From "Facts and Fascism," by George Seldes, 1943
"Fascism is a reorganization of society to maintain unequal
distribution of economic power and a substitution of barbaric
[nationalist] values for [individual liberty]."
Raymonf Gram Swing, "Forerunners of American Fascism."
"Fascism is a dictatorship from the extreme Right, or to put
it a little more closely into our local idiom, a government which
is run by a small group of industrialists and financial lords.
Of course, if you want to go back into recent history, the
influence of big business has always been present in our federal
government -- BUT there have been CHECKS on its control ..
"I insist that we can have Fascism even while we maintain
the pretense of democratic machinery. The mere presence of a
Supreme Court, a House of Representatives, a Senate and a
President are not sufficient protection against centralization of
power in the hands of a few men who hold NO political office.
"Even in the case of Hitler, many shrewd observers [in 1936]
feel that he is no more than a 'front man,' and that his power is
derived from the large munitions and steel barons of Germany ...
"One of the first steps which Fascism must take in any land
in order to capture power is to disrupt and destroy the labor
movement ... It is not unfair to say that any businessman in
America, or public leader, who sets out to [disenfranchise the
working man] is laying the foundation for Fascism."
HEYWOOD BROUN, May, 1936.
"The press is the hired agent of a monied system and set up
for no other purpose than to tell lies wherever its interests are
involved."
The Letters of Henry Adams, Vol. II, p. 99. p244
________________________________________________________________
GLOBAL CARTEL of "MERCHANTS OF DEATH"
In the wave of disillusion which swept over the world after
the Treaty of Versailles and proved that the old march of the
imperialists would be resumed and that all international idealism
(Woodrow Wilson's for example) would be destroyed, many secrets
were uncovered and one of the most sensational was that
concerning the international of blood -- the cartels of the
merchants of death, the armaments makers, who made a profit on
the guns, the shells and the bullets. The manufacturing
corporations in many instances were found linked to governments
and to have arranged, even in wartime, for the continuance of
their dividends and distribution of their profits.
There were several hundred members of the cartels, but only
fifty were powerful and of these the handful which influenced
world events and formed the Harvey United Steel Co. cartel, the
Nobel Dynamite Trust, the various rifle, gunpowder and similar
cartels were: Krupp in Germany, Vickers-Armstrong in Britain,
Schneider Creusot in France, Skoda in Austria-Hungary,
Terni-Ansaldo in Italy, Mitsui in Japan and the Bethlehem Steel
Company and DuPont Empire in the United States. Charles M.
Schwab's Bethlehem held 4,30I shares in the Harvey cartel.
Albert Vickers was chairman.
It should be noted here that just as American Big Business
was found at the time of the first World War to be linked to
Japanese Big Business through the Harvey cartel, Nobel
international trust and other agencies, so just before the
outbreak of the Global War it was discovered that the
international of money was even stronger than ever. One of the
links was the I. G. Farbenindustrie, which Hitler and Goering
controlled and which involved Standard Oil, Standard Drug,
General Motors, General Electric and other of our greater
corporations.
Just as American Big Business was linked to Japan through
the Harvey combine (steel), the Nobel Dynamite Trust (munitions)
and the other munitions cartels before the last war, so before
the Global War there were the usual international cartels in
which both the U. S. and Japan shared with Germany ...
ON JAPAN:
"Japan's financial oligarchy," wrote Anthony Jenkinson for
the Institute of Pacific Relations, "is composed of great family
trusts known as Zaibatsu. Its leading members are the Houses of
Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Sumitomo and Yasuda. Between them they own
the greater part of industry, trade, banking, and shipping. By
I937 they controlled more than one third of the total deposits
in private banks, 70% of the deposits in all trust companies, and
one third of total foreign trade. By controlling the banks, they
controlled the smaller credit institutions throughout the
country."
The income tax returns of I938-39 showed that Japan consists
of a vast majority of farm workers and farmers and industrial
workers who earn less than the equivalent of $10 a week. There is
almost no middle class, only 1,500,000 or about one family in 40,
which earns less than $2,500 a year, but on the other hand there
is a small rich and powerful ruling class consisting of 3,233
persons with incomes of $50,000 or more a year. The top flight
consists of 7 persons who paid an income tax on more than
$2,000,000 each. (New York Times, April 2, I939.)
On July 30, I94I, income tax authorities announced that
during the year 1940-41 there were 24 millionaires who paid more
than I,000,000 yen each in income taxes, the total for the two
dozen being 57,000,000 yen. Baron Takakimi Mitsui was listed as
the richest man in the country (although actually he is not
richer than the emperor); he had an income of 7,500,000 yen and
paid 4,450,000. Kichizaemon Sumitomo, earning 5,800,000 annually,
was next, and after him Baron Kikoyata Iwasaki, head of the
Mitsubishi interests, who makes 3,800,000 yen a year.
In all countries where the regime in power prohibits the
full development of the nation's industries --or the
manufacturers and raw materials producers themselves limit
production (the economy of scarcity), as in the United States--
there must be poverty.
In Japan, thanks to the fact that four industrial families
and the royal family have colossal wealth --Mitsui is said to be
richer than Ford-- the majority of the people, farmers and
workers, are poor. Moreover, the International Labor Office of
the League of Nations reported in I938 that one quarter of the
entire population did "not earn enough to maintain health and
efficiency."
<full text in attached file>
from:
Facts and Fascism
George Seldes
In Fact, Inc(C)1943
25 Astor Place
New York 3, NY
-----
If'n ya never read any mister Seldes here is some of his stuff from the
forties. I can not recommend enough his autobio - Witness to a Century - hear
it from the man who been there. AMAZING.
This book is a compilation from his weekly newsletter In Fact. Yes, he is in
a 'war mood'; and has his worldview, but the courage and awareness that
George displayed, showed his mettle.
Om
K
"The press is the hired agent of a monied systems and set up for no other
purpose than to tell lies, where its interests are involved. One can trust
nobody and nothing."--The Letters of Henry Adams, Vol. II, p. 99.
p244
======
CHAPTER IV
THE FIVE WHO OWN JAPAN
EVERY Japanese gun, bullets torpedo, ship and airplane that has killed or
wounded an American soldier, sailor, airman or marine has meant actual cash
money in the pocket of Emperor Hirohito.
When the "merchants of death," the armaments manufacturers who had a
financial interest in waging previous wars, and who still do in fascist
dictatorships, were exposed in I934, it was found that Mitsui and Mitsubishi
were the Japanese members of the cartel, and that the reigning family was a
large stockholder in both.
Hirohito owns 3,800,000 acres of land with all the buildings on them, many
being tenements from which he makes a rent; the total value when the yen was
still 50c[500?] was estimated at 637,-234,000 yen. The son of the Sun Goddess
has also invested 300,000,000 yen in the Bank of Japan, the South Manchuria
Railroad, the Yokohama Specie Bank, Nippon Yusen Kaisha (the shipping line of
the Mitsubishi firm), the Imperial Hotel of Tokyo, and Mitsui and Mitsubishi
enterprises.
