capacity crowd of 3,000 cheered lustily when he said that if he is elected, “he will take the choking hard of government off the throat of every small business in the country… and restore free collective bargaining in the United States.”

Democrat speaks

Police estimated that 300,000 persons lined the streets to watch the parade. Former Democratic Mayor Howard W. Jackson, defeated in 1943 for a fifth term, rode in the Dewey parade with the man who beat him, Republican Mayor Theodore McKeldin. Mr. Jackson, who has been speaking for Governor Dewey, also spoke at the rally, saying he was a Democrat but in this case “an American first.”

Occasional boos rose from the street throngs as the parade passed, and “Vote for Roosevelt” banners were in evidence. Dewey was loudly cheered, however, and received a long ovation at the theater.

He told the rally in an open bid for Democratic votes:

The only way for the real membership of the Democratic Party to win this election. The only way for the Democrats to recapture their party, is to join with the Republicans in defeating the New Deal, the Political Action Committee and the Communists.

Speaking only from a partial prepared text, Governor Dewey also used sections of previous campaign speeches.

Chorus of ‘noes’

He evoked a chorus of “noes” from the crowd by asking “do we continue with secret diplomacy… Harry Hopkins… constant bickering…”

He praised the country’s military and productive leadership but said “we can and we will speed victory on every front” by ending quarreling and dissension in the administration.

The United States, he said, should participate in efforts to achieve world peace, but through open methods “resting on the rock” of public understanding and agreement rather than through “secret diplomacy.”

Governor Dewey accused President Roosevelt of “dusting off” and bringing out again all the “broken promises of the past and then doubling down” in his speech last Saturday night. But “the best this administration ever did” in employment, he said, “was in the spring of 1940, before war saved it, and that was 10 million unemployed.”

In another allusion to the “1000 Club,” he said:

My opponent in his desperate desire for 16 years is making desperate efforts including an offer to sell “special privilege in our government” for $1,000.

Governor Dewey carried forward the anti-New Deal attack he launched in Boston last night with an accusation that President Roosevelt is selling out his party to Communists.

Not between parties

Dewey insisted:

This is not a contest between Democrats and Republicans. It is a contest between, on the one hand – those who believe in our system of government – Republicans and Democrats alike, and on the other – those who have kidnapped the Democratic Party in order to change our system of government.

Recalling President Roosevelt’s frequent clashes with Congress, including the Supreme Court case of 1937 and the subsequent attempt to purge Democrats who opposed him, Governor Dewey argued that the problems confronting the nation in the post-war years cannot be solved without unity between the legislative and executive departments of government.

Good start made

Tying that need for unity with the problem of maintaining peace, he said:

We have made a good start toward the establishment of a world organization to prevent future wars. But much remains to be done.

In the end it will be Congress that must approve the terms and Scope of our participation in this world effort to maintain peace. In the working out of that program there must be mutual confidence and teamwork between the President and Congress.

If we are not to run the grave danger of seeing this whole program wrecked on the rock of one man’s arbitrary will, we must install next Jan. 20 an administration that wants to work with Congress, that knows how to work with Congress, and that deserves the confidence of the people and their elected representatives.

From Baltimore. Governor Dewey goes to Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, for evening appearances. None of his three talks today were being broadcast.

Denounces ‘cynical alliance’

His Boston speech last night was the strongest denunciation he had made of the “cynical alliance” which, he told 25,000 persons in strongly Catholic Boston, the New Deal has entered into “with Earl Browder’s Communists.” He charged that the alliance was effected through Sidney Hillman and his Political Action Committee.

Boos for Communism

Mention of Communism, Browder and Hillman brought a chorus of boos from the audience which packed Boston Garden to the rafters.

Lashing out with the bitterest personal denunciation of President Roosevelt since the campaign began, Governor Dewey charged that “Mr. Roosevelt, in his overwhelming desire to perpetuate himself in office for 16 years, has put his party on the auction block – for sale to the highest bidder.”

