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Show THE house appropriations committee com-mittee favorably reported out the Department of Agriculture appropriations ap-propriations bill for the 1930 fiscal News Review of Current Events the World Over President's Proposal to Eliminate Utility Holding Companies Brings Storm of Criticism Treasury Seeks to Simplify Nation's Currency Structure. By EDWARD W. PICKARD C, Weitern Newtpaper Union. year, a cut or 878.758 was due largely to a $411,-022,428 $411,-022,428 slash In the AAA item. The total bill calls for $053,-278.758, $053,-278.758, of which j $570,000,000 would go to the Agriculture Agricul-ture Adjustment administration ad-ministration activities. activi-ties. At committee THE Preside nt's special message calling for abolition of utility holding companies Hllrreil tip a storm that probably surprised rvfu sui u an umwvo politlean us Mr. lioosevelt. The President Pres-ident urged legislation legisla-tion to abolish those holding companies uhleh were unable to show they were operated in the public pub-lic Interest. Representative Repre-sentative Bertrand H. Snell, Republi- Lemke farm mortgage bill was valid. Federal Judge Merrill E. Otis, at Knnsas City, declared the Frazler-Lernke Frazler-Lernke law was constitutional, "although "al-though unwise In many of Its provisions pro-visions and almost Incomprehensible matter." Judge Otis said his ruling rul-ing was not the first in which the act was upheld, and that an appeal ap-peal was already before the United States Supreme court and a decision de-cision might be expected shortly. The AAA was declared invalid as regards Intrastate business by Federal Fed-eral Judge Ira Lloyd Letts at Providence, Provi-dence, R. I., who issued an Injunction Injunc-tion restraining Secretary of Agri-cnlture Agri-cnlture Wallace from enforcing the act against three Rhode Island re-tall re-tall milk dealers1, on the grotinds that their business was conducted entirely en-tirely within the state, and the national na-tional government had no right to Interfere. At Newark, N. J., Federal Fed-eral Judge Guy L. Fake ruled the national recovery act unconstitutional unconstitu-tional as applied to Intrastate commerce com-merce "because It attempts an unlawful un-lawful delegation of legislative authority." au-thority." The latter decision agrees with that handed down by Federal Judge Nlelds in the controversial Weirtnn steel lispute. C ECRETARY OF THE TREAS- URY MORGENTHAU revealed plans to dip Into profits from gold seizure to retire $G74,G25,630 of me nauooui ueui through the use of gold certificates. Potentially Po-tentially Inflationary, Inflation-ary, It will deprive national banks of the power to Issue currency, and save the government an annual Interest charge of $13,500,-000. $13,500,-000. Questions on - , ... ,, hearings it was ex-Sec'y ex-Sec'y Wallace " plained that it is Impossible to estimate how much would have to be obligated because of the crop control program, but the AAA Item was a rough estimate of processing tax collections and Is not controlling. Henry Wallace, secretary sec-retary of agriculture, told the committee com-mittee that the farmers' share of the national income Is now about 10.2 per cent, and that it should be 13 to 16 per cent Wallace said "true prosperity" cannot come "until there has been a very material Increase in the output of physical goods, industrial goods." "If in some way It were possible to turn out 50 per cent more Industrial Indus-trial goods at a price definitely lower low-er than the present price," the secretary sec-retary testified, "the result would be to make it possible for agriculture agricul-ture to buy more with the agricultural agricul-tural dollar and there would be more factory workers to be fed in the cities." pVEN though the senate will not "-act immediately on the "pink slip" bill to repeal income tax publicity, pub-licity, income tax figures will not be available to the public for six months, according to internal revenue rev-enue officials. While It is likely the act will be repealed, the house having hav-ing so voted, it is not anticipated that the senate will act on the measure for some time. Even though the latter might not act favorably, favor-ably, there remains considerable work to be done before the figures can be made public, and Income tax payers may be confident that prying pry-ing neighbors cannot have Immediate Imme-diate access to such Information. In the senate a drive has been started for higher federal income and corporation cor-poration taxes. Senator LaFollette offered an amendment proposing a new scale of income taxes to yield $260,000,000. FRENCH courts have formally Indicted In-dicted 10 persons, Including Mrs. Stavisky, for the Stavisky scandal scan-dal that rocked the government after the financial debacle, which caused losses of millions of francs to investors, had broken. Stavisky. known as "Handsome Alex.djei