In the wave of disillusion which swept over the world after the Treaty of
Versailles and proved that the old march of the imperialists would be resumed
and that all international idealism (Woodrow Wilson's for example) would be
destroyed, many secrets were uncovered and one of the most sensational was
that concerning the international of blood--the cartels of the merchants of
death, the armaments makers, who made a profit on the guns, the shells and
the bullets. The manufacturing corporations in many instances were found
linked to governments and to have arranged, even in wartime, for the
continuance of their dividends and distribution of their profits.
There were several hundred members of the cartels, but only fifty were
powerful and of these the handful which influenced world events and formed
the Harvey United Steel Co. cartel, the Nobel Dynamite Trust, the various
rifle, gunpowder and similar cartels were: Krupp in Germany,
Vickers-Armstrong in Britain, Schneider Creusot in France, Skoda in
Austria-Hungary, Terni-Ansaldo in Italy, Mitsui in Japan and the Bethlehem
Steel Company and DuPont Empire in the United States. Charles M. Schwab's
Bethlehem held 4,30I shares in the Harvey cartel. Albert Vickers was
chairman.
It should be noted here that just as American Big Business was found at the
time of the first World War to be linked to Japanese Big Business through the
Harvey cartel, Nobel international trust and other agencies, so just before
the outbreak of the Global War it was discovered that the international of
money was even stronger than ever. One of the links was the I. G.
Farbenindustrie, which Hitler and Goering controlled and which involved Standa
rd Oil, Standard Drug, General Motors, General Electric and other of our
greater corporations.
Just as American Big Business was linked to Japan through the Harvey combine
(steel), the Nobel Dynamite Trust (munitions) and the other munitions cartels
before the last war, so before the Global War there were the usual
international cartels in which both the U. S. and Japan shared with Germany,
Italy and other nations.
In addition, according to the San Francisco journalist John Pittman, "among
the owners of Japanese business are International General Electric, which
operates plants through its subsidiary, Tokyo Shibaura; Westinghouse Electric
International, associated with Mitsubishi Electric Manufacturing Co.; Tide
Water Associated Oil, handled by Mitsubishi; Libby-Owens-Ford, represented by
the Nippon Plate Glass Co.; Standard Oil, with a known direct investment of
$5,000,000, exclusive of frozen credits and oil in storage; Ford, and General
Motors, with approximately $10,000,000 sunk in Japan proper; Eastman Kodak,
and Singer Sewing Machine, with big organizations in the Japanese Empire;
United Engineering & Foundry Co., holding a large stake in Shibaura-United
Engineering Co.
"Besides these shares in the industry of Japan proper, American capital is
heavily invested in Manchukuo and other exploitation companies of a Japanese
origin scattered throughout the Far East."
In Japan one of Mitsui's partly owned corporations is the Nippon Steel Works,
but this firm was controlled by Vickers. Their French connection was through
the Franco-Japanese Bank, founded with the aid of Schneider Creusot, whose
I933 report stated that "our bank has acquired important participation in
various activities of the Mitsui group, a group destined to have a fine
future."
Baron Hachirumon Mitsui was reported at the time as controlling 65% of the
industry of Japan, with the Japanese royal family owning a large interest in
the Mitsui Consortium. Mitsui, referred to in the Japanese press as King of
Armament-makers, Emperor of Steel, Caesar of Petroleum, and Demigod of the
Banking System, owned or controlled most of the mines; factories, steamships,
newspapers and commercial enterprises of the first order, not only in Japan
but in Korea, China, IndoChina, Manchuria, the Philippines and Hawaii.
The conquest of Manchuria was popularly said to have been instigated by
Mitsui, and there is no doubt that this firm was the largest beneficiary from
the coal and steel Japan seized. This firm also gained most from the first
Sino-Japanese war. It was also credited with dictating Japan's peace terms at
the end of the Russo-Japanese war, using the Tokyo Foreign Office as one of
its many handy instruments. It may be remembered that one of the points Japan
would not cede was the occupation by its troops of North Sakhalin, and they
remained there until- the oil deposits were leased to Japan. Russia was
forced to agree. The lease was then given by Japan to one of the owners of
the government and nation, the Mitsui Consortium.
The so-called "Asia for the Asiatics" doctrine, which means simply "Asia for
Japan," found Baron Hachirumon Mitsui its chief exponent. This is a Monroe
Doctrine which marches with banners and is followed by an army of salesmen
and exploiters. Hachirumon's fascist imperialism burned even more ardently in
his successor, Baron Takakimi Mitsui.
"Japan's financial oligarchy," wrote Anthony Jenkinson for the Institute of
Pacific Relations, "is composed of great family trusts known as Zaibatsu. Its
leading members are the Houses of Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Sumitomo and Yasuda.
Between them they own the greater part of industry, trade, banking, and
shipping. By I937 they controlled more than one third of the total deposits
in private banks, 70% of the deposits in all trust companies, and one third
of total foreign trade. By controlling the banks, they controlled the smaller
credit institutions throughout the country."
The income tax returns of I938-39 showed that Japan consists of a vast
majority of farm workers and farmers and industrial workers who earn less
than the equivalent of $10 a week. There is almost no middle class, only
1,500,000 or about one family in 40, which earns less than $2,500 a year, but
on the other hand there is a small rich and powerful ruling class consisting
of 3,233 persons with incomes of $50,000 or more a year. The top flight
consists of 7 persons who paid an income tax on more than $2,000,000 each.
(New York Times, April 2, I939.)
On July 30, I94I, income tax authorities announced that during the year
1940-41 there were 24 millionaires who paid more than I,000,000 yen each in
income taxes, the total for the two dozen being 57,000,000 yen. Baron
Takakimi Mitsui was listed as the richest man in the country (although
actually he is not richer than the emperor); he had an income of 7,500,000
yen and paid 4,450,000. Kichizaemon Sumitomo, earning 5,800,000 annually, was
next, and after him Baron Kikoyata Iwasaki, head of the Mitsubishi interests,
who makes 3,800,000 yen a year. In all countries where the regime in power
prohibits the full development of the nation's industries--or the
manufacturers and raw materials producers themselves limit production (the
economy of scarcity), as in the United States--there must be poverty. In
Japan, thanks to the fact that four industrial families and the royal family
have colossal wealth--Mitsui is said to be richer than Ford--the majority of
the people, farmers and workers, are poor. Moreover, the International Labor
Office of the League of Nations reported in I938 that one quarter of the
entire population did "not earn enough to maintain health and efficiency."
Official Japanese statistics as of May, I94I, show the average wage for men
at 82 yen ($19.25 at current rate of exchange) and 31 yen ($7.30) for women.
The trade unions were abolished in I940 when the royal-military dictatorship
began following the Fascist Axis line in action as well as form. "Workers,"
writes Jenkinson, "were ordered to become members of the League for Service
to the State through industry," which approximates the Mussolini labor
corporations and the Nazi Hitler's forced labor. The Minister of Welfare in
announcing the abolition of the trade unions made this statement: "Our
primary aim is to drive communist ideas and dangerous social thoughts from
the minds of the people by ordering the dissolution of the established labor
unions, which have a tendency to sharpen class consciousness among workers,
which hamper the development of industry, and disturb the peace and order of
the country." November 23, I940, the Japanese Patriotic Industrial Society,
or Sampo, absorbed the League, and claimed it had 4,500,000 members. It was
declared to be a wing of the Imperial Rule Assistance Association.
This Imperial Rule Assistance Association (IRAA) is an outright fascist body.
