Open forum, vol. 21, no. 14 (April, 1944)

THE OPEN FORUM |

"Eternal vigilance is:the price of liberty'--John Philpot Curran

VOL. Xk.

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, APRIL 1, 1944

LOS ANGELES COUNCIL DEBATES

STATUS OF C.O. CITY EMPLOYEES

The American Legion drive against con-

scientious objectors in general, conscien-

tious objectors securing exemption from

military service pursuant to the provisions

of the National Draft Law, in particular,

and conscientious objectors in public em-

ployment, more specifically, moved into

high gear in Los Angeles last week when

L. F. `Ole'? Olsen, Los Angeles County

Council Legion Commander, reappeared

before the Los Angeles City Council in con-

nection with the report of the Personnel

Committee of the Council upon conscien-

tious objectors.

_ The Personnel Committee, by a two to

one vote, over the dissent of Councilman

Carl C. Rasmussen, had recommended to

the Council:

(1) That this Council go on record as

being opposed to the granting of defer-

ments by draft boards to Ministers ordained

by `Humanist Society of Friends' or any

similar organization.

(2) That this Council go on record as

being opposed to the granting of a leave

of absence by the Civil Service Commission

to any employee of the city who leaves

city's employment on orders by the gov-

ernment to be confined in a camp for con-

scientious objectors."

The Council heard charges by Council-

man Delamere F. McCloskey, member of

the Council's Personnel Committee, that

the Los Angeles Civil Service Commission

was protecting "yellow back slackers" and

was "coddling"? conscientious objectors to

military service.

Friends of C.O's. Speak

Over the protest of Rev. S. Martin

Eidsath, pastor of the Southwest Presby-

terian Church, and a representative of the

Federation of Presbyterian Churches, the

Council, by a vote of nine to six adopted

the first recommendation of the Personnel

Committee condemning the Humanist So-

ciety of Friends. They eliminated the words,

"or any similar organization."

The next day the Council listened to a

brilliant defense of the rights of conscience

by Rev. Wendell Miller, pastor of the Uni-

versity Methodist Church, who also vouch-

ed for the religious sincerity of William

Wallace Higgs, employee of the Dept. of

Water and Power, found by the local draft

board to be a sincere conscientious ob-

jector and now at a conscientious objec-

tor's camp.

It heard Dr. David Henley and David

Walden, of the American Friends Service

Committee, explain the functioning of the

conscientious objector camps and the Selec-

tive Service System in determining and

recognizing sincere conscientious objectors ;

and permitted attorney A. L. Wirin, rep-

resenting the Southern California Branch

of the A.C.L.U. to urge that discrimination

against conscientious objectors in public

employment was at variance with the tra-

ditional American policy recognizing free-

dom of conscience as written into the Selec-

tive Training and Service Law, which ac-

corded such recognition to sincere objectors

by granting them immunity from military

service.

A vote of ten to eight resulted, however,

in the acceptance of the Personnel Com-

mittee's recommendation that conscientious

objectors in camps be denied leaves of ab-

sence by the Civil Service Commission.

The day following, the Council threshed

the issue out once again, this time voting

by narrow margins not to communicate the

action of the City Council either to the

National and State Selective Service author-

ities or to the City Civil Service Commission.

The issue is still pending.

Last Monday the Council, upon motion

to reconsider the status of conscientious

objectors, after hearing Dr. E. C. Farnham,

Secretary of the Church Federation of Los

Angeles, and Dr. Glenn Phillips, represent-

ing Bishop Baker and the Methodist

Church, voted to adhere to their original

action by a vote of seven to five.

RACE DISCRIMINATION PROPERTY

AGREEMENTS TO BE TESTED IN

CALIFORNIA SUPREME COURT

Are agreements between property own-

ers providing for the exclusion of Negroes

from certain residential areas legal and

enforceable in the courts? Or do they vio-

late constitutional guarantees vouchsaf-

ing equal treatment of all irrespective of

race or color?

The Supreme Court of California will

be given an opportunity to pass upon these

important questions when there will be

presented to it a petition for hearing in

behalf of Christine Burkhardt and a num-

ber of other Negroes. This petition will

seek a review of the adverse decision by

the California District Court of Appeals

handed down last week which upheld the

legality of such racial restrictions. In an

opinion written by Justice Clement L.

Shinn, with which Justices Walter Des-

mond and Parker Wood agreed, the Ap-

pellate Court took the following view:

"Racial restrictions have been employed

in the development of countless residential

communities and have very generally been

considered essential to the maintenance and

stability of property values. Non-Cauca-

Sians are and always have been just as

free to restrict the use and occupancy of

their property to members of their own

races as Caucasians have been.

"The fact that members of the Caucasian

(Continued on Page 2)

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No. 14

DILLON MEYER SAYS JAPANESE

SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO RETURN

TO THE PACIFIC COAST STATES

Following the orgy of race-baiting and

bitter, hysterical anathemas which have

been hurled at the Japanese evacuees in

recent months, it is refreshing to hear Dillon

S. Meyer, Director of the War Relocation

Authority, declare that unquestionably

Japanese-Americans moved froia their hab-

itations in the Pacific Coast states `should

have the right to go back to their former

homes if they choose to do so."

Mr. Meyer gave utterance to these words

last week at a meeting of Salt Lake City

civic clubs. He said other things that are

equally significant, as follows:

"There are groups on the West Coast |

- who have been campaigning for months to

stir up sentiment to keep the evacuees per-

manently excluded from their former

homes.

"The plague of intolerance which they

have fostered has spread into other areas;

well organized efforts undoubtedly will be

made to spread it still further. .The efforts

will be carefully disguised in the cloak of

patriotism. ...

"I find it hard to believe that the Ameri-

can people will tolerate for very long the

fostering of hatred for fellow Americans

and the destruction of American ideals

when their sons are giving their lives to

protect those ideals."'

He made it plain that in his judgment

the job of relocating the evacuees "is na-

tional in scope, and no one section of the

country can shirk its responsibilities."

In conclusion he asserted:

"There is no logical reason why the

115,000 people who were evacuated from

their homes in the Pacific Coast area can-

not be absorbed into the national life in

such a way that their abilities may be used

and that the people become inconspicuous

individuals rather than members of a prob-

lem group."

MAILING RIGHTS RESTORED TO

TROTSKYITE PAPER

The Post Office Department has agreed

to restore the second class mailing privil-

eges of the "Militant," organ of the Social-

ist Workers Party, which were revoked

last year on advice of the Department of

Justice. The Department held that certain

articles violated the espionage act by en-

couraging disaffection in the armed forces.

The conduct of the paper since that time

has resulted in recommendations by both

the Department of Justice and the Post

Office Department that the privilege be re-

stored.

The leaders of the Socialist W orker's

Party are serving prison terms following

their conviction in Minneapolis in 1941

under the Smith peace-time sedition law,

for literature and speeches held to advo-

cate the overthrow of the government by

force and promote disaffection in the arm-

ed forces.

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THE OPEN FORUM

Published every Saturday at 501 Douglas Building,

257 South Spring Street, Los Angeles 12, California by

Civil Liberties Union. Phone: Michigan 9708

Editor

Clinton J. Taft

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS

Upton Sinclair Kate Crane Gartz _

A. A. Heist : A. L. Wirin

John Packard Edwin Ryland

Subscription Rates-One Dollar a Year. Five Cents

per Copy. In bundles of ten or more to one address,

Two Cents Each, if ordered in advance,

Advertising Rates on Request

Entered as second-class matter Dec. 13,

1924, at the post office of Los Angeles,

California, under the Act of March 8, 1879.

ease 36

LOS ANGELES, CALIF., APRIL 1, 1944

HOUSE P.O. COM. HOLDS ANOTHER

RACE HATRED BILL HEARING

At a second hearing, held before the

House Post Office Committee on the "race

and religious hatred" bill, the American

Civil Liberties Union submitted expressions

of opposition, endorsing the Union's stand,

from a group of prominent citizens includ-

ing Harry Elmer Barnes, Margaret Culkin

Banning, William Rose Benet, Louis Brom-

field, Godfrey L. Cabot, John Dewey, Leon

Carnovsky, Countee Cullen, Franklin P.

Adams, John Chamberlain, J. Salwyn

Shapiro, Stanley High, James Branch

Cabell, Waldo Frank, Bruno Lasker, Elmer

Rice, Hermann Hagedorn, William C. de

Mille, A. J. Carlson, Arthur Spingarn, Dr.

Alice Hamilton, Louis Utermeyer, Mark

Van Doren, Lewis Gannett, William L.

White, Hervey Allen and John Erskine.

The Union proposed to the Committee

a substitute bill to transfer to the courts

control over objectionable matter in the

mails. Morris Ernst has urged that dis-

closure of the distributors and their backers

be required as a condition of mailing litera-

ture in quantity to reach anonymous matter.

A.C.L.U. "OPPOSES. N.Y.

"RACE HATRED" BILLS

Bills penalizing publication or radio

broadcasting of statements likely to arouse

hatred or contempt for groups orindividuals

- because of color, race or religion, are now

under consideration by committees of the

New York legislature. Known as the

"Wicks-Steingut bills" and introduced by

Assembly Minority Leader Irwin Steingut

and Senator A. H. Wicks, the bills would

amend the criminal libel law to include

libel of groups. They. are similar to a

recently vetoed Rhode Island bill and the

New Jersey so-called anti-Nazi law, de-

clared unconstitutional in 1941. .

The New York City Committee of the

A.C.L.U. has sent a memorandum to mem-

bers of the legislature urging defeat of the

bills on the ground that they are dangerous

to all discussion of race and religion.

BOOK NOTE

Race And the Rumors of Race, by Prof.

Howard W. Odum, University of North

Carolina Press. 245 pages, 1943.

A revealing and challenging study of

attitudes, both of Negroes and whites in

the south, covering the critical year lead-

ing up to the riots of the summer of 1943.

The material was gathered from several

thousand sources and submitted to a large

number of southern authorities for check-

ing as to fairness and accuracy. While the

study is confined to the South it reflects

northern attitudes as well, and deals with

the race problem in its largest national

and international aspects. It also indicates

lines of action toward removing sources

of racial conflict and tension.

A.C.L.U. BACKS CITIZENSHIP

FOR FILIPINOS

A provision for naturalization of Fili-

Pinos resident in the United States will be

presented to the House of Representatives

in the bill advancing the date of Philippine

independence, now before the House Insu-.

lar Affairs Committee after passing the

Senate.

Bills to accomplish this purpose have

been previously introduced, both by the

Hawaiian delegate, Joseph Farrington, and

Rep. Jennings Randolph of W. Virginia.

The proposal is supported by the Philippine

delegate and by the Philippine Common-

wealth government.

The American Civil Liberties Union is

supporting the proposal, as a move to ex-

tend to nationals of another Oriental

country, the opportunities recently accord-

ed the Chinese by the repeal of the exclu-

sion act.

A similar bill to extend citizenship to

Indian nationals resident in the United

States has also been introduced under

pressure of the Indian community, follow-

ing the repeal of the Chinese exclusion act.

Nationals of India were naturalized up to

1924 when the Supreme Court held that

they were not "white persons" within the

meaning of the law.

REFORMS IN C. O. SYSTEM URGED

ON PRESIDENT

A four-point program for reforms in the

treatment of conscientious objectors was

presented to President Roosevelt in March

by an American Civil Liberties Union Com-

mittee composed of Ernest Angell, chair-

man of the Unicn's Committee on Consci-

entious Objectors, Rt. Rev. William Apple-

ton Lawrence, Episcopal Bishop of Western

Massachusetts, and Dr. Rufus M. Jones of

the Society of Friends.