He said the highest bidders were “the Political Action Committee of Sidney Hillman and the Communists of Earl Browder.”

Governor Dewey charged that President Roosevelt has “so weakened and corrupted the Democratic Party that it is readily subject to capture” and “the forces of Communism are, in fact, now capturing it.”

The candidate painted the Communist system as one under which “the individual cannot worship, vote or think as he would, or conduct his life as his own.” The price for disobedience, he declared, “is liquidation, either through violence or slow economic strangulation.”

Attacks Browder, Hillman

The GOP candidate leveled personal attacks against Messrs. Browder and Hillman. Of the former he said:

He is the man who was convicted of draft dodging in the last war. He was again convicted – this time of perjury – and pardoned by Franklin Roosevelt in time to organize the fourth term campaign. Mr. Browder stands for everything that would destroy America.

He described Mr. Hillman as a labor leader who had held “one official post after another in the New Deal” and “a front for the Communists” in the fourth-term campaign.

Mr. Dewey predicted, however, than any Communist bid for control of the American government is doomed to failure.

Describing the PAC levy of one dollar per member as "This Roosevelt poll tax imposed by Sidney Hillman,” Governor Dewey said working men and women are “rising in protest all over the nation.”

The solution, he continued, lies in voting for the Republican Party “in the secrecy of the voting booth.”

americavotes1944

President aims speech tonight at two states

‘General discussion’ hinted by his aide

Washington (UP) –
President Roosevelt’s radio address tonight will probably be a “general discussion” in which he may explain why he is unable to make a personal campaign appearance in the Midwest, White House Secretary Stephen T. Early said today.

KDKA will broadcast the address at 9:00 p.m. EWT.

The President scheduled only one appointment today, a luncheon hour meeting with former War Production Board Chief Donald M. Nelson, and arranged to devote the rest of the day to the speech.

Asked what its topic would be, Mr. Early said:

In general, I think he will describe the situation that made it impossible for him to go West and to New England at the same time, despite the desires of some that he go to Ohio and Michigan.

Democratic program

The President speaks from the White House over a radio program from 9:00 to 9:30 p.m. His address will last 15 minutes and the rest of the program will be taken over by the Democratic National Committee.

The address tonight is obviously a substitute for a trip to Ohio and Michigan, and Mr. Roosevelt was expected to tailor it somewhat for listeners in that area.

In New England Saturday

Mr. Roosevelt will hold a news conference tomorrow, then start on his last major campaign swing which will find him Saturday in two of Connecticut’s major voting centers – Bridgeport and Hartford – and then in Massachusetts. There he stops at Springfield and proceeds later to Boston for a full dress and expectedly bare-knuckled blast at the Republicans from Fenway Park at 9:00 p.m.

Since the Chief Executive returned from the Midwest, he has been taking it easy, restricting his daily appointments to a minimum and concentrating on last-minute campaign plans and accumulated war duties.

Massachusetts doubtful

His weekend trip will take him to Boston three days after the appearance there of his Republican opponent, Governor Thomas E. Dewey. Speaking from Boston Garden last night, Mr. Dewey attacked what he termed Communist elements in the Democratic Party. He may receive a reply from Mr. Roosevelt Saturday.

Massachusetts, with 16 electoral votes, is listed by many polls as a “doubtful” state in this election. Mr. Roosevelt carried it in his first three campaigns by majorities ranging from 63,189 over President Hoover to 174,103 over Alf M. Landon. He topped the late Wendell Willkie by 136,822 votes in 1940.

americavotes1944

Truman praises war’s operation

Roosevelt efficiency prevents scandals
By Robert Taylor

Because the country had a Commander-in-Chief who “knew where he was going,” Senator Harry S. Truman, Democratic candidate for Vice President, said here today, “there never has been a war in the history of the world more efficiently operated than this one.”

Mr. Truman, here for an all-day tour of the district and a major address at a Democratic rally in Syria Mosque tonight, said the fact that President Roosevelt “knew where he was going” was responsible for the lack of scandals in the war program.