from a gunshot wound as police tried to arrest him in January, 1934. CHANCELLOR ADOLPH HITLER'S HIT-LER'S "diplomatic" cold is over, and he will welcome Sir John Simon, Si-mon, British foreign secretary, to a conference beginning March 24. Accompanying Sir John will he Capt. Anthony Eden, lord privy seal, and disarmament authority. After the Berlin visit Eden will go to Moscow Mos-cow to talk with Soviet leaders. The Berlin conferences will discuss legalization le-galization of Germany's rearmament rearma-ment in exchange for an air Locarno Lo-carno pact with Great Britain. France, Italy, and Belgium, and an eastern security pact with Poland and Russia. Limitation of armament arma-ment by all nations will also be taken up. The visit Is complicated by a recent announcement that Germany Ger-many possesses military nvlatlon In violation of the Versailles treaty. Because of this, France may Invoke the Rome accord with Italy and Franco-British declaration at London Lon-don in support of its move to keep the relch from giving the air force official sanction. A FTER twenty months of bar-gaining, bar-gaining, the documents conveying convey-ing full title to the Chinese Eastern railway to Manchukuo were initialed In Tokyo, thus eliminating Russia Rus-sia as a factor In Manchukuo. The written approval of the agreements was signed by Kokl Hirota, Japanese foreign minister; Dr. Constantine Youreneff, Soviet ambassador to Japan ; and by Gen. Ting Shih-Yuan. Shih-Yuan. Manchnkuonn minister of finance. The consideration was 140.000.000 yen, or about $30,300. 000. The documents require that all three governments approve them before their formal signing about March 23. Thus Is ended forty years of Russo-Japanese contention. SAMUEL FNSULL, former utilities czar, was acquitted In a Chicago Chi-cago criminal court of charge of embezzling $66,000 from the treasury treas-ury of one of his former companies to use in supporting a brokerage account by his brother, Martin. Insull was "delighted." since It probably prob-ably Is the end of the Insull prosecutions, prose-cutions, although another charge of embezzling $104,000 is pending. Further. Fur-ther. Insull faces a charge of violating vio-lating the federal bankruptcy laws, but It is believed that the verdict in the criminal courts case will discourage dis-courage efforts to try blm. THREE Illinois farmers refused to tell the government census takers how much their farms were worth and how heavily they were mortgaged, claiming such informa tion was none of the government's business. The trio were arrested and held for a grand Jury, charged with violating the census act , can leader, lmmedl- Bonator Noma . , . ately attacked the message, claiming the President had denounced propaganda against the proposed legislation, and was himself propagandizing for It Utility Util-ity companies also swung Into the battle, and thousands of Investors In utility stocks are reported to have sent In protests to congress. In tho senate, Norrls, Nebraskn Republican, Re-publican, offered a resolution calling Upon the federal trade commission to investigate propaganda regarding regard-ing the legislation. The senate approved ap-proved without debate. Charges were made by utility companies that because of the administration's campaign cam-paign against public utilities "the value of utility securities has declined de-clined by three and one-half billion dollars since 1933." Enactment of legislation to halt holding companies compa-nies will cause enormous loss to the American family, one power official testified before the house interstate commerce committee. GREECE Is mopping up the loose ends of the revolt. Some fighting fight-ing Is reported near the Bulgarian border where one regiment, part of the rebellious Fourth army corps, has declined to surrender, but the revolution Is definitely over. Eleu-therlos Eleu-therlos Venizelos, ex-premier, and leader of the futile revolt, was reported re-ported a refugee at Rhodes, the tiny island where Julius Caesar was interned in-terned by pirates some 2,500 years ago. Venizelos was transferred there by the Italian government after he had been landed in Italy by one of the rebel w-i - . iooU luiui oaturaaAr.;"us George Knnnenos, rebel commander, command-er, is safe In Bulgaria, where officials offi-cials have refused extradition. Rebel Reb-el prisoners are being concentrated in camps, and courts martial are functioning In Salonikl, Kavala and Larlssa, and military trials have begun be-gun In Athens. It is believed that only a few of the most flagrant rebels will suffer the death penalty. Venizelos Is almost certain to be court-martialed in absentia, and banished forever. His elaborate home in Athens, and his valuable library have already been confiscated confiscat-ed and will likely be converted to public use. Italy has refused to extradite ex-tradite him, although It Is possible that new demands will be made by the Greek government, who