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THE TRI-WEEKLY JOURNAL
ATLANTA, GA., 5 NORTH FORSYTH ST.
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THE TRI-WEEKLY JOURNAL, Atlanta, Ga.
A Tide That Rises Stronger
With Each Attempt to Stem It
THE little group of political dictators
who have so stubbornly decided to
do both the thinking and the voting
for thousands of their fellow Georgians are
finding it impossible to kill what they set out
to kill.
Not only are their repeated attempts to
crush the life out of Hoover supporters in
Georgia proving fruitless, hut occasionally
they are proving droll. To announce the
death of a public movement one day, only to
make the same announcement a few days
later, is, to say the least, bewildering. That
is, it would be bewildering to any one to
whom it was not patent that these frequent
inquests are being held over a remarkably
lively corpse.
The fact of the matter is that the sub
committee of the Democratic State Executive
committee and its clique of partisan primary
rulers are trying in vain to assasinate, by
word as well as deed, a state-wide sentiment
that grows stronger with every blow they
strike against it.
Three times they struck hard. Once a
caucus of the subcommittee sought to bar
Hoover’s name from the preferential primary
and cram their own program down the
voters’ throats by arbitrarily fixing a rule
to suit their own case. Once again the sub
committee, with a typically partisan inquiry
and a typical political trick, strove to force
into a politician’s uniform the man whom the
people want because, first of all, he refuses |
to be bound blindly in advance by any parti
san pledge. A third time, desperately re
solved to exterminate this peril to their own
pleasure and profit, they deafened their ears
to the voice of the entire state, and again re
fused to listen to appeals from every part
of Georgia.
Each time they planned a death-blow, each
time they congratulated themselves that they
had successfully throttled this menace to
themselves, even though it meant the throt
tling of every instinct of true democracy and
fairplay.
“We have killed it,” they said. “Let the
play go on.”
• But did they kill it?
The answer is the signed statement last
week of two hundred and thirty-five Demo
crats of Hall county, original signers of the
petition for Hoover’s name on the primary,
including county officials, county judges,
chairman of the county Democratic executive
committee and other members of the com
mittee, the mayor of Gainesville and city of
ficials, the president of the chamber of com
merce, presidents of the railroads, presidents
of the banks and the colleges, superintendents
of mills and factories, lawyers and doctors
and a host of other thinking, reputable cit
izens of high standing, declaring their con-;
viction that in his principles Herbert Hoover ;
is a true Democrat and reaffirming their de- j
mand that his name go in the Georgia pri- j
mary.
The answer is the declaration of Colonel
H. H. Perry, prominent lawyer of Gainesville,
that, far from subsiding in Hall county, the
sentiment for Herbert Hoover is “stronger
and more widespread than ever,” and that,
“in addition to the town feeling, I am cred
ibly told that,,- two-thirds of the voters
throughout the county are strongly for
Hoover.”
The answer is the open letter addressed
last week to the State Executive Committee
by Lon J. McConnell, leading Democrat of
Royston, from which we quote a part: “The
great body of Georgia Democrats are doing
some very earnest thinking and plain talking
, about your invading their rights at the bal
lot box in the approaching presidential pri
mary. They are not willing for the servant
to assume the role of master, nor for the
creature to dictate to and coerce the creator.
Your committee has shut the gate on every
body but professional Democrats, and has
told the real Democrats to go to the devil.”
The answer, again, is the organization in
Chattanooga Friday of a Hoover-for-President
club at a meeting attended by two hundred
leading Democrats, including the editors of
both Chattanooga newspapers, and the ap
pointment of a committee to organize simi
lar clubs throughout the state of Tennessee.
The people want him in Tennessee. They
want him in North Carolina. They want him
in California. They want him in the middle
west, in the gulf states and along the shores
of the Great Lakes. Everywhere, east, west,
north and south, there is a lusty, spontane
ous, insistent cry from the rank and file of
the Democratic voters of the nation for Her
nert froover for president. It is not from
the politicians—the old-line rulers of both
parties are fighting it tooth and nail—it is
from the men and women who pay the taxes,
bear the burdens and carry on the real busi
ness, make the real tissues of America. They
are sick and weary of the political jugglers,
who have made American elections their own
pet vaudeville shows and have never missed
the chance to turn American government into
a stage for their own strutting.
