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Show National Topics Interpreted L by William Bruckart Washington. As the political pot begins to reach the boiling stage throughout the Red Hot country, It Is ap- f parent that, In- Campaign of fl dearth of "issues" over which candidates can harangue, there will actually be many of then). A few short weeks ago, political leaders here either boasted or moaned about the lack of Issues for the campaign, according ac-cording as the boaster or the moaner moan-er was a Democrat or a Republican. The Democrats felt President Roosevelt Roose-velt had been such a huge success that Republicans would not find a vital or vulnerable spot to attack. Republicans, Re-publicans, whether they said so out loud or not, felt much the same way. In the Interim, however, all of tills has been changed and there surely will be a red hot campaign during the coming summer and fall months. Looking over the situation, one sees as probable points of controversy contro-versy such things as the air mail contract cancellation ; the charges that the "New Deal" has overridden the Constitution of the United States; the devaluation of the dollar dol-lar and the profit-taking in which the treasury thereafter engaged through seizure of gold ; the encroachment en-croachment of the federal government govern-ment upon business itself through NRA and the scores of administrations administra-tions and commissions that have been set up; the proposal to revise the method of electing the President, Presi-dent, and the use of taxpayers' money in development of such plans as the Tennessee Valley authority, to mention a few of them. But it seems to me that the most Important issue of all is only now coming to the surface. Succinctly, it Is whether the voters desire to have the various New Deal items made a permanent part of our national na-tional government. It Is to be recalled that virtually all of the Items of the New Deal have been put through congress as emergency legislation. Some of them have been tested In courts on a constitutionality basis and have been upheld as emergency laws. But it Is necessary to think of the pronouncements by President Roosevelt Roose-velt almost directly asserting his Intention to make them permanent Otherwise, They would expire in June, 1935, a little more than a year from now. The expiration date furnishes the basis for the issue is-sue that appears to be so important impor-tant The 435 members of the house of representatives and the 35 senators who are up for election this fall will have been re-elected or defeated defeat-ed eight months in advance of the time when the decision must be made on continuation of the New Deal items that were enacted as emergency laws. Congress, made up of the re-elected or new members, mem-bers, will convene in the first week of January, 1935. That will be the congress to decide what the course shall- be. It cannot dodge the question. ques-tion. If the President requests that the emergency laws be made permanent, and he says he will, the new congress either will do his bidding bid-ding and re-enact the laws he desires, de-sires, or it will kill them off by its refusal to act. So the candidates this summer and fall must be prepared to answer an-swer whether they will support a continuation of the New Deal or will work against it That puts the question up to the voters. It is closely akin to a referendum. I have frequently expressed the opinion in these columns that things have happened so Pace Is rapidly under the Too Swift "New Deal" that most of us here cannot keep up with them. Frankly, Frank-ly, as an unbiased observer without political affiliation of any kind, I have been unable sometimes ' to reach a conclusion for myself regarding re-garding many of the New Deal projects. . They have been thrust upon us with such speed that it has been utterly impossible to study all of them. And that is the unfortunate unfor-tunate part of the forthcoming campaign. cam-paign. If we, who are in the front rows of the theater, are puzzled, what then must be the state of mind of those who are far removed from the stage and can judge only by the few favorable or adverse effects that reach them as individual citizens? citi-zens? There will be quite a bit of water wa-ter go over the dam before the votes are cast in November. It may be, therefore, that a better understanding under-standing of the plot of the play can be disseminated to the country at large. I hope so, because the decision de-cision to be made is momentous. I hope, too, that the campaign will be the hottest we have had in generations. gen-erations. Otherwise, the questions the Issues, will not be thorou-hlv debated. If they are not thoroughly debated, thousands upon thousands of voters are going to cast their bal lots as Democrats or Republicans just because they have always been Democrats or Republicans The coming campaign is not of that structure. The best Indication I have seen of a probability that all phases of the economic policies evolved from the New Deal will be thoroughly discussed is the greater freedom or debate in congress. All of us remember re-member how bills were sent to the Capitol a year ago and earlier in the present session of congress, and passed without debate, or with very little. There is still too little debate de-bate on much of the legislation, but that which is going on serves to enlighten en-lighten the public on the subject matter proposed. This ought to be. After all, congress and the administration ad-ministration are only representatives representa-tives of the people who pny the bill and whose citizenship make up our nation. Figures have Just been released here showing that the federal government gov-ernment has ap-U. ap-U. S. Payroll proximately 650,-. 650,-. n i. 000 officials and at Feak employees on its payrolls. That is the highest point reached since the post war days of 1920. It represents a good many hundreds of millions in dollars for salaries or wages. And the increase has been brought about despite the economy laws that were forced through congress last year, some 20,000 of the increase having occurred oc-curred since January 1, 1934. The figures I have given do not Include the members of the house and senate, nor their employees, nor do they include the scores of workers work-ers that make up the staff of the house and senate and the employees of the Capitol. The country's federal fed-eral Judges and their staffs are counted in the totals, but the army, navy and marine officers and enlisted en-listed men are not Included. Almost Al-most 400,000 men who are enlisted In the Civilian Conservation corps also are omitted. If one figures the average family as four persons, the federal payroll pay-roll provides a livelihood for at least -2,600,000 persons, although I am assured by the Civil Service commission that five persons is a better average than four, in which event government pay checks sustain sus-tain about 3,250,000. I do not make these statements in criticism. Ours is a vast country coun-try and a population of perhaps 127,000,000. But it seems Important Impor-tant to me that there should be such a vast number of persons living on government pay checks. I mentioned in an earlier paragraph para-graph in this letter that one of the Issues about Norris which argument Election Plan is likey t0 be heard in every state this fall is the proposal to revise re-vise the method of electing the President Pres-ident It is proposed, In effect, to amend the Constitution of the United Unit-ed States so that the method of electing a President of the United States would be accomplished by a division of electoral vote in each state proportionately with the division di-vision of political party strength as shown by individual ballots. For example, ex-ample, and as a better way of explaining ex-plaining what is proposed : a state may be allowed twenty votes in the electoral college. At present, all of those electoral votes are cast for the Presidential candidate who receives re-ceives the majority of the individual individ-ual ballots. It is a unit rule. Now, the Constitutional amendment that is projected would force a division of those electoral votes so that, assuming as-suming the party votes were so divided, di-vided, eight of the electoral votes would be cast for one candidate and twelve for the other. The authors of the proposed amendment are Senator Norris of Nebraska, and Representative I.en of California. It is the charge of the Republicans Republic-ans that the move is designed to give the Democrats perpetual control con-trol of the' Presidency. They are not making that charge out loud yet. They want congress to pass the resolution proposing the amendment amend-ment to the states, so the Republican Repub-lican speakers can argue about It all over the country this summer The point the Republicans are making is that the so-called solid South will continue to vote nearly all of Its electoral ballots for the Democratic candidate. The case of Mississippi is cited. It has nine electoral votes. The Republican party is virtually non-existent there The result would be that certainly eight, and maybe all, of the nine votes would be cast for the Demo-orat, Demo-orat, just as they are each four years under the present system. Add to the electoral votes of the South, the gains that would come from such normally two-party states as New York, and the Republicans assert that the result would be pe manent control of the government machinery by. the Democrats Representative Lea savs' how ever, that he thinks that a virulent two-party figh, woul( c every state In the Union. R . ' scntative Martin, a Mass,,ch.so t3 Kepubhcan, argues that the Hon, I. .cans "won't have a chance." Anu there Is your issue. by Western Nuvvspapw unloB- |