| OCR Text |
Show Merry-Co-Round By DREW PEARSON and ROBERT S. ALLEN WASHINGTON Vice President Gamer is still regaling close friends with stories of hi visit with President Roosevelt Just before congress con-gress opened. Best tele Csctus Jack tells is one in which he deliberately laid a trap for Roosevelt Roose-velt on the agricultural situation. He began by asking the president how his farm was getting along at Warm Springs, Ga. Roosevelt replied that it was doing fairly well. "What do you raise on it?" asked the vice president "Some corn, barley, little wheat, and soma eotton," replied the president. "Do you run it yourself or hire a superintendent?" superin-tendent?" "I hire superintendent." "Does he do s good job?" the vice president pursued, "Yes, he gets along pretty well," replied the president. "Well, now suppose you hsd a superintendent superinten-dent who didn't get along so well. Suppose he was slwsys quarreling with the hired hands, and they were always worrying you snd fighting fight-ing among themselves. You'd get rid of him, wouldn't you? You'd get another superintendent?" superinten-dent?" "Naturally," replied the president. "All right," continued the vice president, "you've got the biggest farm superintendent in the country right here in your administration a secretary of agriculture, and farmers all over tha country are sore st him snd complaining about him. It may not be his fault, but what we need is a new man, new secretary of agriculture." agri-culture." This aroused no enthusiasm from Roosevelt He msde no comment to Garner, but he does not plsn to fire Henry Wallace. Note: Garner haa told friends he has the highest personal regard for Secretary Wallace, feels he has tried hard, but thst the agricultural situation is extremely difficult and a new man ahould take on the job. Arms Exports Any doubt that U. S. firms are benefiting from foreign wars snd unrest was erased by the latest report of the munitions control board. It shows thst 60 per cent of our munitions exports are aircraft. Total value of munitiona Jicensedfor exportduring the year ending. No- vemberSO was M million dollars. Of -this, 8T million waa for aircraft or part. Heaviest business wss done by Lockheed-Aircraft Lockheed-Aircraft with a total of 24 million dollars. The next three did about 10 million dollar each Glenn L. Martin, Curtiss-Wright and, North American Aviation. The figures slso ahow that Latin-America Is arming heavily. Of the 12 countries taking mora than a million dollars worth of U. S. munitions in the year, four are Latin-American. A F L Dissenters Some A T L locals snd central labor councils coun-cils apparently don't agree with President Bill Green on opposing the reappointment of Labor Board Commissioner Donald W. Smith. Senators snd the White House sre receiving messages from labor unite in all parts of the country asserting they have nothing against Smith and urging that he be given another term. Some give credence to the story that Green got the two Smiths on the N L R B confused and wss really shooting at Commissioner Edwin S. Smith, whose term he thought was expiring. Edwin S. Smith is a frank believer in industrial indus-trial unionism and therefore anathema to A F L mogul. Donald W. Smith on aeveral occasions haa sided with the A F L against his two colleague. col-league. Green vehemently denies the alleged . . : i ..... w.. - i, -M h-.. it - rectly on Joseph Psdwsy, A F L general counsel coun-sel . . An hilarious angle i that one of the pro-Smith pro-Smith wires came from the Central Labor council coun-cil of Omaha, Neb., home town of Senator Edward Ed-ward Burke, No. 1 N L R B foe. At a banquet in Omaha last fall, attended by Smith. Burke praised him warmly and declared, "I will not only not oppose his confirmation, but I may even offer the approving motion." Burke wa speaking "off the record but present at the dinner wa Mace Brown, president presi-dent of the Omaha labor council. Brown took Burke at his word and the council came out for Smith putting Burke on the spot with the AFL brass hats with whom he hss been playing ball behind-the-scenes in the fight against the NLRB. Some of Smith's AFL support is coming from District of Columbia locals right under Green's nose, among them the Restaurant Worker' Work-er' union. Life Lin The flood of endorsement from th AFL rank-and-file haa saved Smith' scalp for th time being, anyway. Several weeks ago, Roosevelt indicated to senate leader he would not renew Smiths' recess appointment, but would lend up another name for the full six-year term. His indicated choice waa former Representative David Lewis of Maryland, a life-long laborite acceptable to both the AFL and CIO. But with AFL locals supporting Smith and with private word from certain senators that they had changed their minds about him, the president has decided to do nothing for a while and see how the sentiment crystallizes. A secret poll in the senate last week showed the line-up much closer than earlier in the month. Note: An undercover candidate for Smith' Job is Mrs. Cornells Pinchot flaming-haired wife of Pennsylvania's former liberal-Republican governor. Another name suggested to the president was William M. Leiserson, chairman of the national mediation board which administer admin-ister th railroad labor act. Copyright, 1939, for Th Telegram - .. |
