Gore & Volstead

Sirs:

On p. 12 in your issue of Nov. 30 you showed a picture of Senator Gore, and a news story to the effect that he had said at a banquet in Ottawa "To hell with Mr. Volstead."

I wrote to the Senator, and received the following reply:

"This will acknowledge your note of inquiry of recent date. I had read the article in TIME with a good deal of amusement. I could not add surprise, as I have been in politics too long to be surprised when misquoted or misrepresented. I suppose I have too much sense of humor to be puritanical concerning a joke. The story in TIME was inexact. For instance I did not make a speech and I never made a speech in Montreal, and of course, I did not in Montreal or elsewhere say 'To hell with Mr. Volstead.'

"Very truly, "J. P. Gore"

... I stirred the preachers up with this story last Monday. Must I eat my words?

A. H. THOMPSON

Washington, D. C.

Hearst's Universal Service, which arranged the sales-tax-study junket, was TIME's source for the information that Senator Gore made a speech at a state dinner in Ottawa, in the course of which he rendered Four & 20 blackbirds Got a little dry . . . etc., etc. On the junket were four and 70 people, including four and 60 members of Congress. Senator Gore added that this party had not come to drink rye. But liquor was served them everywhere except at U. S. Minister Hanford MacNider's tea party. TIME gladly prints Senator Gore's denial that he rendered the last lines of the song, which ends: To Hell with Mr. Volstead And God save the King!--ED. Chandler, Ariz.

Sirs:

In your issue of Dec. 7 in the department of The Press you state that Mr. Harry Chandler, publisher of the Los Angeles Times, has among his many accomplishments the founding of Chandler, Ariz. This statement is in error, and credit for founding the unusually attractive little city of Chandler, Ariz., belongs to Dr. A. J. Chandler (unrelated to Harry Chandler of Los Angeles) who is the first citizen of that prosperous community.

Dr. Chandler . . . came to our Salt River Valley in 1887. He has been foremost in the development of the Valley, and founded Chandler in 1912.

Dr. Chandler owns and operates the luxurious San Marcos Hotel at Chandler, where he entertains each winter many of the country's notables, prominent among whom are:

Frank Lowden of Illinois.

Darwin Kingsley of the New York Life Insurance Co.

Owen D. Young of the General Electric Co.

John Galsworthy of London.

Cyrus Curtis of the Saturday Evening Post.

LEO M. MEEKER

President

The Arizona Bank Phoenix, Ariz.

Michigan's McLeod

Sirs: . . . Would appreciate a detailed account of the record of Congressman Clarence J. McLeod, of the 13th District of Michigan. HERMAN A. AUGUST W. F. CALDWELL H. G. CARON MURDOCK M. KERR, M.D. ROBERT Y. OGG FRANK A. POSSELIUS* Detroit, Mich.

The record of Representative Clarence John McLeod of the 13th Michigan District (in Detroit) is as follows:

Born: In Detroit July 3, 1895.

Start in life: Youngest member ever elected to Congress (the 66th) up to 1920.

Career: Son of a well-to-do Scottish father who had served as Collector of Internal Revenue in Detroit, he was educated in the local public schools and the University of Detroit, got an LL.B. degree from the Detroit College of Law. During the War he enlisted as a private in the aviation service, transferred to military intelligence, was commissioned a second lieutenant, never got overseas. Back in Detroit, he began to practice when death caused a House vacancy in the district in which he lived. A Holy Name Society leader in a strong Catholic community, he presented himself as the Republican candidate for the short term, was elected Nov. 2, 1920 by a 3-to-1 majority. When he took his House seat in December, he was just five months over 25, the minimum age required by the Constitution for membership in the House of Representatives.* In Congress: Widely publicized as the baby Congressman," he served through the three-month session as something of a curiosity. In 19? 3 he was again elected to the House, and, at the age of 28, found himself the youngest member of the 68th Congress. Said he then: "Before I came here, I thought I might be ignored because I was so young. But I was wrong. Everybody gives me a friendly hand." Once he had to produce his birth certificate to prove and retain his title to "baby." Aware, however, that such a distinction was transitory, he began to specialize in legislation in which Michigan and Detroit were most interested-- larger Congressional representation. As a member of the Census Committee he was in the forefront of agitation which resulted in the Reapportionment Act of 1929-This law gives Michigan four more House seats. The 13th District, one of the biggest in the land (pop.: 468.0--4), was recarved to include a Negro community and a Protestant "silk stocking" area, political factors which, after all his efforts, may cost the present Catholic Congressman his seat next year. He voted for: Soldier Bonus (1924), Bonus Loan Increase (1931), Tax Reduction (1924, 1928) Reapportionment (1929), Tariff (1930), Farm Board Bill (1929). He voted against: Restrictive Immigration (1924), the Jones ("Five & Ten") Bill (1929). He votes Wet, drinks Dry, favors a referendum on the 18th Amendment. Legislative Hobby: Laws of interest especially to Detroit's automobile and aviation in- dustries. He has urged a House Committee on Aviation He worked for a Pan-American Highway "Ot survey committees appointed, conferences held. Even before he was in a bad automobile accident at Columbus, in which a friend was killed, he favored a Federal law compelling all drivers to carry liability insurance. In appearance he looks younger than he really is (now 36). He is slight (145 lb.) and trim. His dark hair is slicked straight back. He wears well-cut conservative clothes and a black derby, smokes cigarets. He converses better than he speechifies. In 1920 he married Marie Cathrine Posselius, has two sons and a daughter Outside Congress: He lives at Wardman Park Hotel during short sessions, rents a house and brings his family from Detroit for long ones. He drives a big Packard limousine everywhere at top speed. He flies much as a passenger, was almost killed in a plane crash in Pennsylvania. In Detroit he is a member of the law firm of McLeod, Pixel, Abbott & Pixel. His good friends are Robert Clancy, Detroit's other Congressman, and Fred Bucholz, Washington's jolly restaurateur (Occidental Hotel). In Washington's formal society, he has little part. Impartial observers rate him thus: a pretty good" Congressman, personally popular with his colleagues, active in House affairs, attentive to his district's wants. Neither profound nor brilliant he performed national service by his hard-hitting advocacy of Reapportionment. Though he is now serving his sixth term. 1 old title of "baby" handicaps him in advancing toward real leadership.--ED.

