North Carolina Newspapers

SbpHihtitnplon&tar * PubUshed Daily Except Sunday By Tne Wilmington Star-News At The Murchison Building R. B Page, Owner and Publisher Telephone All Departments DIAL 3311 _ Entered asTewHd Class Matter at Winning ton N C., Postoffice Under Act of Congress pi March 3, 1879 SUBSCRIPTION RATES BY CARRIER Payable Weekly or in Advance J Combina Star News tion , Week .$ .20 $ 15 $ 30 J j! nL" . 2.60 1.95 3.90 3 Months . .... 5.20 3.90 7.80 i Year^..!.10.40 7.80 15.60 News rates entitle subscriber to Sunday issue of Star-News_ -BY MAIL Payable Strictly in Advance Combina Star News tion , Month .$ 75 $ .50 $ -au 3 Months . 2.00 1.50 2.75 6 Months . 4.00 3.00 5.50 1 Year .. 8 00 600 1000 News rates entitle subscriber to Sunday issue of Star-News _ (Daily Without Sunday) 1 Month . $ 50 6 Months ... $3.00 3 Months . 1-50 12 Year . 6.00 — (Sunday Only* 1 Month . $ 20 6 Months .$1 25 3 Months . 65 1 Year . 6.00 Card of Thanks charged for at' the rate of 25 cents per line. Count five words to line. — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS is entitled to the exclusive use of all news stories appearing in The Wilmington Star MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1940 -:-z-i 5tar-News Program Consolidated City-County Government under Council-Manager Administration. Public Port Terminals. Perfected Truck and Berry Preserving md Marketing Facilities. Arena for Sports and Industrial Shows. Seaside Highway from Wrightsville Beach to Bald Head Island. Extension of City Limits. Sb-Foot Cape Fear River channel, wid er Turning Basin, with ship lanes into industrial sites along Eastern bank south of Wilmington. Paved River Road to Southport, via Orton Plantation. Development of Pulp Wood Produc tion through sustained-yield methods throughout Southeastern North Carolina. Unified Industrial and Resort Pro motional Agency, supported by one county-wide tax. Shipyards and Drydock. Negro Health Center for Southeastern North Carolina, developed around the Community Hospital. Adequate hospital facilities for whites. Junior High 8chool. Tobacco Warehouse for Export Buyers. Development of native grape growing throughout Southeastern North Carolina. Modern Tuberculosis Sanatorium. • TOP O' THE MORNING “It is a great security against sin to be hocked at it.’’ Cardinal Newman Stay On The Job A week or so ago we could see no good eason why congress should not adjourn. So ' nucn has happened since that we are now onvinced that congress will make the worst ossible mistake if it adjourns now or before re new session begins in January. Never in recent history was the need greater | 3r watchful legislative attention to the wel are of the nation. Each day’s developments ; how how urgent the emergency is becoming nd reveal the stark fact that the war crisis is it>ving closer and closer to our shores. The British blunder at Dakar may give Ger aany a naval base where the Atlantic is nar Dwest. The action of the Japanese in invading ado-China poses for the United States ques j ons of momentous importance. In the face of these far-reaching events, ad jurnment of congress would be little short ■ f desertion. Compared to the national inter sts which are now in jeopardy or may be in ! :opardy in the immediate future, the election r defeat of any sitting congressman is of nail consequence. It is possible to understand the eagerness of andidates for office to return to their dis ■icts so that they may conduct their cam aigns in person. But at a time like this the •st politics any man can play is to stick to Is job and to do his patriotic duty as a ser ant of the people. _ No Pay For Hard Work ~———— * There is no good reason to suppose that the »nk and file of North Carolinians will be re ictant to serve on draft boards because there ill be no remuneration for their work. On te contrary, it is believable that there will e almost universal willingness to do this job ; a patriotic duty, just as there was when lilitary draft machinery was set up for the st World war. Not all citizens of North Carolina can serve i military, naval or air forces. But few are lwilling to serve their country in the present •ucial period of our national existence. Care, ! course, will be exercised to avoid asking arsons to whom this service would involve jfinite financial sacrifice. Many would gladly ) the work but cannot afford to lessen their irnings. Naturally these will not be consider 1. There are many of independent means and no regular hours , of employment. The advisory boards which Governor Hoey has caUed upon to recommend county draft board personnel will bear this in mind when making their re commendations. The thing to remember is that there is a difficult job to be done, that it must be thor ough, that the qualifications of draftees must be carefully weighed, and that injustice must be avoided. At the same time there must be exceptional care that no “dodger” escapes, and no fifth-columnist