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Show WEEKLY NEWS ANALYSIS BY JOSEPH W. LaBlNE Congress May Out-Spree FDR In Boosting Defense Budget, Despite Election-Year Fears (EDITOR'S NOTE When opinions are expressed In these columns, they are those of the news analyst and not necessarily of this newspaper.) D.i.n.A . Wastcrn NautniirMr fTnlrtn I.MH.aBMw vcica."'iu Wj ........ CONGRESS: On Guard (?) Biggest item on the congressional agenda was Franklin Roosevelt's $ii,242,000,000 budget, which the senate sen-ate voted to investigate via a joint super-committee. But there was more talk than action. While congressmen con-gressmen fumed to bury their teeth in the $1,800,000,000 defense program, pro-gram, major budget item, they also hesitated, watching developments abroad. In an election year there must be economy talk, but 1940's congress may end up by spending more on defense than even the President Pres-ident asked. low the fortification plan. (See ASIA.) Appropriations, under Colorado's Alva Adams, wanted to junk the emergency defense fund and probably prob-ably would. What would eventually happen, most observers were willing to guess. Investigations will probably string along several months until Europe's war gathers steam. Then, overnight, congress will shoot the works and forget that it's an election elec-tion year. Also in congress: I, The house passed Rep. Joseph I Gavagan's (D., N. Y.) perennial anti-lynching bill imposing fines on county or state officials who fail, by negligence, to prevent mob killings. The bill went to the senate, which customarily defeats it, two years ago by a South-sponsored filibuster. C. The house ways and means committee com-mittee heard Secretary of State Cordell Cor-dell Hull defend his reciprocal trade act, which expires June 12 unless renewed. Score: Ten Republicans against it, most of 15 Democrats in favor. But on the door it will face greater opposition, probably being renewed only on the condition that the senate shall ratify all pacts. Meanwhile doughty Sen. Bill Borah There were probes aplenty. Even though the house might kill that unprecedented un-precedented super-committee, four more groups were hard at it. The house naval affairs committee began be-gan by slapping newly appointed Navy Secretary Charles Edison. The slap: Pigeon-holing a proposal that the President be given peacetime peace-time power to commandeer factories, facto-ries, materials and ships. Next came Admiral Harold Stark, chief of naval operations, who opined (1) that the U. S. now has no two-ocean of Idaho inferred that the breakdown break-down of trade talks with Argentina and Uruguay was a plot to win continuation of the act. C Adolph Sabath of Illinois, chairman chair-man of the house rules committee, said he opposed any more money for Martin Dies' un-Americanism committee. Reason: "After all, Mr. Dies has had enoueh publicity ? t ' I uj l,,wiii-y,---i?i,in hit, -Tii itti Lm xmtuwi hm for any and all purposes and perhaps per-haps he will be still in demand for public speeches and writing magazine maga-zine articles." ASIA: Naughty U. S. By mid-January the U. S. was giving Japan so much trouble that the cabinet of Gen. Nobuyuki Abe was ready to fall. It was not enough that Tokyo's emissaries had been unable to win a new trade treaty replacing the pact being abrogated this month by Washington. Japanese also learned: (1) That the senate foreign affairs af-fairs committee was talking again of imposing an embargo on war material shipments to Japan. Leader Lead-er of the move is Nevada's Sen. Key Pittman, committee chairman. Such IDISON (LEFT) AND VINSON The committee was jealous. navy, and (2) that 52,000-ton battle-sh'ps battle-sh'ps wouldn't be a bad idea. (Now building are two 45,000-tonners, with tvo more provided in the current bill.) Chairman Carl Vinson stepped in at this point with the week's No. 1 surprise, a proposal to boost naval strength 25 per cent the next three years through a $1,300,000,000 added add-ed appropriation. With this suggestion sugges-tion Admiral Stark agreed in toto. Another house committee, appropriations, appro-priations, showed neither spend-thriftiness spend-thriftiness nor laziness in okaying $267,197,000 for immediate emergency emer-gency defense (army, navy, coast guard and FBI). The committee simply knew not where to turn. But if the senate approved this fund the current year's defense bill will be higher than next year's. Next day, when Carl Vinson learned the appropriation ap-propriation committee might okay another $4,000,000 to fortify Guam, he boiled over. That question, he insisted, should first come to his attention. at-tention. Said he: "This committee (naval affairs) is jealous of its prerogatives." Two senate committees meanwhile mean-while got up steam. Foreign affairs af-fairs looked suspiciously at Guam, wondering how Japan would swal- cj SCHUNGKINOgl WANG'S EMPIRE (IN BLACK) What would an embargo do? a step would sound the death knell of Japan's war in China. (2) That Washington was again laiKing aDoui a Dig navy (See C()-CRESS). C()-CRESS). The Guam fortification plan, pigeon-holed last year, when Japan objected, was making news again. Tokyo papers were warning warn-ing that the U. S. would soon be No. 1 offensive-defensive power in the Pacific. But the public, suffering from an internal stomach ache, was unexcited. It seemed likely, meanwhile, that the Abe cabinet's sole accomplishment accomplish-ment and last act would be to launch the puppet government of Wang Ching-wei over Japanese-dominated sections of China (see map). But if the U. S. embargo falls, lack of military supplies will make it hard to preserve what Japan has already won. PEOPLE: Outstanding Stassen At Chicago, the U. S. Junior Chamber of Commerce chose Minnesota's Min-nesota's G. O. P. Gov. Harold Stassen Stas-sen as 1939's most outstanding young man. C. Off to Australia from Shanghai went Clarence E. Gauss, U. S. consul con-sul general, just named the first American minister to Canberra. C. At Washington, chief G-Man, J. Edgar Hoover, told a house committee commit-tee why he needed a special $1,475,-000 $1,475,-000 fund to fight saboteurs and spies. Revelation: Plans for an army bomber were stolen from an aircraft air-craft plant, but recovered by FBI. L At Baltimore, dethroned gangster Al Capone left the hospital where he has been treated for a brain ail-men'., ail-men'., taking up residence in a quiet, fashionable section of that city. C Introduced by Tennessee's Democratic Demo-cratic Rep. Kenneth McKellar was a measure to cancel the rest (about $8,000,000) of Finland's war debt |