The Wilmington Morning Star

Stassen Speaks Out
By ARTHUR KROCK

WASHINGTON.-A very important economic
and social issue in this country was chosen
by Harold E. Stassen for the first formal
speech he has made since he announced his
candidacy for the Republican nomination for
the Presidency. It involves the question
whether laws and administrative procedures
are to be directed to encourage that enter-
prise called small business on which some
of the foundations of the United States were
laid.

Mr. Stassen, making his position very clear
and specific on Kansas Day at Topeka, Jan.
29, gave the best insight to this social-econom-
ic philosophy he has yet afforded to the
party he has offered to lead. This section of
his philosophy, as revealed, is what used to
be known in the English-speaking world as
"liberal" until the term lost its meaning
through distortion and the spurious claims
upon it. Another interesting aspect of this
thinking is that it matches what the Presi-
dent has said on the same subject, on one
occasion to this correspondent.

While other Republicans, also, though un-
avowed, aspirants to their party's Presidential
nomination, control the great avenues of
publicity by holding official position, the form-
er Governor of Minnesota must travel the by-
ways. They can make the headlines and com-
mand space in the press and time on the
radio because as incumbents of office they
can act and he can only exhort and suggest.
But this disadvantage was self-imposed by
Mr. Stassen; he could have been in the
Senate today had he wished to be.

He determined, however, to make his bid
as a private citizen, the course pursued in a
much briefer period of campaigning by Wen-
dell L. Willkie and forced on Abraham Lin-
coln by his defeat for the Senate in 1858. And
the Kansas Day speech is the first test of
what influence in this role Mr. Stassen can
exert in his party and how much notice he
can evoke among the people.

While Lincoln was actively seeking the
nomination of 1860 as a private citizen the
issues of slavery and secession were thrust-
ing the Republic to the brink of war. The
current problems of the nation and the world
are of larger scope and potentially even
more dynamic. Yet they are neither as dra-
matic nor as concentrated, and this adds to
Mr. Stassen's difficulties in his effort to gain
public attention.

But on Kansas Day he dealt with a situation
that is foremost in the minds of many people
and communities, and he offered counsel
which in time will be noted broadly. First, the
social-economic tax philosophy of the New
Deal and, second, the advent of war to this
country, struck hard at the vitality of exist-
ing small enterprises and then almost closed
the door to new ones. Though the New Deal-
ers' stated objective was to aid the weak
against the strong, the small against the great,
in the economic area, their tax revisions have
worked the other way.

Addressing himself to this condition, Mr.
Stassen made a statement which can be briefly
summarized as follows:

The Republican party should become the
champion of small business because "the
future high productivity of this economic sys-
tem depends upon a high birth rate of new
small businesses * * and upon the growth
and development of many of these small
units." History shows that nationalization and
socialization of industry arrive with the con-
solidation and combination of industry. When
the many can make their own business de-
cisions "there is a toughness * * in an
economic system not found on any other
basis."

There must always be a strong big busi-
ness element in the United States; only through
this channel can come efficient mass pro-
duction. But from this element monopoly
must be barred so that big business will al-
ways compete with itself. Also, it must not
be permitted to dominate the Republican
party," adding major political power to those
it already possesses.

The war and the tax structure decreased
small business concerns from 3.307,000 in 1940
to 2,839,000 in 1944, and the trend is still
downward. Yet it was the ease of starting
such enterprises in earlier days, and plowing
back receipts, that laid the groundwork for
the production, high employment and excel-
lent living standards that followed. The
smithy grew into the factory, the local bus-
line into the great transportation system.
And this opportunity must be re-created.
Assistance must be given by Government
action in five areas-tax adjustments on prof-
its, reserves and capital structures of small
business; revision of controls so that it can
meet them without heavy legal and account-
ing costs; amendment of labor laws so that
various unions in a small unit must combine
on one bargaining representative; decentrali-
zation so that a company can do its govern-
ment dealing locally; incessant vigilance
against the growth of monopoly.

Mr. Stassen concluded by saying that his
proposals were not made solely in the interest
of those engaged in small business, but for
their long-range effect, as he saw it, on free
economy here and throughout the world. If
capital is not free, neither will labor be, he
said, and the maintenance of big business
is dependent on the existence of a strong
numerous small business community.

Republicans in Congress, candidates in
varying degrees of hopefulness, have already
put this subject on their agenda for study
and early action. But none has stated the
problem better or offered as specific a set
of remedies.-New York Times.