No coterie of cock-sure autocrats, ani
mated by a desire to hug to themselves
the power and privileges of a position
which is theirs only by the sufferance
of their fellowihen, can set themselves up to
defeat the overwhelming will of a determined
people and ride down their rights as though
they were so many tumbleweeds in the road.
Herbert Hoover’s boom for the presidency is
THE ATLANTA TRI-WEEKLY JOURNAL.
not a Hoover-made boom and not a politician
made boom. It was born fully and freely
of the earnest, sober-minded people of this
state and of many other states. The people
bore it, the people fathered it and fostered
it, and it is the people who demand now that
this obstinate attitude of the subcommittee
shall cease and the voters shall be given what
was never in the rightful power of the sub
committee to deny them.
Two extremes and two only in candidates
are permitted the people of this sovereign
state by their own servants, One of them,
it is freely admitted, could not carry his own
state were he nominated. The other is not
even making a pretense of being a candidate
in his own state. But, because the subcom
mittee so wills it, Georgians must vote for
one or the other or must not vote at all.
There is only one answer free men can make
to such tyranny —and thousands of them are
crying it and will continue to cry It daily
from every city and hamlet in the state.
The Defeat of the Treaty.
EVER was a great cause more need-
Nlessly lost or a great issue more
bewilderingly entangled than in
the failure of the Treaty of Versailles to se
cure American ratification. A little more
tolerance and a little less pride would have
spared the country and the world this griev
ous disappointment. Only a minority of the
Senate —a lean and unrepresentative minor
ity—was hostile to the larger purposes of
the compact. There were wide divergences
of opinion, it is true, on particular clauses.
There were apprehensions that certain ar
ticles, unless duly qualified or explained,
might imperil the nation’s vital interests.
Within Democratic and Republican ranks
alike there were sincere differences of judg
ment as to the most expedient methods of
accomplishing the ends for which the
League of Nations was designed, and the
most advisable words in which to phrase its
serious obligations. But it was on words and
methods, not on basic principles, that the
majority of Senators found themselves di
vided. How unfortunate, how lamentable
that a spirit of large-minded reasonableness
did not unite all who were together in prin
ciple, regardless of the particulars and re
gardless of partisanship and pride!
It was the irreconcilables who defeated
the Treaty. We do not mean merely the
little group who fought its every provision
and stood from the outset opposed to its en
tire design, but all those on both sides who
refused to deal with the issue in a temper
of mutual accommodation. Long ago it be
came evident that the Treaty could not win
the requisite majority for ratification in
precisely the form in which the President
submitted it. Thus the one and only path
to satisfactory peace, the one and only hope
of America’s taking her rightful part in an
international league, lay in agreement upon
Treaty reservations. There was talk of throw
ing the whole question into the presiden
tial campaign, but the wisest friends of the
Treaty and the astutest counselors of the
Democratic party saw how fruitless that
course would be. They saw that only a
third of the Senate is to be elected this year
and that by no manner of means would it
be politically (possible so to revolutionize
the alignment in that body as to pass the
compact without substantially such reserva
tions as the present majority insisted upon.
That was the consensus of Democratic ,
press opinion last autumn when the Presi- i
dent wrote his unfortunate Jackson Day ,
letter, and it was the still more pronounced '
and widespread opinion at the time of his i
more recent utterance discouraging efforts
at a compromise which our associates in the i
war had indicated would be satisfactory to j
them.
The President, it will be readily granted,
acted out of an abundance of zeal for the ,
great covenant whose framer he chiefly was, ;
nor will the best of motives be denied those
who voted with Borah and the irreconcil
ables against ratification, and so defeated
the one from in which the Treaty could be
passed rather than accept reservations. But j
would it not have been far better for Amer- ;
ica and far better for mankind if there had i
been a yielding on the letter of the pact in
order that its spirit might prevail? How
the matter may be ultimately disposed of is
as yet beyond predicting. It is certain, how
ever, that nothing will be gained for the
cause of peace or of democracy by plunging
the question into a bitterly partisan cam
paign. There has been too much partisan
ship as it is, and too great an injection of
the personal element. Let tolerance and
co-operation now try their hands.
Our Greatest Future Problem.
w "■ | OOD is our future problem;
America is growing too fast
industrially.”
This is the observation of as keen and far
visioned a student of things economic the
world ever knew —Herbert Hoover. He
speaks not merely as a cold onlooker, but
warm from the experience of having striven
with the tremendous food perils of this na
tion and its allies in the war’s all-critical
years, and also from the sympathy of one
who senses the human suffering that will
come if harvests continue falling behind the
people’s needs.