Up to July 6, I940, there had been many parties in Japan, which gave the
nation the semblance of a constitutional monarchy in accordance with its
Constitution, granted by the Emperor in I889 and modeled on that of
Bismarck's-Prussia. Like Prussia it created a Diet consisting of a House of
Peers and a House of Representatives actually elected by popular vote.
Leading parties were the Seiyukai and Minseito, both controlled by the big
industrialists, the Zaibatsu (very much as our Republican and Democratic
Parties are frequently, but not always, controlled by the National
Association of Manufacturers). In I936, however, the Minseito Party came out
against Fascism and won a victory and the Social Mass and Proletarian Parties
elected 23 working men to the Diet.
But on July 6, I940, the Social Mass Party was ordered dissolved, and within
a few weeks all other parties dissolved "voluntarily." An attempt to form a
Laboring People's Party was suppressed.
This left the IRAA in control, a one-party system without an official
dictator, but Japan is actually a fascist dictatorship ruled by the Emperor,
the Army and Navy, and the Zaibatsu.
No one can tell where the political rule and industrial ownership of these
three elements (Royal Family, Big Business; Military) begin and end; they
intermingle and draw their money profits from the same seizure and
exploitation of foreign lands, exploitation of the impoverished majority not
only of Japan but Korea, Manchuria and China.
Japan has been described as an ancient feudal, modern capitalistic, fascist
dictatorship. Wilfrid Fleisher dubbed it a "collective dictatorship."
Fascism, as any study of Hitler-Germany shows, has been built up as a system
of super-colossal robber barons, thanks largely to the international cartels,
of which I. G. Farbenindustrie was the largest.
Nationally, all forms of Fascism have flourished thanks to the aid the state
has given them in maintaining monopolies or trusts. In every instance where
business men subsidized a reactionary party--whether it was the Fiat works in
Italy paying Mussolini or a landed estate owner bribing a Rumanian
premier--the party and the most powerful few of the subsidizers have always
engaged in forming national monopolies when they took over the rule of the
country.
Professor Brady is the only economist who has related the "peak associations"
or Spitzenverbaende as they were known in Germany--that is, the biggest trade
associations, such as the NAM and the U. S. Chamber of Commerce--with the
subsidization of fascist movements, and shown how business, whether or not it
is officially on the throne, has in all countries become a political
power--in fact, the ruling power behind the thrones of fascism.
In Japan, the "peak associations" are dominated by the Zaibatsu, or four
ruling families, who are comparatively more powerful and richer than the
thirteen ruling families of America.
"Almost all economic organizations in Japan" stated the Monthly Circular
issued by Mitsubishi Economic Research Bureau of December, 1937, "have
developed after the World War. Excepting chambers of commerce and industry,
they have no legal basis, but as governmental control of the national economy
becomes stricter, the part played by these organizations is necessarily of
greater importance. The most representative organizations, the members of
which include all branches of the national economy, arc the Japan Chamber of
Commerce and Industry, Nippon Kogyo Club, Nippon Keizei Renmeikwai, and Zen
sanren." The Chamber of Commerce is quasi-governmental. It belongs to the
International Chamber of Commerce, and is dominated by the Zaibatsu. The
Kogyo Club "exclusively represents the interests of large industries which
developed during the World War," and is compared to the Union League Club by
Dr. Brady.
Nippon Keizei Renmeikwai, the Japan Economic Association, is comparable to
the Federation of British Industries of London (which is the equivalent of
the NAM) and the U. S. Chamber of Commerce. Zensanren (Zenkoku Sangyo Dantai
Rengokai) is the National Federation of Industrialists which is described in
the Monthly Circular already quoted as having for its main objective
"protecting employers' interests against attack from the labor movement."
Says Trans-Pacific: "It is that the Federation was organized to present a
united front of capitalists against the labor class."
In I937 the government brought all the leading employers and business
confederations together in the Japanese League of Economic Organizations,
which Brady describes as a sort of private National Defense Council for
business enterprise. He concludes: "It would be hard to imagine a much higher
degree of policy-determining power than is indicated by the combination of
the Zaibatsu and its concentric cartel and federational machinery. The
hierarchy of business control seems well-nigh complete." The government of
Japan and the business interests of Japan are bound together "from center to
circumference." "What is being accomplished is the gradual rounding out of a
highly coordinated fascist-type of totalitarian economy."
Professor Brady points out the fact that it was because the old system of
feudalism prevailed longer in Japan than elsewhere that "the new Japanese
totalitarianism has been easier to achieve than in any other major
industrial-capitalistic country." The "feudal and patriarchal-minded
hierarchies of business" and the political and military bureaucracies were
identified and centralized. Government and business are more intermarried in
Japan than anywhere else, much more so than in the ruling family of
Goering-Hitler and company. But all in all the fascist pattern is pretty much
the same in all countries where wealth and power have taken over the
military-economic-political rule. Professor Brady writes that in Japan the
elements "are not greatly dissimilar to those noted for other totalitarian
systems of the general fascist type." He lists:
"1. The Zaibatsu, the monopolistically-oriented enterprises centered around
them, and the extensive network of trade associations, chambers of commerce,
cartels, and similar bodies of which they are the acknowledged leaders,
constitute an elaborate, semi-legal, hierarchy of graduated economic
power....
"2. The hierarchy works very closely with the civil and administrative
bureaucracy of the state.... This constitutes the Japanese version of
National Socialism....
"3. The military is becoming increasingly part and parcel of the same control
pyramid....
"4. And finally, the psychopathic, ideological, propaganda cement which holds
the Kokutai (Corporate State) amalgam together in the fused power of Shinto
(the main religion) and Bushido (Precepts of Knighthood)."
DOCUMENTATION AND REFERENCES:
Anthony Jenkinson, Know Your Enemy: Japan, American Council, Institute of
Pacific Relations.
Robert A. Brady, Business as a System of Power.
Carl Randau and Leane Zugsmith, The Setting Sun of Japan, Random House, I942.
pp.48-56
=====
CHAPTER V
THE PRESS AND WAR PROFITEERS
No PRESS and propaganda department of a fascist regime could be more
successful than is the American self-styled free press in doing the double
job of attacking labor while suppressing the news of the real traitors and
saboteurs of the great Global War production effort.
The profit system, Free Enterprise, are the great golden calves and sacred
bulls of the American press. It is now certain that the editorials it
published after the Munitions Committee disclosed corruption for profit in
the World War and the support it gave Mr. Bernard M. Baruch who published his
program entitled "Take the Profits out of War" were also items for thc
dossier of journalistic hypocrisy. Even if all the lies and biased reports
against labor in this war were fair and true they would not have a fraction
of the importance that the treason has which was committed by certain
corporations and industries before and after Pearl Harbor--treason for
profits protected by the press. Yet the history of our wartime journalism
shows clearly two trends: one of slander, libel and daily attack on labor;
the other defense and whitewash of the elements which have committed treason
for money: the war profit makers.
The documentary evidence of this treason can be found in the reports made
either to government departments and agencies or by Congressional committees.
Notable are the reports of Thurman Arnold, assistant attorney general, the
Tolan Committee, the Bone patents investigation, the several and most
important Truman Committee reports. Together they indict General Motors, the
DuPonts, Chrysler, Ford, Aluminum Corporation, the Mellons, Standard Oil and
in short the elite of big business of what may be termed industrial treason.
