Browning chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1941-1953, 1945-12-21
Washington Digest
Nation Can Head Off
Postwar Crime Wave
Quick Reconversion Can Prevent Era of Law
lessness, FBI Chief Says; Expects
Vets to Demand Order.
BY BAUKHAGE
Ne,Us analyst and Commentator.

tu commentator.
| in taking life and appropriating
property that does not belong to
them?
Vets Desire
Orderly Community
On this subject, Director Hoover
issued an emphatic mol" Here is
| his reasoning:
"Of course, soldiers are trained to
| kill-but so are we of the FBI and
so are police officers. But no man of
the FBI has ever been arrested for
crime of violence. There will be
criminals among the returning vet
| Grams, it is true-criminals who will
operate more efficiently than they
would have if they hadn't had army
training. But these are the men
who probably would have been GRIM
inals anyway if they had remained
civilians. After all, the army is only
a cross-section of the American peo-
pie. OF course, the real criminals
never got into the army-their rec
ords were too bad.
II expect the returning veteran to
be big help to us in combating
crime" Hoover went on. 1.-THE boys
who are returning from the battle
fields have seen so much Of destruc-
ton, horror, disease, the dangers of
dictatorship that they are anxious
to see their communities get back
to normal, peaceful ways. They are
more interested in their homes and
civil affairs. They want law and or
der over here"
The FBI expects the veterans to
be a major influence on the GRIM
inal tendencies of the teen-agers.
If the big brothers and fathers
coming back settle down into jobs or
60 back to school, they can show
the younger boys and girls how to be
good citizens. The youngsters look
up to these men as heroes-they can
be a strong influence on them"
But the responsibility for leading
the teen-agers Alright does not rest
solely on the veterans-nor alone
on the agencies of law enforcement.
"The question of crime among our
youth cannot be pawned off on few
juvenile courts, overburdened juve-
nile bureaus, and the local police"
Director Hoover declared. "These
agencies can help materially, but the
big job is getting every parent, bust
ness man, school teacher, salesman,
farmer, mechanic, housewife, and
every other forward-looking citizen
to knuckle down to the two-fisted
realization that this is their job and
it is up to them to do something
about it."
But no matter what is done to try
to meet crime situation that now
has a potentially for great evil in
this country, there is one thing
which Hoover believes will deter
mine in the long run whether it will
be law or lawlessness from here on.
whether or not we have a post
war crime wave will depend in the
| last analysis on how we as nation
convert to a peacetime basis" Di-
| rector Hoover announced emphati-
| cally. "You can't divorce econom-
les from crime. Although it is true
that having money does not neces-
| sarily prevent person from COM
hitting a crime, not having money
| is a definite cause of it. When peo-
pie are out of work, there is a great
er chance for them to get into trou-
BILE than when they are employed"
eff the Republicans don't look out,
this guy Truman is going to pick up
some votes right out from under
their noses, he's so darned human"
political wiseacre whispered to me
at the Press Club party for Byron
Price.
We were watching the President
mingle with the guests, obviously
enjoying himself.
Just then a colleague of mine on
the weekly press came up. His face
was wreathed in smiles.
Guess what" he exclaimed. 81
just said to the President I'm from
Kansas City and what do you think
he said? That's suburb of GER
tain city, isn't it?'"
And my friend, who has been a
Republican since he can remember
and especially so in the last IL
years, is beginning to think that
this guy Truman" is all right.
When the party was breaking up
the President was heard to observe
with broad Missouri grin that he
was having as good a time as he
did when he was at the Press Club
last. That time he was still vice
president and his picture was taken
playing the piano with movie star