Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1944-04-06
FAIR
ENOUGH
By estbrook
Pegler

ffE DleS committee has >peeH
i operating since May 26.
1888, and has performed a great
public service under difficult
conditions. \
The Dies committee was APP
pointed as successor to an ear
lier committee which had had
somewhat the same mission.
John Mccormack of Massachu-
sets. the New Deals leader in
the House OF Representatives,
was chairman of this earlier
committee. and Samuel Dick
stein of New York was vice
chairman.
However, Mccormack was not
very active and Dickstein took
over and ran the show. He was
mainly concerned with the OPP
preston of the Jews in Ger
many, VIII ic h was just then
becoming severe, and with the
extension of the Hitlerian anti
Jewish campaign TO the United
States.
He was less interested if he
had any hostile interest AT all,
in communism as subversive
influence. Dies has looked into
not only Iitlerian and Italian
fascism but communism as well.
He also discovered alarming ev-
idence of the japanese inten-
tons before Pearl Harbor and
presented u 70 the government.
nICKSTElN preferred not to
~ be chairman of the new
committee because he felt that
the fact OF his being a Jew
would embarrass the inquiry.
The Dies committee started
off on the Nazis and received a
cordial press from the New
Deal-Communist Q @ m enb in
Washington Journalism which
was almost unchallenGed at the
time. But. when Dies turned tql
the Communists and began tdy
expose men and women Commu-
niSts and feIlow-travelers in APP
polntive jobs in the New Deal.
he came under attack al once.
One legitimate criticism laid
against him was that his meth
DDS were irregular and uncon-
ventional.
NEW DEAL journalists openly
~ heckled Dies witnesses at
public hearings and Mrs. Roose-
welt, 10 show her disapproval of
any interference with her Conn
munist friends, publicly sympa-
thlzed with members OF the
Muscovite student and youth
rackets called before the COM
mlttee and oStenSibly invited
them 10 lunch at the White
House
However, the Dies committee
has examined about It's wit
nesses concerning AXIS activi-
ties German. Italian. japanese
and American. and including the
leading Bundists Of The prewar
period and has about 600 pages
of their testimony In 1910 the
Dies committee seized the files
OF a number OF SubVerSiye Ger
man agencies and American off,
shoots Of German propaganda
and espionage arms and the
closing of the German and Ital-
ian consulateS followed the pres
entatlon of this material 10 the
state department
MORE recently. the depart
~ ment Of justice went 10 the
files Of the Dies committee.
now grown 10 enormous size.
Tor information on which the
indictments OF 80 Americans on
charges of SeditiouS activity
were based Much Of the evi-.
dence which will be presento
IN these trials was turned u
by the Dies committee.
~ IS important 10 note also
that information of great i'm
portance now available 10
various departments of the
government, including national
defeGse, doubtless would have
been destroyed by the enemy
agencies if II had not already
been seized by Dies.
In September. 1871. alarmed
by discoveries on the West
Coast Dies planned to hold
public hearings in Washington
Of a number Of witnesses whose
testimony might have aroused
the people 10 the danger of at
tack by Japan. Three months
before Pearl Harbor, he wrote
the attorney generals office in
curing whether such hearings
would interfere with the gov
ernments plans of International
relations.
Matthew F. Mcclure. acting
attorney general replied that
he, President Roosevelt and
Secretary Hull all felt that such
hearings. would he inadyisahle.
Dies therefore abandoned his
plan but, on Feb %. 1912, after
the Pearl Harbor disaster. he
did publish portion of the
evidence.
Copyright, 1914 by United Features synd.