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Show NEWS BEHIND THE NEWS Written for The Telegram By Ray Tucker W A S H I N GTON-Club-and- cloakroom speculation on the 1940 presidential lineup has shifted strsngely In the last fortnight. President Roosevelt's rightist gestures ges-tures and coalition confabs both feeble thrusts as yet have definitely defi-nitely influenced advance political politi-cal thinking. Eventa have moved faster than even Mr. R. anticipated, for a while ago he figured there would be four partiea in that year the new deal, a conservative Democratic, Demo-cratic, a Republican and a left-wing left-wing movement Now the amart railbirda look for only three, unless un-less the scene changes radically under the impact of unseen foreign for-eign and domestic forces. Best gueas today is that the new deal will go to bat with a man like Assistant Attorney General Robert Rob-ert H. Jackson at the plate; that the coalitionists will occupy the visiting team's dugout with a Byrd-Burke-Vandenberg type of leader; that progressives will clamor for major league recognition recogni-tion behind "Young Bob" La Fol-lette. Fol-lette. The old-fashioned Dems have given up hops that they can steal the party organization from Mr. Roosevelt, or kidnap him back from the "brain trusters," so they're on the warpath for a new hero. The liberals Norris, La-Cuardia, La-Cuardia, La Folletta permitted Mr. Roosevelt's personality to sway them from their long-time dream of a permanent organization. organiza-tion. Now they're beginning to doubt the wisdom of the wait-awhile strategy. The SO-odd house-senate members mem-bers who banded together loosely as a new deal bodyguard can't find ths man they're supposed to protect Franklin D. Roosevelt. Organized to save him from sabotage from Inside and outside party ranks, they're afraid they'll have to save him from himself. The bungling leadership of recognized rec-ognized bosses in both chambers originally inspired their night classes in loyalty to the White House. The leaders' Indifference to the four-point program was a contributory factor. Ths mavericks furnished the drive that wrested the wsge-hour bill from the recslcitrant rules committee, com-mittee, and they rounded up the votes for the farm measure. Their credo also dedicates them to such issues as plentiful relief, public power, conservation, antibigness taxation. Oddly enough, they have enjoyed en-joyed no support, moral or political, po-litical, from the man in the White House. He haan't indicated that he knowa of their existence. His probuslness passes worry them, and some day they may descend on the mansion to remind Mr. Roosevelt he was the original new a dealer, and to ask where he's hiding hid-ing the deck. They complain that they can't play without cards and a set of instructions, and it's too late to learn a new game. The breakup of party and geographical geo-graphical alignments on Capitol Hill confuses and repudiates the wisest political prophets. It is one of the most spectacular but unsung developments at the present pres-ent session of congress. For yeare corridors and cloakrooms cloak-rooms have hummed with predictions predic-tions of an alliance between the supposedly sgrfcultural south and west against the industrial north and middle west. It was thought, superficially, that Iowa Republicans Repub-licans had closer bonds with Democratic Georgians than with brethren in New York, and that they should sit in the same legislative legis-lative pews. The half-hatched scheme has exploded violently. On two major measures agricultural and industrial the north and west have lined up against the south, which does not want compulsory control of crops or pay envelopes. It will probably be the same on power and government reorganisation. reorganis-ation. Ironically, It's the responsibility of a few southerners to jam through F. D. R.'s program against the wishes of their political po-litical klnfolk. It's as if Robert E. Lee had remained in the federal fed-eral army when Virginia broke away from Washington. The south still has the leadership Bankhead. Rayburn, Garner, Barkley but the other fellows have the votes. Loyal Rooeevcltlans' complaints com-plaints against the brand of leadership lead-ership on Capitol Hill have become be-come so violent that the mutters must tingle the esra of Messrs. Barkley and Rayburn. The rebuffs which house bosses have suffered are almost unprecedented un-precedented for a chamber pre-dominatly pre-dominatly Democratic. They couldn't or didn't prevent their gang'a forcing the Ludlow antiwar anti-war amendment and the wage-hour wage-hour bill out of the gss chamber. cham-ber. In the former case they didn't discover ths signatures were dangerously numerous until it was too late. Nor did they realize that the petition was aimed at the rules instead of the judiciary committee, com-mittee, thereby insuring prompter action on the floor. It was an example ex-ample of supreme sleepiness. On the farm and antilynching measures meas-ures Senate Leader Barkley stood aside helplessly; his plight was pitiable. Mr. Roosevelt's closest friends concede that he has nobody but himself to blame. He Intervened on behalf of Mr. Barkley, a lea . forceful, skillful snd popular figure fig-ure than rival Harrison, and ha slightly supported Mr. Rayburn, a less driving, dominant fellow than Candidate O'Connor of New York. F. D. R. "planned it that way." Faint traces of a Roosevelt-LaGuardia Roosevelt-LaGuardia iclnesa have frigid-aired frigid-aired several politicos who can't stand below-zero weather in a reelection re-election year. Senator Robert F. Wagner has told friends in confidence that he may not seek his seat again when his term expires next year. The New York statesman has undoubtedly heard warnings that the American Labor party may nominate a man against him in retaliation for his campaign against the mayor. In a three-cornered three-cornered contest "Bob" might encounter en-counter trouble If the G. O. P. chose a popular fellow. He also knows the LaGuardia ns resented his intervention more than they did National Chairman Farley's; the tatter's position forced him to be a regular. Mr. Wagner's predicament ex-em ex-em plifiea the tragic unfairneas of politics. No senator has accomplished accom-plished more for the working-man, working-man, yet they might easily desert de-sert him for their new romantic hero Mr. LaGuardia. He had to support Candidate Mahoney for friendship's sake and the lifetime debt he owed to Tammany. Yet loyalty may not save him if his tide is running seaward. It'a too soon to count "Bob" out. but he may be the loser by a technical knockout. Representative Jack Nichols' colleagues are chuckling over his political resourcefulness, and memorizing his Ingenuity for future fu-ture reference. The Oklahoman discovered on a recent trip home that he was losing los-ing ground rapidly that rivals were growing on every bush-that bush-that 1938 might pull down the curtains for him. Straightway ha composed a speech entitled "Farmers still have faith." and postcarded it throughout his district dis-trict It reads like an inspired prayer, especially the last paragraph, para-graph, in which he lists the nation's na-tion's greatest need as "an old-fashioned old-fashioned revival of real religious worship ths spiritual blessings that this would bring to prevent us from falling back into the depths of despair." Newspspers reprinted It. mothers moth-ers read it to their children at evensong, ministers made it the text of sermons. Now they're talking of running Jack for senatorfor sena-torfor president for anything! (Copyright, 1937, for The Telegram) |