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Show shington. It always has been Jesting to me to see how politicians politi-cians frequently po Many overlook real is- Laws sues in national I affairs. Many s, they simulate the hound that sruns the rabbits. That is the pn why so often a new man in :.c life suddenly rises to leader- He has taken hold of a bad ytion that is right under our j offered a constructive solu- and has dealt with an immi-; immi-; condition rather than schemed ; re-election through political !i building. ";ese facts lead directly into a Of current history. It will be lied how Bruce Barton cam-ned cam-ned through congested sections ew York's Manhattan island for unexpired term in the house of esentatives last fall. About all Mr. Barton said of consequence is campaign speeches was that J are too many laws. I think is obvious. When he was cam-ning cam-ning on that line, he was speak-!or speak-!or great masses of inarticulate :ens. :t Mr. Barton went further. He mnced his intention to seek re-. re-. of one federal law a week un-lere un-lere is some semblance of rea-in rea-in the structure of federal laws. w, of course, Mr. Barton is new in politics. He had been ;ing his nose to the grindstone .usiness. He knew only what r persons outside of politics , namely, that high pressure ;irities, sour pusses and nit wits - getting one law after another Igh congress, and that, in the i those laws would be ruinous to country as a whole. Whether iBarton thought he would suc- - or whether he recognized the i that he was only making a ;:, it does not matter. Bruce on has taken hold of an obvl-issue obvl-issue in national affairs and it t outside of the realm of prob-lies prob-lies that he will "go places" his program. Thus far, it must aid that Mr. Barton has suc-:d suc-:d only in getting a dozen re-bills re-bills into the house commit-through commit-through Introduction in the 5. None has been acted on. I probably will be acted on if touse runs true to form. That I say, Mr. Barton is a Republi- and the house is controlled by ocrats and New Dealers. Nat-,y, Nat-,y, they will give no opportunity )ie opposition to gain credit for ung, no concessions at all. k5 significance of the Barton ram goes much deeper, howev-id howev-id it is of that significance that ;nt to write. Through more J. twenty years as an observer ('tional affairs here in Washing-I Washing-I obviously I have witnessed issues develop, or be created, f discovered. It seems to me Jthe really important national are those that develop, as arton program is developing, mcans the issue is fundamen--t means, further, that there is cessity for building the issue, wt means as well that it inly., in-ly., vital questions of policy. tEI said above, there are too ' laws, too many don'ts and 'Jew do's. Restriction and reg-' reg-' h always breeds more restric- of even greater age built as wartime war-time emergency units, but still in existence for no reason at all. Besides Be-sides the War Finance corporation and some others of that wartime era, it is proposed to get rid of some things of more recent date. The Commodity Credit corporation and the two export-import banks, to mention only three. Now, there is no reason available for retention of the skeletons of the World war, and there appears to have been no reason rea-son for creation of such things as the export-import banks. I mean there was no sound reason. Those radicals who forced the diplomatic recognition of Soviet Russia thought there was reason for the export-import export-import banks because they held such banks would enable trade with Russia. But Russian trade has amounted to about the same as the sale of mules in my home county of Missouri. Two other pieces of legislation which Mr. Barton seeks to repeal are strictly New Deal. One is that law which gave the President the right to change the value of the dollar dol-lar at will, within certain limitations. limita-tions. I suppose there are some who still believe that devaluation of the dollar has done or can do good in aiding recovery. It seems to me, however, that existence of that power in the hands of one man is just another basis for uncertainty among all of the people. In any event, the failure of that panacea has been amply demonstrated. The piece of far-reaching New Deal legislation concerned is the so-called so-called Guffey coal law. That thing is a price fixing measure. It gave authority to a coal commission to prescribe prices throughout the country, and producers would be violating a law if they sold below those figures; they would be subject sub-ject to fines and prison terms. Only recently, the price fixing