‘Dragged in gutter’ by GOP

Speaking to some 5,000 employees of the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company in East Pittsburgh, Mr. Truman said:

This campaign has been dragged in the gutter by the opposition because they have no issues on which to base their demand for replacement of the President.

Mr. Dewey is trying to cut the Commander-in-Chief down to a Prosecutor’s size, but he can’t do it.

There never was a war in the history of the world more efficiently run than this one. I’ve been in a position to see it.

Large turnouts in valley

Senator Truman, before his nomination for Vice President, was chairman of the Senate committee investigating the war program.

He spoke to about 2,000, mostly schoolchildren, in Braddock, and another 2,500 in Wilmerding. Escorted by motorcycle police, the Truman entourage was greeted in the Turtle Creek Valley towns by large turnouts.

The East Pittsburgh rally, at which Mr. Truman tarried the longest, was managed by three officials of the CIO United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers’ Union.

Three main issues

Here the vice-presidential candidate said the three main campaign issues are “couldn’t afford” to “take a chance on Harding promises again.”

“We are hearing almost exactly the same promises [from the Republicans] now as in 1920,” he said.

Schoolchildren enlisted

The candidate, in an obvious dig at Governor Thomas E. Dewey, said President Roosevelt “doesn’t have one foreign policy for New York, another for California, and maybe another for Minnesota.”

“He has one foreign policy,” the Senator said.

In Braddock, Mr. Truman told assembled school children to “go home and get your parents to keep Roosevelt” so another world war won’t happen.

Lunch in McKeesport

The Senator, escorted by local Democratic leaders, followed his valley appearances with a luncheon given by Mayor Frank Buchanan in McKeesport. Later in the day, he was due to speak in Uniontown.

An extensive program arranged by George B. McDonough, Braddock Democratic chairman, was cut short in that borough to enable Senator Truman to maintain his schedule.

Mr. McDonough introduced the candidate as “the No. 2 man of this great nation.”

Met at station

Democratic city and county officials met him on arrival at 8:45 a.m. at the Baltimore & Ohio railroad station and escorted him to the William Penn hotel, preparatory to starting out on a six-speech schedule of personal appearances.

Mr. Truman’s visit is the first appearance on behalf of the Roosevelt-Truman ticket in the campaign in Allegheny County, where President Roosevelt 12 years ago outlined his New Deal in a huge Forbes Field meeting.

Governor Thomas E. Dewey and Governor John W. Bricker, Republican nominees, have made two appearances each here, since their nomination last June, indicating the importance GOP campaigners attach to the vote of the district.

Program at Mosque

The night rally in Pittsburgh at Syria Mosque will start at 8:00 p.m. At 9:00 p.m., the audience will hear President Roosevelt’s address from the White House, after which they will hear six speakers from the stage.

Senator Truman said he would devote his speech tonight in part to stressing “the necessity for continuation of an administration that understands the problems of the country, particularly as they affect reconversion and jobs after the war.”

Other speakers will include former Governor Gifford Pinchot; screen and radio celebrity Orson Welles; James L. McDevitt, president of the Pennsylvania Federation of Labor (AFL); David J. McDonald, treasurer of the United Steelworkers (CIO), and Mrs. Kermit Roosevelt, widow of the late son of President Theodore Roosevelt.


Schools dismissed to greet Truman

Braddock, Rankin men called partial

Schoolchildren in Braddock and Rankin were dismissed for an hour today and the school’s bands were out to welcome Senator Harry S. Truman, Democratic candidate for Vice President.

Their dismissal brought charges from some civic leaders in Braddock that favoritism was being shown by school officials who, they said, had canceled chapel meetings last week in which another speaker was to appear, on grounds that it would have been a “political meeting.”

According to Edward McCrady, one of a group of eight Braddock civic leaders who had arranged for DeLoss Walker, former associate editor of Liberty Magazine, to speak to the school students, school officials canceled his visit asserting that they understood his talk would be of a political nature.