taken. Appointment to the draft boards imposes heavy responsibilities. It is in keeping with the fine American tradition that there will be no reluctance among eligible appointees to do the job well without pay. Two Important Factors This expansion of the Axis contemplates the division of Europe and Africa between Hitler and Mussolini and the ceding of Asia to Ja pan. Spain, growing bold, announces that she has never surrendered her claims in South America. This leaves Russia alone among the major dictator states whose position is prob lematical. But it is quite evident that from the dictator viewpoint there is no place in the sun for Great Britain and little consideration for the United States. If all goes well, this is to become a totalitarian world, with the dicta tors in supreme power and the people serfs. There are, however, two factors still to b* dealt with. One, and it is primary, is the con quest of Great Britain. Unless Britain can lK brought to her knees the whole iniquitious scheme will fail. The other is that, left t<* themselves in a conquered world the dicta tors inevitably will fall out and destroy each other. The United States could not stand alnn* against their united strength. We, too, would be forced into bondage. The second factor here cited is sufficiently remote to create no great hope for the world. The present problem, the survival of Great Britain, is the most important consideration. That must be made possible at any cost, any sacrifice. And here is where the United States comes in. This nation’s part in the troubled situation is clearly defined and inescapable It is to give the British war machine all the help our industries, our finances, our moral support can produce. W c lid vc scut uu ucou u/cia nttuoa uic «v lantic, we are sending warplanes, we are build ing tanks, for the defense of Britain. We must also send the giant bombers that Britain nas asked for, if we are to be consistent. With them Britain will be able to destroy German industries now inaccessible to the Royal Air Force because of their great distance from England. With them out of the way, Nazi coast al positions under deadly fire and the blockade growing tighter, there would be reason to hope that Britain’s valiant fight for survival would be successful. In that even the dictators’ house of cards would topple about their feet and Hitler’s dream of world conquest be shat tered. As for Japan, her arrogance would suffer a severe shock if we, in addition to placing an embargo on shipments of scrap iron and steel to her, also placed an embargo on her produc tions shipped to this country. On the verge of bankruptcy now,' she could not long endure this blow to her internal economy. - — The Legion Viewpoint As veterans of the last great war in which this country was engaged the members of the American Legion deserve to be heard in this new crisis which threatens the nation. They have suffered, perhaps more keenly than the rest of us, the disillusionment of the last de cade, of seeing a new war and a new and more terrible military despotism follow the conflict which was to end all wars and make the world safe for democracy. At their convention last year these men ad vocated strict neutrality. It is hardly to be wondered at that the emphasis of this year’s meeting is on a militant America, strongly armed for defense, keenly alive to subversive dangers within, realistically prepard to fight, if necessary, for life. Citizen soldiers who have seen war and know its sacrifices would be the last to want to fight again. But they are also apt to be the first to see the necessity for adequate preparation in arms and training to meet any danger which may arise. It is in this mood that the convention adopt ed resolutions calling for defense measures even stronger than any which have been un dertaken so far. The Legion wants an army of 2,200,000 men, more naval bases, mandatory military training for the CCC, a removal of all “mediocre and incompetent’’ leaders from the armed forces, the barring of Communists an Bundists from any public office, allowing only full citizens to man American ships. Fi nally, the Legion urges the creation of a perm anent system of universal military training. Some of these suggestions are clearly sound and well taken: we fail to see the necessity or wisdom of accepting others of the proposals now. The present conscription system, for ex ample, extending over a five-year period, should be adequate to meet any foreseeable need for manpower. After this crisis is over will be time enough to decide whether the Unit ed States will have to maintain permanently a huge military establishment at enormous cost. We cannot yet see that far ahead. But whether these proposals are adopted or not they represent the wholly patriotic sug gestions of men who have served their coun try loyally in the past. As such, they deserve the nation’s consideration. Editorial Comment WHOLESOME CHOICE Raleigh