By “growing too fast industrially,” he
means, of course, that America’s agricultural
production is not keeping stride with the
ever multiplying demands of what may be
called her urban industries; that the hands
behind the plow and reaper are not increas
ing fast enough to provide sustenance for
those at myriad machines and in swarming
hives of commerce. Industrial activities can
grow none too fast if only the farm interests
which underly them develop in proportion.
But if the discrepancy continues to widen as
it has in the last decade or two, we well may
be anxious.
Dilating upon recent statistics which showed
a decrease of 17 per cent in the farm hands
and of 3 per cent in the farm-owning popu
laton of New York State, the Federal De
partment of Agriculture reckons that some
thirty-five thousand men and boys forsook
farming for other fields, and adds that in
varying degree the same condition obtains
throughout the Union. With these rural
losses connect the fact that numerous cities
have increased in population more than
thirty-three and a third per cent during the
last ten years, and it is all too plain that
“food is our future problem.”
But it is not a problem which mere ser
monizing can solve. If American farmers are
to meet the great responsibility which is upon
them (and assuredly no element of our peo
ple was ever more responsive to the nation’s
common interests and needs) they must have
more labor, better marketing facilities, a
fairer share of profits and more comforts
and advantages for their families. It is by
wise efforts upon these lines that the prob
lem will be put on the way to solution.
A woman went to an eminent divine and
complained of the bad conduct of her husband,
who, she said, was an utterly worthless fellow.
The minister listened patiently to her tale
of woe, and wnen she had finished asked her:
“Have you ever tried heaping coa.r of fire upon
his head?”
“No,” replied the woman, “but I’ve tried hot
water! ”
CURRENT EVENTS OF INTEREST
Mrs. Woodrow Wilson, it was announced
recently, has become actively identified with
the project of raising a national victory me
morial building in Washington in commem
oration of achievements of armed forces
and civilians of the United States in the
war. She has accepted the honorary presi
dency of the George Washington Memorial
.sociation, which has general charge of the
iterprise ior which it is planned to raise
19,000,000.
Without a vote the house refused to
amend the army reorganization bill so as
to make General Pershing the permanent
chief of staff. In doing so it approved the
secretary of war make the selection.
Representative i rong (Kan.), Republi
can, offering the . .aendment, declared that
“without it Pershing’s war experience in the
management of the army will be lost,” but
Representative Greene (Vt.), Republican,
and Representative Caldwell (N. Y.), Dem.-
crat, contended that the secretary of war
should be free to choose “the chief military
adviser.”
C. S. Barrett, chairman of the question
naire committee of the national board of
farm organizations which is preparing a se
ries of interrogations to be submitted to
aspirants for the presidency, announced that
the work probably would be completed
shortly.
There was no intention, he said, to offer
questions with a double meaning or to lay
traps for candidates, and the elimination of
such pitfalls from proposed questions took
much of the committee’s time.
“It is the wish and intention of the com
mittee,” Mr. Barrett said, ‘‘to produce some
thing to which all patriotic citizens will
willingly subscribe. We are not initiating
a campaign to punish certain politicians.
We are trying to establish a constructive
program and we hope that a candidate,
morally and intellectually qualified for the
presidency, will be found who is willing to
indorse our views.”
Two American Methodist mission schools
in Korea have been ordered closed by the
governor general, according to dispatches re
ceived by the local newspapers at Tokio, Ja
pan.
The edict closing the schools, which were
presided over by H. D. Appenzeller and Miss
B. A. Smith, says that they failed to prevent
the students from celebrating Korean In
dependence day, despite the government’s
strict prohibition against such celebration.
Jeanne Ousset, who weighed eight ounces
when she and a twin brother were born to
Mrs. Louis Ousset, of 229 East Thirty-fifth
street, New York, sixteen days ago, is thriv
ing. She tipped the scales recently at three
quarters of a pound.
Doctors pronounce the case unparalleled
in medical annuals. The twin, who weighed
three-quarters of a pound at birth, died,
and there was no expectation that Jeanne
would long survive. The infant is perfectly
formed and, save for her tininess, seems
normal in every way. Dr. Henry Koplif. of
30 East Sixty-second street, an authority
on obstetrics, said the nearest approach in
medical records was the case of a baby
weighing a trifle less than a pound, who
lived.
