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Show This Week 7 ARTHUR BRISBANB A Welching Bloc Your Silver Dollar Pride, Not Cowardice, Kills r Rules for Wives It is reported seriously that England, Eng-land, France and Italy have united to "bar the payments of debts to us." They are said to have arranged what might be called a "welching bloc" as though three bookmakers should agree not to pay what they owe, hoping to make the welching less unpleasant by making it co-operative. This welching plan by European Mends that came hat in hand, tears in their eyes, begging tor help in the war, may hurt them more than us. We can afford a ten billion dollar welching process it we must, whereas on future occasions the welchers may discover that deliberately swindling a good lender, with plenty more than Inight be lent, is not profitable. .lso, there are several ways of killing kill-ing a cat, and several ways of recovering recover-ing a debt. Some day a forceful Amer-' Amer-' lean Government may reveal some methods of debt recovery to the "welching bloc." Mr. Mills, Secretary of the Treasury, issues the first $1 bills with his signature. signa-ture. Like other 1 bills, they raise an important question. Take a one dollar bill and read on it in large type, under a picture of George Washington, "One Silver Dollar." Nothing is said about gold, it's a silver sil-ver dollar. Yet that silver dollar with Uncle Sam's name on it is worth one hundred cents, whereas Government gold bonds sell below par. A Government bond is the Government's Govern-ment's promise to pay you the face value of the bond in gold at the present pres-ent standard of weight and fineness. Your dollar bill is nothing but silver plus the country's good name, and it is worth more than the bond. To the average citizen who knows no I more about finance than the average high financier, this indicates that Uncle Sam, it he chose, could finance his affairs af-fairs without going to the bankers that he has created, saying "won't you please lend me a little money at high ' interest rates?" It has been said, in many cases unjustly, un-justly, that he who kills himself runs away, and is a coward. If he leaves those dependent on him to want, it is cowardice. But, more often, back of the leaps from high windows are injured pride and humiliation that cannot endure en-dure the thought of longer existence. A man goes from this world because he is ashamed to remain in it. You may say that he might better have stayed and fought it out, that time cures everything, even loss of money. But you cannot justly call cowards those to whom loss of money I and pride is worse than death. In England, a gentleman was accused ac-cused of enticing away another man's wife. The' husband sued. The learned Justice McCardie decided against him, saying, among other things: , "I must tell you that a woman's body does not belong to the husband. It is her own property; it is not his. A woman can leave her husband by her own free wllL She may choose her own occupation. She may take her own political party. She may profess her own separate creed. Sha may decide de-cide whether she will bear children or not, and she may decide when each child shall be born. The married woman has gained her freedom." That sounds radical for an English justice. Another learned British jurist, Sir Thomas Edward Scrutton, reversed I the opinion of Justice McCardie, who V is a bachelor, saying: "If there is to be a discussion of the proper relations of husband and wife 1 think it had better come from judges who have more than a theoretical knowledge of such relations." The opinion that a British wife owns and can control herself is startling, in England, where until recently there had been no change in the ruling that said that a husband might beat his wife providing he used a stick no bigger big-ger round than his thumb. The Filipinos, preparing for the day of "deliverance" from the United States, plan to buy out Japanese land owners. Thoy say Japanese owners are willing to sell. However, it might not be a good buy tor the Filipinos, if they are really to be delivered from Uncle Sam's cruel grip. It Uncle Sam should depart, the Japanese would come In, having good use for the Philippines, and the real estate purchases might not be profitable. profit-able. In a bad storm at sea, hearing the captain quarreling with the first mate and the second mate calling the captain cap-tain an Inefficient fool, passengers would not be happy. In the present economic storm, citizens, citi-zens, hearing the principal' officials in their government belittling each other, , feel none to cheerful. Men quarrel, when they can think of nothing useful to do. It Is a sad, annoying thought, but the people of the United States may be compelled to take a real interest inter-est iu their government, and do some thinking lor themselves. : |