''Abundantly Clear"

To find where the fate of National Prohibition will eventually be decided, look away down South in Dixie. Next week Alabama. Arkansas and Tennessee will hold elections to ratify the 21st Amendment. "If all three agree to Repeal," said Postmaster General Farley last week, "it will all be over."

To help make it "all over," President Roosevelt for the first time since taking office came out with a public announcement of his position on Repeal. To avoid stirring up unnecessary dissensions within his own party, he had refrained from blunt utterances on the matter while Congress was in session, contented himself with broad hints that if the 18th Amendment were revoked by Jan. 1, he would drop special emergency taxes on gasoline, dividends, corporate profits to finance the Federal building program (TIME. May 29). Last week he took occasion to telegraph National Committeeman Leon McCord of Alabama:

"I think I have made it abundantly clear that the [Repeal] platform of the Democratic Party adopted last year should be carried out in so far as it lies in our power. ... I subscribe to the Democratic platform 100%."

Helpful though the President's message was to their cause in the South, many ardent antiProhibitionists wondered why Mr. Roosevelt persisted in endorsing Repeal syllogistically instead of stepping out boldly in his own person and saying: "I favor Repeal."

With not a single State dissenting, 16 have so far disavowed national Prohibition. Sixteen more will vote before December. Enough additional States may possibly join the Wet parade to effect Repeal by Jan. 1. Such was the earnest hope of nondrinking "General" Farley as he and his Democratic machine concentrated their activities on the South last week.

Officiating at the opening of a Federal building in Greensboro, N. C., he declared: "I am for Repeal, the President is for Repeal, and the national party platform is for Repeal. After Repeal, the right of North Carolina to determine its own methods of dealing with the liquor traffic will be firmly established, and the Federal Government will cooperate with you."

Having fired this opening gun, "General" Farley prepared for a South-wide radio address from Memphis on the eve of the Tennessee-Alabama-Arkansas voting. Senators Robinson of Arkansas and Harrison of Mississippi were ready to make a whirlwind campaign in behalf of Repeal on the strict basis of party loyalty.

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