will claim that he took funds from a bank in Crete. Unless he is surrendered, sur-rendered, he will probably move to Paris where his two sons now reside. re-side. THE senate smacked down Senator Sen-ator Huey Long for his filibustering filibus-tering tactics and his efforts to amend the administration's $4,SS0,-000.000 $4,SS0,-000.000 work relief measure. The KIngflsh had demanded alterations In the work relief bill which would take $100,000,000 away from the $600,000,000 earmarked for CCC work and allot It to students In colleges col-leges and universities. Long's amendment was defeated by a vote of 5S to 27. To prove that old adage of "politics makes strange bedfellows," Long was aided by Senator Hiram Johnson of California, Califor-nia, who declared that the senate should have something to say about methods for spending the huge sum Bought by the President Johnson Las heretofore been considered a supporter of the President. Long's amendment brought forth other proposed pro-posed changes which should keep the senators busy arguing for several sev-eral days. The bonus bill may be dragged in and an attempt made to make It a rider to the relief measure, meas-ure, and Inflationists and leaders of other "ists" will insist on having their say. ALL outstanding first Liberty loan bonds have been called for redemption by Secretary of the Treasury Morgenthau. The $2,000,000,000 outstanding has been called for June 15, before which time the treasury will likely offer lower interest-bearing securities in exchange for the first Liberties, saving the government some $14,-000,000 $14,-000,000 In annual Interest charges. "VJEW Deal policies took two more batterings as Federal courts held both the AAA and NRA unconstitutional un-constitutional as regards Intrastate business. The administration might find some consolation In another ruling rul-ing which held the radical Frazler- Secretary calions were avoid-Morgenthau avoid-Morgenthau . . . ed by the treasury officials, but they admittec the plan would "put gold back to work which can be expanded." The maneuver will place in the hands of the federal reserve banks $674,625,630 of gold certificates, Wa.l l- p, 1 wotpfl w va-ft which must be used as backing for issue of tlie same sum In federal reserve notes to retire the bonds. Note issue against the bonds could be expanded if currency demands warranted, to about $1,687,500,000. since a federal reserve note need not be backed by more than 40 per cent of gold or gold certificates in like percentage. What will happen hap-pen will be the immediate simplification simplifi-cation of our currency system. The treasury and federal reserve banks will have all the authority to Issue money. The plan Involves retirement retire-ment on August 1 of $674,625,630 of 2 per cent federal securities and substitution of federal reserve notes for $657,937,0S0 of outstanding national na-tional bank currency. These bonds will be retired with surplus funds created by devaluing the Roosevelt Roose-velt dollar from 100 cents to 59.06 cents, gold. The total profit was $2,812,000,000. National bank notes Issued by national banks against federal securities se-curities represent more than one-tenth one-tenth of the nation's circulating currency. cur-rency. The administration's program pro-gram likely means the permanent abandonment of the national bank note which has been used since the Civil war. The circulation privileges priv-ileges expire on all bonds deposited by banks and held In trust by the treasury on July 22. 1035, except on two Issues. By calling for redemption, redemp-tion, the treasury will retire all securities se-curities bearing "circulation privilege" priv-ilege" and national banks will no longer have suitable security for issuance is-suance of their own notes. COMPLETE collapse of the ad-' ad-' ministration's long battle to regulate prices in the steel Industry Indus-try is seen in an NRA offer to give up, and in charges by the federal trade commission of a fiasco of collusion. col-lusion. The trade commission insists that price-fixing be scrapped, and no prosecution of steel companies under un-der the anti-trust laws. The trade commission charges that under the code the steel companies have fixed and raised prices on government contract in defiance of competitive bidding requirements. Bids were Identical, and then steel executives slapped fines of $10 a ton on members mem-bers who let the government have steel cheaper, the commission says. DR. ANTON RINTELEN, former Austrian minister to Italy, has been sentenced to life imprisonment in connection with the Nazi putsch of last summer. RIntelen was the man who was announced over the radio as the "new chancellor" at almost the same moment Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss was assassinated. The defendant denied the charges or high treason, but admitted he was lu sympathy with a policy of reconciliation recon-ciliation with Germany. |