In fact it was Senator Truman who said "This is treason" when testimony
before him showed that the synthetic rubber cartel agreements between
Standard Oil and I. G. Farben had prevented the manufacture of rubber in our
country.
Only two important newspapers headlined the treason charge. The January,
I942, report of the Special Senate Committee Investigating National Defense
named names, notably Bethlehem Steel and Aluminum Corporation, but in Chicago
the Tribune and the Hearst Herald-American suppressed them. The report was
official and could not be ignored. Nevertheless the most important paper in
the country, the New York Times, suppressed the names of General Motors,
Chrysler, Ford, Alcoa, Bethlehem Steel, these being among its advertisers.
The Tolan House Committee report, also suppressed or played down or buried,
said:
"The testimony before the committee was almost universal that production to
date has been a failure, measured against the available facilities and the
visible needs for military purposes.
"The largest and most efficient manufacturing facilities are not being used
in the armament effort. At the same time, the system of contract awards in
effect excludes from production the facilities of tens of thousands of small
producers. As a result, the mass production of critical military materials is
awaiting, to a considerable extent, the completion of new plants. Thus, when
speed in production is vital to the nation, the potentially greatest arsenals
stand unused and their unemployed workers are waiting for new plants to open.
The battles of today cannot be waged with deliveries from the plants of
tomorrow."
Assistant Attorney General Thurman Arnold's report to Congress said in part:
"Looking back over 10 months of defense effort we can now see how much it
has been hampered by the attitude of powerful private groups dominating basic
industries whi have feared to expand their production because expansion would
endanger their future control of industry. These groups have been afraid to
develop new production themselves. They have been afraid to let others come
into the field."
The worst criminal of all was the auto industry. It simply had insisted on
pleasure cars as usual; it had promised conversion of some plants but even
after Pearl Harbor it was found that 80% of the industry was still
manufacturing civilian cars. In mid-January, I942, I asked leaders of the
industry and leading members of Congress: "Can the present management of the
automobile industry be relied on to convert the industry to a full war
effort? Do you think the government should take over? What limit would you
set before demanding that the government step in?" Among the replies, all
favoring government operation, was the following from George Addes,
international secretary-treasurer of United Automobile Workers and member of
the seven-man board set up under Knudsen's Office of Production Management to
"advise" on conversion of auto plants:
"From the attitude conveyed in the recent conferences held in Washington
between labor, industry and government, industry can not be relied upon to
convert its facilities to full war effort unless government or the President
of the United States issues an executive order to that effect.
"On that matter of government taking over industries, it is my thought that
government should harness or conscript industry as it has harnessed or
conscripted labor, if management refuses to have its facilities converted and
under way within the next thirty or sixty days. It is quite evident that
labor has sacrificed far more than industry and will no doubt continue to
make those sacrifices for thc duration."
The fact remains that the auto industry, the oil industry, the aluminum
industry, the steel industry and many great corporations sabotaged America
before and after Pearl Harbor, and that crime continued up to the moment of
writing. Here are some of the highlights of what profiteering, also known as
Free Enterprise, did to undermine the war against Fascism:
Before Pearl Harbor the biggest scandal was in aviation. The government in
1940 had awarded $85,000,000 for 4,000 planes, but Secretary Stimson said
only thirty-three planes had been produced by Aug. 9, I940. Knudsen, to the
contrary, said that 45% of the Army and 75% of the Navy plane funds had been
awarded. What was the truth? The truth was there were no planes. The "awards"
had been made, but the aviation firms, many dominated by Knudsen's General
Motors, refused to take the contracts. There were awards, but no planes.
"Only a thin verbal partition separated him [Knudsen] from falsehood,"
concluded I. F. Stone in his book, Business As Usual.
Why were almost no planes built in 1940? Because Big Business staged the
greatest financial sit-down in American history and the newspapers, busy
shouting against labor, suppressed all mention of it. For six months, from
May to October, 1940, there was a sit-down of money and industry, aviation
being used as a "front" by Big Business to break the President's plan (even
at the cost of national safety) and get special tax privileges on defense
contracts. "Unlike the strike of labor," says Stone, "the sit-down strike of
capital in the-summer of I940 had the support of the nation's great
newspapers, of the War and Navy Departments, and of the new Defense
Commission." The notorious merchants of death, the DuPonts, are a major
factor in aviation; DuPonts control General Motors; General Motors' Knudsen
refused to break the aviation sit-down, but fooled the American people with a
tricky statement about "awards" for planes.
Curiously enough, in World War I the industry which came closest to
committing treason was the auto industry. Auto companies actually refused in
the last half of I9I8 to cut production to 25% of I9I7. Bernard Baruch's war
industries board threatened to seize their coal and iron but the war ended
before the showdown.
According to Stone, Knudsen's General Motors in this war has again sabotaged
defense. In I940 its defense production was only 3/2% in the first quarter of
I941 only 8%. Why the failure? Because producing defense goods--and General
Motors had then the second largest order in America, next to Bethlehem--means
building new plants, and General Motors preferred instead to hog the orders
and produce civilian autos. At the same time it put full page ad in the
papers saying it would not produce new models in I943. But it went ahead with
new models for I942.
Curtiss-Wright and Hitler.
At the moment of writing Senator Truman's latest report against the
Curtiss-Wright company is a national sensation. But among the little known
facts is the; Munitions Investigation report showing that Curtiss-Wright is
the actual originator of the Stuka bombing idea and that when Hitler came
into power Curtiss-Wright joined the DuPonts, Pratt & Whitney, and others in
secretly arming Naziism for world conquest. The evidence includes a letter
sent in January, I934, by the president of Curtiss-Wright to his salesmen in
foreign lands. It says:
"We have been nosing around in the bureau in Washington and find that they
hold as most strictly confidential their divebombing tactics, and procedure,
and they frown upon our even mentioning dive-bombing in connection with the
Hawks, or any other airplane to any foreign powers.
"It is also unwise and unethical at this time, and probably for some time to
come, for us to indicate that we know anything about the technique and
tactics of dive-bombing.
"It may be all right . . . to put on a dive-bombing show, to show the
strength of the airplanes--but to refer in contracts to dive-bombing or endeav
or to teach dive-bombing is what I am cautioning against doing."
This was an open order to the salesmen of Curtiss-Wright planes to put on
shows of dive-bombing and let foreign nations, including Hitler-Germany,
learn the secrets which were being guarded by the Navy Department, which had
invented the technique before Hitler came into power. The Curtiss-Wright
Company committed the equivalent of an act of treason in order to sell its
airplanes abroad. It helped make Hitler.
"It is apparent," reads the Senate report, "that American aviation companies
did their part to assist Germany's air armament. It seems apparent also that
there was not an adequate check on the foreign shipments by . . . the War and
Navy Departments."
The first six months in I933 the sales figure took a tremendous jump to
$1,445,000. Pratt & Whitney was exposed as one of the largest smugglers of
planes to Hitler. Thc Nye report then states that by May, I934, a year after
Hitler took over, he had bought parts for making 2,500 modern bombing and
fighting planes chiefly from Pratt & Whitney, Curtiss-Wright and Douglas
Aircraft. He also got planes from Vickers and from Armstrong-Sidley, in
England, and was already rated "superior in the air to France, Russia,
England or any other European power."