According to a dispatch from Honolulu,
Japanese emigration will hereafter be direct
ed more to South America than to the United
States, said a Tokio wireless message, quot
ing M. Nagata, president of the Immigration
Association of Tokio, picked up recently by
the Japanese cruiser Yakumo, here on her
way home from a cruise in the eastern Pa
cific with a number of naval cadets.
The message said it was planned to es
tablish a Japanese colony in Brazil, and that
Mr. Nagata expected to visit South America
in the interests of Japanese emigrants. Lead
ing Japanese in Honolulu said they believed
a number of Japanese would go from Hawaii
to Brazil.
The Excelsir, a Mexico City newspaper,
says in its issue of Sunday that orders have
been sent to Mexican consuls in the United
States “to refuse to vise passports of all
Americans belonging to the Association for
the Protection of American Rights in Mexico.”
The association, the newspaper declares,
“devotes its activities to a formidable cam
paign against the Mexican government, which
has a list of all members of the association.”
THE EDEN FARM SHOWS WHAT
MAKES SINGLE TAXERS
By Dr. Frank Crane
Some fifty years ago or so the Eden Farm
on Manhattan Island was worth around
$25,000.
On the 9th of March, 1920, it was sold for
around five millions.
The Single Taxers are the gentlemen and
ladies who arise and ask the impertinent
question which very much irritates the folks
who hate any disturbance, “Where did that
increase in price come from? The heirs got
it? Who gave it to them? Who earned it?”
and similar Bolshevik remarks.
This writing is not Single Tax propa
ganda. It is merely an effort to show the
reader what the point is which Single Tax
ers make. Having seen the point you can
do as you please—either join the party, or
denounce its apostles ae crack-brained theo
rists. Only it is not sensible either to join
or denounce until you know what it’s all
about.
And it’s about this: When a piece of prop
erty is worth $25,000 at a certain date, and
fifty years later it is worth $5,000,000, who
earned the increase?
Not the owner, manifestly. All he had
to do was to sit on his doorstep and smoke
his pipe. If his property lay in the heart of
a big city he did not have to hoe it, plant it,
fence it, build on it, nor keep the weeds out
of it. He might have gone to Europe and
left it alone. It would go right on mount
ing in value a hundred thousand dollars a
year or so just the same.
Hence he gets something for nothing.
You may say it was his shrewdness in in
vesting that earned the increase. But he
didn’t even need that. It was pure luck.
It was no higher order of shrewdness than
that of the gambler who plays the red and
not the black.
And where any one gets something for
nothing there is a tort. The law recognizes
that (partially) in that it prohibits lotteries
and holds that no promise to pay is enforce
able unless there is a consideration.
The Single Taxer points out the party
who earned that enormous increase. It is
the Public. The Eden Farm became a bo
nanza simply because thousands of people
settled around it and prospered.
The earning was communal and by right
therefore belongs to the community.
The Single Taxer further buttonholes you
and insists that this one dramatic instance
is but illustrative of what is going on all
over civilization; that while every man should
get what he earns, he is not entitled to get
what the community earns for him; and
that this increase in values, the natural in
crement of communal progress, is so vast
that, if the state were to take it, it would
not only take, what is rightfully its own, but
it would not then need to lay a tax on any
man’s property.
(Copyright, 1920, by Frank Crane.)
David Mayer, wealthy real estate man, who
paid for Mary Garden’s musical education
died a few days ago at St. Augustine, Fla.,
according to word received in Chicago.
Mr. and Mrs. Mayer took Miss Garden,
then a young Chicago choir singer, into their
home twenty years ago and began her musi
cal education, which caused her to be one
of the opera stars of today.
Miss Garden spent several years in Paris
with Mrs. Mayer. After an alleged slight to
Mrs. Mayer by Miss Garden, which happened
in New York in 1909, Mrs. Mayer demanded,
and received, $20,000 spent on Miss Garden’s
education. The two women waged a heated
newspaper controversy at the time. Mr.
Mayer, who was sixty-nine years old. was
born in Germany.
Introducing the naval estimates in the
house of commons, Walter Hume Long, first
lord of the admiralty, said the government
was firmly adhering to the traditional policy
that the British navy should not be inferior
to the navies of other powers.
