THE DAXNBU RY REPORTER.
Established 1872
EDITORIAL POINT
THE CHURCH—WHAT ABOUT IT T
Danbury beats the world's largest city in
church attendance.
New York's is 5 per cent., ours 16.
Greater Gotham contains 10 million souls.
Five hundred thousand of them observe divine
worship, while nine millions five hundred
thousand stay at home or go places.
Danbury's white population is about 200, 32 of
whom sit in the pews Sundays. The other 168—
we don't know where we go or stay. No re
wards are offered for this information.
But we do know we have the edge slightly on
the biggest, gayest and wickedest town in the
realm.
But we must not contemn too strongly. This is
a modern age. It is different from that quiet
time, Maggie, when you and I were young and
there were no silver threads among the gold,
and we had not yet strolled over the crest to be
gin the leisurely descent down the sunset trial.
Then there were few diversions on the Sabbath.
You went to Sunday school and church and then
to dinner. In the evening you read, or talked
with friends dropping in, or went for a walk in
the woods.
That was the old time religion.
Now we are confronted with the new-time re
ligion. Modernism, "ites" and "isms."
The blue Sunday has faded into the opaque
ether. You rise late to breakfast, and then
peruse the comic strips in the Sunday papers,
which occupy the major space of the journalistic
treat.
You smoke and 101 l and yawn till the next meal.
The echo of distant chimes does not pinch your
conscience—much.
After dinner there is the baseball game where
you may sit in the shade, sipping lemonade or
eating watermelons, anon listening to the um
pire cuss.
Next comes the cooling bath pool where at
tractive silhouettes may be exhibited gratis to
the lounging habitues.
Then supper, and the quick jump off to the
Sunday night movie with its comedy, its farce or
its sex appeal. Or to the beer joint while you
listen to the swing music over your drinks and
sandwiches, or join in the jitterbug stuff.
Late, a joy ride to the mountains, returning
tired, cigarettes and good-night.
Is there a place in this regime for the church?
No.
Some of us, too, are affected materialists who
have read Upton Sinclair, and his ilk in the yel
low magazines, and have, with our one-track
minds absorbed a pilosophy of know-nothing—
do-nothing—be-nothing.
We read laconically the stories of how Hitler
and Staling in the "new era" burned their
churches and melted the bells into brass linings
for anti-aircraft guns.
We thus become fatalists, follyists and fools.
And bimeby there comes the time when we
feel a loosening of the silver cord and look up to
Bee in amazement the shimmer on the wall of
the golden bowl that is breaking.
And then we wonder if when the hearse comes
We will really be given a Christian burial in the
church that we dishonored and flouted, whether
there will be a song sung or a prayer said, or
whether—
Out on a low slope with only a whipporwill in
the night to chant a dirge, we will be left alone
with our new-time religion.
, One ot the outstanding modernists of America
has fcritten,that even if TFC#reare ,QQ spiritual,
yftlues to religion, that good citizens ought to
Volume 66
Danbury, N. G, Thurs ay, August 8, 1940.
or VIEW ON THE
THE BAD STRATEGY OF THE
HIGH COMMAND
When capable generals undertake to break
through the barricade of the enemy, they gen
erally pick his weakest point for their blitzkrieg.
The bad strategy of the high command of
Roosevelt Haters was betrayed when they chose
for their onslaught on Roosevelt, his most im
pregnable bulwark: The THIRD TERM.
Here they shatter their artillery against the
Rock of Gibraltar.
President Roosevelt's best reason for re-elec
tion is that the people want him for a Third
Term.
He is the first President in the history of the
American Republic so strong in the hearts of
the people that without asking it, he is given a
third nomination by delegates representing
NINETY PER CENT, of the party.
No finer tribute to the ability and the efficiency
of a public official has been accorded in the an
nals of the nation
Of course it could not be expected that the
jHigh Command would not find a reason for this
unprecedented and revolutionary unheaval of a
national political convention.
And the reason is so simple and obvious:
The President had his finger on the delegates
and forced them to put him back in.
And yet only two persons in that great throng
ever knew that he would accept the nomination
or not.
After the spontaneous and electrifying vote
was given to Roosevelt, the Haters fled in riot.
