Timely Topics
THOMAS, NORMAN
By Norman Thomas TIMELY TOPICS Omaha, Nab. The President Speaks *T*HE President has made news. In many quartan * his address to Congress was interpreted as a definite move to the left. So,...
...The Budget Message PAR more important ¦ than the President's address to Congress was his budget message showing a deficit of $7,000,000,000 and the need of $10,000,000,000 new financing with an estimated all-time high burden of debt in excess of 51 billion at the end of 1934 at which time the President believes—without adequate evidence—that the emergency will be over...
...Amirsed chuckles in the crowded court failed to disturb the seriousness of the probation officer...
...The money will go straight to workers now unemployed and if the amount is not increased beyond the increase in consequent production, there need be no disastrous inflation at all...
...To support the test case in theAppellate Division, a Red Flag Appeal Committee has been formed with Norman Thomas as chairman...
...The Associated Press carries a cable from Rio de Janeiro to the effect that Brazilian coffee growers have broken their best (or worst) previous record...
...Every day makes it clearer that we are sunk unless we reduce capital structures (in terms of money value) and wipe out the worst of our debts...
...Th* codes aren't satisfactory and they aren't enforced against chiseling employers...
...And Retzkin," added the probation officer, "is an active member of the Young People's Socialists League...
...ROOSEVELT makes the wish father to the thought when he says that emergency expenditures for unemployment relief will be over in two years...
...The notes should be secured by the new wealth created...
...too much oil—and the world is starving to death...
...That's not moving to the left...
...This burden of debt is alarming, less alarming so far as immediate trouble for the government is concerned than no unemployment or agricultural relief, but very bad...
...They must oe taken care of by social insurance which will be an expense to government or C.W.A., or both...
...The government could judiciously expand credit without the danger of wholesale inflation...
...He went on to explain that Altman had received suspended sentences last July on charges of "inciting to riot" and "leading a parade without a permit" following a demonstration at the City Hall and in front of several Wall Street banks against the city's failure to provide adequate relief for the unemployed...
...workers...
...If I were running the show I night use the General as a barker outside the tent, jut never as the lion tamer inside...
...Some of them, including teachers, are getting more than the regularly employed...
...To do this, a capital levy is infinitely superior to repudiation, piecemeal confiscation, ruthless deflation, or wild inflation, and it can be used to facilitate the socialization of industry...
...On the ground floor of the building in which the court is located are the Bronx headquarters of the American Legion, which caused the arrest of Altman and Retzkin...
...And-once more, I repent, labor can be protected "by requiring that wages fixed in the codes increase if and when the index of the cost of living increases...
...So, perhaps, it was in a vague, sermonie sort of way...
...Even if we get back to so-called normal— which is more than doubtful—we shall have some 3,000,000,000 unemployed...
...There is no control of money and credit without this measure of common sense...
...too much cotton...
...Too much coffee...
...A New Deal Contradiction **"\NE of the contradictions in the New Deal: For ^"^ purposes of relief the unemployed are being put on subsistence farms, increasing the number of farmers and the total agricultural output To help agriculture the government plans to buy submarginal land and put it back in forest (in itself good if the displaced farmers are taken care of) thus decreasing the number of farmers and the total output...
...they should be controlled in amount by obsrving their effect on the price level as they enter general circulation, and stopping their issue if and when the price level goes rbove the 1926 level...
...During the calendar year 1933 they burned, dumped into the Atlantic Ocean and otherwise destroyed 918,000 tons of inferior coffee, bringing the total destroyed since July, 1931, up to 1,710,000 tons...
...Notice of appeal will be filed shortly by Charles Solomon .and Samuel S. Rosh, defense attorneys, in bine with plans of the Socialist party to test the legality of the statute which was signed by Governor Alfred E. Smith amid the hysterical aftermath of the war...
...This was not true, Altman explained, but neither defendant took the witness stand, the defense conceding all the charges by the prosecution because it wanted to have a test case with a clear-cut decision on the red-flag law...
...I am aware that this is a new kind of mcney but it is as safe, or can be as safe, as our present money without any gold backing...
...We cannot drift along...
...Attorney Rosh was in court, prepared to argue against the law, but it was quickly . apparent that no argument was needed...