Then, referring to the United States as the
only country whose navy approached that of
Britain in strength, he said that the idea of
competition in armaments between the United
States and Great Britain repugnant, add
ing:
“We hope and believe that if there is any
emulation between us it is likely to be in
the direction of reducing that ample margin
of naval strength which we alike possess over
other naval powers. This is the foundation
of the British naval policy.”
Cheers for former Emperor William of
Germany and other expressions of satisfac
tion at the overthrow of the Ebert govern
ment in Berlin were given by 320 German
officers.
The Germans were prisoners in France,
and on arriving in Switzerland, on their way
home to Germany, learned che news of the
revolt.
Many former prominent German military
leaders are now in Switzerland. They are
watching the developments in Germany with
great interest, and it is said that although
none of them has yet returned home, many
are ready to depart at a moment’s notice,
according to the turn in events.
So far as the frugality of Chinese is con
cerned* nothing is wasted in China. Even
the dirt of the streets is sold to farmers,
who turn it into a fertilizer.
Prices of dirt vary in their kinds. The ash
of burning wood from a cooking stove of
a Chinese family has a good value. It brings
a good amount of tea money to the house
boy of a big Chinese family, who sells it
to gardeners for fertilizing flower plants.
When a peculiar cry is heard the house boy
seems to understand that an ash buyer has
come. Immediately a big quantity of kitchen
dirt and stove ash, which he has stored up,
is brought to the buyer. Thirty pounds of
the waste material of this kind brings about
10 or 15 cents.
Indorsement of the movement to establish
in Palestine a national home for the Jewish
people, made by Secretary Daniels in an ad
dress in Baltimore, Md., to the Zionist Or
ganization of America for the Palestine
Restoration, was supplemented by high
tribute to those in America.
“I would not be here in sympathy with the
spiritual ideal which is behind this move
ment,” he said after denying an impression
that anything like a general exodus was con
templted, “but I would be mobilizing the
fourteen and sixteen-inch guns to prevent the
loss to America of the thousands of Jews who
contributed, are contributing and will con
tribute so much to the best life and best
thought of America. They are so rooted in
our national life th ebulk of them could nod
wisely be transplanted.
“I come here today as a Christian, devout
ly believing in the divinity of Jesus Christ,
to say that this holy movement has our god
speed to all who are engaged in it. But I
could not in conscience bt» with you, and
share your religious and patriotic fervor as
I do in full measure, if I did not know your
whole-hearted devotion to the principle of re
ligious liberty.”
Tracow university, at Warsaw, has con
ferred the degree of honorary doctor of med
icine on Herbert Hoover for services ren
dered to Poland.
■HYGIENE FOR EPILEPTICS
By H. Addington Bruce
THAT .epileptic attacks may in many cases
be la’stingly checked by a treatment that
is hygienic rather than medicinal is the
claim of an Ohio physician, Dr. C. W. Kink,
of Dayton. It is based on the theory that
epilepsy is often a product of self-poisoning
from toxic and uneliminated waste products of
food.
To promote elimination, therefore, Dr. King
advises epileptics to live, whenever possible,
in country districts where they can obtain a
maximum of fresh air and freedom from the
nervous, digestion-impairing stresses incidental
to city life. He urges them to take plenty
of sleep, to exercise daily, and eat lightly.
Moreover, he would not only have them
avoid overeating any food, but he would also
have them eat certain foods seldom, if at all.
This is the essential point in the treatment
he recommends.
In especial he would have epileptics great
ly reduce their ration of proteid foods, both
animal and vegetable. During the treatment
itself no meats or eggs are to be eaten, and
little of such vegetables as peas and beans,
rich in pr< teins.
Alcoholic drinks, tea, and coffee are forbid
den. Cooked desserts also are tabooed, as
tending to overeating. In their stead the use
of fresh fruits is recommended.
These have the extra advantage of promoting
elimination. And because defic’ nt elimination
is, in Dr. King’s opinion, a basic factor in caus
ing epileptic attacks, he prescribes certain fa
miliar cathartics and laxatives.
While treatment is under way he would give
calomel once a week once every ten days.
Rhubarb also is advised, in combination with
sodium bicarbonate.
When anaemia is present the taking of iron
is indicated. Dr. King, however, does not ad
vise drugging with bromides, the traditional
antiepileptic remedy. Only when insomnia
complicates the case would be give bromides.
Such, in outline, is this Ohio physician’s
method of treatment for the dread disease
of epilepsy. He reports that he has found it
efficacious even when the favoring conditions
of a country life cannot be secured.
