TE = TR A I I .—,°Ad : ials + The DallasPost - ESTABLISHED 1889 TELEPHONE DALLAS 300 : A LIBERAL, INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER Eh PuBLISHED EVERY FRIDAY MORNING i Y AT. THE DaLLAs PosT PLANT ¥ LEHMAN AVENUE, DALLAS, PA. By THE DaLLAs Post, INC. * Howard RisLEY HoweLs Regs TRUMAN STEWART a General Manager rerio: Managing Editor ‘Mechanical Sup orimsendent: pis i “ GA The Dallas’ Post is on sale at the ‘lecal news: stands. : iptiom price by. .mail $2.00 payable im advance. Single copies five ceats each, i Butered as second-class matter at the Dallas Pest Office. ; . THE DALLAS POST is a yeuthful weekly rural-euburban news: _ paper, owned, edited and operated by young rcn interested im the de- velopment of the great rural-suburban region of Luzerne Ceuaty and im . the attainment of: the highest ideals of jeurnalism. THE POST is truly “more than a newspaper, itis a community institutiem.” | fi \ Congress shall make no law ¥ ¢ abridging the freedom 'of<speech, oc CE Lh the first amendment to the Constitutien of the United ©“ Subscription, $2.00 Per Year (Payable in Advance), ~ Subscribers who send us changes of addvess are requested te include both new and old addresses when they submit their notice of change. | A THOUGHT FOR THIS WEEK "Tis greatly wise to talk with our past hours; eos "And ask them what report they bore to heaven; J 7a And how they might have borne more welcome news. ot YouNc—Night Thoughts The State Department Comes A Cropper # ~ As far as we have been able to learn no school board in the vicinity of Dallas has chosen to gamble on the vague promises of additional funds for teachers’ salaries from the State this year. That may develop into a tragic and expen- sive mistake, but the fault will lie, not with the local school ‘boards but with the State. Last year the Legislature passed an act which provides for an increase in appropriations to local school boards pro- viding they reduce their millage. The money for those ap- propriations was to be provided by the Income Tax Law. ~ Subsequently, the Income Tax Law was declared unconsti- ~ tutional. In the opinion of outstanding lawyers, the unconstitu- tionality of the Tax Law in no way destroyed the legality of ~ the act offering additional funds to school districts. But in ‘the eyes of school directors, it did create a very definite problem concerning where the mopey was to be raised to alfill the increased appropriation act. : When Dallas School Board and the other boards in this section prepared to make up their budgets last month they attempted to secure accurate information about the new law. So great was the confusion at Harrisburg that only the most conflicting reports could be secured. The Department of Public Instruction, for example, in- sisted that it would be unable to pay the new appropriation. In a letter to one local school board E. A. Quackenbush, chief of school business, wrote: “It would seem to us unwise ~ for your board to take into account revenue that there is no probability of your receiving.” i» Had the boards been able to follow that advice without question there would have been no great problem. But at the ~ same time the Department of Public Instruction was warn- ing the school districts against gambling on the funds from the State, the Pennsylvania State School Directors Associa- tion at Harrisburg was intimating that the funds would be demanded by the larger school districts and warning the small districts that if they failed to take advantage of the offer this year they would be debarred from future partici- pation in the fund, when and if it becomes available. As a result some districts, notably those in the large ~ cities, lowered their millage and gambled on the funds from the State. Most local rural districts ignored the new law on ~ the advice of the Department of Public Instruction and pre- pared to collect their teachers’ salaries by local taxation as ‘usual. : Now it appears that the Department of Instruction is ~ feeling more kindly toward the appropriation act. There is a possibility that funds to carry out the provisions may yet be raised by the State. If such is the case and local school districts are exposed to criticism the fault will belong di- rectly upon the shoulders of the State Departiaent. wv * * The Chain Store Tax The completely prejudiced and entirely old-fashioned idea that chain stores are always a safe target for discrim- inatory taxation is again having its brief day at Harrisburg. Because the people of the Dallas section do a good share of their buying at chain stores they must be interested in the new Stores Tax Act aimed especially at the big food chains. It is a matter of common knowledge that such chains operate on a small margin of profit. Consequently, exorbi- tant taxes would present only one choice to the chains, to pass the cost of taxation along to the consumer in the form of higher prices. Chain stores have found a very real place in community life. They are as important to John Consumer today as his own friendly independent merchant. There is room for both. A discriminatory tax against the chain store would place it at an unfair disadvantage and only pass the tax on to the consumer who would have to foot the bill. WASHINGTON LETTER The American automobile industry must hold all world records when it comes to emerging from depression. it was the first industry to show signs of recovery; and it is still the leader. .Motor’s first spurt forward occurred near the end of 1934. During the depths of. depression, ‘car: and truck: sales had ‘dropped close to the vanish- - ~.ing point. Retail outlets for all makes » i of cars were in difficulties, ‘and many - “of them found the going too tough-and soo had to-fold up: In 1935, the picture - . § _ underwent drastic ‘change. Car and = © | trucks sales zoomed forwdrd; and ‘the’ : assembly lines in Detroit and Flint and : A elsewhere hummed. There'was an ob- "vious reason for the « amazingly -fagt improvement—a large part of Amen- ca’s gasoline-powered “rolling stock” was completely out of date, and much of it was utterly unusable and unsafe. But no one expected motors” boom to go on indefinitely. Supposition’: was that a certain number of new cars would be sold, and that the industry would slow down again. _~ That supposition proved to be prac- tically 100 per cent wrong.. Apparent- ly the average American would rather have a new car than anything else, and the first place he goes when his bank account swells is to the automobile agencies. He is buying relatively few homes, few new furnaces or air-con- ditioning machines. He is buying cars—and how! —0— Nineteen-thirty-five was the motor industry’s best year since 1929. Now the figures for production and earn- ings in the first quarter of 1936 are out—and they indicate that this year is going to put "35 in the shade. Giant of the industry, as everyone knows, is General Motors. This corpor- ation recently reported its best first- quarter since 1929—and the fourth best quarter in its entire history. In April alone, the concern sold 200,000 cars—an all-time record for a month. It’s net income for the quarter was al- most 70 per cent better than in the same period last year, and came to more than $52,000,000. GMC directors declared the usual 50c quarterly divi- dend, then made stockholders happy with a 75¢ extra dividend. —— Chrysler, another member of the big three of motordoni, had the sec#¥d biggest quarter in its history (biggest was last three months of 1935) when it earned over $11,000,000 net. Its di- rectors jubilantly jumped the quarter- ly dividend 50c, to $1.50 a share. Third member of the big three, Ford, is not a corporation, and profit figures are not given out. However, Ford sales were almost a quarter low- er than they were in the same period last year. This is the only important automobile manufacturer to show a drop. —Q— Smaller, so-called independent mak- ers are also going ahead in company with their big brothers. Nash has been losing money ever since 1932—in the first quarter of this year it made a pro- fit of $72,000. In the first quarter last year, Packard lost around a million and a quarter dollars—this year it earned that much while Hudson had a net of almost $600,000, and reor- ganized Studebaker Corporation net- ted over $100,000. Interesting fact, is that the buying trend is toward cars in the medium and high-priced groups, away from the cheaper cars. In the quarter, the low- priced makes increased output by 16 percent, as compared with 51 percent for all other cars. ’ Over 90 percent of all cars sold come from the factories of Fore, Chrysler and General Motors. In the first quarter independents managed to make only an infinitesimal dent in this percentage. Present forecast for the industry is that sales, following past seasonal ex- _ perience, will slowly decline until late summer, when new models will appear on the market. 4 — Wy i LANTERN-JAWED PEOPLE ARE _NOT ALL LIGHT-HEADED. __ > \ Jil fag yf Ig $ te Hi Haiti t HN \ J 3 R\ | ade AE Mead SRA \ REC A JAW ARAN A SAN 3 = Comment Dis BLUE GHOST I i) % lol ve A AE A Wk \ 1 \ \ le A \ 0 Q WN WN \ AN p N \ ARN LE W . \ \ Ny NNN NL ; \ \ \ 2 ER SR mA 7 FAM nH HH TH. nnkt NL \ 3 NNT NN DN rT | BAG THE MAIL In this department The Post presents letters from its read- ers on current problems—suggestions, criticisms, bouquets. The Post need not indorse any sentiment or criticism expressed here, nor can it vouch for the accuracy of any sentiment. It recognizes only that in this country people have, within reason, the right to express themselves. Dear Editor: We have had enough of experimen- talism. Let us resolve to drop the anti- quated notion of low and free tariffs, if we desire to maintain a decent liv- ing standard. Enough of this silver stabilization that has wrecked hun- dreds of millions of good taxpayers’ money. Enough of crop-suicide that puts thousands of farmers out of em- ployment and raises the price of the fruits of the earth. Enough of this in- sane taxation that penalizes the minori- ty, that pauperizes the nation and that constantly fattens a bloated bureau- cracy, with its inevitable unbearable burden on future generations. And we have had enoughof incompetent poli- tical meddling with the business ma- chine of the nation. M,C. —0— Dear Editor: No alleged murderer should be al- lowed to plead insanity unless he is completely and permanently insane; his insanity to be adjudged by a com- mittee of responsible doctors. Such a process would simplify the trial so that the defendant could be judged—as is only proper—on his definite guilt or innocence. —R:W. 'B. aly uie Dear Editor: Is it perfectly okay, legal and so-so to shoot down a fleeing suspect run- ning away to avoid arrest? A few days ago some Negroes were caught operat- ing an illicit still; one of them lost his head and ran away from the arresting officer; whereupon said officer shot him dead. Are these men allowed by law to do these things? Can they take the law into their own hands on the spur of the moment and set aside pro- secutor, judge, jury and executioner? These acts are called “accidents.” Are they accidents or are they man slaugh- ter? —Inquirer. i) en: Dear Editor: “President Decries Plight of Peoples Oppressed Abroad” —It occurs that if the President would also « décry * the plight of the “white-collar” old men of the United States who have spent a lifetime skimping and saving in pre- paration for the’ time when they are no longer wage-earners, it might be of interest to the country at