News and Observer The selection of Representative John Mc f r+?1C^ of Massachusetts as majority leader of the House of Representatives is a whole some one and should meet, as it apparently does, the approbation of Democrats in every section of the country. Southerners should be the last to object to the selection of Mr. McCormick. He earned the leadership on the basis of ability, loyalty and seniority. As long as those standards are applied, the South will take care of itself in the distribution of party honors. Sectionalism should not be a factor in choosing a party leader. Fortunately, sectionalism has not con trolled such selections in the past. Since the Democrats first organized the House in 1931, there have been five Speakers, all but one of whom has been a Southerner. Mr. McCormick now is in line to become the sixth Democratic Speaker, when and if there is a vacancy. He has merited his promotion in the same way as his predecessors. It is generally admitted that the leadership would again have gone to a Southerner had Representative Lindsay C. Warren of North Carolina not accepted ap pointment as Comptroller General of the Unit ed States. But when the vacancy was created by the death of Speaker Bankhead and the promotion of Speaker Rayburn, Mr. Warren was not available. With the North Carolinian out of the race, the most available man was Mr. McCormick. He should not have been de feated because of sectionalism any more than Mr. Warren should have been. Happily, sectionalism has again been avoid ed. North Carolina and other Southern States long ago learned the value of seniority in Con gress. Massachusetts has now profited by that lesson. The elevation of Mr. McCormick not only assures his party a worthy leader in Con gress, it will encourage the retention of that body of other Democrats from Northern and Western States. There must be such encour agement if the Democrats are to continue to have a majority leader. 4 THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS Charlotte Observer To what extent this country should extend material aid to Great Britain in its fight of defense against Germany quite properly puz zles both the military and political leaders of the nation. The practical question is, How far can the United States go in this direction without serious and dangerous impairment of its own fighting resources? For example, England wants as many of this country’s flying fortresses as can be spared. These are the giant bombers with a far longer cruising radius than is possessed by any plane so far developed in Europe. England has none at all of them, nor has Germany, but England needs this particular type, whereas Germany doesn’t. If England had them, the remote naval and airplane production plants of Germany, now largely removed from the Ruhr district to eastern and southeastern Germany, even to faraway Poland, could be bombed. But this country has only about 60 of them. They are designed to defend America from long-distance attack—to defend even the West ern hemisphere by meeting the enemy far out at sea and preventing him from reaching any base for supplies nearer our own domain. Naturally, it’s a perplexing question as to whether it would be wise to furnish England with some of these mighty planes when, if England should lose its case, America might need all it now has, and more, relatively soon thereafter. c-ven so, it, would seem to be logical to con clude that, even though England may some day be defeated, the more America can now do to forestall that decision and thereby post pone the imminence of its own perils from Hitler’s total conquest of Europe, not only the less the chances of a German invasion of the Western hemisphere, but the more time al lowed during which the United States can set its own defensive house in order. The greater risk would, therefore, seem to be in holding on to what little we may have of military, naval and air resources than in sharing these to the largest practical extent with England, counting on that country, with such aid, being put in position to hold off its own defeat at least until the United States be comes totally prepared to defend itself. 1 WASHINGTON DAYBOOK BY JACK STINNETT WASHINGTON, Sept. 29. — Answering the mail orders: M. G., Columbus, O.—You’ll have to take up your problem of rising prices with "Aunt Hit,” but if you are less familiar with Dean Harriet Elliott than I am (which Is knowing her hardly at all) you hadbetternot address her that way. Prices are up here in Washington, too. Government officials aren’t worried yet and although sturdy, round-faced Defense Com missioner Elliott has been busier than an ice cream merchant in mid-August, she hasn’t (so far as I know) had to put the screws down on anybody yet. What the administration and Miss Elliott figure so far is that the upcoming prices are merely a reflection of improved industrial con ditions. However, if you feel differently about it, write Aunt Hit a letter, in care of the De fense Commission, 20th and Constitution Ave. I’ll guarantee that if you have a legitimate cause, you won’t get ignored. “Aunt Hit” is so darned busy NOT ignoring people that she has had to cancel her three-times-a-week golf game and giye up swimming. For the former Dean of Women at North Carolina U., that’s a heap of being busy. L. D. N., Portland, Me.