Consternation seized the upper brackets, and
pandemonium broke loose when, blended with
the bands, 20,000 voices sang "God Bless
America."
Scurrying to cover the Haters flocked togeth
er, and began issuing their manifestos:
A 1 Smith who failed one day to Get It Himself,
allowed he would continue walking, tho his soles
were worn thin.
Cactus Jack, who "also ran," would sulk back
to Texas.
Burke, the victim of a Nebraska catapult,
would lay off his coat for Willkie.
John Hanes, who failed to save the country at
Washington, would join the crusade against
Roosevelt.
Lewis Douglas, who could boast he had been a
Republican two months longer than Willkie,
swore he would stay a Republican.
Rush Holt, who had been kicked in the pants
by his West Virginia constituents, echoed,
"count me in, too."
And so on.
A third term for President of the United States
can only be a praise for his trustworthiness when
so many people call for it.
In making the Third Term tradition their
chief issue, those who are seeking his defeat are
throwing oil on his fire.
The great masses of the people have a sixth
sense to see that:
"Nothing Succeeds Like Success."
attend the functions of the church as an encour
agement to good government and a safe society,
as crime or disorder are not incidents of the
church. Its influence is always for the highest
standards of living.
This pagan might have added that neither he
himself nor any one-track idisciple of Sinclair
would buy property or become a resident of a
ehurcklefcß, town, o* city, thus giving, the lie to
their own philosophy. __ '
PASSING SHOW
MARY TAYLOR TO THE RESCUE
One day a Pensylvania farmer, discouraged at
the unproductiveness of his plantation, sold out
at a nominal price and went West to seek his
fortune.
The new buyer, shortly after taking possession,
found his stock would not drink at the creek. A
scum floated on the surface. An examination
by experts disclosed oil presence. Excavations
were made, and the owner soon became a
millionaire.
Read on a little further and you'll see what we
mean.
A Danbury radio fan asked a nearby broad
caster to play "Cavaliere Rusticana." At the ap
pointed time, the announcer said he could not
find such a tune among his repertoire, but offer
ed apologetically "Coming Around the Moun
tain." A station from another city declined to
respond to the request for the rendition of the
beautiful Italian opera.
He was also evidently innocent.
Then shortly afterwards, Miss Mary Taylor
was heard playing- the classic to perfection.
Mary was educated in music by her parents,
the father who had a soul for music, and her
mother with a fine background of culture and
sympathy like the Quakers of Indiana, who mi
grated from North Carolina, you know.
Mary can take a piano and make it express the
emotions of the human heart. Sometimes like
the scream of a tornado through the mountain,
then as of a brook that babbles playfully
through the ivies to the river, and now soft and
tender as doves singing in i;he night.
The moral of this piece is this: Don't go afar
till you see what you've got at home.
MORE NEWSPAPERS AGAINST ROOSEVELT
Here is what Walter Winchell—the best posted
newsman in New York—said Wednesday:
"F. D. R. isn't going to have any landslide, per
haps, or 46 states. Insiders believe he may get
35. They concede the loss of Ohio, but won't ad
mit Pennsy is lost. ... The Broadway bookmakers
will lay 6 to 5 for all you want and they'll take S
to 5 for all you want. ... In 1936 F. D. R. had 86
p. c. of the press against him. Today the figure
is 91."
One of the strongest psychological things in
{ he President's favor before, was the overwhelm
ing hostility of the press.
The reference is of course to the large and in
jf'ooential dailies, and the controlled magazine.-',
i and the fradulent poll-takers.
I Most all the big' sheets are owned by wealthy
I men, and their editors are paid to write as the
boss says.
Confucius say now—the more the better. That
is as the percentage of newspaper support go
down, FDR in inverse ratio, go up.
CREPE ON WALNUT COVE
Our neighbor Walnut Cove has the sympathy
of Danbury and all other sections of the county
in its mourning for the death of five of its good
citizens since last week.
We refer to the passing of Dr. J. W. Neal and
J. W. Linville on Friday, to Mrs. Nelson's death
Tuesday and the tragic end of Mr. Fulp the same
day. Also to the demise of Mrs. Thomas Lawson.
All these people will be missed in their respec
tive spheres, and their relatives and friends are
both shocked and grieved at the shadow that
has fallen on the town. , ... k .... *
Number 3,552