Truman in Braddock

“Obviously, said Mr. McCrady today, “they don’t consider Mr. Truman’s visit today a political meeting.”

Mr. Truman, in his campaign tour of the Pittsburgh district today, was scheduled to appear at the Rankin Borough building and at 8th Street, and Braddock Avenue, in Braddock.

School officials in Braddock and Rankin, who today admitted that they had canceled the scheduled appearance of Mr. Walker before student assemblies last week, said they understood that Mr. Walker was not in the Pittsburgh District on the day he was scheduled to make his appearance, but instead had gone to Canton, Ohio.

Walker did appear

Mr. McCrady said that Mr. Walker, however, did appear for a scheduled meeting last Friday night at the Carnegie Free Library in Braddock, where more than 100 persons heard his address on the topic of “The China, Japan, and American Way of Life.” He said that there was nothing of a political nature in his address.

He declared that the appearance of Mr. Walker in the schools had been arranged by his group after they had heard a short resume of what would be contained in his talk “and we felt it was such a good talk that it should be given broader hearing.”

americavotes1944

parry3

I DARE SAY —
Decent laughter, honest thinking

By Florence Fisher Parry

I hate to admit it at this critical moment in the campaign; but one of the funniest parodies I ever read can be found in the current New Yorker. It is written by E. B. White and is entitled “Breakfast on Quaker Hill.”

I cannot seem to be able to make my friends and family, who take their franchise hard, understand that I can laugh heartily at this ribbing and still remain true to the razor-backed, rock-ribbed, stiff and bristling, deep-dyed tradition of our family politics.

Besides, it’s a relief to find something light and harmless among the ill-smelling “jokes” of this campaign.

We have lost much in dignity and decency in the past months; but no attribute has seemed to deteriorate so much in us as our usually healthy sense of humor. Perhaps the all-time low in presidential campaigning was reached the other evening when Frank Sinatra introduced Vice President Wallace at a get-together, followed by Ethel Merman singing a song entitled “Don’t Look Now, Mr. Dewey, But Your Record Is Showing!”

There exist, in both parties, men and women whose sensibilities are affronted by such tactics, and who feel shame and embarrassment that America should thus expose itself to the dubious opinion of its friends and allies.

And at such a time! When our fighting men’s performance in the waging of this war has reached so noble and magnificent a stride!

It can happen

If you want to get a cross-section of the really frightening mood of the rank and file, particularly our youth, sit in a motion picture theater and listen to the cheers and boos when the newsreel campaign material is shown upon the screen… Anyone who could say, after a demonstration like this (and it occurs in all our movie houses these days), “It Can’t Happen Here,” has greater faith in mass common sense than I!

There is a word that has grown cheap and shallow by over-usage: the word RABBLEROUSER. It is the most dangerous of all words in any language. Have you seen a rabble roused? Have you been one of a mob? Have you been crushed onward, helpless, in a pressing crowd at Times Square in New York on New Years Eve? Have you witnessed the frenzy of the congregations of Aimee McPherson?

ANYTHING can happen. Yes, here as elsewhere. Mob mood is the most dangerous single emotion in the human chemistry.

So, watch the exhorters; they bear watching.

And when you hear them, tremble. And when you see them, stiffen in your tracks.

Ask yourself

In so few days we will be going to the polls to vote. If only, if only, some miracle could be invoked to purify our souls, make clear our minds!

We make attempt to shrive our souls when we enter church; we shed, so far as we are able, the clutter and the cares of day when we enter our homes at the end of our work day. We try to bring cool judgment to bear upon business decisions we make. In any moment of decision each in his own faltering but honest wav tries to be calm and thoughtful and farseeing.

And so, surely, when we enter the solemn secret privacy of a polling booth, we must rally every worthy attribute within our minds and souls. We must catechize ourselves with simple searching questions like these:

Am I voting for my own personal immediate advantage?

