The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1934-10-05
Liberal Viewpoint
by DIR. HARRY ELMER BARNES

| GENERAL HUGH S. JOHNSON may be ex-
" cused if he holds that there is no such thing
as justice in the world.
After General Johnson has been fayed by
Clarence Darrow as man who played into the
hands Of big business by promoting monopolistic
| tendencies through the NRA and denounced by
labor leaders for his antl-labor tactics-particu-
larry his Indictment to violence against radical
strikers in the San Francisco conf1ict-Presdent
Hartman Of the United States Chamber of Com
merce now thanks God publicly that General
Johnson has been dropped and business delivered
from his malign influence.
MIR. Hartman says among other things:
THE National Recovery Act had fallen into
serious disfavor and diSrepute. Extremists among
the bureaucrats had extended it into fields it
never was intended to invade.
Let us hope that the shift in control will re-
suit in a lessening of offensive RECOMMENDATION.
| As it stood the NRA was an agent for the de-
moralization of confidence among business men
of the nation I am sorry to say that it was de-
laying the recovery it was meant to bring about.
While it has accomplished some outstanding
good, its value in the form it took under General
Johnson was very questionable
IF one takes this utterance at its face value it
i passes human understanding. If General
johnson deviated at all from strict impartiality
in his administration of the recovery act it GER
tainly was in the direction of favoring business
rather than the consumer or labor. 1t is hard
to imagine how American business could have
had a more sympathetic friend at court than
| the general. This was his attitude from the
beginning.
John T. Flynn has shown the two original
drafts OF the NRA, prepared by General Johnson
contained nothing about collective bargaining
and one of them embodied general 10 per cent
sales tax This does not indicate the sentiments
of man antagonistic to business and buddy
Of labor and the consumer.
Even more incredible do Mr.. Harriman's
sentiments become when interpreted literally if
We examine into the generals successors. Ger
tainly Mr. Hartman does not imagine that an
| executive board dominated by Sidney Hillnaan,
Walton Hamilton and Leon Marshall will be
more friendly to big business and less hospitable
to the interests of labor and consumers than
General Johnson
If he does he certainly should extend his
study of the biographies of contemporary
Americans. And he will get little more satisfac-
ton out of the personnel of the policy-hxlng
board.
Nor do Mr.. Harriman's words become any
clearer if we look into his own past pronounce
ments. In October, 1881, his committee OF the
Chamber of Commerce said
"a freedom of action which might have been
justified in the relatively simple life of the last
century can not be tolerated today because the
unwise action of one individual may adversely
affect the lives of thousands. We have left the
period of extreme individualism and are living
in a period in which national economy must be
recognized as controlling factor"
MOREOVER, when the NFA finally was for
1Vk mulated, Mr. Hartman is said upon the
best of authority to have assured the directors
of the United States Chamber of Commerce that
the act was "a complete victory for the cham
ber"
The only Interpretation of Mr.. Harriman's at
tack on General Johnsons administration of the
NFA which makes any sense to me is to regard
it not as a criticism of Johnson at all but as
just another volley in the persistent campaign
of the chamber and big business men to get the
recovery act turned over to business This was
urged in November, 1888, and in June and Sep
TENDER of the present year. The generals resig-
nation offered another opportunity to whip the
governmental control of the act over the gen.
erals shoulder.
It is clear enough to any careful student Of
the genesis of the NF2A that the act is the child
of big business in all respects save the licensing
clause and Clause IA on collective bargaining.
The licensing clause was abandoned last June.
If business administers the act, what is left of
Clause IA will evaporate and the one feeble eff
fort of this government to assure labor policy
long since adopted by all the leading civilized
states Of the world will fall to the ground.