Writing in the Ohio State Medical Journal
he records that of some forty cases of epi
lepsy treated by him in the past fifteen years
a complete cure was effected in fifteen cases.
Ten were so improved that seizures became
rare and light. Six improved in somewhat
less degree, while five showed no improvement
whatever.
The time required to work a cure varied
from three months to a year. Much, of course,
depended on the patient’s willingness to co
operate in the hygienic measures laid down
for him.
Manifestly this hygienic treatment is not a
panacea lor epilepsy. But it certainly seems
to hold for many epileptic a promising means
of relief.
(Copyright, 1920, by The Associated News
papers.)
TUESDAY, MARCH 23, 1920.
THE TRI-WEEKLY EDITORIAL DIGEST
A National and Non-Partisan Summary of Leading Press Opinion on Current
Questions and Events
It puzzles lots of people to hear from the
supreme court that when a corporation cuts
a big “melon” the stockholders do not have
to pay income taxes on it. If a man owns
stock in a prosperous enterprise which de
cides to distribute its surplus in the form
of a “stock dividend,” why should he not
have to report such a dividend as taxable
income, just as if he had received it in
cash?
“The cutting of an apple into four parts
instead of two does not increase the size of
the apple,” says the BOSTON POST (Ind.
Dem.) byway of illustration. “So, the di
vision of a corporation’s assets into 100,000
shares instead of 50,000 shares does not in
crease the value of the shares, nor give the
shareholder a larger equity in the assets.”
In the same way, the SUN AND NEW YORK
HERALD (Ind.) points out that “if a man
owns a dollar bill and splits it into silver
half dollars or into four quarters, or into
ten dimes, or divides it as many times as
you please, he has not a penny more and
not a penny less than when it was in the
single dollar bill.”
Thus stock dividends represent really
capital, and not income, or, as the CHICAGO
DAILY NEWS (Ind.) describes it, the
“promise or possibility of income. The fact
that the stock dividend is a gift—a ‘melon’
—does not alter the essential feature of the
situation, since the gift takes the form of
a paper title to dividends, should they be
earned.” If dividends are paid on the stock,
of course, they are taxable.
The effect of this decision is “in the di
rection of removing hampering burdens and
restrictions from capital and freeing it to
engage in the development of the country’s
industries,” in the opinion of the NEW
YORK MAIL (Ind.), and the mail goes on
to say:
“To tax investments, in addition to tax
ing earnings in the form of dividends, is the
surest way to discourage enterprise, block
expansion, and make the road to prosperity
difficult. To realize that fact It is not neces
sary to go further than the consideration
that, in order to pay an income tax on a
share of stock given him in lieu of dividend,
it would be necessarj r for the holder to in
vade his savings from other sources or sell
his share, perhaps at a loss.”
The far-reaching effect of the decision Is
illustrated by the WHEELING REGISTER
(Dem.), which notes that:
“For instance the American Car and Foun
dry with a total of $31,324,521 undivided
profits is ready to declare stock dividends
equal to $lO4 a share; Morris & Co., pack
ers,, are holding $52,823,864 or $1,760 per
phare; the Stndard Oil companies of Indiana,
New York and Ohio have big dividends on
which the tax as earnings has been paid and
can be distributed as stock dividends, while
the Republic Iron and Steel, National Bis
cuit, Pittsburg Coal and many other indus
tries are in similar positions, whch means
that the court’s decree is bound to send
prices skyhigh in the market, as there will
now be sharp buying in order to grab blocks
of the common stock of those companies
upon which stock dividends are sure to be
paid.”
But if the correctness of the decision ap
pears obvious from the arguments above
quoted, it must be remembered that four of
the nine supreme court justices dissented,
and held that stock dividends were taxable.
Many newspapers agree with the minority
of the court. “As judges disagree, so will
individuals disagree,” observes the MINNE
APOLIS JOURNAL (Ind. Rep.)
The decision “is based on neither sound
law nor sensible logic,” declares the SIOUX
CITT JOURNAL (Rep.), which further ex
presses the opinion that “it will enable
every corporation to dodge the payment of
income tax on its stock for its stockholders,”
and the NASHVILLE BANNER (Ind.) be
lieves the decision will undoubtedly prove
unpopular.” Sharply critical also is the
PITTSBURG PRESS (Ind.):
“The supreme court is evidently deter
mined, says the PRESS, “that wealth must
be cherished. ... The legal pendulum
which seemed to be swinging a few years ago
strongy against privilege now seems to be
swinging back hard.”
