The united American : a magazine of good citizenchip., January 01, 1925, Page 15, Image 15

JANUARY, 1925
THE UNITED AMERICAN
wegian immigrant has rendered his full quota of
spiritual service to America in hi® citizenship, then
much good may be accomplished. But if the celebra­
tion is aimed to remind America of the material
benefits the country has derived from the Norwegian
immigrant and to remind him of his accomlishment«
in the direction of building and retaining his nation­
ality institutions in America, in language,, in social
and religious life, for the purpose of creating a mental
reaction favoring a continuous support of these
nationality institutions and their close relations with
the institutions of the mother-country, then the
celebration will be as detrimental to the Norwegian
immigrant as it will be to America.
Due to the fact that such leaders of foreignism
in America as Waldemar Ager, Editor of the Nor­
wegian language weekly, the “Reform of Eau Claire,
Wisconsin, are at the helm, leading the centennium
procession of the population reading the Norwegian
language, one may without compunction conclude
that the celebration in all its aspects will tend to
laud the Norwegians, particularly the faithful ones,
for what they have accomplished in this direction,
with a “broadside” here and there to those who have
become so Americanized that they have felt it their
duty to pitch in where the all-American family meets,
and assist in the important work that is everywhere
to be done for the uniform advancement of all and
the equal enjoyment of every American right and
privilege.
The centennial of any immigrant people in Amer­
ica should be the signal for a general checking up along
the nationality front, with everyone taking-the vow to
double his efforts for Uncle Sam. Whatever good has
been accomplished for the individual through ag­
gressive nationality movements can be duplicated and
made doubly beneficial where the same effort is put
forth in the all-American family where the call
is for a square deal only and not for concessions.
It’s of far greater importance that the American
rights and privileges be equally enjoyed than that
they are enjoyed in spots according to the group or
nationality strength.
IN THE INTEREST OF THE LAWBREAKERS
A NOTHER IMPRACTICAL suggestion to re-
assign powers in government in Oregon appears
in a Senate bill which was introduced in the upper
branch of the state legislative early this month. The
bill provides in effect that a municipal council shall
have no right to revoke a license granted by that body
to business or professional undertakings within the in­
corporate limits of the municipality, no matter if
such an undertaking or individual has violated the
municipal law or ordinance under which the license
was specially granted. The bill seeks to open the
way for these establishments or individuals to take
their cases into court and fight such charges of mis­
conduct as may have been preferred against them by
the police authorities of the municipality.
The enactment of such a law would please all un­
derworld characters, soft-drink and pool-room pro­
prietors, keepers of desreputable rooming-houses,
lodging-houses and hotels and all others who have an
interest in the traffic of vice and immorality. Like-
Page Fifteen
wise it would displease all decent and law-abiding
people who view with alarm the defiant attitude, of
the lawbreakers who use every known method of
strategy and trickery to obtain a license to conduct
some kind of business or hotel which affords them an
opportunity to carry on their illicit and immoral
practices.
The greatest check against vice and immorality
is the present system of speedy justice. A dive-keeper
arrested for a law violation affecting his license should
not be permitted to stall around for time, through
court injunctions and motions. Before he can realize
what has happened he now finds himself before the
city council facing that body on the basis of the
charges.of misconduct preferred against him. He
may bring counsel along to defend himself; but he
cannot stall for time at public expense, and if the
charges are substantiated against him he loses his
license forthwith, and the community is that much
better of.
Give these hardened criminals and moral perverts
the right to defend their city licenses in court and
the fear of police authority will be no more. It will
be decidedly cheaper for them to operate unmolested
under the immunity of an injunction secured by an
attorney as long as the case can be held up in court
for months at a stretch.
If the legislators agree to pass this law, it is obvi­
ous that they must pass another law doubling the per­
sonnel in both the Circuit and the District courts in
Portland. The court dockets will in no time be cluttered
up with such an abundance of vice and immorality
cases, involving the right to retain license, that other
cases of civil or criminal nature will become hopless-
ly lost in the melee. With the proposed law in effect,
the tax payers of the state would have an added
burden to carry, but it would also open a channel to
affluence for all starving third-rate lawyers who with
a little effort would find themselves blest with a
moneyed clientile of maqueraux, gamblers and dive­
keepers.
It is to be hoped that the Oregon legislators will
carefully consider the opposition to the proposed
measure and by their vote sustain the rights of the
municipality rather than the criminal elements that
flock to the cities to pray upon the innocent, the un­
sophisticated and the gullible.
OPPORTUNTIES IN OREGON
XT 0 MATTER what is said of Oregon and its many
1' disputed political innovations, it’s a good old state
at that. Its development is still in its infancy, and
if its citizens concern themselves with placing ade­
quate safeguards around their economic and political
institutions, avoiding too much dangerous and experi­
mental legislation, it will not be long before an immi­
gration movement into Oregon will be on the way,
bringing with it capital and brain for industrial,
agricultural and horticultural development and an
adequate supply of desirable labor from other states,
an added impetus to progress.
Highway and railroad building now under con­
struction give promise of accessibility to large and
fertile land areas in the eastern, southern and