features were enjoined by a circuit court of appeals and so at the moment they are not operative. Yet the threat exists. And attention should be called to the fact also that the three judges who granted an injunction were appointed by President Roosevelt Roose-velt and supposed, therefore, to be very liberal in their views. Mr. Barton called the Guffey coal act a piece of "grand larceny against the consumers," because, he explained, the consumers are made to pay the higher prices fixed by the commission commis-sion and they have no word to say about it. Among other laws which Mr. Barton Bar-ton wants to repeal is the ill-starred silver purchase act. That law was another one which the inflationists in congress forced through in 1934 when all of the brain-trust camp followers were in their heyday. The only result that I can discover flowing flow-ing from the silver purchase act is a grand outpouring of cash for the owners of silver mines. They obtained ob-tained two or three times what their silver was really worth. Analysis of the limited number of laws, I believe, shows the trend of the Barton program. It may be that he will never get to first base with any of them. My conviction, however, is quite to the contrary. I firmly expect to see a growth in the strength that such a program will muster. jj-nd regulation. The Roosevelt listration has been constantly 1(4 "don't" in the shape of laws sliie tremendous majority in con-alb: con-alb: has been giving President ptVclt almost unlimited power as he wants to do beyond SJ.on't" legislation. So the Bar-'yogram Bar-'yogram would restore a great J.f freedom to the people them-e't;. them-e't;. and would restore to con-$ con-$ much of the power that it ven to the President. To car-jgit car-jgit thought further, then, the A program actually seems to ii propose saving only those JrJ.hat the progress of civiliza-liows civiliza-liows to be sound and work- .jmight consider some of the .'s which Mr. Barton wants to tt r rePeal- There is ,e to Cut for example the fern Out so-called Thomas " amendment one ;P most assinine and dangerous " of legislation ever to get on jiitute books. The legislation, ; through by Senator Thomas ahoraa in May of 1933, gave is resident the power to issue 1 000,000 in paper currency. I f see how anybody can regard 1 nything but authority to issue ig press money. Of course, it -j.has been used by President , elt and probably never will the authority to go into print-ess print-ess inflation exists and that is ngcr. How, for instance, can I or anyone else feel sure Phe money we have it-, our , or the few dollars in the fjs going to be worth anything ow when the President of the jl; States, by one stroke of the iould turn loose a flood of ,,tss money, j, I Barton also seeks liquidation (b!ock of government agencies. ,,iof them are 20 years old or t About the time you are reading this column, there will be an inci-. inci-. dent taking place Milestone in 'way off in Tient-Army Tient-Army Historysin, China, that is a milestone in the history of the United States army. Late in February orders become operative for the departure of the Fifteenth United States infantry from Chinese soil. That, of itself, of course, does not provoke particular particu-lar interest. But the famous Fifteenth Fif-teenth has been on foreign duty for 26 years and that is the longest any unit of the United States army ever has been away from our shores. It ought to be explained that very few of the soldiers making up the Fifteenth infantry were with the outfit when it first was assigned overseas. But the regiment has been stationed abroad and the recruits re-cruits to its ranks have been dispatched dis-patched continuously to it as retirements re-tirements and expiration of enlistments enlist-ments have occurred. It is now coming back to American soil and will be stationed at Fort Lewis. The Fifteenth has a most honorable honor-able record, beginning with its organization or-ganization in 1861. It won honors at Shiloh and in the campaigns of 1862 in Alabama and Kentucky. It fought at Murfreesboro, at Chicka-mauga, Chicka-mauga, Chattanooga, and at Atlanta. Atlan-ta. In 18S0, it was at the front in the campaigns against Utes, and again in the China relief expedition of 1900, and these were followed by action in the Philippine insurrection. insurrec-tion. There was a brief spell when the regiment was on home soil, but then it went to work in Cuba. Subsequently, Sub-sequently, it was moved around here and there until the Manchu dynasty was overthrown and China became a republic. It sailed for Tientsin in November, 1912, and there it has remained. Western Newspaper Union |