Anaconda.
One of the worst cases in American history of a corporation "defrauding the
government and endangering the lives of American soldiers," was exposed in
Attorney General Biddle's indictment of Anaconda Wire & Cable Co., whose
Marion, Indiana, branch had sold the United States $6,000,000 worth of
telephone wire and cable for war purposes, and had previously sold the
Russian government wire which was 50% defective and which no doubt resulted
in the death of many soldiers.
One newspaper (the Milwaukee Journal) suggested that the death penalty for
corporation heads responsible for sabotaging the war should be instituted.
The newspapers, generally speaking, did their best to bury the Anaconda
scandal. It broke about New Year's Day, and it is the custom of the
newspapers--one of their most corrupt customs--to hold up Big Business for
good-will advertisements for a special supplement (known in the trade as a
racketeering job) to celebrate the passing of a commercial year. There were
no indignant editorials in the big New York papers --the Times, the Herald
Tribune. the Hearst Journal-American-- but their annual business supplements
each had a full page advertisement signed by Anaconda of Montana and listing
all affiliates, including Anaconda Wire & Cable, Andes Copper, Chile Copper,
Greene Cananea, American Brass and International Smelting & Refining Co. The
ad contained this phrase: "The Army-Navy 'E' pennant for excellence in
production flies over eight plants." And wooden crosses surmount the graves
of soldiers murdered by Anaconda for profit.
The press, of course, is equaled by the radio in venality. December 21, I942,
the date of the Anaconda scandal, several non-sponsored news broadcasts had
the Anaconda indictment as the biggest news of the day. Not so Lowell Thomas.
His broadcast (for the Pews of Sunoco) had no mention of the copper firm Both
Sunoco and Anaconda are members and subsidizers of the NAM, and Mr. Thomas
had done jobs of work both for the NAM and for General Motors, the DuPont
controlled auto firm which is one of the main pillars of NAM Free Enterprise.
TREASON IN RUBBER
It was March 26, I942, that Senator Truman applied the word "treason" to the
Standard Oil, after listening to Mr. Arnold's testimony. Immediately
afterward Standard Oil began a nationwide advertising and propaganda
campaign, asking every editorial writer, publisher, columnist, radio
commentator and other maker of public opinion to whitewash it. Many who
received money did so.
An excellent example of usual newspaper and magazine venality was shown in
the indecent rush of our leading paper, the New York Times, and leading
newsweekly, Time, to defend Standard Oil from the treason charge.
Time, April 6, said Standard Oil had been smeared, said its treason "turned
out to be strictly of the dinnertable variety," poked fun at Thurman Arnold's
"horrific" charges, and tried to answer every one of them. This was on page
16. On page 89 Time carried a $5,000 Standard Oil ad.
The New York Times, April 2, main editorial whitewashed Standard Oil. Reading
it one can conclude either that the entire press which does not take
advertising lied, or that the New York Times and Time, which live on the
money which Standard Oil and other corporations give to them, are lying
today.
The day after the Times whitewash Assistant Secretary of State A. A. Berle
testified Standard Oil refused to stop fueling Nazi and Fascist airplanes in
Brazil until the United States put enemy plane companies on a blacklist.
Standard Oil's Farish never denied he shipped oil to a Japanese navy which
made possible the attack on Pearl Harbor and Japan's ability to resist the
Anglo-American Navies today. He excused himself by saying that Standard Oil
was "an international concern."
Standard Oil supplied Franco during the Spanish Fascist uprising. Standard
Oil supplied Franco-Spain after I939, National Maritime Union men giving
testimony that oil went to Germany and Italy, for use against France and
Britain.
Technically Standard Oil was not committing treason then because the United
States was not at war. This will be interesting news to the men on Bataan and
the men in the United-States Navy.
U. S. Cartridge Co.
The facts about U. S. Cartridge were unearthed by the St. Louis Star-Times,
one of the few brave crusading papers left in our country. (The Associated
Press did not pick this story up and send it to its I,200 subscribers, as it
did the Akron Beacon-Journal Guadalcanal lie.)
Julius Klein and Ralph O'Leary, of the Star-Times, submitted their findings
to the Office of Censorship, Washington, which made no objection to
publication. The story is copyright. It says in part:
"Evidence indicating that thousands of defective cartridges manufactured at
the St. Louis Ordnance Plant passed through plant inspection as good
ammunition and might, unless stopped short of the war fronts, imperil the
lives of United States fighters, has been obtained by the Star-Times through
an independent investigation....
"The Star-Times has learned that picked agents of the F.B.I. for weeks have
been making a sweeping investigation into complaints they too have received
that defective shells are being passed through company inspection at the
ammunition works.
"This plant, one of the largest small-arms ammunition factories in the world,
is operated for the government by the U. S. Cartridge Co., subsidiary of the
Western Cartridge Company of East Alton, Illinois....
"Evidence in possession of the Star-Times includes sworn statements by
members of the U. S. Cartridge Co.'s inspection staff in the ordnance plant
charging various types of imperfections in the cartridges produced there. The
plant manufactures .50-caliber cartridges for machine guns and .30-caliber
shells for rifles and machine guns.... The charges of faulty ammunition in
each instance involve company inspection and production and are not made
against gov
"Five company employees have given affidavits to the Star-Times charging
manufacture of defective ammunition...."
It is not necessary here to explain the defects and the methods by which
cartridges liable to explode within the rifle were passed. What is important
is this: that the Department of Justice has taken up the case after an
attempt to whitewash the corporation was made, according to a broadcast by
Drew Pearson. Important also is this fact: no less than twelve persons,
working men and women in the plant and inspectors who risked losing their
jobs and livelihood, voluntarily came to the Star-Times office and signed
sworn affidavits.
This is one of the thousands of proofs that the working men and women of our
country place true patriotism above everything else, whereas many of our
biggest corporations have been proven by United States investigations to
place profits above patriotism.
U. S. Steel, Bethlehem Steel, etc.
The main element needed for war is steel. A book could be written giving the
documentary evidence of the sabotage of our war by our steel corporations. In
case the reader does not have access to non-commercial news; papers, here are
a few headlines indicating the nature of the story:
"SABOTAGE OF WAR PROGRAM CHARGED TO STEEL \ MAGNATES
"More Interested in Keeping Monopoly Than With Beating Axis, Senator
O'Mahoney Declares"
--Labor, July 7, I942.
"TRUMAN ACCUSES STEEL COMPANIES OF 'SABOTAGE' "Senator Black Charges That Big
Corporations Hamstring Production"
PM, June 6, I942.
"STEEL SHORTAGE SCANDAL INDICATED AS COMPANIES FIGHT EXPANSION"
Federated Press, October I7, I941.
"BLAME FOR STEEL SHORTAGE PLACED ON TRUST
DOORSTEP"
--Labor, June 30, 1942.
"BIG STEEL CONCERNS REFUSE TO FILL UNCLE SAM'S ORDERS"
--Labor, April 28, I942.
Under the above heading the report is:
"It has become clear as the noonday sun that the vicious attack which has
been made on the nation's workers in recent weeks was actually a red herring
designed to divert attention from treasonable sabotage of the nation's war
program by Big Business, which is being exposed by Congressional committees
and defense agencies.
