L.T» - SUNOCO. TnR.sn^Y, 24. 1939. GOOD EVENING EVERYBODY: This evening the affair of the American steamship, CITY OF FLINT, brings ns a veritable fantasy of sea-raiding. It amazes one to know that German raiding ships have got through the British blockade and are out on the high seas, destroying Allied commerce - just as that same sort of thing used to astonish us during World War days, when the Kaiser1s sea raiders repeatedly ran the British blockade. The CITY OF FLINT had previously played a brave part the ATHENIA rescues. Now it was seized by a German cruiser in 0 North Atlantic waters - ih an area that may be considered a special] province of the British fleet. The raiding ship, the EMDEN, so reminiscent of the World War EilDEN, which left a trail of havoc in eastern waters. Before being captured by the present-day EMD^N, the American CITY OF FLINT had picked up the survivors of a BritjLsn freighter, the STONEGATE, which had been sunk by still another Sjea raider - the pocket battleship DEUTSCHLAND. So the story goes Making two Hitler warship raiders now loose in tne Atlantic. In addition, there have been persistent reports of a third, the pocket battleship, ADMIRAL SCHEER. SHIP - 2 Ine Emm put a prize crew aboard the CIT:{ OF FLINT, and took the vessel into a Norwegian port. There, the survivors of the nritish freighter STONEGATE, were landed. The Norwegians are sending them home to England. After this, the prize crew took the CITY OF FLINT out to sea again and steered north for the Russian nort of Murmansk. There, the American crew was taken ashore, and the Geriiians interned by the Russians. A This double business of seizing the ship and then taking it into a Soviet port, provides a multiple complication of international law. What right did the Nazi cruiser have to capture the CITY OF FLINT in the first place? Because of contraband^- and that1s a thorny question, -u^war—etB c ont-ra-band y 4>ut -na4rion§ und er rr- almost •anything -Ao ha ■epjfttrabirid 1 i t t \%——seiWe used to have complicated disputes with Great Britain on this subject, during the World War. During the present conflict, the British Navy has seized American vessels, has taken them to pert, removed the contraband, and let them go. YVrup __ _ But tneGermans -^svtA-e farther The present-day raider SHIP - 3 EiIDEK put a prize crew aboard the CITY OF FU1T , and hoisted the i'iazi flag- ftnat are the rights and wrongs about that? I1?1 7 M4* Yriu^-' And t*ien - about taking the ship to tne Soviet Port A of Murmansk. Stalinas government is neutral, though we know it * s tied up in all sorts of ways with Hitler. Murmansk is a port of refuge for a lot of German vessels, including the great luxury ( liner, BREMEN. J * kxx ’ k ii:xx^.xxixsxxxltsrxx%icxxxx5cxxx}(M'fct 'ataaaxxxxxxxaxxxxxxxiixniiXxslixxnkxxiixkx^xacxxXfitwxwxKxxxxxxxxxx There are regulations of the sea which permit a prize crew to take ii a captured vessel into a neutral port, and the vessel may stay there under the ownership of the nation that made the capture ^There is a decision the United States SupremeCourt which expresses the American attitude toward ail that. During the World War, the Germans took a ship they had seized^into an American port. The law was invoked and. the case went to the highest tribunal. Tne Supreme Court decided that the ship must be returned to its original owners- the British. Bo you can see the snarl of f^galities that surround the case of the CITY OF FLINT♦ Today, officials in Washington made an immediate SHIP - 4 statement — that the vessel was on a legal voyage^ carrying merchandise to Gr©at Britain. Such a voyage would not be legal under the Neutrality Act now being debated in Congress - but that Neutrality Act is Hi not yet in force. in his press conference. The President declared that the CITY OF FLINT affair proved the need of the Neutrality Law, which the Administration is advocating. The President said he had not yet received any official word about the capture of the American ship, no word either about the crew, where they are, what has been done reports that the United States, through diplomatic channels, has asked both Germany and Russia to hand back the CITY OF FLINT and These points were stated today by President Roosevelt with them tansf po4it»g>iiod its Auicr Andf^iere* s a late dispatch from Copenhagen which its crew of forty-one men. vnjj RIBBENTKOP ■ ■ There had been some surmise that Hitler’s Foreign Minister, von Hibbentrop, might make some sort of important declaration today - but nothing of th©'sort happened. Von Ribbentroj addressed a Nazi rally at Danzig, and made an imposing sort of speech, which was pretty much the same old thing that Hitler s 11 ! I has said before - blaming Britain for the war, saying that Berlin wanted to come to terms with London, but London wouldn’t have it. He devoted a number of words to saying that the Nazis had no quarrel with the United States, no ambitions in the Americas anywhere - beyond peaceful relations and trade. !?