The Evening Star. THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1937. HEAVY-WEIGHT BOXING.

Evening Star, Issue 22683, 24 June 1937, Page 10

The Evening Star. THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1937. HEAVY-WEIGHT BOXING.

Two important questions—important to sporting circles at any rate —arise from the heavy-weight boxing bout staged at Chicago between James Bradclock, who became world champion through his defeat of Max Baer, and Joe Louis, the negro fighter whose dynamic ring tactics have captured the American imagination. Tho first of these questions will have to bo considered chiefly by officials closely associated with the “ noble art,” and should in no way have trenchant repercussions among tho laymen and infidels with no knowledge of pugilism. By knocking out Braddock has Louis legally established himself ns world champion? If so, what will Max Schmeling, the German champion, have to say? Herr Hitler, General Goering, Dr Goebbels, and possibly Dr Scliacht are quite definite on the point. It was announced from Berlin dictatorial quarters some time ago that Schmeling was the world’s heavyweight champion and it is certain that all Germany will bo glad to hold that view. Schmeling beat Louis last year in America and later returned to New York to make arrangements for a title bout with Braddock. In the circumstances no one can deny that he was entitled to it.

But the wheels of boxing revolve along an erratic course in the United States. Politics, in which the contentious subject of Nazism was introduced, took a hand in the game, the result being, it is thought in authoritative quarters, that the German was palpably side-tracked. If newspaper reports from America are to be accepted without reservation, the battle of words ended in victory for Schmeling, who is stated to have won a court action germane to the situation. The visitor, therefore, had reason on, his side when he returned to Germany claiming to be the logical champion and accepting his Fuhrer’s blessing. In the meantime a difference of opinion arose in the United States. The New York State Boxing Commission, the most powerful body of its kind in America, recognised Braddock as the champion but did not regard the Braddock-Louis encounter as a championship fight. The bout had to be held in Chicago under a different Eegis. Now that Braddock has been beaten can the commission still recognise him as champion, even though it did not admit that the title was at stake in Chicago P This is just another of those ludicrous situations which have developed in the United States during recent years. Who is world champion ? Is there to be one in Europe and another in America? The British Boxing Control Board, in the course of its negotiations with the corresponding German body, has been asked to recognise the Scbmeling-Farr fight as a world title affair.

The second question, ■ unfortunately, is not confined in such a • domestic manner to boxing administration. Will the triumph of Joe Louis excite the negro population of America to racial demonstrations reminiscent of the serious disorders that characterised the rise to fame of Jack Johnson? In those days- “ white trash” were subjected to so many -impertinences, the result of a suddenly acquired negroidal feeling of superiority, that the search for a “white hope” to thrash Johnson became positively frantic. America, or, for the matter of that, the rest of the world would not welcome a repetition of this unhappy state of affairs. So far the Harlem district of New York has been on its best behaviour. Perhaps it has worked off its available ebullience over the amazing developments which recently occurred in connection' with Father Divine and Faithful Mary. Also, the demonstrations in Chicago’s South Side appear to have been more good-natured than revolutionary. Present indications point to a more peaceful aftermath than was the case in the Johnsonian era. But where racial rivalry is concerned one can never be sure of anything.