Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1937-05-13


Henry Ford. be-
cause Mr. Ford has been fighting
dictatorship all his ife-dictatorship
bv bankers, dictatorship by monopolists,
dictatorship by politicians and die
tatorship by unscrupulous exploiters OF
the working men.
Certainly, also Mr.. Dodd cannot
have had in mind Mr.. Rockefeller, be-
cause he has used his fortune to pre-
vent the dictatorship of disease in the
field Of medicine and the dictatorship
of ignorance in the field of education.
Saws it Couldn't Be Mellon.
. Certainly Mr.. Dodd cannot have had
Nm mind Andrew Mellon. for he has re-
Gently given many millions of dollars
for the building of a national gallery
of art in Washington, grateful Gov
eminent has just passed special act
of Congress accepting it, so one might
suspect that Mr.. Melons interests
nowadays are in the fine arts rather
than in the black arts Of dictatorship.
Who else might be called billion
aires? No other individual in this
country probably can boast any such
assets or controls over assets unless it
is the Chief Executive in the White
House itself
Mr.. Roosevelt is the first President
of the United States who may IN a
certain sense be called bllllonalre.
He has had more than S25,000,000, 1000
of public funds to eXpend in the last
four years, and about $4,000 100000
of it has been absolutely discretionary
with him. 1t is true this is not MI.
Roosevelt's own money, but he has
had the use of it.
Have the Roosevelt billions been
employed to build up a dictatorship
OF some kind? Opponents OF Mr..
Roosevelt insist that billions of pub
lie funds have been allocated in such
ways that today the Farley political
machines exercise dictatorship IN
America, a dictatorship over the Con-
gress and about 40 State governments
where the Federal and local ma
chimes are intertwined.
Purpose of Letter.
There is every reason to believe,
however, that Mr.. Dodd didn't have
MI. Roosevelt in mind, because the
Ambassador was trying to impress on
the Senators to whom he wrote his
letters that some one was trying to
establish dictatorship as sequel
to the Roosevelt regime. AS mat
ter of fact, Mr.. Dodd's idea that a
dictatorship might arise in America
is not original with him. Many per-
sons who feel that the unbalanced
budget and unbalanced economy may
some day lead to an economic collapse
say that the ultimate swing will not
be from the New Deal to conservatism,
but to some man who capitalizes on
the discomfort of the masses caused
BY the fiscal mistakes of the Roose-
welt administration.
It is, of course, extraordinary that
an Ambassador of the United States,
resident in a land where dictatorship
is the new form of tyranny imposed
on a once free people, should be
writing to members Of Congress tell
ing them how to vote on the Presi-
dents proposal to pack the Supreme
Court. Heretofore Federal Office hold
ers have been expected to deal only
with subjects relating to their own
particular fields of service and then
only when called upon to express
views before congressional commit
tees.
With the present Roosevelt admin
istration, however, the American dip
lomatic corps abroad is to no small
extent an adjunct of the New Deal
political machine. Last year most of
the Ambassadors were summoned
home to use their vote-getting influ-
ences in the campaign. Mr.. Dodd
himself is not in the political group
and does not owe his appointment,
as do 50 many of the others, to the
size OF the contributions they made
to the Roosevelt campaign funds.
Possibility of Dictatorship.
But Mr. Dodd is impressed with
the possibility OF dictatorship if the
Democratic party breaks up. He is
right on one point-When political
parties break up into blocs and groups
and democratic government breaks
down, educators have their best OPP
portunities. But the person who is
breaking up the Democratic party
today is Mr. Roosevelt himself. Some
day, it may well be said, if unfor-
tunately the prophecy does come true,
that a man with billions at his dis
posal established a political dynasty
which, successfully or unsuccessfully
sought a merger of the executive,
legislative and judicial bodies at
Washington into single instrument
tally of one-man government.
Copyr1ght. 1870