* Ill ii-i: | i FAK EAST II I M The ooviets are taking a fling at Uncle Sam. The official Bolshevik newspaper IZVESTIA, today attacked Ane rican altitudes in the Far East. ^Americans,^ says the Stalin newspaper, "are convinced that better Soviet-Japanese relations might strengthen Japan, which would be against American interests. So therefore, the Communist paper reasons, the United States is using its influence to promote trouble between the Soviets and the Japanese in the Far East. Another official .tfoseow newspaper, PRAVDA, accuses Aiis*ican % munition manufacturers of conspiring to prolong the European War, trying to ma&e it a long drawn out, desperate struggle. ^The virtuous Bolsheviks are representing outc Uncle Sam as a wicked and sinister fellow! ) : I ijl ■ f! I If! Ij i|| ! l i i il In trie Dies Committee today, there was a blast against the American League of Peace and Democracy. Chairman Dies called upon all members of that organization who are not Communists, to resign, because the American League of Peace and Democracy is a member of the T,Conmiunist Front” - said he. This followed a whole series of charges before the Committee. Yesterday, Dr- Harry F. Ward, National Chairman of the League, testified that the organization was neither for nor against the treaty between Hazi Germany and Soviet Russia. Today, SifTcarx Chairman Dies produced a copy of a letter which he said had been distributed by the Executive Board of the Washington branch of the Aiip'T ^r- am League# »f Peace' and Dgmocrgreyv £he letter described the Hitler-Stalin pact in these words:- "A real xaosy contribution to world peace and the peace and security of the United States.9 One witness today, Mrs. Clinton M. Barr of Milwaukee, told of a speech that she intended to deliver on the radio under the auspices of the American League of Peace and Democracy. Sne said she sent her radio address to the Milwaukee Secretary of the DIES 2 League, to be copied The Secretary returned it with a number pf changes, saying that these had been required by the radio station. Mrs.ffarr testified that she later found that the changes had really been made by the Wisconsin State Secretary of the Communist Party. ",,*hri{i''usn h1! i-hT?:'i Prrrc~ci—and DeHWfrP&^yH^act-DOcn censored by-thie Goimttni-&fr-«££iTrttri-% This Communist official had censored her manuscript. What changes did he make? he struck out a denunciation of Hitler and the Ngzi-Soviet treaty and in place he substituted an attack on 0 Father ^oughlin. -t&a Another witness today was a former official of League. »£—Peace and Demc’or(if*y<- fie got into the organization through having served as a reliei worker in Spain with the Loyalists. This Spanish relief, he testified, was dominated by Communists, and he reverted to the fact that Bishop Francis J. McConnell, of the Methodist Church, had been active in behalf of the Spanish Loyalists. This, told the Dies ,, . „ nn the question of Fellow Travelers again. Committee today, brings P DIES - 3 ”1 think^ he d6Clared> nit ^uld be a great mistake for anyone to say that Bishop Mewonnell consciously aided Communism,” The witness added that the Bishop and other prominent people, non-Communists,^had permitted their names to be used without investigating the organization that used them. Then the witness laid down a set of rules for determining whether or not any outfit is dominated by a series of questions to ask:-"First, is the general secretary a Communist? Second, does it participate in Communist functions such as parades? Third, does it adopt resolutions tending to •gtti-frgnnrTngyicfr follow the Co.mnunist Party line? Is it advertised in Communist publications? Do Communist publications devote mucii space to. the organization?” By asking these questions, a plain American citizen can find out whether or not he belongs to an outfit that's part So the Dies Committee was told today. of the Communist Front. BROWDER In the case of Jiari Browder of the Communist Party - the spotlight today was orx ars. Hester G. Huntington of the Social Register. She it was who provided the seventy-five hundred dollar bail needed to get the Communist chieftain out of prison. As for the fraudulent passport charges against Browder, the authorities are harking back to former 0 / charges that the merican and Russian Bolsheviks have worked all r*' sorts of phoney schemes to get fake United States passports for Communist agents. As&efci^ll this will have to go over until Browder comes up for trial. He was released today, after spending the night in a cell, decidedly unusual for a former presidential candidate who several times ran for the highest office in this land. Browder seemed not to have a bad time of it. hadn’t any complaints to make. The- ^uestiono ab&ufc-prirstmeT'S^ inG^^ets And then/j&L~ met