The FARGO COURIER-NEWS (Non-Part.
League) dissents so strongly that it is even
moved to suggest “some popular curb on
the supreme court.” It continues:
READY-MADE FAMILIz
NEW YORK, March 18.—The adoption of
children has become such a popular pastime
in New York this season that the demand,
especially for infants, is threatened to ex
ceed the supply. People must have acquired
the adoption habit during the war, the city
authorities think, for never before has there
been such an amazing run on the orphan
market. Not only are would-be foster par
ents springing up in all parts of the state,
but requests for orphans are being received
from points as remote as Alaska and Texas.
In fact, New York appears recently to have
become a regular clearing house for orphans
and foundlings, the majority of whom are
sent to residents of other sections of the
country.
If you set out to adopt an orphan these
days with the pleasant idea that you are
conferring a favor upon society in general
and upon the orphan in particular, you are
quickly disillusioned' in the beginning of
your search. The competition is so keen. Call
at any of the children’s agencies in New
York, and vou will find several individuals
there ahead of you, eager to adopt, and pa
tiently enduring the inspection and inter
viewing of the agency’s officials. At the head
quarters ot the City Charities department
in the Municipal building it is the same.
They have on an average a dozen applicants
for adoptable children every day, ranging
from Fifth avenue heiresses to colored dress
makers, so that, while your offer to relieve
them of an infant charge will be appreciated,
if you are the right sort of person, it will
by no means create a sensation.
Furthermore, if your demand is for a baby
girl, it is quite likely to be refused for the
reason that the stock is exhausted. “I am
sorry, but we haven’t any just at present,”
the matron will inform you sympathetically,
“but how about a nice little baby boy? You
hadn’t considered adopting a boy? Why, I
thought most people preferred them. We
nave one listed now —a cunning little fellow
only two months old —really quite a beauty
in his way, abandoned by his mother. Would
you care to see him?” And so inspiring is
the sudden enthusiasm of the matron for
baby boys, and. especially for this baby boy,
that you are convinced he is quite the prize
of the collection, and after that there is
little chance of your refusing him.
But, after you have departed, the matron
will very likely turn to her assistant and
say, “Isn’t it strange they all want girls? I
I thought I would never be able to persuade
| that couple to take little Charlie; their
■ minds were so made up about adopting a
1 girl. They wanted one with the regulation
blue eyes and infantile suggestion of curls,
while Charlie’s eyes I’m sure will be brown
and he has such a quaint little turned-up
nose.”
This preference for girls is rather sur
prising in view of the world’s general par
tiality toward boys, and is one of the many
inexplicable features of the adoption busi-
Why “Melons" Are Not Income
“A constitutional amendsent should be
initiated, restoring the original intent of the
constitution that congress should be supe
rior to the supreme court, not its inferior.
No other nation in the world permits a sma 1 ’
legal autocracy to veto at its will the man
dates of the elected representatives of the
people.”
“From now on it is safe to say,” predicts
the SALT LAKE HERALD (Rep.), ‘‘that
capital stock increases and stock distribu
tions will be highly popular and the revenue
.osses to the government must necessarily
.ncrease relatively and have to be made up
in some other way,” and the GRAND RAP
IDS PRESS (Ind.) adds that the decision
“involves losses running into many millions
in prospective collections and requires re
funds of about $35,000,000 in such taxes col
lected since 1916. . . . The stockholders
will be gladdened in the same measure that
the revenue collector is saddened.”
Many regret that the decision should have
been so close. “It is a margin of one mail
that determines the sacredness or lack of it
in this law,” comments the FRESNO RE
PUBLICAN (Ind.) and the SYRACUSE HER
ALD (Ind.) notes that “we are witnessing
a good many of these close shaves.” It cites
examples:
“The decision against 2 % beer under the
wartime prohibition act was rendered by a
majority of one. So was the decision uphold
ing the legality of the U. S. Steel corporation,
though in this instance the vote was four to
three, owing to the abstention of Justice Mc-
Reynolds, a former attorney general, and of
Justice Brandeis, who had expressed some
emphatic opinions derogatory to the steel
trust in a congressional investigation before
his elevation to our highest bench.”