Is this advantage one abnormally induced by the WAR, or would it have been mine to enjoy now had there been no war?

The vote I cast may determine the election, and thus, the kind of destiny my country is to have. Therefore, which man am I the surer to trust?

In which company of MEN shall I walk most trustfully, relying upon their vigilance to keep America FREE, supremely itself as it has been, the envy, the example and the hope of the world?

I have a family, or shall have. What kind of future will this, my vote, demand? The right to incentive and an earned reward? The right to initiative and freedom to exercise it?

Questions like these we have the right, the duty, to ask, as we approach the free and secret privilege of the polls.

James L. Fly resigns post as FCC head

Radio boss to return to law practice

americavotes1944

Orson is braced for GOP ‘hoax’

New York (UP) –
Orson Welles, speaking at an extemporaneous radio forum sponsored by the Democratic National Committee, said last night he expected “one more act of desperation – a big hoax, an outrageous one” from the “Deweyites,” before Nov. 7.

He said:

I don’t know whether it’s too much to wonder if the Deweyites might not even attempt their own equivalent of the Reichstag fire.

Others on the NBC forum were authors John Gunther and Quentin Reynolds.

americavotes1944

State is key to election, survey finds

Says results hinges on Pennsylvania

New York (UP) –
Newsweek Magazine announced today the final results of its presidential election survey which showed that the two candidates are so closely matched on the eve of the balloting that the final result hinges on the outcome of the race for Pennsylvania’s 35 electoral votes.

The survey, conducted nationally by 118 political writers, reported that Mr. Roosevelt leads in 27 states having an electoral vote total of 249 while Governor Thomas E. Dewey holds the lead in 20 states with a total electoral vote of 247.

In Pennsylvania, the survey said, the outcome is a “tossup,” which places the entire presidential race in the same category,

States believed either safely in the Roosevelt column or “leaning Democratic” were California, Washington, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Texas, Oklahoma, Minnesota, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Delaware, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts.

Those believed favoring or leaning to Mr. Dewey were Oregon, Colorado, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia, New York, Maryland, Vermont, New Hampshire, New Jersey and Maine.

americavotes1944

Bricker: Democrats ‘shake down’ U.S. employees

En route to New York (UP) –
Ohio Governor John W. Bricker today headed toward New York and New Jersey with their combined 63 electoral votes to deliver campaign speeches tonight at Paterson, New Jersey, and Queens, New York.

Last night at Toledo, the GOP vice-presidential nominee charged that the Democratic National Committee was illegally soliciting campaign funds in Ohio from federal employees. officers and employees of firms with government contracts, and recipients of federal loans and benefits.

Mr. Bricker based his charges on a letter which he said had been received by a federal civil service employee in Ohio asking for financial aid in reelecting President Roosevelt.

Mr. Bricker said:

This is the most brazen effort yet heard about to force federal employees into line. It is a violation of law and the spirit of patriotism with which many are serving. It is in keeping with Hillman’s effort to sell out American labor.

After holding a press conference in New York City this afternoon, Mr. Bricker will go to Paterson.

WJAS will broadcast Mr. Bricker’s Paterson speech at 9:30 p.m. EWT.

Immediately afterward, Mr. Bricker will go to Queens for another speech. Tomorrow, he will speak in Wilmington, Delaware, at noon; Camden, New Jersey, at 8:00 p.m., and in the Philadelphia Metropolitan Opera House at 9:30 p.m.

Simms: Chinese Tito may emerge in Far East

Breaks go against Generalissimo Chiang
By William Philip Simms, Scripps-Howard foreign editor

More money than weapons flown over hump to China

Chungking black market exchanges 185 to 200 national dollars for one U.S. dollar
By Darrell Berrigan, United Press staff writer

Bogarts reunited

Hollywood, California –
Patching up their differences after a two-week separation, screen actor Humphrey Bogart and his wife, the former Mayo Methot, today announced a reconciliation. Neither offered an explanation of their breakup or reconciliation.

