The producers news., 1934-04-27
BY JOHN L. SPIVAK

This failed because of the depres-
sion.
''To summarize it." l said. you
are a soldier of fortune after the
coconuts."
"That's right" he agreed quite
amiably. "But not in the Silver
Shirts. It's the principle of the
thing here"
"Yes. of course. Now. how much
does this principle bring you?
"Not a cent" he said triumph
antly. "I. as chairman of the
executive committee of the Silver
Shirts of America and in Califor-
mia had it incorpora' ed so that no
one can touch a nickle of it. Not
even Pelly Pell E.. (here he used
a well known four-letter word o f
Aryan extraction) 26 men in Cali
fornia out of plenty of dough. Pm
the 27th and Pm him."
The three of US laughed appre-
ciatively.
Don't you and Pellev work to-
gether."
"He's gotten enough dough out
of this racket. Now it's nv turn"
"Oh. it's a racket"
He looked at me disgustedly.
Certainly not. Ii's the principle
of the thing. Communism"
well get to that. HON MANY
members have YOU got in Califor-
MIA and what's YOUR income ?"
"Uh-uh. Can't tell that"
"It's been my experience when
an organization refuses to tell the
number of its members and the
amount of its income. that both
are equally verv small. NV own
inquiries into your affairs leads me
to place your total maximum mem
bership at 600."
/ He grinned. 1--WE amt got so
many" he admitted cheerfully. We
have six posts in Los Angeles
alone and that's our biggest con-
centration. The posts are divided
to play for different types. One
plays for the riff1raff; YOU know
what you Communists call the
proletarians. Another post PLAYS
for the nuts-the kind that go to
fortune tellers and seances. This
class is our mainstay-our heaviest
contributors at lectures. They
sure shell out with the halves"
He chuckled and added. "You
know there are more nuts in this
part of the world than any place
you can name outside of al
asylum"
"How do you divide the coconut.
after the collection"
Half goes to the speaker anC
half to the organization or the
group which advances the money
to stage the lecture. But what yol
didn't give me a chance to tell yol
Is that my pet post is the militar,
one-this one right here. / wan
ex-soldiers-about 1900 of them t,
form a nucleus. military body t,
run Communism out of the coun
try"
. That's swell. Is that your sol,
obiect?"
1--WE also want to elimiaten tn,
international banker"
That's swell. too. What obiec
tlon have your members to the in
ternational banker?"
Thev haven't anv. They dom
know anything. They got to b
/ taught, see? All they know is
that Baruch. Morgan. Rockefelle
t and those fellows have all of tn
money. The rich have every;h hin,
and the Door nothing. so we teacl
them to band together and get
: back. That's where our bigges
| appeal is to the nuts at the meet
mRs. Most of these nuts have com
down here to retire and spend tn
l rest of their lives in the sunshine
} Well, what happens? The depres
: sion comes along and wipes on
their stocks and bonds and rea
: estate. They know something i:
r wrong, but don't know what it i
= all about. so we tell 'em. The
= used to go to seances or send thei
: souls Hopping up in the sky wit
! the spirit guides; now they art
down to earth and sore as hell a
i the international bankers"
e That's fine. Now if half tn
money goes to the speaker and tn
D other half to the organization an
}. no one can touch the money in tn
organization. how do you live ?"
He smiled. looked wisely at m
and said "Oh. l have little none
and there may be people intereste
| in supporting me while I do thi
+ work"
You get contributions througl
the mails?"
"Lots of them. Dollar bills. Fiv
! dollar bills"
Z "Who opens those letters ?"
81 do. No one touches them"
"And no one knows how much /
received as contributions in YOU
6 noble work."
; He looked me straight in tn,