—I don’t want to make any enemies up there, but to be honest I think opinion here is about 50-50 on that “As Maine goes’’ business. As nearly as I can get it, the whole thing started back in Lincoln’s time and, because it held true for a while, became something of a political adage. However, political wiseacres here say that Maine is not even typical and that if you want to get the true pulse of voting trends, you should go out to—well, say some county in Iowa or Nebraska. Louis Bean, the Department of Agriculture statistician, who is, up to now, one of the best election guessers in these Harts, also subscribes to this theory. * * * D. D., Poplarville, Miss.—I have a column coming up shortly on the defense program, but I’ll give you the lead on it now. I think the more serious bottlenecks are being broken out. The situation is changing so rapidly that this might not hold true until tomorrow. What some of the commentators seem to have over looked is that although we, in this country, are not getting orders as fast as we might, England is getting deliveries about as fast as our present industrial set-up can come across. Those who subscribe to the theory that our first line of defense is in the British Isles think this is perfect. Fair Enough | By WESTBROOK PEGLER The Star wishes its readers to know that views and opin ions expressed in this article are those of the author and may not always harmonize with its position.—The .Editor. All told I have received, I sup pose, a thousand letters from in dividual little people who have been kicked around, deprived of their right to work, robbed and cheated by labor unions under the authority and protection of Pres ident Roosevelt’s labor policy. The people are unorganized, afraid and in many cases, desperate, and it seems very unlikely that they will vote for Mr. Roosevelt in Novem ber, although as yet Mr. Willkie has offered them no reason to hope that he will give them any relief. Mr., Willkie is on a spot, because if he should blast the crooks and dictators of the union movement and promise to break their brutal power over the little people every labor faker in the country would immediately dSmn him as an ene my of labor with a capital L. The citizens who are individual victims of the labor skates can only hope that Mr. Willkie has some mental reservations and in tends, if elected, to proceed against the thieves and fakers. That seems to be their only hope, because Mr. Roosevelt is playing ball with the boss unioneers. Not Mentioned Aside from one very coy refer ence to the rare, occasional scoun drel in union leadership the presi dent has never mentioned this op pression of American citizens by unofficial but harsh and arrogant dictators, many of them crooks of the meanest sort. It may be ob served that even that mild con demnation was not gratuitous. It was wrung out of him. The disclosures which have been made in the last year—with no help, incidentally, from his musco vite labor relations board—finally became so scandalous and the facts were so authentic that Mr. Roose velt had to take some notice of them. That is Mr. Roosevelt’s v^ay. He took no action to compel state, county and municipal employees to pay federal income taxes until their outrageous exemption h ad been shown up in print for about a year, and he was dead sure that the people who would personally resent a change were vastly out numbered by those who would ap prove it. I am an utter novice in politics, but in my dumb, instinctive way, I figure that the big national boss es of various unions are merely touting when they assure Mr. Roos evelt that “the labor vote” will support him. I just don’t believe they can speak for their members, many of whom, I am certain, do fiercely resent their pretentions to leadership. During the last years incalculable numbers of little peo ple have been driven into unions against their will, harassed and persecuted, and without gaining a dollar beyond the amount which was promptly snatched back by the thieves representing the unions nate umciai Nobody can tell me that people who have been the victims of this kind of doing feel loyal to the union movement or kindly toward any candidate who builds up the pres tige of the boss unioneers by com plimenting them in public. These little people might not have been quite so resentful if the .unions had been comradely .or half-decent to them. As it is, they hate their unions ad hate the business agent and the local and international of ficials who treat them as if they were serfs—as, in fact, they are. If you are a