...There was a brief conference among the three judges, in which Justice Murphy indicated that he was doubtful of the merits of the statute...
...A Legion representative testified at the trial that the column of 125 young men whom the defendants were leading staged a red-flag demonstration in front of the Pelham Bay Park war memorial...
...He removed Peek from A.A.A., but transferred the codes to NRA where Peek's, not Tugwell's, point of view prevailed...
...S. So far as debt is concerned, nothing I have discussed is aa important aa the capital levy...
...Contributions *oward a $300 fund to cover necessary expense should be sent promptly to Julius Gerber...
...In Toledo, Ohio, a city of about 800,000, no less than 22,000 are C.W.A...
...My thanks to them for a long and happy day...
...The Federal Coffee Depart-j ment," the despatch goes on to report, "in announcing the figures estimated that stocks had been so reduced that normal exports could be shipped when the new crop was ready in July...
...They can't be suddenly cut off by being told that we're back to normal...
...They talk of the dangers of bureaucracy...
...Capitalism, the finest flower of' civilizntion...
...too much grain...
...Coffee dumped into the ocean and burned, grain used for fuel, hogs slaughtered and buried, oil wells shut down, cotton plowed under, fruit rotting on the ground, and bread lines lengthening and millions of human beings on relief...
...treasurer of the committee, at 7 East 15th Street...
...But his actions have meant a move to the right He left 800 codes solely to General Johnson who is the world's greatest flop is an enforcer of codes .hat protect labor...
...Thus the Brazilian government keeps up the valorization plan it adopted in 1912 to achieve the excellent result of keeping up prices...
...Especially in the cold, wintry days of January...
...To use a rough illustration, you can keep a hungry dog from biting you for a long time but can't safely give Hm a bone and then grab it away...
...A Sub-Pedal Nickel TTHE Tugwell pure food and drug act for our pro' tection ought to pass, and the newspaper opposition to it and to Tugwell is one of the most shameful examples of the effect on morals of "the nickel under the foot" in history...
...We can't just keep on piling up debt The Unemployed Still With Us AMR...
...It is either the capital levy equitably applied at a graduated rate or one of the other methods of debt reduction which willsjp used...
...So long as the suspended sentence stands the defendants, if they should again violate that law, could be sent to prison fci as much as a year or fined 500, or both...
...A young probation officer read a typewritten record of the defendants' records prior to the court's decision...
...It invites wholesale, fresh collapse, or a paralyzing burden of taxes improperly distributed...
...EVERYWHERE I go it's the same story...
...Justice Brady, presiding, then announced the suspended sentences...
...too much meat...
...Appeal Red Flag Conviction Despite Suspended Sentence By John Nicholas Beffel ^ SECOND division in the Court of Special Sessions in Bronx Borough, New York, on the constitutionality of the anti-red flag law resulted in suspended sentences for Jack Altman and Alex Retzkin, convicted January 2nd of displaying the forbidden banner at the head of a hiking party in Pelham Bay Park last autumn...
...It is only part of the total indebtedness we struggle to bear...
...It is a step toward money for which there is not a double cost to consumers...
...Under socialized banking the government would ret the profit that now goes to banks for issuing money...
...Prom a Socialist standpoint, three things should be done or should have been done: 1. The banks should be socialized...
...There is a like load on cities, states, and private business...
...IWAS delighted by the progress of the Socialists in Toledo...
...When the defendants appeared for sentence, Justice Daniel F. Murphy was sitting in place of Justice Vorhees...
...Maybe these can be reconciled, but hot easily...
...Norman Thomas has sent $10, Harry C. Oppenhelmer $10, and .lame* Oneal $1...
...Good News for the Bread Line "pi.EASE, have you got a nickel ¦ for a cup of coffee...
...too much sugar...
...That's nothing against him," Justice Rayfiel commented...
...2. Treasury notes rather than interest-bearing bonds should be used to pay for public works, especially self-liquidating public works, instead of interest-bearing bonds...
...they think of advertising profits...
...Today C.W.A is saving us from riot or starvation, or both...
...Solemnly he recited that Altman was 28, an active organizer for the Socialistic Party, and had twice been a candidate of the Socialistic Party for the Assembly in the 23rd Assembly District of Brooklyn...
Vol. 17 • January 1934 • No. 2
