Judge — November 8, 1924 — page 17: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Editor, Norman Anthony. Associate Editors, U.S. S. Menken Officer, the gentleman’s name is... ? S. Stanwood Menken, your Honor. Good morning, Mr. Menken. Are you any relation of the Mencken who edits the American Mercury? I am like hell! There, there! We don’t permit such language in this court. You must be the Menken at the head of the National Security League, then; a very, very different sort of person. Yes, your Honor. Well, I didn’t mean it as a compliment exactly. Why have you been hounding the Countess Karolyi? She’s a dangerous radical. There seem to be two opinions about that. But tell me this: Are you afraid a nation which so unmistakably prefers Calvin Coolidge for President is in danger of con- tamination from a lone Hungarian lady? I consider it my duty to protect my country from every subversive influence. You mean you consider it your duty to advertise the National Security League. And Canon Chase has showed you how. Menken, many and many a patriot has started out, like you, to be a messiah, but has never got beyond the first syllable of the word. Goldfish A man’s income is as personal as his toothbrush. The idea of making it public could only occur to those without modesty or any genuine self-respect, in other words to a majority in both Houses of Congress. But no one can say that it is not strictly in keeping with all our other national assaults upon the privacy and dignity of the in- dividual. Prohibition is on the same plane. So is the cen- sorship that would pick for us our pictures, plays and books. So is the threat in some quarters to publish the names of non-voters. So is the Ku Klux Klan and all its works. A friend has sent Heywood Broun from West Virginia a leaflet labeled “Kalendar of Ku Klux Klan.” It con- tains these items among others: “Ground above the Tygarts Valley Glass Company used on Sunday for crap-shooting ground. “A certain man and another man’s wife seen on the Thorton- pike ning. “A married woman, now separated from her husband, seen from time to time in the company of another man—her cousin. “Supposed law-abiding man seen on Main street drunk. “The above items were turned in with names of parties, time and exact places happenings took place. We have the proof in our files. For the second offense the above items concerning will be repeated only with this difference—the name of the guilty party will be given.” | Si esha illiam Edgar Fisher. Dramatic Editor, George Jean Nathan. Can’t we persuade Congress to make the “Ku Klux Kalendar” a national institution directed from Washing- tion—only with this difference, that names shall be pub- lished the first time? The publication of tax returns establishes an excellent precedent. A Lesson We Are Going to Learn Certain gentlemen in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania and Utah and Idaho will probably always believe that the prosperity of the United States is dependent on a high protective tariff, just as certain other gentlemen will always believe that the earth is flat. To such minds it is only the evidence of the senses that counts. The earth is flat because they can see it is with their own eyes. The tariff makes everybody rich because they can feel it does with their own pocketbooks. And if it isn’t the tariff, they ask, what is it that has made the United States the richest nation in the history of the world? Well, one reason why it is the richest nation in history is because it is also the greatest free-trade experiment in history. This is old stuff to economists though it may sound like a paradox to the rest of us. From ocean to ocean in an area comprising half a continent, containing 100,000,000 people and natural advantages beyond belief, there has never been a tariff barrier. One section or district has dealt with another without let or hindrance; each has had the unmitigated competition of all the rest, and each, therefore, has learned to specialize in the pro- duction of those commodities it can produce best or cheapest. Not only that, but thanks to this same lack of internal customs barriers, we have learned to do business on a scale that is the despair of Europe, cut up as she is into tight little compartments. If there had been pro- tective tariffs dividing North from South and East from West we'd all have been poorer, very much poorer, though there might now be more Pittsburghs west of the Mis- sissippi and fewer abandoned farms in New England. Exactly the same principle holds true respecting inter- national trade. Maybe we shall be made to see it. We have begun to lend money abroad in large quanti- ties. This money is going into foreign industries that are adversely affected by our tariff. We are bound to feel that adverse effect in the returns on that money. When that pinch comes it is a safe guess that a lot of us—as many as now shout for the tariff—are going to yell for the open door not only in China but in the United States of America. And we are going to curse out these hide-bound gentlemen of Massachusetts and Pennsylvania and points West, who will continue to insist that the tariff makes everybody rich. Marvelous teacher, the pocketbook. W. M. A. eaaerne | comicbooks.com