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Show MARQUIS CH1LDS Conservatives Would Profit By Hannegan's Retirement WASHINGTON If there U one person out of official Washington Wash-ington who really ia enjoying this holiday interlude, it isRob-ert isRob-ert IE. Hannegan, the Democratic Demo-cratic national chairman and postmaster general. Shortly after the Republican landslide In November, Hannegan Hanne-gan I went to Florida In a state bordering on exhaustion. It was! considered certain that he would step out of at least one of his Jobs the party chairman-ship. chairman-ship. In most of the columns written about Hannegan at that time a requiem note crept in. But rest and the Florida sun have done wonders for him. Those who have been to see him recently report he is rested and relaxed, and that a coat of tan has made him look younger than his 43 years, whether he will ' resign the chairmanship is still an open question, according to those who have talked with him; I Depends on Doctors White House in 1933. from the -outset of his career he was a I highly efficient and hard-work- ; lng organizer. But Farley broke with Roose- velt before the 1940 convention. I He did not go along with third term. Nor did he take any part in the effort to elect FDR to a -fourth term; Tel the change la ; generalship seemed to make lit tie or no difference In the oat- " come.' While Roosevelt's popular ma- ; jorities were not as large as . they were in 1936, he was over- 1 whelmlngly reelected both In -'40 and '44. The chairman In '40 was Edward J. Flynn. In '44 it was Hannegan. Tou can argue, of course. that, with the war on, nothing ; could have prevented Roosevelt's reelection. But If you use that ; kind of argument, then you can also make a case for saying that ' with . the war ended nothing , could have prevented the Dem- ocratlo defeat of last Nov. & ' Matter of Tides ' Tie answer will depend on what his doctors tell him when he returns to Washington around Jan. 15. A great deal will depend on whether it ' la judged necessary, for Hannegan to undergo an operation to relieve re-lieve the high blood pressure from which he suffers. If Hannegan Han-negan decides to keep the post of chairman, he will have the backing of President Truman. This would be bad news to Hannegan's critics and enemies. They have assumed that he would retire for reasons of health, probably retaining the postmaster generalship, and, thereby make way for a far more conservative regime at Democratic headquarters. The other day in New York one of Hannegan's predecessors In his two jobs spoke about the need to get new life Into the direction di-rection of the Democratic party. James A. Farley, now a successful success-ful corporation executive, seemed to be hitting at Hannegan.) Hanne-gan.) By implication he was saying say-ing that if only a different type of direction had prevailed last fall, the outcome would have been different. ' ' I Interesting Question This, it seems to me, raised an extremely interesting question. How; important is the part played by the professional politician poli-tician in determining the outcome out-come of major elections. Farley's own career is a significant sig-nificant case history that throws some light on this question. Few would dispute big Jim's right to the title of ablest politician of our time. His far-reaching activity ac-tivity did a great deal to help put Franklin D. Roosevelt in the This Is another way of say ' lng that larger forces a pe- t riodlc shift in the tides. of op In- -Ion which may be geared to eco- nomie change determine the outcome. The professional poll- ' Ucian can help or hinder these ' forces, in my opinion, but he cannot create them. ' Hannegan had some severe , handicap. He antagonised some of the president's intimates. If en such as John W. Snyder, now . secretary of the treasury, were constantly urging caution and a retreat from the Roosevelt poll- cies. Hannegan's advice ran directly counter to this. He was ' for a bold approach, supporting ', the Roosevelt New Deal. The result was a conflict of fatten-tlon fatten-tlon and objective within the president's official family. One reason that many people would like to see Hannegan oat of the chairmanship Is because , they regard him as standing for the Roosevelt wing of the party. -There are, certainly, valid crit- ': icisms of the job he did in the last campaign. But if Hanne- ' gan does retire, it win be a ' cause for rejoicing among those ' who want to restore the Democratic Demo-cratic party in the normalcy of southern conservatism. Copyright. IMS, by United , Feature Syndicate The history ot American poll- ' tics shows that the party that loses congress in the off-year elections loses the next presidential presiden-tial election, but we very rarely 1 have voted a party out of power if the country ia prosperous at. the time of the general election. James A. Farley. H MMM |
