Evening star., 1947-12-25
Mr.. La Roe's Position
To the Editor of The sts

10 the Or OF i ne StS:
Either I did not make myself clear in my
talk in New York, or you misunderstood it,
probably the former. .,.. ,l.:l:..
I am strong supporter of the Marshall
plan and of our policy in Greece. My sole
point is that We should not engage in war
talk or in military gestures while sincere
effort is being made to settle the whole grave
matter amicably. Gen. Marshall said few
days ago that the common people all across
the world are praying for peace and that we
should rise above our difficulties in what may
be termed q spiritual conquest ~ He
predicted the success of peaceful methods.
Clearly we should avoid anything that savors
OF sabre rattling, such as military maneuvers
across the Arctic and naval practice in Siberian
waters. while peaceful methods are being
pursued. Military gestures are quite different
from spiritual conquest"
You are right about the difficulty of stopping
Russias vicious and vituperative propaganda.
But war is not the answer to 1t. Our Gov
ernment apparently realizes that its radio
voice. in Europe has been less effective than
Russias and plans are being made to expose
Russian falsehoods by putting the truth on
the air.
This terrible pagan theology with its destruc
ton of the dignity of man and its denial of
God causes everybody to sense the danger OF
armed conflict. do not minimize the danger.
It is because OF the danger that the church
would discourage military gestures and war
talk until it becomes clear that war is in
evitable. Gen. Marshall says that point has
not yet been reached, and he hopes it will
never be reached.
WILBUR LA ROE, Jr..
Moderator Presbyterian Church, U. S. A.
Praise for Chaplin Film
70 the Editor of The Star:
1t is hard to understand Jay Carmodys dis
senting opinion concerning the selection of
Chaplin's Monsieur Verdoux' as the best
picture Of 1947. Certainly. it is Disappointing
to learn that so banal work as Great Ex-
pectations" was even considered to be in the
running for any prize, even among so-called
'class B" pictures
With the exception Of "Odd Man Out"
"Shoe Shine" and The Overlanders' it is
hard to consider any Of the other selected films
as coming anywhere near Chaplins production
from the standpoints of entertainment value,
story interest, selection of cast and photog-
raphy. True, Monsieur Verdoux" suffers in
some instances from the same tendency to mix
inept propaganda with slapstick that marred
The Great Dictator" However, with all its
of an audience whose mental age exceeds that
of box-office Juveniles the story of this suave
French Bluebeard must remain not only the
best hlm of 1947, but probably the only film
to come out of Hollywood during the past year
that can compare favoraby with the best of
foreign productions we have been fortunate
enough to view in Washington, such as Rus
sias Ivan the Terrible Sweden's Torment"
or Italys open City" JOHN c. ROGERS.
High Profits and High Prices
To the Editor of The Star:
In Wednesdays Star, David Lawrence once
more repeats his old refrain. BY some strange
economic alchemy he has produced the
astounding theory that high profits are not the
cause of high prices. He belabors the point
that high profits merely reflect the marked-up
values of inventories.
I have no doubt that few isolated cases OF
this type exist but I would like to ask Mr..
Lawrence If the profits of the meat packers,
dairies, steel and oil industries are mere paper
profits. am afraid it's asking little too
much of the average wage-earner to swallow
this sort Of bilge at this stage of the game.
In addition, Mr.. Lawrence once more drags
out his favorite whipping boy-labor. In his