In such a case as the latter, the TOLEDO
NEWS-BEE (Ind.) thinks “proper legisla
tive steps should immediately be taken to
make a majority of the supreme court nec
essary for all decisions, “but even this is
not enough in the view of the QUNICY
(Ill.)- JOURNAL (Ind. Dem.)’, which holds
that there should be [at least two-thirds
vote.” The HARTFORD COURANT (Rep.)
thinks, moreover, that “minority opinions of
court should not be made public.” The
only effect of such publication, it declares,
“is to lessen the dignity of the court.”
Get in or Stay Out
There are two courses to take with respect
to the Leageu of Nations. We can join it
whole-heartedly or else we can back out of
it as gracefully as possible.
The third course proposed by Senator
Lodge is that we join the league without as
suming any responsibility or offering any
co-operation with the associated nations. A
membership in the league under such terms
would be no credit to us and it would be
a hindrance to the other member nations.
We should be a drawback and a killjoy.
There may be good reasons why the
United States should assume an isolated, po
sition in the world. There is no excuse for
our forming a /partnership that would be
meaningless. Our participation in the league
of nations under the Lodge reservations
would be a dishonest sham. We should
either honestly adopt the treaty and league
covenant or straightforwardly reject it.
After nearly a year of debating the sena
tors ought to know by this time whether
they are for or against the treaty and act
one way or the other. The public is thor
oughly tired of their failure to reach any
sort of a decision.—EVANSVILLE COU
RIER (Dem.)
The German Counter Revolution
That reaction should occur in Germany
was inevitable. The task laid on the repub
lican government could not be attempted by
any administration without creating grave
dissatisfaction. An unreasonable but never
theless profound disappointment possessed a
large section of the German people because
overthrow of the monarchy did not instanta
neously cure the country of its ills. Reac
tionary agitation has been maintained stead
ily since the emperor abdicated. Some at
east of the junkers have been laboring dili
gently to restore the old order. On the
other hand, many advocates of social up
heaval were suppressed by Noske’s guards.
The policy of the ministry has been assailed
from all sides. —THE SUN AND NEW YORK
HERALD (Ind.)
S —By Frederic J. Haskin
| ness. Another is the curious manner in which
j some children, and even infants, appear to
attract different people, winning them for
their parents in spite of their obvious ineligi
bility. For instance, it is not at all unusual to
have a couple visit an agency with a well
defined idea of just what they want in the
way of a child. There is a widespread demand
for curls, and to this may be added several
other specifications such as a straight nose,
well-set ears and long eyelashes. But almost
without exception they end -by adopting
some little waif who does not fit the pic
ture at all, but who has won them ovei’ by
a few timid advances. The matrons who
have been engaged in this work for some
time say that they never attempt to force
certain children upon certain applicants, but
leave it to the law of natural selection, which
operates in adoption as well as other roman
tic matters.
“One time I was notified by a very wealthy
New York woman that she wanted to adopt
a little boy. who had golden hair, blue eyes,
i and a straight, sturdy back,” said a woman
official of the City Charities office, the other
morning, her eyes twinkling as she related
her various experiences. “He was to be any
where from five to ten years old. I knew
of one such little boy whose cherubic coun
tenance answered the even more detailed de
scription which came later, so I had him
dressed in a new suit and sent up to the
great lady’s house.
“I was immediately called on the telephone
and showered with praise for my w-ise choice,
so that I went about for the next ten •’Kys
feeling exceedingly pleased with myself rbr
having started one little boy on the road to
wealth. Alas, a week later, the boy was re
turned as unsatisfactory. Again I was sum
moned to the ’phone, anti ihis time a tear
ful voice asked me how I expected it to keep
an uncouth little scoundrel who turned the
hose on dear Fido, slid down the banisters,
and threw his pretty new Fauntleroy collars
out the window.
“After that. 1 gave up sending C. O. D.
orders. The same boy, however, was later
placed with a couple who were blessed with
greater humor, and who permitted the child’**
normal personality to assert itself. Th«>r
chose him not because of his golden hair and
seraphic smile, but because they liked him—
a fact which the boy seemed to sense and
appreciate.
“Os course, the matter of coloring is pret
ty important to the prospective parents, you
know. If they want a young baby, it is us
ually because they want to keep secret the
fact that it is not their own, and so they
want its coloring to be of the type that pre
vails in their respective families. It would
never do for a couple without a blond hair
or blue eye between them to go back home
escorting a blond young offspring, if they
wanted to convince their friends and relatives
that it was their own.