"Proof of that statement may reasonably be drawn from sensational and
unbelievably shocking disclosures of a cold-blooded betrayal of national
welfare by men whose only flag is the dollar sign. . . . One of the most
shameful chapters in our history.
"1. The Carnegie-Illinois Steel Corporation, subsidiary of U. S. Steel, and
the Jones & Laughlin Steel Company were charged by the War Production Board
with having refused to fill government armament orders while diverting iron
and steel to favorite civilian customers for non-essential purposes. The
result is that shipbuilding and other war construction have been held up.
"2. The President directed the Navy to take over three plants of the Brewster
Aero Company, accused of sabotaging the aviation program....
"3. The United States faces a shortage of critical war materials because many
outstanding industrial concerns have contracts with German monopolists
restricting production here...."
General Electric.
Senator Bone's Patents Investigation Committee heard testimony April x6,
I942, that until Pearl Harbor the General Electric Co. observed an agreement
with the Krupp Co. of Essen, Germany, under which the Nazi trust was
permitted to limit American use of a vital element in arms production. The
man who admitted this was Dr. Zay Jeffries, head of W.P.B. metallurgy
committee, chairman of General Electric's subsidiary, Carboloy Co. The vital
element is known as Pantena, or carboloy, or cemented tungsten carbide, which
is almost as hard as diamonds and used for machine tools.
Aluminum Corporation (Mellon-Davis-Duke families).
"If America loses the war it can thank the Aluminum Corporation of
America."--Secretary of Interior Ickes, June 26, 1941. By its cartel
agreement with I. G. Farben, controlled by Hitler, Alcoa sabotaged the
aluminum program of the U. S. air force. The Truman Committee heard testimony
that Alcoa's representative, A. H. Bunker, $1-a-year head of the aluminum
section of O.P.M., prevented work on our $600,000,000 aluminum expansion
program. Congressman Pierce of Oregon said in May, 1941: "To date, 137 days
or 371/2% of a year's production has been wasted in the effort to protect
Alcoa's monopolistic position.... This delay, translated into planes, means
IO,OOO fighters or I,665 bombers."
This, of course, is the answer to the boys on Guadalcanal and in Tunisia, and
not absenteeism, the 48-hour week, or wage increases to meet the cost of
living.
AUTOMOBILE INDUSTRY
The big three of the auto industry, General Motors, Chrysler and Ford,
refused to convert to war production, refused to extend plants, refused to
give up civilian production, insisted on government cash and business as
usual, thus delaying war production of tanks, guns and planes, while labor
offered excellent war plans.
The pro-auto magazine, United States News, which carries big ads and boosts
corporations, nevertheless admitted: "Today, 20% of U. S. effort is devoted
to defense, 80% to meeting civilian demands.... Next year: armaments ... will
average 30% ... Ieaving 70% for civilian demands."--Dec. 12, 1941.
United Automobile Workers Union President Thomas testified before the Tolan
Committee that "of I,577 machine tools in thirty-four Detroit plants, 337 are
idle . . . not working more than 35% of capacity"; he urged coordination of
unused equipment ". . . producing arms to frustrate Nazi designs for world
domination." This was forty-seven days before Pearl Harbor. Autoworkers
Secretary Addes on December 22 reported 64% machine tool idleness, "a crime
against civilization and democracy in this critical hour." Very naturally
Charles Coughlin's Social Justice, following the Nazi line, demanded that
"the metropolitan dailies which have profited most from the automobile
advertising dollar should campaign against this curtailment of production of
American motor cars." (July 28, I94I.) Any shortage of guns and tanks is due
to General Motors, Ford and Chrysler delay, not the autoworkers.
Ford.
Delay in constructing Willow Run was due to management (and mismanagement),
not labor. One of the major scandals was old man Henry Ford's decision to
keep adequate workers' housing away from Willow Run--he plans to tear down
the place when the emergency is over and return the land to his dearly
beloved squirrels. The newspaper announcements, that the assembly line for
bombers at Willow Run was in full operation and planes were being turned out
so many per day, were all fakes. It was not until mid-1943 that the Willow
Run works began operating efficiently.
Tank Failure.
Mismanagement was blamed by the C.I.O. United Autoworkers for the failure, up
to May, I943, of the General Motors Tank Arsenal at Los Angeles to produce
any finished tanks, although many men worked at their jobs. The union was
forced to file a brief against General Motors with the War Production Board;
it disclosed, incidentally, that when Lieut.-Gen. Knudsen (former head of
General Motors) made an official inspection of the Tank Arsenal, General
Motors officials put on a fake show--the old Potemkin village trick. They had
the men install and remove the same tank treads fifty-seven times, likewise
the motors, giving Knudsen the impression that fifty-seven tanks were being
produced, instead of one.
On April 21 "Time Views the News" (WQXR, New York), admitted the fact, known
in Army circles, that one of our major failures was the much-advertised tank
known as the M-7.
Production had been stopped, the news commentator announced, but he did not
name the company making the M-7.
It was General Motors.
General Motors ads saying that the M-7 was a wonderful tank and was chasing
the Japanese and the Italians and the Germans to perdition were still running
in the newspapers when the War Department ordered them abandoned as being no
good whatever.
As for the Army and Navy "E" pennants, the fact is that many of them are part
of a racket, as Space & Time, advertising news letter, first disclosed. Big
advertising men in Washington arrange to award the Army and Navy pennants to
war manufacturers who place advertisements in the right newspapers via the
right advertising agents.
The Buick local of the C.I.O. believes the "E" pennant should be given for
100% cooperation between management and labor. General Motors, however,
refused to recognize the Labor-Management Committee at the Buick plant,
refused to permit the union a voice in deciding the merits of suggestions
which labor supplies for increasing production, refused to comply with the
WL.B. order for maintenance of membership, refused to obey the law and pay
women the same rates as men for the same work and, finally, refused to
utilize fully for winning the war the machinery and manpower labor offered.
Local 599 of the United Automobile Workers, Flint, Michigan, therefore
refused to participate in the "E" pennant award ceremonies; they called them
a fraud.
TREASON IN THE SHIPS
When the history of what America did to rid the world of Fascism is written,
one of the truly great pages will be that devoted to the maritime unions.
At the date of this writing they have given 4,500 lives to carrying the
munitions of war across the Atlantic and Pacific to our own men, to Britain,
China and Russia. They have suffered many wounded, and their list of
torpedoed survivors is I2,000.
In proportion to the small number of men in this service the casualty list of
the unions is many times as high as that in any service, not excepting
aviation, tanks, or submarines.
On the other hand the shipowners and in several instances the ship
construction companies and the ship lessees have committed crimes of
profiteering tantamount to treason in wartime.
"An orgy of profiteering that staggers imagination" is how the I.L.W.U.
Dispatcher reports the official revelations of war profiteering by the
shipowners, made before the Congressional Merchant Marine subcommittee. James
V. Hayes, general counsel, gave proof to the subcommittee that profits from a
single trip of some vessels involved were enough to pay the entire book value
of the ships many times over.
Eighty-one privately owned merchant ships made ninety trips to the Red Sea
receiving charter hire of $21,364,880, it was testified. Profit was many
times the cost price of these eighty-one ships. The American Export Line sent
six ships on six trips. Profit was announced at $1,572,144; cost of ships was
$232,350.
