The Charlotte News

Tuesday, August 22, 1939

FOUR EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: "Alas, Trafalgar!" refers to the Soviet-Nazi non-aggression pact concluded the day before; it would last until Hitler, paranoid of Stalin's aggressive intent, invaded Russia, June 22, 1941.

Cash assumes that the pact will delay the coming of war. In fact, it would hasten it, taking Russia out of the equation as an adversary when Hitler attacked Poland, instead promising Stalin part of the loot.

For its unmitigatingly cold conclusion and its granting of some degree of deference even to Bob Reynolds, it appears at first blush that it is unlikely Cash authored "Dominick Goes". On a second reading, however, the editorial likely strikes at the harshness of the laws which produce such a cold and harsh result. Today, the case of Dominick, with an American wife and children, would be excepted in the law and he would be granted citizenship--which is of course the way it should be, job or no job.

Coleman Roberts Gives Lesson In Hospitality

The retraction wasn't long in catching up with the slander about Coleman Roberts and the inevitable itty bitty you-know-what. It was a sardonic story Sunday--"Extra! Big Conservation Man Fined For Having Undersized Fish!" (Ah, Coleman, Coleman.)

But by Monday afternoon the facts behind the record of the violation of the fish laws had come out. Mr. Roberts hadn't caught the you-know-what: it was a guest. The guest hadn't caught the you-know-what: he had brought them along for bait. And when the charge was lodged against him, why, Mr. Roberts, perceiving the obligations of the true host, submitted along with the guest and, as the record showed and the newspapers reported, was fined $10 and costs.

It is a pleasure to chronicle the story behind the entry, which finds Mr. Roberts altogether in character. Not particularly a conservation man, his greatest usefulness on the Board of Conservation & Development has been in advertising North Carolina to the world outside and in preparing the state to receive visitors and treat them with real Carolina hospitality. You see, it all comes out very neatly, for it was a hospitable act that he was--er--caught, and now we all know the mannerly thing to do in similar circumstances.

Whether With Or Without His Wife And Kids Is Up To Them

Bob Reynolds' attitude towards immigration and the deporting of aliens illegally in this country, has something of defensibility in it. But the trouble with taking an extreme position about aliens, as Robert has, is that you make ruthlessness and inconsideration mandatory.

Take, now, the case of Dominick Landoln of Los Angeles. He entered this country twelve years ago, and quite illegally. He hasn't risen to anything like affluence--matter of fact, he hasn't even a job at the moment.

But he has married (an American girl) and has three children (aged four, three and two) with another on the way. Says Mrs. Landoln, who'll either have to go with Dominick and take her chances with him in Italy, or take her chances here without him:

A sympathetic people, which Americans are, would hesitate long before subjecting a family either to separation or to hardship and perhaps great suffering together. And yet their laws allow no alternative. This man is an alien, here illegally. He must be sent away. There is no room for him and his kind in America, or even for kindness.

Congressmen Add A Series Of P.S.'s To The Record

The song is ended, but the melody lingers on. It was two weeks ago that Congress adjourned, half of them having gone home already, but the Congressional Record keeps coming in.

The explanation is easy. There is an ancient and traditional practice on Capitol Hill which permits Congressmen to address their constituents and the world at large though principally their constituents, without taking up the time of their colleagues and the press galleries. This is known as "Extension of Remarks," matter which may be inserted in the Appendix of the Record as though it had actually been uttered.

And it is the Appendices of the Record, of course, that keep coming in. Such as that for Monday, Aug. 14, running from Page 15, 745 to Page 15, 808. Never was there such an assortment of all topics under the sun.

The Hon. William King, for instance, a Senator from Utah, opens the discussion with a nine-page treatise on the "Stabilization Fund and Weight of the Dollar." It is quite weighty. The speech.

The Hons. Samuel Dickstein and Vito Marcantonio, diverse Representatives from New York, stand each other off; the Hon. Dickstein with a diatribe on "Un-American Activities," the Hon. Marcantonio with a diatribe on, "Five Years of Tyranny in Puerto Rico." The Hon. Marcantonio might well have captioned his piece, if he had known of the Hon. Dickstein's, "Un-Puerto Rican Activities by Americans."

And so this Appendix goes, a medley of speeches never uttered before and of views and opinions which nobody, in all probability, with the possible exception of their proprietors, will ever read. But, at that, probably the cheapest means of letting Congressmen blow off steam. You can't pass any bills back in the Appendix.

Chamberlain's Policy Breaks England's Power In Europe

The Baldwin-Chamberlain chickens have come home to roost--moulting. For, taken with the new trade pact, the so-called non-aggression pact between Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany seems to indicate the beginning of co-operation between the two. And if so, then, without hysteria, it is a major catastrophe, not only for England and France but for Western civilization at large. Indeed, if the pact is not a mere matter of words, the thing is a major catastrophe under any view of the case.

As far as Europe is concerned, England is not on her way to becoming a second-rate power: she is a second-rate power. For she stands today in the position of being unable to make good on her promises to aid Poland and Rumania in case of attack.

Theoretically, she might smash her way into the Baltic, or destroy Mussolini sea power in the Mediterranean and send supplies up the Danube to Rumania for transport to Poland. But actually neither scheme is feasible from a military standpoint. Nor is it likely that either will ever be called for. What is almost certain to happen is that the Central European nations, reading the handwriting on the wall, will collapse without a blow. Beck of Poland is an unashamed realist, well aware that there is no use fighting when you are sure to be overwhelmed. And so what he probably will do will be to seek the best conditions he can--to come into the German orbit with at least some semblance of autonomy for his country, and to try to avert of art a new partition, after the fashion of those arranged between Germany and Russia in the eighteenth century.

And when Poland goes, Rumania will hasten to follow suit. That, in turn, leave no choice to Greece. And when Greece goes, Hitler will have become a Mediterranean power--so that in common sense Turkey will also have to come into the orbit.

The Eastern Front, in short, has been destroyed, and without an Eastern Front, England's navy is pretty well canceled out. For its primary usefulness against Germany has been laying down a blockade against terror in conjunction with the Eastern Front.

What is more, the Mediterranean may well be on its way to becoming a Nazi-Fascist lake. Gibraltar has already been largely neutralized. And with the whole eastern end of the city in the possession of the Axis, it is highly doubtful that England can hope to keep the lanes open. And if England cannot make good on the mastery of the Mediterranean, then it is improbable that France can long maintain her hold on the North African coast--unless, what is far from impossible, she herself enters the Axis orbit.

Such, in part, is the outcome of the Baldwin-Chamberlain policy. It does not necessarily follow that England is through. She has encountered disaster before and survived it. Nevertheless, the fact remains that something has happened to her which is much as though Nelson had lost Trafalgar--to the machinations of the most inept politicians she has ever had. In common sense, it is odd to spell the final doom of the Chamberlain and Daladier regimes. But the people of both nations are so fuzzled that it may not. And, ironically enough, both will be able to point to the fact that now there probably isn't going to be any war--immediately at least.

What is most curious about this is the role of Stalin. He probably has been promised a new partition of Poland, and perhaps the little Baltic states of Latvia and Esthonia. But Hitler's word is no more account to him than it was to England. And he almost certainly stands to be gypped. What explains his course, then? The only reasonable explanation that occurs is that he fears war above all things--on the ground that the army, which he mistrusts and which hates him, would take charge in that case, and probably destroy his regime.