large in these days of the Townsend Plan and other panaceas for the benefit of the aged. —An Old Man. —0— Dear Editor: I wonder why the country does not give earnest and calm consideration to the peace plan of Colonel Arthur W. Little, former heroic commander of the famous Fifteenth “Hell Fighters.” His simple formula is: “Before this country engages in any war, except to repel invasion, let the question of our entering upon such an engagement be the subject of a nation-wide referen- dum. Let the vote be by signed ballot. Have each affirmative vote so worded as to constitute a pledge of enlistment, or if by examination the affirmative vote should prove to be unavailable for military service, then to constitute a pledge of half his or her fortune for the uses of the war for which he or she votes.” —L. B. Dear Editor: People in general like to get in a rut and enjoy the feeling of security which reflects merely the undisturbed repetition of habits of thought and ex~ istence. It is inevitable that they be disturbed from time to time, and the period of disturbance always produces irritation and complaint in the effort to blame some one or some class or system for the disturbance. Economic "security is a phrase which implies that all the people should be confined to one rut and stay in it permanently. That is the negation of life and healthy activity, except for the few who may enjoy the privilege of leadership and the struggle for the right to rule the rut. The importance of government is exaggerated in all countries because of the dramatic appeals of those who wish to rule and the mental laziness of those who are indifferent. —W. F. F. The Kaleidoscope The 155 elevators in Rockefeller Center comprise the largest and most modern vertical transportation system in the world. Here are some almost in- credible facts just made public about it for the first time: The elevator cars traveled a total of 720,000 miles in 1935. If this mileage had been covered by one car, it could have circled the earth at the equator once every twelve days throughout the year. Or it could have reached the moon in four months. If the elevator shafts were stacked one on top of the other their height would about equal the world’s altitude record for airplanes, a little over eight miles. Two hundred thousand people were carried in the elevators every day last year. That is, every man, woman and child in a city the size of Richmond, Virginia, could have been hoisted up and brought down again every day in the year. An elevator made a stop and opened its doors for a passenger on the aver- age of once every second, day and night, during 1935. Every time a loaded elevator travels up to the 65th floor in the RCA build- ing, it costs six cents. Every tenant in Rockefeller Center consumes as much electric current for his elevator riding as he uses, for all purposes, in his home. There is enough iron and steel wire in the cables to girdle the globe. The cars were in operation 386,000 hours during the year. If that opera- tion were performed by one car, start- ing this week, it would be running continuously for the next forty-four years. The cars in the RCA Building tower travel at the rate of 1,200 to 1,400 feet a minute. That is the fastest way a person can go straight up in the air, much faster than an autogyro can take him. The cost of installing the equipment was $3,600,000. SEO A quarter of a century from now, says Henry Ford in an interview with S. J. Woolf in the June Rotarian Mag- azine, people will look back at these times in much the same way as we now do at the stagecoach era of the world’s development. However, he explains that while im- provements are taking place and new things are being created, it does not follow that old things must be aban- doned, if there is any good in them. “Aviation,” says Mr. Ford, “will not come into its own until the automobile has been absolutely perfected. But there is much still to be done in auto- mobiles. Give us a few years more, and the automobile will be improved and refined beyond all present imagination. Motor-car manufacturing is still a new industry. There will be changes for the better in almost every part of the car. “All our machinery will be light er and better. This is true not only of automobile machinery but of ma- chinery in general. Almost every mec- hanism today is unnecessarily over- burdened with weight—due to a sys- tem of interlocking directorates; man- ufacturers have been only selling ma- terials instead of also studying their best use. “No one can speak of the future,” he continues, “‘without taking into thoughtful consideration just what the last few years have seen in the in- creased employment of agricultural products in manufacturing. We grow much of an automobile now; it is not beyond possibility that eventually we shall grow most or all of it. “Shorter hours and higher wages are inevitable,” Mr. Ford predicts, “We cannot escape them. If we go on making things, we must have money . to buy them and leisure to use them. These will result from economies, im-~ provements, and refinements of manu- facturing methods which in turn re- sult from the incessant labor and creative experience of management. “We shall find out that no social ad- vance can be introduced into industry by law; it will come because it is right, and what is right will support it- self. We shall have shorter hours be- cause work will be plentiful and pro- duction ample, not in order to spread work but to enable men to enjoy and use the things they make. “As far as competition is concerned, that must continue. But we must learn what competition really is. It is a striving to attain the best. To throttle it would mean to stop all progress.”
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers