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Mr. Garson on Freight RatesTTON. STUART CARSON'S address on the proposed increase in freight rates did more than merely oppose the 30-peroent increase asked for by the railway # .companies. Mr. Garson brought into sharp focus the unfavorable position in which the people of the West are placed by present rate schedules and indicated that an increase right across the board would only serve to shift a greater part of the load of transportation costs to Western Canada.The four Western provinces are now assembling data in order to oppose the requested 30 percent increase. It is quite likely, however, that they will fight at the same time to secure a major revision of present rate structure in order that the West may get a more equitable deal in transportation costs.In the matter of a 30 percent increase, however, it should be borne in mind that the railways have strong arguments with which to back up their request. As Professor J. L. McDougall in reply to Mr. Garson pointed out, material and labor costs have continued to rise while volume of traffic has fallen off. Thus since 1939 the cost of ties had risen 94 percent by May 1 last, fuel had risen 62 percent, steel rails 32 percent and so on right down the line.What irks Mr. Garson and all other Westerners, however, is the way in which the present rate structures penalize the West. A simple percentage hike of these schedules would serve to aggravate theunfairness and make the situation even more unacceptable. Hence such a blanket increase is meeting determined opposition.Westerners are caught by transportation costs going and coming. For example, when a farmer ships anything for export not covered by the Crow’s Nest Pass agreement, he must pay a good percentage of the cost of hauling it to seaboard because he must meet world price. The farmer cannot pass along transportation costs in this case to the consumer. But when manufactured goods from the East are sold to Westerners, freight charges are included in the selling price. Hence the West gets soaked both ways.On top of this, Eastern shippers enjoy lower freight rates as a result of railway attempts to meet ship and truck competition, a condition that does not apply in the West.In the long run, greater benefits would probably accrue to Western Canada if the prairie brief to the board of enquiry emphasized these aspects of the freight-rate schedules and brought heaviest pressure to bear on having remedial measures adopted. Even if the West were successful in having rates held at present levels, a matter of considerable doubt, a mere continuation of the status quo is not good enough. There should be a thorough revision of the freight rate structure in order that the West may no longer be penalized with higher transportation costs than prevail in Eastern Canada.New Champion of the IndianCANADA is not deliberately unfair to her Indians. Sins against them are of omission rather than commission. Treated almost like children they have been left on reserves, the majority of them leading listless and futile lives. In hard times they are fed and if disease breaks out among them medical relief is provided. There are Indian schools and an attempt is made to give tl^p youngsters an education of sorts.All of which is nor good enough. It is to be hoped that the commission appointed by Ottawa to recommend changes in the Indian Act will find the remedies for a situation which has caused much worry to those interested in the welfare of the Indians.A new champion of the Indian has arisen in the person of Tommy Prince, an Indian of Scanterbury in The Pas district. He served with distinction as a sergeant in the Canadian forces in Europe and was awarded the Military Medal, the United States Silver Star, and was mentioned in despatches for his many acts of bravery. On his return from overseas he visited some northern Indian reservations and was appalled by prevailing conditions. He has organized various Manitoba bands to fight for a new deal and his views were recently aired to the commission now sitting.Given a few more leaders like Tommy Prince, the Indian bands in Canada would unite in the fight for more consideration and improved facilities.Passing ShotsSitting out a coal strike gives you all the sensations of an Antarctic expedition except that you arn't dressed for it.The peace settlements mean more work for mapmakers, who fortunately are recovered from the wartime jitters, caused by a boundary moving while being drawn.Recipes for sauerkraut pie and “sauerkraut sherbet are included In a collection just put out by a national association of packers of guess what.In times like these one must study all the angles. Thus it is possible to beat both the coal strike chill and