Colgate Beardists

CONTRARY TO YOUR STATEMENT IN TIME DECEMBER 21, REASON OF WITHDRAWAL OF WILLIAM FRANCIS CUTTEN FROM COLGATE UNIVERSITY BEARD-GROWING CONTEST WAS NOT THREAT OF HIS FATHER BUT OF A GIRL TO BREAK DATE. PRESIDENT GEORGE BARTON CUTTEN. NO ANTIBEARDIST. SPORTED A FULL BEARD WHILE PROMINENT MEMBER OF YALE '98 FOOTBALL TEAM. SURVEY OF COLGATE FACULTY REVEALS SEVEN BEARDISTS AND TWENTY-ONE MUSTACHERS AMONG ONE HUNDRED MEMBERS. PROMINENT BEARDISTS ARE WILLIAM HENRY CRAWSHAW, DONALD ANDERSON LAIRD, ALBERT PERRY BRIGHAM, JOSEPH FRANK MCGREGORY. NO BEARDIST SINCE HIS COLLEGE DAYS, ACADIA-TRAINED PRESIDENT CUTTEN HAS AN ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF OF FIVE CLEAN-SHAVEN, EIGHT MUSTACHERS AND ONE BEARDIST. . . .

L. ROBERT OAKS

Hamilton, N. Y.

Tobacco Markets

Sirs: TIME is usually right in what it says: In Dec. 14 issue, you say that Lexington, Ky. is the scene each year of the biggest tobacco auctions in the U. S. This was true ten or 15 years ago, but there are in North Carolina at the present time two or three markets, viz. Wilson, Greenville and Winston-Salem which sell more tobacco than does Lexington. When Lexington was the largest tobacco market in the U. S., Kentucky was producing more tobacco than any other State. Now North Carolina produces more than Kentucky and Virginia, the third State in production, combined. , I am getting my information from some oi our State papers which make the claim that North Carolina has the largest tobacco market in the U. S., and produces more tobacco than any other state. This information is printed on the front page while the editorial page is devoted to a column "cussing out" the manufacturers of tobacco produced and sold in North Carolina and the inside of the paper is filled with enormous advertisements paid for by these manufacturers--all in the same day. But this hasn't anything to do with North Carolina having the largest tobacco market in the world. On the second thought, it should. W. G. Cox

Burlington, N. C.

Official Dec. 1 estimates of 1931 tobacco production (in thousands of pounds) for 18 commercial producing States are:

Kentucky 506,890 North Carolina 468,520 Tennessee 127,528 Virginia 106,27 South Carolina 70,070 Georgia 59,640 Pennsylvania 58,487 Ohio 53,622 Wisconsin 47,201 Maryland 31,540 Connecticut 29,295 Indiana 16,060 Massachusetts 10,184 Missouri 8,501 Florida 7,598 West Virginia 5,388 Minnesota 2,188 New York 1,170* U. S. Total 1,610,098 (000) In 1930, largest auctions were 1) Wilson, N. C.; 2) Lexington, Ky.; 3) Greenville, N. C--ED.

* Brother-in-law of Congressman McLeod. -- ED. *"Baby" of the 72nd Congress is Fred Allan Hartley, Jr. of New Jersey (Republican), 28.

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