Dickinsoniana

Dickensoniana

The Governor of Michigan, who at 80 is the oldest of all present Governors, continued criticizing moral tones last week following his denunciation of the Governors' Conference in New York. Not for nothing was he six times president of his State's Anti-Saloon League (and an honorary national vice president). Not for nothing had he served Michigan seven terms as Lieutenant Governor in throttle-bottomed obscurity. He announced last week that his real purpose was to bring Prohibition back to Michigan,* then, in a radio sermon he declared:

"It is not what one contacts immediately at these high class functions that is the danger, but it is what they are taking away. These ladies and men that I saw drinking were not intoxicated as might be inferred."

Then he continued: "Why? I do not know, unless it might be that they learned the formula advised by a prominent lady of our nation just before liquors came back after Prohibition, when she made a statement to young girls who would avoid being called prigs.

"She said: 'The average girl of today faces the problem of learning very young how much she can drink of such things as whiskey, gin and so forth and sticking to the proper quantity.' "

Reporters at once asked Governor Dickinson if his "prominent lady" was Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt. Of course she was; he had quoted her nearly verbatim from a radio address of Dec. 9, 1932. His predecessor, Frank Murphy, now U. S. Attorney General, promptly replied in Washington:

"Mrs. Roosevelt does not need any one to take up for her," and proceeded to attack Governor Dickinson for letting his (Murphy's) merit system die in Michigan.

Meantime a semi-serious movement was set afoot in Michigan to recall Governor Dickinson, as an embarrassing if not improper old bore. When the Governor heard about it, he surprised everyone by offering to sign the recall petition himself. When the recall's author (John B. Corliss of Detroit, onetime State legislator) dropped the plan, the Governor surprised everyone again by getting off one of the week's most arresting similes.

"Now, Johnny," he wrote, "the people around the Capitol are saying that I'll use the advice you gave so fast that it won't last long. Therefore, if you make a trip to the Capitol, pack your valise for some new and fresh advice, as it would be used as eagerly as an old maid chews an onion when she expects her beau."

> To the New York World's Fair last week went Miss Willo Sheridan, 23 and beauteously redheaded, of Detroit. As "Miss Michigan Aviation" she bore a letter from Governor Dickinson to Fairmaster Grover Whalen. She stepped up to bars, downed drinks, inspected a nude dove dancer whose act was gagged by a stooge called "Miss Reformer", declared: "I am very anxious to visit these dens of iniquity. Perhaps Governor Dickinson shouldn't have warned me against them."

*Besides Michigan, only two other States permitting local option (Montana and Arkansas) now contain not a single Dry county, township, village or precinct.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.