Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1942-05-28
What Became
Of $4,000
Limit Idea?
High Income eorners
Not Recovered Yet
BY DAMON RUNYON

YOU will perhaps recall that
L not long ago Pres en-
Roosevelt said that no person
should have an income of more
than SIS, 900 per year.
His statement was given wide
circulation in the public prints
at the time but / have seen no
report on the aftermath. feel
it is my duty to state that IL re-
suited in a distinct increase in
nervous disorders among many
of our citizens in the higher in
come brackets, though most of
them have only themselves to
blame.
They made the error of trying
to repress their true feelings
and doctors will tell you that
repression is very bad for the
nervous system. 1t is said that
something like this FASTENED the
demise of pittsburgh Phil"
Smith, a noted race tr az X
plunger of years ago.
Phil would stand watching the
tight finish of a. race that might
have differed him out of thou
sands OF dollars without display
ing the faintest sign of emotion
though internally he must have
been seething.
Some think II he had loosed
his feelings in wild hollering az
the horses came laundering to
the wire and in jumping up and
down and cussing when he lost
a tough one. he would not nave
burned up inside, and wou d
have lived longer.
7 WOULD not presume TO offer
L an opinion on a medical prob
lem, but / have heard of high
brackets fellow who remarked
casually on hearing of President
Roosevelt's statement:
Anything the President says
II okay with me. - as II IL did not
have the slightest effect on him.
Then he went home and had a
nervous breakdown In private.
A rurnor that reached my
ears of a high-brackets man
leaping head foremost off a
building and sustaining concus-
sion of the brain on hearing of
President Roosevelt's idea was
later discovered as having no
basis Of truth.
What happened was that the
fellow went to the Roosevelt
Room in his home, which is
secluded room with padded walls
against which he bangs his head
whenever he thinks OF the
President and inadvertently
knocked his noggin against a
spot from which the padding
had been worn.
Naturally he suffered a light
confusion of the sconce piece
but not a conclusion. This Is
not exactly repression except
that il is committed in private.
and but for the injury the fellow
would have continued to publicly
give the impression that he did
not care what becomes OF his
income.
THE most serious manifesto
Il ton of repression in this
particular situation Is believed
10 be toe-tappipg. Some OF the
high-brackets boys have just
been sitting down tapping a toe
against the floor since President
Roosevelt's statement and IN
certain cases the toe, tapping
has reached chronic degree
where the tappers are unable
to stop.
One gentleman was cured only
when he tapped a hole plumb
through the floor OF his living
room and fell into the base
ment. breaking all his toes.
Oddly enough, after strewing
the landscape with nervous
wrecks, President Roosevelt has
offered no folloW-up on MS inc
DRY that / have seen. He has
merely dropped one shoe. so 10
speak. Maybe as soon as his
statement appeared in print his
accountant, or whoever IL is
that looks after his personal
business affairs, rushed TO him
in great alarm and said to him
like this:
Look, Boss! You cant cut
yourself OF ut the pants pockets
that way and still pay the taxes
and upkeep on the Hudson River
property and the other real
estate and the Insurance pre-
miums and all this and that.
You have calculated wrong"
But let me tell you something.
Any time President Roosevelt
gets an idea in his head, he does
not lightly abandon IT,
Copyright. 1912. by King Features
Distributed ,py International News Service