Mr. Farley's letter to Senator Black is all that any supporter of the President in the air-mail scandals can desire. Along with the evidence submitted it forms a clear-out indictment of the aviation companies; various records introduced by Mr. Farley prove that representatives of the companies met and entered into arrangements whereby they agreed not to bid competitively for the air-mail contracts and by which they divided them among themselves. The contracts were then awarded to these companies in direct violation of the Act of June 8, 1872, which provides that "No contract for carrying the mail shall be made with any person who has entered or proposed to enter into any combination to prevent the making of any bid for carrying the mail," and "if any person so offending is a contractor for carrying the mail, his contract may be annulled." Since representatives of every company carrying the air mail were at these conferences, Mr. Farley had no choice in the matter; under the law he was required to annull the contracts, and in doing this he was merely performing his legal duty.
It is perhaps significant that there has been practically no editorial comment on this decisive victory for the administration. After waging a bitter battle for companies which are now proved to have been guilty of collusion and conspiracy, the papers might at least have the grace to exercise some of the "fair play" about which they set up such a lusty howl. Fortunately, the evidence is so incontrovertible that it does not need editorial elucidation; no one with the energy to look through it can fail to see the justice of the government's action. Even more damning than the actual evidence are the efforts which the air companies made to delude the public and destroy confidence in Mr. Roosevelt. It was a peculiarly underhanded trick, and is in line with the tactics used by men who, except for the leniency of the law, would be classed as common criminals; especially despicable was their use of Lindbergh, and it is by now apparent that that noble soul was either dishonest and hypocritical in his protestations or extremely stupid.
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The really regrettable feature of the whole affair is that the men involved can be punished only by annulling their contracts and thereby causing them financial loss. It does not speak well for our society that a man can rob the government of millions of dollars and get away scot-free, when others are sentenced to long terms for offenses which are slight by comparison. Still worse than this is the fact that those who have committed the worst crime of all, betrayal of a public trust, are apparently not even to be prosecuted; on Postmaster General Brown and his assistant, Mr. Glover, most of the blame for the whole affair must rest, for it was due to their connivance that the aviation companies were able to defraud the government; it would perhaps be enlightening to investigate the financial connections between these two gentlemen and their clients. At any rate, Mr. Brown may have the satisfaction of reflecting that his late colleague, the unspeakable Mr. Doak, is no longer without a rival.
