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Show CONVOYH IOK SHU'S TO It It IT A I.N WASHINGTON. Advisers who have talked tu the President during the lust four months say that he has gone through a significant transition tran-sition regarding aid to Britain, also regarding a more aggressive policy toward Japan. Last August, for instance, Secretaries Sec-retaries Stimson, Knox und Morgen-thau, Morgen-thau, who have strong influence on International policy, wanted Roosevelt Roose-velt to bar all oil shipments to Japan. Ja-pan. But the state department persuaded per-suaded Roosevelt to the contrary. Several months later, when the duko of Windsor Hew to visit Roosevelt Roose-velt during his Caribbean cruise, the duke put up to him the desperate plight of British shipping and asked for American naval convoys to protect pro-tect British ships across the Atlantic. Atlan-tic. To Una the President gave an emphatic No. It was at approximately the same time that the late Lord Lothian came back from England and submitted sub-mitted a list of the naval vessels Britain would need to maintain her lifeline of supplies from the U. S. A. The list included not only destroyers, destroy-ers, but four cruisers of the Omaha class. Lord Lothian did not actually ask for these ships. He merely listed the vessels which Britain desperately desper-ately needed. But Roosevelt continued contin-ued to shy away from the Idea of convoying British ships with U. S. naval vessels. Later certain White House advisers. advis-ers. Including such powerful figures as Secretaries Knox and Stimson, pointed out that the British navy had lost a terrific toll of men, did not even have enough seamen to man the American over-age destroyers. destroy-ers. What Britain needed was ships manned by the U. S. navy. The British picture was also made depressing by the difficulty of finishing fin-ishing work on vessels in British shipyards. Two battleships of the King George class were launched last spring, but since then no ship of any Importance has come off the ways. Reason is that the bombardment bombard-ment of Britain began in earnest last summer, and shipyards have been one of the main targets. Since the yards are exposed, they have suffered suf-fered much more than factories. I As a result ships have been ! bombed, patched up, then bombed ' again. j Another development is that with-! with-! in the last 10 days in the Mediter-j Mediter-j ranean, where the Eritish have lost j the equivalent of seven ships. The 1 Southampton was sunk, the Illustri-i Illustri-i ous was put out of commission, I and five others damaged -so badly I that repairs will take two or three l months. Repairs are difficult in the Mediterranean, because Malta is I under constant bombardment and ! the naval base at Gibraltar is small. 1 Meanwhile. German bombers, realizing that the strength of the British fleet in the Mediterranean is the key to victory, have taken over Italian bases and are raining destruction on the royal navy. It was the succession of these de- velopments which began to change ! Roosevelt's mind about U. S. naval I convoys for British shipping. ' Note No commitments have been given the British, and no policy has ! been definitely decided for convoying convoy-ing British ships. But advisers believe be-lieve the President will adopt such j a policy if permitted by congress. I SCURRILOUS LITERATURE Sensational feature of the forthcoming forth-coming report of the senate campaign cam-paign fund investigating committee will be an expose of scurrilous literature lit-erature disseminated in last year's hectic presidential battle. A 500-page 500-page "scrapbook" of exhibits has been assembled by Harold Buckles, committee investigator, from all over the country. WTiile partisans of both candidates resorted to this type of literature, more than 80 per cent of Buckles' collection is anti-Roosevelt Also, of 406 typical exhibits, one-half are wholly anonymous or only vaguely identified. The committee lists 135 such groups, of which 111 were pro-Will-kie and 22 pro-Roosevelt. Only six of the 135 filed reports of their contributions con-tributions and expenditures with the clerk of the house. This failure to report is a violation of the law and carries heavy penalties. Dominant theme of the scurrilous literature is racial and religious prejudice. More than 60 per cent of the committee's exhibits harp on this, 10 per cent played up the war issue, and 15 per cent leveled foul personal attacks on the candidates. Note Committee investigators are of the private opinion that not less than $10,000,000 was spent for this material. MERRY-GO-EOUND Sam Pryor, ball-bearing-tongued national committeeman from Connecticut, Con-necticut, is pushing lame-duck Governor Gov-ernor Baldwin as successor to National Na-tional Chairman Joe Martin. Some time ago Pryor had his own ambitions ambi-tions for the job, but was stopped dead by a blunt warning from mid-western mid-western leaders. Franklin Field is a famous football foot-ball gridiron; also the name of a man who urges more Good Neigh-borliness Neigh-borliness through private aviation. |