Judge — January 16, 1926 — page 15: what you’re looking at

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

Editor, Norman Anthony. Letoes Good-by, And Not lu Revoir ITHERTO, every time we have said good-by, for Philadelphia, to General Smedley Butler, a move- ment has gained ground there to keep him a while longer. But this time our farewell would seem to Indeed, we want to congratulate both the and the city on what looks lik divorcee, the Gene be safe. Gener a permanent al because he was not the right man for the place, and the city because it was not the right place for the man. T° BE suRE, the circumstances of General Butler's departure leave something to be desired. It is too evident now that when President Coolidge interposed a final to Mayor Kendrick’s impassioned plea for another year of Smedley, the Mayor heaved a great sigh of relief. What must have been his consternation and disgust, therefore, when the naive General, taking the petition of the Mayor and his committee of prominent citizens at its face value, resigned his commission in the Marines in order to comply with it. Mr. Kendrick knew then the true bitterness of irony, and that was a very lame excuse of histhat he didn’t want a re on the jol “no” ned officer of Marines General Butler was quite justified in waxing furious at the deception: only in his fury he let the cat out of the bag. “Now, w this.” the auspices of the Pennsylvania, ire you good citizens going to do about he asked of a lot of Pittsburghers meeting under Adult Bible Classes Federation of if the civic affairs of Philadelphia were any of Pittsburgh's business. or as if Pittsburghers hadn't cnough of a problem of self-government on their own hands without meddling in Philadelphia’s—Now what are you good citizens going to do about this? Philadelphia belongs to this State and there is no more reason why you should allow a cesspool in Philadelphia than the United States should have allowed one in Cuba... . If neces- sary you should pass laws taking their government away from them if they don’t know how to min it.” Ox MORE than one occ Butler's attempt to to General Woods* clean up H sion we ve likened General clean up” Philadelphi much successful attempt to vana’s streets, or with the tactics of our soldiers and sailors in putting other Caribbean ports over the sanitary jumps. And now the gallant General vir- tually confirms our impression that such were b *s morals more models. Nn com- and in this case one of the greatest and oldest, As if a (theoretically) free, self-governing Amerie: munity Dramatic Editor, George Jean Nathan the first capital of the country, home of Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell—could or should he treated as a subject’ city, its constitutional guarantees suspended, to be kicked and cuffed and serubbed into righteousness hy an imported police officer. “Take their government away from them if they don’t know how to run it.” There speaks your true man-on-horseback. priate that would be for the ¢ AY WHA ter all, is all the pothe> about? Why +“ does General Butler consider that government in Philadelphia has broken down and that the eity should be deprived of its autonomy, like Port au Prince or Santo Domingo? Does political chaos rule there, have its finances gone Swedish, is ita prey to looters or epidemics? 4 few days before he told Pittsburgh that Philadelphia was a cesspool, he defended his police administration there as follows: How appro. y of our Sesqui-Centennial! . ry rey * As a matter of fact crime is only 40 per cent. of what it was when I came. We've arrested 1,600 loose women, 18,000 men for violation of the liquor laws and confiscated $4,000,000 in liquor. figures. Those are a few of the Of course, we got no help from the courts. We did not get many conv All we did was raid and raid and raid again. We smashed down their doors. broke up their furniture and their beds. After a while they got tired and closed up—some of them.” Not a word here, you will notice, about murder. Yet according to Richard Washburn Child, “Philadelphia has had a murder record far above the figure for the whole da!’ Not a word about burglaries. bank rob- payroll hold-ups. assaults, arson. Yet in these crimes, too, Philadelphia's rate keeps well abreast of that of the country as a whole, which is much the highest in the ed world. In other words, when the former Director of Public Safety speaks of crime he does not refer to peecadillos of this sort, but to such heinous offenses against the security of the Commonwealth as the violation of the Volstead Act or of the moral code. Tt is on, account of them that he says Philadelphia should be deprived of its self-govern- ment (what is left of it). “All we did was raid and raid and raid again.” What has come over this country that even for a moment any where we should call this sort of thing policing a city. or term its perpetrator a Director of Public Safety? What he was, of course, was a Billy Sunday in uniform. And now he’s condemning the town to hell for not hitting the sawdust t Well, ms. iyway. good-by, General. We MoM. comicbooks.com