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Show Merry-Go-Round By DREW PEARSON and ROBERT S. ALLEN WASHINGTON The president ha the anti-lynching anti-lynching bill to thank for the senate agriculture committee's sudden burst of speed in rushing out a farm measure. He could have prodded Committee Chairman Chair-man "Cotton Ed" Smith until the cows came home and the mellifluous South Carolinian would have taken his own sweet time Smith had told newsmen it would be weeks before his committee would have the farm bill ready. But two days later, when the backers of the antilynching measure had forced it before the senate, "Cotton Ed" was warbling a different tune. "We'll have a bill out by next Monday," he announced, "even if it consists of nothing more than a blank piece of paper with a number. We can work out the details on the floor." Reason for this abrupt change was a barrage bar-rage of outcries from southern colleagues that Smith's delay on the farm bill was playing squarely into the hands of the antilynching bloc. Under the agreement made at the close of last session, the farm bill takes precedence over all other legislation. The minute it reaches the floor of the senate everything else, including the antilynch act, returns to the shelf. So "Cotton Ed's" colleagues put the heat on, reminded him that he was up for reelection next year, that his opponents would make the most of his farm bill delay and consequent indirect in-direct aid to the antilynching act. "Cotton Ed" is no dumbbell politically. He got this in a flash. . Sick Man Smith faces a very tough battle In South Carolina to hold his seat. Young Governor Olin Johnston is after his scalp and is accusing "Cotton Ed" of being an enemy of the farmer. He doesn't want marketing or production -control, would love nothing better than to take off his coat and cudgel the president But South Carolina farmers are overwhelmingly for control as Smith learned forcefully at a hearing he conducted in Columbia, S. C. last month. After a speech in which he took some left-handed left-handed slaps at regulation. Smith -shouted: "I want to know what you fellows Tight from the hoe handle think. How many favor compulsory com-pulsory control?" Out of 600 cotton growers present, S75 raised their hands. After the meeting. Smith dolefully told a friend: "I wasn't feeling very good before that hearing, but I'm a sick man now." The administration will depend on Louisiana's Louisi-ana's curly-headed Senator Ellender to carry the ball on the control issue. While Roosevelt and Secretary Wallace want a farm bill with teeth, they are chary about going too far. They favor a "middle-of-the-road" course, with cotton and tobacco under some form of compulsory control, and grains on a voluntary basis. The chances are strong that this is the kind of a measure congress will pass. Not Coming Justice Hugo Black has declined an invitation invita-tion to be a Gridiron club guest at its annual dinner next month. The Gridironer will put on a skit satirizing the Alabaman's one-time klan membership. Whether Black knew this when he declined is not known, but as an old Washington hand he doubtless suspected he would be put on the griddle. . Historic Mistake John L. Lewis was chatting with his friend. Coal Commissioner C C. Smith, about the trials and tribulations of the bituminous board. "What's this I hear about you folks staffing the Bluefield (W. Va.) office with men backed by the operators?" Lewis asked. "There isn't a thing to that story, John," re- Jilied Smith. "It's just another one of the un-ounded un-ounded tales going around about us." "Well, you will admit Clarence," Lewis said, "that the commission has made some mistakes in personnel." Then, before Smith could answer, Lewis laughingly added, "But that's only human. I guess I made the biggest mistake in the whole history of the United States." "What was that?" "When I supported Rush Holt for the senate." Holt was elected chiefly through the support of the United Mine Workers. Now he has become one of the bitterest union foes in the senate. 000 United Air Lines has refused to accept a post office department offer to settle a S3.000.000 airmail air-mail cancellation claim and is pressing its demands de-mands before the U. S. court of claims. Representing Repre-senting the firm ia Bruce Kremer, one-time Montana Democratic national committeeman 1 and intimate friend of Attorney General Cumin Cum-in ings. The White House still is receiving mail advising ad-vising the president how to w.m his supreme court battle. o e o Agriculture department experts predict no real relief from high meat prices before 1939. It will take that long, they explain, before cattle and hogs will reach predrouth levels. (Copyright, 1937, for The Telegram) ; s. |