Evening star., 1938-04-29
WASHINGTON OBSERVATIONS
BY FREDERIC WILLIAM WILE

One of the famous and most amusing
episodes in The Pirates of Penzance,"
whose tuneful melodies are delighting
Washington audiences again this week,
is the futile effort of Gen. Stanley, that
very pattern of a modern major gen.
eral, to induce battalion of the metro
polltan police to pursue and apprehend
the pirate crew. The sergeant of police
and his men go through the motions
of obeying orders, but do nothing but
"ta-rant-ta-ra' about it. Yes. yes. we
eo!" they bravely chorus. over and over
again. Quoth Gen. Stanley: Yes, but
you don't go!' Despite months of ami
able protestations of cooperation by the
administration and voiced by the Presi-
dent in particular. business is in mood to
chant: yes, but you don't cooperate
Captains of industry. commerce and A.
nance, among whom Henry Ford is prob
ably included. await deeds from the
White House and from the Congress it's
supposed to influence, instead of the
words which have avalanched from the
executive mountain-top. That is to say,
if F., D. R. really means to do anything
to check depression and promote re-
covery, business expects him to come
across with action more tangible than
pious pledges of good intent
Business, to put it in homespun Ameri-
can vernacular. is from Missouri 1t wants
to be shown. 1t will believe there is balm in
Gilead when administration leadership
urges tax revision on business lines in
stead of anti-business lines; when it
sponsors T. v. A. policy involving no ruin
for the millions who have invested in
privately owned public utilities; when it
moves concretely toward a balanced
budget instead of piling up Federal def
cits and debt in the spirit of drunken
sailor; when it places more store by the
counsel Of Fords, Baruchs Joneses, Nor
genthaus -Harrimans, Swopes. Sloans,
Youngs and despised economic royal
lists" instead of considering that the
fount of all economic wisdom is the i'm
practical idealists who have the ear of
the throne. The moment Skipper Roose-
velt tacks in the directions just indicated
business is virtually unit in holding
that there will be restored automatically
that fundamental called confidence,
which is the spark plug necessary to
ignite the engine of recovery and set the
wheels OF trade whirring again.
~ +*
Eyebrows are raised in many quarters
over the announcement that Ambassador
Hugh Wilson at Berlin has been in
structed to study the Hitler Youth Move
ment and make special report on it
to the White House. The system whereby
German youngsters are brought under
state control, practically from the age
of five or six years, is the bedrock of the
Nazi cult. Under the aggressive lead
ership of Baldur Won Schirach, potent
figure in Der Fuehrer's personal gang,
boys and girls are thoroughly coached
and drilled, outside of regular public
school hours to become the germ car
riers of the Hitlerite theology, anti
Semitism and all. The underlying prin-
ciple Of the youth movement is that
parental control passes entirely to the
state, which, of course, also bosses the
school system with an iron hand. One
wonders whether President Roosevelt,
in desiring to know more about Nazi
regimentation Of youth, realizes 1t is one
of the main bones of contention between
Hitler and the Catholic Church, which
resents the challenge to its traditional
supervision of its own youths training,
as we'll as the fact that the movement.
as far as Rome is concerned, violates
the German concordat with the Vatican.
X
It's gracious compliment that Presi-
dent Roosevelt is by way of paying the
two Oldest White House attaches Ru-
dolph Forster executive clerk in charge,
and Pat McKenna. veteran doorkeeper.
Forster has served under every President