worker earning so little money that the internal rev enue doesn’t even ask you to file an income tax return, and some union then makes you pay $75, cash, to join and from $2 to $10 a month in dues and buy $2 worth of tickets every three months, you are not going to cheer for unionism You are going to be sore, and the little woman is going to figure that money in terms of milk and food and clothing which the chil dren deserved but didn’t get I don’t want to hear anything about the rarity of the union scoun drel. I know better. The thief «, id extortioner is more common than rare, but that question aside, the damned spot that will not out is the fact that more of the high union eers, from Will Green on down through his executive council, has made a concerted move to kick out the crooks or relieve the op pression of the little people by the union politicians. In fact, they have a gang man in the executive council itself, the same being George Browne, and nobody in the American Federation of Labor has the character, hon esty or courage to look him in the eye and tell him to get the heli out. 2 Many Mothers, Children Are Moved From London LONDON, Sept. 29.— OP) —Eleven thousand mothers and children were moved from London to the compara tive safety of the countryside over the week-end. The record exodus in two days raised the number moved since the start of the aerial bombings on the capital to between 75,000 and 100,000. Most of the women and children were from the poorer districts of the East end where blocks of houses have been wrecked, leaving thou sands homeless. SHORT CIRCUIT SANTIAGO, Chile, Sept- 29— (JPt— A short circuit halted trolleys and left homes without electricity in sev eral sections of the city today. En gineers said last night’s minor earth quake was not the cause, however. They’re Just Killing •v Man About Manhattan By GEORGE TUCKER SAN JUAN. P. R., Sept. 29.—To day we drove out through roads that were lined with coffee and Australian pine trees, and past pineapple and sugarcane planta tions, to Puerto Rico’s most mod ern rum distillery, the Carioca dis tillery, which has become one of the show places of the island. If you have ever visited Ben Marden’s Rivera in New York you will get some idea of how this place looks. It isn’t at all real, in the sense that you expect to find a factory or a distillery. It is pat terned along color and architectur al designs that Walt Disney might have thought up. On all side is lush tropical foli age. Almond trees, and the flam ing flamboyans throw patches of red against the darker background of the canebreaks. You see tower ing coconut trees, fronds waving in the light summer trades, which are never still, and you see boys shinneying up those trees with long wicked machete knives (made in Connecticut), and chopping off the green coconuts. Down here they cut them while they are green, for then they hold a quart of milk. There is a trick of dexterously flourishing the knife and trimming away one end of the coconut, so that you can drink the milk in comfort. It is quite a trick. I tried, but couldn’t get anywhere with it. After this refreshing drink we advanced upon the distillery. The air was heavy with the smell of molasses. It is pumped into the ground in storage tanks, much as oil is stored under ground. The Carioca distillery has sev eral of these bright, new build ings, all of which look like night clubs. You could pass your hand over any part of it, and wear white gloves, without soiling the gloves. You see giant copper vats holding thousands of gallons of fer menting rum. You go into another building and a chemist is care fully analyzing the new rum and the old, and the ingredients he puts into the rum, in hundreds of test tubes. You go into still another building and there you will find the “assembly” line. This is the bottling works. An endless stream of empties is fed mechanically into a central point, where they are filled by machin ery. As the bottles come out one man places a stopper in the mouth. Another bangs the cork with a hammer, ramming it home. Wom en are next in line, and these are slapping labels on the bottles as they move past. Today they are bottling white rum, because the label says “blanca.” * * * Outside, laborers are leveling off a new drive which has been named Frances K Avenue. Landscape ar tists are fashioning new designs in the always luxurious tropic shrubbery. Off to one side hun dreds of barrels are stacked, ready and waiting. They are pouring mortar for a nwe storage house. To the right, you can gaze out over the harbor, and to a tiny is land in the mouth of the harbor, where once the lepers were kept. Beyond that is the sea and the old route which the pirates used to use keat up from Peru against the summer trades. From this point you can see also the moun tams and the blue sky and the ba i ana trees and the breadfruit trees and the mango trees and, indeed, all the beauty and warmth and color that