Two American Foreign Steamship Corp. ships worth $895,974 made a profit of
$481,128 on two trips. Two American President Line, Ltd., ships worth
$307,828 made $814,242 profit on three trips. Ten Luckenback ships valued at
$1,426,857 made $8,879,729 on twelve trips. And so on.
Another report showed $26,874,176 profit on ninety trips. American Merchant
Marine Institute lawyer J. J. Burns protested that the figures did not
include overhead and depreciation of about $2,500,000, but that wouldn't
change profiteering figures much.
Every labor union leader in America except John L. Lewis has plans to speed
up victory. President Murray of the C.I.O., President Harry Bridges of the
International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union, President Joe Curran
of the Maritime Union have presented the government complete detailed plans
for helping victory. Says Bridges:
"If this war is to be won before millions of American and allied lives are
wasted there has to be an integrated plan for shipping and a single,
authoritative agency to administer it. The proper cargo has to be on the dock
and properly sorted when a ship arrives. The required manpower has to be on
hand and at the right place. The required number of seamen have to be ready
to sail. The ship has to be dispatched to a port that can accommodate
discharge of its cargo without delay. Provision has to be made for the
skilled manpower to unload it at the foreign port. These things and a
thousand others that need to be dovetailed require blueprinting of the
highest order.
"Blueprinting isn't being done. Ships carry sand ballast to Africa and bring
ballast back. Ships shop for low-fee piers. Ships wait at piers while
somebody digs through red tape to find the heavy cargo that goes in first.
Ships wait while prying agencies investigate seamen. Ships wait while
longshore labor is being wasted at other piers.
"And ships carry booze and bananas, birdseed and artificial flowers while
munitions pile up in warehouses. This space isn't long enough to begin a list
of the delays and waste.
"In peace time the shipowners have an incentive for meeting schedules. It is
the way they hold their business. Today they have no incentive. The
government guarantees them a profit and they suffer no penalty for failing to
deliver the goods on time. Naturally, they favor their old customers and that
is how toothpicks and wine get crowded into shipping space so vitally needed
for war supplies.
"The big failure of the War Shipping Administration to date has been its lack
of a centralized plan. It hasn't called in labor or permitted labor to
participate in its policies. In fact, it has no policy to speak of.
"The time has come for a plan to make the whole shipping industry operate as
one integrated unit, regardless of the sacrifice it may demand of labor and
the owners."
pp252-267
-----
CHAPTER VI
THE SUPPRESSED TOBACCO STORY
FEW persons are aware that the two largest advertisers in the country are the
manufacturers of the most expensive and the least expensive products, namely
automobiles and cigarets[sic]. It is, therefore, natural that the press which
protected the automobile industry during the first three years of war
scandals should give the same protection to one of the most harmful of all
industries, the tobacco manufacturers. The story of tobacco is told here to
illustrate its power in dictating to the press, and also to satisfy the
request of thousands who were unable to obtain the special issue (and IO,OOO
additional reprints) of the In Fact story. The entire report of Dr. Raymond
Pearl is included in the Appendix.
"War is booming the Tobacco Business," say recent press reports; no less than
20,000,000,000 (twenty billion) cigarets[sic] are being made and smoked a
month. Press and radio urge you to remember the fighters against Fascism by
sending them tobacco.
But the American press and radio--at least 99% of each--have suppressed the
facts, scientifically established, that the more tobacco a person uses the
earlier he dies. Tobacco impairs the health of all users, moderate and heavy.
But the tobacco companies spend fortunes--four (Camels, Lucky Strikes,
Chesterfields and Old Golds) spend $50,000,000 annually--to keep the American
public in ignorance.
The story is sensational. It must be said here that the term sensational is
generally used against a newspaper to characterize it as yellow, biased,
unfair, given to overplaying news. But sensational news can also be news
really worth playing up, such as, for example, the discovery of the electric
light, or the American landing in Sicily. These were sensational news items
which no paper need be ashamed for headlining, whereas the Hearst press and
the New York Daily News, which played up the Errol Flynn rape case for almost
as much space as the Rommel defeat in Africa, were illustrating the
sensationalism of yellow journalism.
Certainly the first scientific, documented report from the head of the
biology department of Johns Hopkins University listing tobacco as first in
impairing life, as causing users, of whom there arc tens of millions in
America alone, to die earlier than nonusers, was a first-class story, a big
story, and in a scientific way a sensational story, and worth the front page
of any paper not corrupted by cigaret[sic] advertising. But to this day the
story is suppressed by 99% of our commercial newspaper and magazine press,
and if used at all in the other 1% (which is doubtful) it is buried or played
down so effectively that not one-tenth of 1% of America's newspaper readers
have ever heard of it.
And here is the evidence of the venality of the press as regards tobacco--an
industry which pays the press much more than $50,000,000 a year.
In February, I938, Dr. Raymond Pearl, then head biologist at Johns Hopkins
University, gave the New York Academy of Medicine the scientific results of a
study of the life histories of some 7,000 Johns Hopkins cases which, for
newspapers, should have constituted a story "to scare the life out of tobacco
manufacturers and make the tobacco users' flesh creep," as Time commented.
In brief, Dr. Pearl discovered that smoking shortens life. Between the ages
of 30 and 60, 61% more heavy smokers die than non-smokers. A human being's
span of life is impaired in direct proportion to the amount of tobacco he
uses, but the impairment among even light smokers is "measurable and
significant."
The Associated Press, United Press and special correspondents of New York
papers heard Dr. Pearl tell the story. But a paragraph or two buried under
IGSS important matter, in one or two papers, was all that the great free
press of America cared to make known to its readers, the consumers of
200,000,000,000 cigarets[sic] a year.
When the Town Meeting of the Air announced a debate, "Do We Have a Free
Press?" January I6, 1939, the present writer sent to Secretary of the
Interior Ickes documentary evidence proving quite the opposite. In the debate
Mr. Ickes easily bested Frank Gannett, chain newspaper owner. During the
question period someone asked for examples of news suppression and Mr. Ickes
mentioned a few casually, adding, "I understand that at Johns Hopkins
University there is a very sensational finding resulting from a study of the
effect of cigaret[sic] smoking that has not appeared, so far as I know, in
any newspaper in the United States. I wonder if that is because the tobacco
companies are such large advertisers."
The statement was correct. Research had proved that although the A.P., U.P.
and I.N.S. had sent the story to every paper in America, although New York
science reporters were present and Science Service had sent an advance
account to numerous big papers, 98% of the big city press, the press which
takes the cigaret[sic] advertising, suppressed the story.
But because Mr. Ickes had said "in any newspaper" that same press threw a
journalistic bombshell. It attacked and smeared Mr. Ickes, it lied outright
and printed half-lies which are harder to nail, it distorted and faked the
news, published untrue editorials and generally presented to America the
spectacle of as corrupt a press as that usually charged to fascist nations.
The tobacco story, to be exact, appeared in some country papers, and one or
two big city papers. Here is what happened in the great free press metropolis
of New York:
Herald Tribune, totally suppressed.
Sun, totally suppressed.
News, totally suppressed.
Mirror, totally suppressed.
Post, totally suppressed.
Journal-American, totally suppressed.