the $1 haircut by letting it grow.Nothing in the world of immortal art is safe. In New York and Hamburg, on the same day, works by Rembrandt were stolen as coolly as if they were Chopin melodies.Another three weeks, and first bulletinsIT DID not matter what kind of an editorial chair you sat in, or what kind of a desk on which you wrote—all that counted was: What did you say and how well did you say it? That was the theory of Horace Greeley, famous editor and founder of the New York Tribune, and it accounted for the scantiness of furnishings of his office; indeed, of the old Tribune Building in general, declares Henry Luther Stoddard, himself a noted editor (in Horace Greely: Printer, Editor,Cruader—rich reading).Two windows of his office afforded a wide view of City Hall Park,” says Mr. Stoddard. His swivel chair stood on a small rug, but no carpet covered the pine-board floor; a high stool at a reading desk and two narrow cane-bottomed chairs did little to relieve the bareness.That well-remembered desk! How many stories have been related of it; how many memories for all familiar with it! It was larger than he actually needed, yet had it been twice the size it would still have been completely covered with all sorts of things. He permitted no one to touch a book or paper upon it. Though absent a week or even longer he wanted to find it on his return exactly as he had left it. Books and pamphlets full of oldpair of scissors v hich he pulled down when needed; they would have cut tin; a bell cord to summon a copy boy hung from the ceiling too; at one corner of the desk there was always a paste pot and at the other end a box of sand which he peppered over the pages to dry the ink. It was a marvel to others how he ever found whatever data he needed, but he always did and he never thanked anyone for presuming that he could not.”How they got home no one but themselves knew. They crash-landed. Seriously injured but still very much alive, they were hauled out of the wreckage and t^ken away in a field ambulance. It was then that the Irishman who had been defending De Valera decided that the truce was over. Turning painfully toward his friend, he said. ‘Well, at least you’ve got to admit that Dev kept us out of the war.’ ”C. V. R. THOMPSON, (in How To Like An Englishman) says, “I could give you some impressive figures of the numbers of Irish who ran away from home to enlist in the British armed forces, but I prefer to tell a story that has been told with relish by Winston Churchill.“The two Irishmen had volunteered to go out with what was nicknamed—not without reason—a suicide squadron, bound on one of the early raids on Berlin. Hardly had their plane taken off than the couple began a violent political argument, an Irish political argument. One was attacking De Valera, the other defending him. It continued all the way to Berlin.Over Berlin the ack-ack was bursting all around them, and the bomber wasOn it is depicted the Admiral in full uniform in a small boat, lifting from the ocean “the nude and stony corpse of theVenus de Milo.”A MOST CURIOUS tomb is to be found in the famous Montparnasse cemetery in Paris, notes Nina Hamnett, the artist (in her lively, very lively, reminis-censes, Laughing Torso). It consists of a large bronze French bedstead. At the top is a bronze angel and at the foot a bronze india-rubber plant. In the bed, on a bronze counterpane, lie Monsieur and Madame Pigeon. Monsieur lies on his side in a bronze frock coat, and Madame lies beside him in a dark bronze bombazine. Her hair is done in a bun on the top of her head.In the same cemetery is the tomb of Ste. Beuve, who sits in front of a stone bookcase, containing all his books, and these are quite enough to fill the wholeONE OF Ellen Terry's favorite stories —she even told it to George Bernard Shaw in one of her letters- was about a cat which trotted on to the stage of the Lyceum Theatre when she was playing a part. The ar tress picked puss\ up and placed it on a sofa where it curled up and went to sleep. Presently, the titt«rs of the audience caused her alarm, and looking around, she saw that the cat had changed Its position and was sleeping on the red-hot” property fire!