help to make Puerto Rico what U it 2 OUR COUNTRY America, Child Of Courage, Need But Remember Its Past To Go Forward—James Boyd By JAMES BOYD Author of “Drums,” “Marching On," “Long Hunt,” "Roll River,” etc. This country is the child of courage. In 10 generations our people have won a continent from the bravest aborigines and made it into a unique power in the world. They have i fought one war for freedom and another desperate one for union. Our history in war and peace is the history of brave men and women and often of brave children, too. In addition to this incredible effort we have de signed and developed a form of government that has been a model and inspiration to other nations. It is not strange that the speed and size of this achievement has left many gaps and brought problems faster than we can solve them. It is not strange that a second world war coming on top of all our own difficulties should leave us feeling that we are suddenly faced with more dan gers than we should be called on to handle. But it would be strange if a nation, always at the forefront in any enterprise of daring and noted for its resourcefulness, should not meet these dan gers and conquer them. The first step, as we form for our tremendous task, is to remember our past; not only our great names © Pinchot. James Boyd aiou me uucuuihcu nuuiuers or piain people, native ana loreign-uum, who created this new world, who cleared the woods and won the West and manned our armies and our ships and made our industries supreme. Then we can go ahead, looking on our country with love, on our fore bears with reverence and on orselves with confidence and honest pride. A sword and a vision—Taylor Caldwell sees these as essential to the survival of democracy, in the next article of this series on “Our Country.’ Hollywood Sights And Sounds BY BOBBIN COONS HOLLYWOOD, Sept. 29—1 never suspected it before, but Edgar Kennedy is really burning. Slow ly, as usual, but surely. Edgar was sitting on the side lines of “The Quarterback” set, burning in lonely, unnoticed bril liance, and he was talking. No body could see the burn. All you saw was the ordinary Kennedy face, plain and open, that you see on the screen; above it the grow ing baldness which is as familiar as the face. "You know,” Edgar began, “when I do that burn I’m really burning—I get sick of their mak ing me do it.” Edgar’s secret desire, his hope of escape from that gesture which made him famous, that slapping himself on the brow and wiping his face in exasperation, is to play heavies. Heavies burn, but they can do it differently. They can twirl moustachios, for instance, if they have moustachios—but Ed gar, here, hasn’t even a toupee. * * * Well, how’d, the “slow burn” stuff start, Pagliacci? This way He’d been looking for movie jobs and asking and asking heard was “Nothing today.” He heard it so much one day that he at casting offices and all he’d at coasting officese and all he’d burned. He slapped his brow, wiped his face slowly, shook with helpless rage. And the caster cried “Do that in a picture and we’U get you something sure!” It did get him something, a job as a Keystone Kop'and a chance to “slow burn” from that time on. At that point in Edgar’s recital came a voice from the set. "Ed. we’re ready for you—this is where you get in there and burn up. ’ Edgar did a typical slow burn, very lmoressive, and walked on. “See?” he said, or words to that effect which had best not be car ried here. In the musicycle the band lead ers are flocking to roosts in Holly wood. Kay Kyser is here for "You ’ll Find Out,” and Artie Shaw is in “Second Chorus” with Fred Astaire and Paulette Goddard. Ro ger Pryor is in “lamour for Sale" With Anita Louise, and talks of giving up orchestra-touring forever to be here with Ann Sothern. Char les (Buddy) Rogers has a movie deal in prospect, while Orrin Tuck er (and Bonnie Baker) dropped in to talk over their new musical, “You’re the One.”. . .And that's to say nothing of Astaire, who in “Second Chorus” leads an orches tra by tap-dancing, or of Albert Dekker, who is to play at orches tra-leading in “You’re the One. . John Barrymore, even at this late date, still can rhapsodize over the fine qualities of a landlady during his early New York days, to wit “A marvelous woman, truly. . . .Never asked for a cent. . . .And inasmuch as she never did, I always paid her on the nail —when I had money!”. . -Isn t there somewhere in that a tip for the Barrymore creditors—for whom he says he made “The Great Profile?” RESOLUTION ADOPTED BOMBAY, Sept. 29. — (jP) — The Council of All India Moslem league unanimously adopted today a resolu tion declaring the league cannot ac cept the viceroy's invitation to send representatives to the expanded ex ecutive council and the proposed new war advisory council. The iridescent colors seen on » thin film of oil is due to certain phe nomena which result from the mu tual action of the rays of light oa one another.