Urging that administration of objectors'

work camps be under civilian rather than

military direction, the committee made four

specific proposals: 1) that jurisdiction over

Civilian Public Service be placed in the

Interior or Agriculture Department and be

removed entirely from Selective Service;

2) that the present Appeals Board in Selec-

tive Service be replaced by a special civil-

ian board to hear the appeals of conscien-

tious objectors; 3) that exclusive jurisdic-

tion over paroles be placed in the Depart-

ment of Justice; and 4) that a civilian

committee be appointed by the Secretary

of War to examine for reclassification the

cases of all objectors in the army.

The President agreed to give the pro-

posals careful consideration.

(Continued from Page 1)

race have freely availed themselves of their

right throughout the nation, even (though)

those of the non-Caucasian races have not,

is the most satisfactory proof of the public

policy of the nation with respect to this

phase of the right of contract."

The court rejected the claims of attorneys

Thomas L. Griffith, Jr. and Loren Miller

that such restrictions were not only in vio-

lation of constitutional right, but were a-

gainst the present public policy of the na-

tion which was inconsistent with such dis-

crimination because of race.

The Southern California Branch of the

A.C.L.U. has been co-operating in the cases;

and will seek permission of the Calif. Su-

preme Court to file a brief in behalf of the

Negroes, as a "friend of the court."

COLORADO ANTI-LABOR STATUTE

ATTACKED BY A.C.L.U.

The American Civil Liberties Union has

challenged the Colorado labor peace act

of 1943 as unconstitutional in a brief filed

in the Colorado Supreme Court by Arthur

Garfield Hays, Nathan Greene and Osmond

K. Fraenkel of New York and Carle White-

head of Denver. The case was brought

jointly by the AFL and CIO against a

statute which "typifies the wave. of anti-

labor legislation that swept the West and

Southwest in 1942 and 1943." The present

suit is the first to reach a higher court.

Pointing out that "the American Civil

Liberties Union point of view is that of the

general public, not of either labor or em-

ployer," the Union's brief charges that the

Colorado act "violates constitutional guar-

antees of freedom of speech, press, as-

sembly and petition." The law requires com-

pulsory incorporation of unions, and re-

stricts picketing and the right to strike.

The Union contends that picketing is

so restricted that ``a minority of employees

may not peacefully picket. The exercise

of the right of free speech is thus made

dependent upon the consent of the majority

of employees." By authorizing the State

Industrial Commission `"`to regulate the

number of pickets, the manner of picket-

ing and otherwise prescribe the limits to

picketing which might tend to lead to dis-

turbances," the brief holds that the law

goes beyond the legitimate control of vio-0x00B0

lence. The lawyers say, "It does not re-

quire a showing either that there has been

or will probably be violence, or that if there

is threat of violence, it is the pickets who

are responsible rather than the victims of

it. Such a restriction is invalid."

The brief further attacks the limitation

of the right to strike to cases where a ma-

jority of employees vote to do so, and the

requirement of a 20 day "cooling off'

notice before going on strike. The lawyers

say, "Deprivation of the right to strike in

the absence of specific circumstances war-

ranting application of that specific remedy

is a deprivation of liberty without due

process of law. While it may be conceded

that a strike may be illegal because of its

purpose, state interference with the method

by which a strike is called is a limitation

upon the rights of assembly and of speech.

If the statute is construed as limiting a

man's right to leave his work, then clearly

the federal constitutional provision against

involuntary servitude is violated."

Compulsory incorporation of unions is

attacked in principle. The brief contends:

"In granting incorporation, the state may

attach such conditions as it chooses. Thus

the statute conaitions the exercise of the

rights of free speech and assembly on a

license from the state. Yet perhaps the

most fundamental aspect historically of

these constitutional rights is that they can-

not be made subject to a grant of permis-

sion from anyone."

BOOK NOTE

"The Gateway to Citizenship," by Carl

B. Hyatt; 153 pages; published by the

Immigration and Naturalization Service of.

the U.S. Dept. of Justice, Washington, D.C.,

1948.

A manual "of principles and `procedures

for use by members of the bench and bar,

the staff of the Immigration and Natural-

ization services civil and educational au-

thorities, and patriotic organizations, in

their efforts to dignify and emphasize the

significance of citizenship."?" Documents of

general interest as well as of value as pre-

cedents and models are included.