St. Paul recorder. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1934-2000, 1946-03-15
Washington
Spotlight
By Louis Lautier

This column dominates for the
Hall Of Fame, Representatives
Helen Gahagan Douglas, Democrat,
Of California, and Clare Boothe
Luce, Republican, Of New York,
and Mrs. Eugene Meyer, wife Of
the publisher Of the Washington
Post.
Without designating their rela-
tive positions, they are the three
top women in Washington from
the standpoint Of freedom from race
prejudice and the most active in
seeking better race relations. All
three have demonstrated by posi-
tive acts their adherence to demo-
cratic principles.
Mrs. Douglas is the wife Of Mel
vyn Douglas, the movie actor. It
was he who told her upon his re-
turn from the China-Burma-India
theaters of operation Of colored SOL
diers who rode their bulldozers
down with tons of sliding rock
when narrow lodges gave way,
while building the Ledo Road, cut
ting and blasting their way through
jungle and over mountain passes.
When Mrs. Douglas appointed
David Carlisle, a Los Angeles lad,
to the Military Academy, newspa-
per men bounded her wanting to
know her reason for picking him.
She told them she did not believe
in young people starting careers
with patronage and for that reason
she gave examinations to fill her
vacancies at both West Point and
Annapolis and that Carlisle stood
at the top in the West Point exam.
That's all there was to it." she
said.
Her contribution in speaking on
the floor of the House on the Negro
soldier and his contribution to
World War II and her subsequent
insertion into the Congressional
Record Of the record Of Negro de-
votion and heroism in the cause Of
freedom" deserves the plaudits Of
colored people.
The records of the part played
by colored soldiers in all wars in
which this country has engaged are
very meager. After World War l,
Major (now GENERALLY Brehon B.
Somervell, who was commanding
general Of the Army Service
Forces, made a study Of that ques-
ton and determined that on the
basis of such meager records, in
.l,,J;n~ yNavfnrunonnn in WOrld
War /, colored men were fit to be
used mainly in service units as
stevedores and laborers.
The Helen Gahagan Douglas
compilation of the record Of col
ored soldiers as a part Of the Con-
gressional Record will stand for
ever as a refutation of any charge
that colored soldiers performed ig-
nobly in World War IL.
Mrs. Luce's nomination is based
on the fight she has been carrying
on against intolerance in the
Daughters Of the American Revo-
luton because of that organiZa-
tons refusal to rent Constitution
Hall for a concert by Miss Hazel
Scott, the wife of Representative
Adam C. Powell, Jr., Democrat, of
New York.
Moreover, her speech at the Re-
publican's Lincoln Day dinner at
the Hotel Statler required courage,
She denounced her colleagues, Re-
publican as well as Democratic,
for their opposition to fair en-
ployment practice legislation and
called upon the Republican party
to finish the task Lincoln began by
freeing colored people from eco
nomic slavery.
Some of her colleagues wanted
to insert her speech in the Congress
sional Record, but in order to so it
would have been necessary to de-
lete her ridicule Of Bilbo and "his
southern delinquencies." She re-
fused to permit the deletions.
But Mrs. Luce is a woman of
courage. She displayed her cour-
age again when she allowed it to
become known that she patronizes
John A. Butler, the milliner, and
permitted herself to be photo
graphed with him showing her
some Of his creations. After all,
Washington is a southern town and
has more than its share of Rankins
and Bilbos.
Mrs. Meyer has long been a
worker for social reform. She is
not only liberal but devoid of race
prejudice. During the war she ad-
vocated better treatment Of colored
personnel in the armed forces. AS
their advocate she talked with high
War Department officials and
wrote articles which appeared in
the Washington Post and the New
York Herald Tribune.
AS secretary treasurer of the
committee on the Wendell Willkie
awards for Negro journalism she
was largely responsible for the pro-
cedure which eliminated in the
dinner here on March /, at which
the awards were presented to the
winners.
Mrs. Meyer firmly believed that
such a dinner, attended by some of
the leading publishers, white and
colored, would result in better race
relations. Not only were the pub
fishers, white and colored, at the
dinner, but there were also there
members Of the Supreme Court
and of Congress. Surely, out of
such a meeting of men who mold