Evening star., 1935-10-24
RALLY TOPROTEST
COMMUNISM VIEW
Constitution Day Commit.
tee Calls Mass Meeting
on School Ruling.

Objecting to the Interpretation Of
the Districts anti-communism law,
attached as a rider to the last school
appropriation bill, the Constitution
Day Committee, headed by Maj. Gen.
Amos A. Fries, U. S. A., retired, plans
to hold a mass protest meeting on
November to arrange to send a
committee before the Board of Edu-
cation.
Gen. Fries, who has appeared be-
fore the board before to voice a SINH
lar protest, said the delegation will
demand that the Interpretation Of
Corporation Counsel E. Barrett Pretty
man be set aside and that a proposal
by Henry I. Quinn and Benjamin L.
Gaskins, lawyer members of the board,
be adopted as the boards interpreta-
tion.
Prettyman held, in effect, that there
communism" and teaching" COM
munism. To tell of the existence of
communistic government and to ex-
plain its operations, the corporation
counsel ruled, is legal within the
meaning of the rider. but to advocate
communism would be a violation of
the law.
Rider Held Prohibitive.
Quinn and Gaskins, after Pretty
mans opinion was presented to the
board, submitted their own opinion
that the rider forbade all mention of
communism in the schools. Henry
Gilligan. also lawyer member of the
board, offered his own minority opin-
ion upholding Prettyman's views, and
this was upheld, with only Quinn and
Gaskins disagreeing.
With that action, the board in
structed DR.. Frank w. Ballou. super
inte1.dent, to determine whether any
violations are taking place.
Gen. Fries and the members of the
Constitution Day Committee inter-
preted the Prettyman ruling as au-
thorizing the teaching of Communism
and Immediately objected.
The meeting now being planned,
Gen. Fries said, probably will be held
at the Mayflower Hotel. It is planned
two days before the next regular
meeting Of the board, on Wednesday,
November 6 Fries said group would
be selected to present the commit
tees views.
Mrs. Marion Wade Doyle, president
Of the board, said today that the COM
mittee will be given hearing when
and If 1t appears before the board.
Pupil Withdrawn In Protest.
Meanwhile it was learned that Otto
Healy, 13, son of Thomas Healy, 1901
Wyoming avenue, has been Withdrawn
from school because his father objects
to the Communist ruling. Robert L.
Haycock, assistant superintendent in
charge Of elementary schools, said in
quiry was made into the reason for
the youths withdrawal and that Healy
expressed his objection to the laws
Interpretation, but that he had no
specific complaint to make against the
school or any of his sor's teachers.
Young Healy was an eighth-grade
pupil at the John Quincy Adams
School.
Haycock said today that the COM
pulsory attendance law would require
the father to send the boy to school,
since he is under age, but that the
parent has the right to send him to a
private school if he desires.
Plans for the mass meeting were
made last night at a meeting of Gen.
Fries committee at the Ambassador
Hotel. The committee was established
several weeks ago to plan observance
here of Constitution day on Septem-
Der II and has continued to function
since that date, sponsoring a city-wide
essay contest on the Constitution.