Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1942-03-10
Let's Have the Truth

DRICE ADMINISTRATORS HENDERSON, mas given
Congress and the country blunt and OF course dls
turbing picture of the rubber situation. an,
The bleak detail of his picture is that no RUBBER VIII
be available for normal civilian use Tor al Aeast lee
years and that government requstlonng OF automooe
tires already in the possession OF cvans may DE heces
sary -, ,,,r.ou ,,o,
If is not however necessity from which the Ameri
can public will shrink-provded II Is necessity.
The American people do not expect 10 cohouct ana
WIN the war without hardship and sacrifice.
If they have to forego the of automobiles alto
geher to win the war they will do so in the same willing
patriotic and effective spirit they respond TO draft calls
and TO high taxes and bond purchases, and to the
myriad other difficult arduous and restrictive things that
must be done to win the war.
DUT what disturbs the American people far than
u the supposedly bleak facts of this situation is the
glazing divergence official and expert opinion regarding
those facts.
Administrator Henderson, for instance, discusses the
situation with high authority
But with equally high authority the American people
have been given utterly conflicting picture OF the
rubber situation
Federal Loan Administrator Jesse Jones, who has
been even more intimately associated with the rubber
problem than Mr. Henderson recently declared that do
nestle rubber production sufficient for all military needs
and some civilian needs would be available by the middle
of 1913
Here is the basis for the most dangerous sort of
public confusion and wholly unnecessary confusion
When officials and responsible authorities so far
apart their judgment of the realities of the rubber stu
alton how the public reaction be anything but con-
fused?
THE actual realities of the situation be serious
| without presenting a condition from which the public
will shrink.
Real hardship and danger the EXPECTED con-
dtons of emergency of this nature
But the people entitled to and should know the
proportions of hardship and danger accurately as
possible.
Everybody understands the rubber problem is acute
Normal foreign sources entirely cut off, for all
practical purposes and for undetermined tme-because
the enemy occupied the previously relied upon
Domestic production must eventually supply the bulk
of rubber and shortage must be acute until do
nestle production is sufficient for needs.
Mr. Jones. who should know, says domestic rubber
produconargely synthetic-will be 100000 tons annu
av within and 600 900 tons annually by the end of
1944-which is at least comfortable approach to
peak peacetme consumption Of about 100000 tons annu
ally
But Mr. Henderson who also should know, says these
are heroic" figures and that it will take almost mira
Gle" to achieve them.
WHY do not the federal authorities responsible
w for meeting the rubber situation put together the
same facts and arrive at the conclusions?
Why are the American people continually told one
thing by authority and another and conflicting thing
by another authority?
The people face and meet the facts however
hard without Sinking despair. q
But why must they always have conflicting sets or
facts?
Senator Truman of Missouri chairman of the Senate
committee investigating the rubber situation told Mr..
sary deprivals, requSonng but that they would
resist such action unless convinced it essential
Elemental to that conviction is the requirement that
the responsible government authorities ascertain and
know the facts without the amazing disparity of opinion
disclosed by Mr. Jones and Mr.. Henderson.