2,000 U.S. planes blast Nazi targets

Smashing attack on oil, rail centers


U.S. fliers down 131 Nazi fighters

americavotes1944

Stettinius supports Roosevelt campaign

Washington (UP) –
Acting Secretary of State Edward Stettinius Jr. said today that he thought this country needed “the continued wise and experienced leadership of President Roosevelt to bring about a speedy victory and a sound peace.” He made the comment in response to a press conference question whether he supported Mr. Roosevelt for a fourth term.

americavotes1944

Perkins: Dewey seeks miners’ favor in second bid

Surveys give GOP slim hope for swing
By Fred W. Perkins, Pittsburgh Press staff writer

When Governor Thomas E. Dewey makes another invasion tonight of this key political state, with speeches in the “Twin Cities” of the hard-coal region – Wilkes-Barre and Scranton – he will be attempting to crack the coal miner vote which most observers believe has not yet been greatly affected by the anti-Roosevelt declarations of John L. Lewis.

Here in Western Pennsylvania, the soft coal region, surveys have produced opinions that the best the Republicans can hope for is a swing of 10 to 20 percent among the miners away from their old political love.

Pennsylvania’s governor, Edward Martin, who is campaigning daily for the Dewey-Bricker ticket, said today he was sure of a “large Republican vote” among the United Mine Workers in some sections, and also from AFL trades unions and the railway brotherhoods. He even predicted that Governor Dewey will receive substantial support from workers in steel mills, who are organized under the CIO, the labor organization most active in the fourth-term drive.

Martin optimistic

Governor Martin said:

I am certain that much labor support will be behind Governor Dewey in next Tuesday’s voting. That will be healthy for the country, because if labor votes all on one side it would encourage the evil of setting class against class. It would be a bad thing if labor were solidly Republican. I am sure it will not be solidly Democratic in this state.

One argument being used with the coal miners is based on the fact that their union will have to enter contract negotiations with coal operators next March. The present contract, which produced a long and bitter conflict in 1943, punctuated by four strikes and dramatized by government seizure of the coal mines, will end on April 1, 1945.

With the anti-Roosevelt attitude of Mr. Lewis a matter of record, the miners are being told that their hopes for higher wages and more favorable working conditions depend on Governor Dewey moving into the White House.

Signs for Democrats

Signs favorable to the Democrats have been found by investigators in all the important coal counties of Western Pennsylvania, But all of them have reported that the Republican presidential ticket will get “some” votes from the miners. The important question is how much is “some?”

Most of the United Mine Workers district officials support the Dewey campaign. But some district officers claim to be “neutral” and a few minor officials are openly backing Mr. Roosevelt.

The miner vote is most important in two states – West Virginia and Pennsylvania. In West Virginia, with only eight electoral votes, it bulks larger because the 110,000 coal miners are a larger proportion of the total population than the 190,000 are in this bigger state, with 35 electoral votes.

In West Virginia, this writer found symptoms of a considerable swing toward Governor Dewey in the southern section. Evidence of a swing diminished in the northern sections of West Virginia, and the same was true in the neighboring regions of Pennsylvania.

americavotes1944

Voters removed, attorney to charge

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania –
U.S. Attorney Gerald A. Gleeson said he would present charges of the “wholesale removal” of voters’ names from Philadelphia voting lists to a special grand jury session tomorrow.

Mr. Gleeson made his statement as Federal Bureau of Investigation agents worked at the office of the Registration Commission checking reports that several hundred voters were disfranchised by removal of their names from the registration books in recent weeks.

The FBI, according to the commission, inquired on the status of 17 voters, divided equally among Republican and Democratic registrants.

Mr. Gleeson said approximately 100 complaints were received in his office. Earlier reports said that 10,000 voters were disfranchised.

Complaints to the FBI were that voters’ names were removed on the word of individuals that the persons named moved from certain districts or died.