Mrs. Hester G. Huntington, who says she had never known him personally before. She is > . -a rtvnon fiie society matron type, distinguished, gray-haired woman, the socx y 4- v-rk architect who designed a a daughter of a prominent New York arc RROWDEK - 2 whole string of well known buildings. She went to private school and to Wellesley, and was married twice - one of her husbands a wealthy New iork Lawyer. In every respect the Social Register surrounds Mrs. Hester G» Huntington, Vlio came to the defense of Communist Earl Browder. Responding to hints that she might be a parlor Pink, she said she attends the Congregational Church, but would not discuss her political belief - save to say that she voted for ^resident Roosevelt. And - she attended a couple of Communist addresses by Earl Browder, She said she got him out of jail just as a matter of - principle. Altogether it was rather curious - a headline Communist affair and the spotlight on a figure out of thepocial Register! nkijtbal 111 lie-trality doings went along at a rapid clip today. This -- after tne members oi the isolationist group had agreed to limit debaue, no ual »,irig on and on and thereby delaying the neutrality issue much further. The proceedings in the Senate were hurried up by Vice-President Garner, who had a sharp clash with Senator Bennett Clark of Missouri. The Vice President was using his gavel to hasten things, when Senator Clark shouted that the Neutrality Bill was being railroaded through. To which Vice President Garner bellowed in return, r-1 ’ m. not trying to railroad it. But this won’t be any horse and buggy outfit either. ” And it wasn’t horse and buggy - it was streamlined. The Senate rapidly took votes on various amendments connected with neutrality. The law makers passed amendments - eliminating the ninety day credit provision from the cash-and-carry plan, relaxing the stringent restrictions of the movements of American vessels. All of this in a drive to get the bill in shape and ready for a vote without much further delay. SILVER-kHIBT£ Tne Chicago police say that three leaders of the Silver Shirts have admitted it was they who tossed the bricks tiiot smashed windows of Jewish owned stores. Yesterday^ four plate glass windows were shattered at a branch of the Goldblatt Brothers Department Store, one of the largest retail houses in Chicago. The brick-throwrers got away in a car, the license number of which was taken. The car turned out to belong to one George Reppner, a member of the Silver Shirts. *ie was arrested and tne police say implicated Joseph Sehimpp, likewise a member of the American Fascist group, and Dr. Homer Herman Maerz, said to be the leader of the Sliver Shirts. The names fieppner, Sehimpp and A Maerz have a souni that might recall the German-American Bund. The police say the three men have admitted the anti-Semitic brick tossing. The Chicago authorities are trying to link this vandalism to a series of extortion letters received from time to time by prominent Jewish citizens of Chicago, letters^emanding fifty thousand dollars of blackmail money. Here's a typical t „ ,, . , „ „ „ „ . ttvrmiil be shot to death and your example of the way they react, xou ±± establishment will be bombed if you fail to send the money.” SILVER SHIRTS - 2 In most cases, it was directed that the fifty thoi^ ard . 4 * dollars be left in one of the city’s public parks. everv A such case, the police laid a trap at the spot where the money was to be placed, but in no instance did anybody ever show up to collect the supposed ransom. Just some freak kind of letter- campaign menacing prominent Jewish figures. AU l this is revealed today as the police are investigating the case,*the Silver Shi^^ts who thresr bricks ’ough the windpjfs of Jewish sto; TALK Today, m a bit of news fronjphicago, we find a familiar plarase echoing. Txie phrase - "So you won’t talk?” Daisy Tegtmeyer is a determined lady of fifty-three, who certainly ought to get the prize as the most stubbornly silent woman in the world. (^or - mo sU. Lhg—pa's l f y ijht s - she hinr-'*> c en- i-n j akl--- botrftusc cho •wonTt tolk-.^* Back in Nineteen Thirty-Four, Daisy Tegtmeyer was brought into court to explain what she had done with the trust fund of thirty-five thousand dollars of which she had been trustee. She refused to answer, was held in contempt of court, and sent to jail on an indeterminate sentence - until she consented to talk. She stayed in the callaboose for a lorg time, then was released for a ten months* period, never breaking her silence, and then wa s back ife" jail - always refusing to talk. She filed xs. appeal after appeal, is to no effect. Today, her twenty-ninth appeal came up. In court her sister produced a bond to bail her out, and she was released until the Appellate Court has had a chance to pass on her appeal. Daisy Tegtmeyer, gray haired and grim, left the Cook County jail today.