• JAMES PAYN was not only a delightful novelist, but a brilliant humorist. He was a splendid companion and a great favorite among literary men at the Reform Club, where his terribly hearty laugh was so frequently heard. Apropos of this, some one made the remark:That man laughs like a cannibal.Yes, that may be,” ejaculated Pavn, “but, sir, I have never been able to swallow you.”: l, i . m ...........An Attic Salt Shaker “ 0r|»nerai government.It is difficult to imagine Philadelphia as the world’s international centre. And San Francisco is out of this world for the Atlantic nations and the Soviet Union.If the reason for placing U.N. in the United States is that it was Woodrow Wilson's and President Roosevelt’s dream and to celebrate American participation, the reason is not good enough. The U.S.A. did not reject the League of Nations because its headquarters were in Geneva.From any viewpoint of logic, the headquarters of a world organization to keep the peace ought to be nearer the geographical centre of the planet than is any part of the w'estern hemisphere, and should be in that part of the world where varying interests and ideas meet, either to conflict or to be reconciled. It should be in a place fitted to become a true world capital, with the facilities and atmosphere of a world capital.It should be in a country whose every interest is in neutrality between the great powers; and in which the great powers also have an interest in maintaining neutrality. It should neither be located in so definitely western a centre as the United States or London, nor in what has become the capital of an eastern bloc: Moscow. It should be, I repeat, not in a provincial town, nor in a great power, but in a great capital city; a capital city too great for its own country.Such a place exists, in exactly the right spot: Vienna. Vienna was, for centuries, the capital of Europe’s largest empire, and the centre of the only European country which was never a nation-state. Since the break-up of Austro-Hungary after World War I, it has been an imperial capital without an adequate hinterland. World Wars I and II began in this area—if one may date the exansionism of Hitler from the Anschluss. Its facilities are superb, desite the war destruction necessitating much rebuilding. (For that matter, it would be well for the U.N. to start build-for a change.And all these facilities exist for a national population too poor and too small to use them fully. The Viennese, being of mixed race, and remembering only one good time, when Vienna was the centre of a federation of many nations, are not nationally minded, and are famous hosts.Vienna is also the centre of the world's least controversial expression: music. It is the home of Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Schumann, Schubert and Johann and Richard Strauss, and music has comforted it through all its woes.Furthermore, no city, with the possible exception of Munich, has such magnificent country at its very doors—the splendid mountains of the Semmering; the idyllic Danubian river country, all replete with exquisite villages, delightful inns, romantic castles, and splendid spas.Everybody likes Vienna and feels at home there. The Viennese are first-rate cooks and the world’s best bakers; the cuisine is international; the dressmakers and tailors are excellent—and all this talent has gone begging for over a generation.Besides, the great powers are there already in the form of occupying armies. Despite the fact that Austria was solemnly promised “freedom and independence, none of them wishes to get out, for each is eyeing the other in this vitally important stragetical area. The “independence” of Austria is largely chimerical. Teuton and Slav interests have perpetually clashed here and east and west met, sometimes in co-operation; often in conflict. Even today Trieste, historically the chief Austro-Hungarian imperial port, and the question of Danubian river control, are chief items of disagreement between the allies.Put the United Nations in Vienna, and we might be able to create, for the first time, a real international peace force of modest proportions, enabling the separ-to break out in Philadelphia.(Copyright, 1940. All righto reoervtd)OpinionsThere could be no guarantee of peace as long as any nation had the sovereign right to decide questions of war and peace for itself. —Dr. Hamilton Holt.* * *The welfare of the United States and the welfare of the world are wrapped up in one package—peace.—President Truman.get out of focus, but keep it close enough so that he can obey that impulse, if he has any.If he says he can’t see anything in your eye and continues to talk about sow thistle, or how the Blue Bombers could have won the cup, all you can do is scratch him off your list and look around for another sucker.OVERHEARD ON THE AVENUE “They certainly have gone snooty since they moved into that district.”There's gravy soup WITH bread, fish, fillet steak, mushrooms and chips, and peach Melba to follow. Then a variety of cheeses, again with bread and as much butter as you want.”(Reproduced by The Winnipeg Tribune bv ftpeclai Arrangement with Publisher* of Punch)
Newspaper Details
Winnipeg Tribune
Winnipeg, Manitoba, CA
Sat, Dec 07, 1946
Page 56
Full Page
Clipped by
Winnipeg S.
CA 18 Jan 2024
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