World-Telegram carried a few lines.
Times carried a few lines.
The World-Telegram and the Times carried a three-fourth and half column story
respectively, dealing first with the effect on long life of hard work and
alcohol, then, at the end of the story, tobacco. This is all the Times had to
say, and that at the bottom of the first column on page I9:
"Professor Pearl also presented the 'first life tables ever constituted' to
show relation between tobacco and longevity. The tables showed, he said,
'that smoking is associated with a definite impairment of longevity.'
"This impairment, he added, is proportional to the habitual amount of tobacco
usage in smoking, being great for the heavy smokers and less for moderate
smokers. But even in the case of the moderate smoker, he said, the impairment
in longevity is 'sufficient to be measurable and significant.'"
The tables had been seen by the press. The leading authority in America, if
not in the world, had made a great discovery and presented the first
scientific study in a controversial matter in which some 50,ooo,ooo Americans
consuming billions of cigarets[sic] were interested, and 75% of the New York
press suppressed the story, 25% half-suppressed it, 100% of the press
manhandled it.
The Federated Press, serving the labor press (which gets precious little
cigaret[sic] advertising) reported that the Herald Tribune not only
suppressed the tobacco story but claimed it never saw it. The F.P. said:
"Wilbur Forrest, executive editor (said) his paper had been scooped on the
tobacco story.. Asked how an Associated Press member could be scooped on an
A.P. story, he explained that the Herald Tribune does not get the A.P. local
service. This excuse was punctured by A.P. executives, who insisted that the
story went not only to the Herald Tribune but also to other New York papers
that failed to print a line."
A large part of the controversy hinged on Dr. Pearl. In preparing the
evidence, the present writer wrote Dr. Pearl, who replied:
"I may say that the newspaper coverage on my statement regarding the
association between tobacco smoking and longevity was very widespread.
Without taking the trouble to count them, for which I have not the time to
spare, I should say that the point was amply and promptly reported in no less
than 250 daily and weekly newspapers in this country."
Inasmuch as a search at the New York Public Library revealed that no San
Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, Pittsburgh,
Cleveland, Cincinnati newspaper, or, in fact, any big newspaper besides the
Washington Post, had covered the story, Dr. Pearl was asked to name two or
three newspapers, outside of country dailies and country weeklies (which are
not subsidized by tobacco advertising), which ran his story. He refused to
answer.
There are 200 big daily papers in America, some I,700 smaller dailies and
many thousand weeklies. Apparently Dr. Pearl had 249 country paper clippings
plus the Washington Post. Science Service, asked to look through its files,
found only the Washington Post story and the two buried references in New
York.
But no sooner had Ickes mentioned Dr. Pearl than the A.P. rushed out a column
story which the Times headlined: "Contradicts Ickes on Tobacco Story--Johns
Hopkins Biologist Says Report . . . Was Widely Published.--'No Press
Suppression."'
Six cigaret[sic] companies grossed $200,000,000 in I937 (SEC report). A
combined profit after all charges of 583,000,000 that year was reported by
the Census of American Listed Corporations (April 5, I939).
The major companies' advertising bill a year on four brands is:
Company Best Known Brand I937 I939
Reynolds Camels $15,422,744 $9,296,470
Liggett & Myers Chesterfield I4,8Z2,I20 8,926,I48
Lorillard Old Gold 9,714,286 I,722,563
Amer. Tobacco Lucky Strike 7,441,554 5,002,056
The newspapers, Editor & Publisher, Saturday Evening Post, all say that
advertising has nothing to do with editorial policy. The facts are:
I. The cigaret[sic] companies spend more than $50,000,000 a year.
2. News inimical to tobacco is not published.
3. Ninety-nine per cent of the American press suppresses government fraud
orders against advertisers.
The tobacco advertisers share with peacetime automobile advertisers first
place in spending money in newspapers and magazines. This is without doubt
the reason the press suppressed the story. The press is therefore part of a
system spreading actual poison throughout America. As for the poison of
reaction (Fascism) the evidence is just as thoroughly documented.
pp.268-273
-----
Appendices
APPENDIX I: WHAT IS FASCISM?
Mussolini: "Fascism, which did not fear to call itself reactionary when many
liberals of today were prone before the triumphant beast [Democracy], has not
today any impediment against declaring itself illiberal and anti-liberal....
Fascism knows no idol, worships no faith; it has once passed, and, if
needful, will turn to pass again over the more or less decomposed body of the
Goddess of Liberty." (Gerarchia, March, I923.)
PALME Dutt: "The fascist system is a system of direct dictatorship,
ideologically masked by the 'national idea.' . . . It is a system that
resorts to a popular form of social demagogy (anti-Semitism, occasional
sorties against usurer's capital and gestures of impatience with the
parliamentary 'yelling shop') in order to utilize the discontent of the
petit-bourgeois, the intellectual and other strata of society; and to
corruption through the building up of a compact and well-paid hierarchy of
fascist units, a party apparatus and a bureaucracy. At the same time, Fascism
strives to permeate the working class by recruiting the most backward strata
of the workers to its ranks, by playing upon their discontent, by taking
advantage of the inaction of Social-Democracy, etc...."
"The combination of social demagogy, corruption and active White terror, in
conjunction with extreme imperialist aggression in the sphere of foreign
politics, are the characteristic features of Fascism. In periods of acute
crisis for the bourgeoisie, Fascism resorts to anticapitalistic phraseology,
but, after it has established itself at the helm of state, it casts aside its
anti-capitalist rattle, and discloses itself as a terrorist dictatorship of
big capital."
"Fascism is the open terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, most
chauvinist and most imperialist elements of finance capital."-- 13th Plenum
of Executive Committee of the Communist International, Moscow, 1933.
RAYMOND GRAM SWING: "Fascism is a reorganization of society to maintain
unequal distribution of economic power and a substitution of barbaric values
for individualist civilization."--"Forerunners of American Fascism."
HEYWOOD BROUN: "I am quite ready to admit that the word Fascism has been used
very loosely. Sometimes we call a man a Fascist simply because we dislike
him, for one reason or another. And so I'll try to be pretty literal in
outlining some of the evidence which I see as the actual danger of Fascism in
America. First of all, we need a definition. Fascism is a dictatorship from
the extreme Right, or to put it a little more closely into our local idiom, a
government which is run by a small group of large industrialists and
financial lords. Of course, if you want to go back into recent history, the
influence of big business has always been present in our federal government.
But there have been some checks on its control. I am going to ask latitude to
insist that we might have Fascism even though we maintained the pretense of
democratic machinery. The mere presence of a Supreme Court, a House of
Representatives, a Senate and a President would not be sufficient protection
against the utter centralization of power in the hands of a few men who might
hold no office at all. Even in the case of Hitler, many shrewd observers feel
that he is no more than a front man and that his power is derived from the
large munitions and steel barons of Germany . . . Now one of the first steps
which Fascism must take in any land in order to capture power is to disrupt
and destroy the labor movement.... I think it is not unfair to say that any
business man in America, or public leader, who goes out to break unions, is
laying foundations for Fascism." (May, 1936.)
pp.277-278
-----
Aloha, He'Ping
Om, Shalom, Salaam.
Em Hotep, Peace Be, Amen.
Adieu, Adios, Aloha.
Roads End
Kris
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