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Show The U. S. Vice Presidency Called 'Unimportant' Job By BAUKIIAGE News Analyst and Commentator. WASHINGTON. Just what are the thoughts of a vice president of the United States between the time of his elec-i elec-i tion and the time he walks in and makes his opening address to the United States senate? "There can be great Judges, great governors, great senators, great representatives and great Presidents. A vice president may move into the presidency and be a great President. A great man may be vice president, but he can't be a great vice president, because the office in itself is unimportant. In my Judgment, the four most potent offices in the nation are: The President, the speaker of the house, the majority leader of the senate, and the chief Justice of the United States." These were the remarks of former Vice President Garner as quoted by Bascom Timmons in his book, "Garner "Gar-ner of Texas." When "Cactus Jack" gave up the speakership of the house to accept the vice presiaen-; presiaen-; tial nomination he called the of-; of-; flee "a no-man's ' land somewhere between the legislative legis-lative and the executive ex-ecutive branch." I don't know whether Mr. Garner Gar-ner was any more reluctant to accept the vice presidential presiden-tial nomination than was Alben i Barkley. Or than Governor Warren was in acceDtine BAUKIIAGE $ However, that was not entirely a flippant observation. Based on a long and successful political expe- rience he felt that although the four potent offices were the presidency, the speakership of the house, the majority leadership of the senate and the chief justiceship, a vice president might at any time succeed suc-ceed to the presidency and, therefore, there-fore, should be as carefully selected select-ed as the President. Many less experienced people in public life and out of it have urged that the number two man on the party ticket should be expected to carry out a real assistant president's presi-dent's job. Heaven knows that the President needs assistance and 1'.e fact is generally accepted that a leader who cannot delegate responsibility re-sponsibility should not himself be entrusted with it. In recent years when it was realized that the man in the White House had a literally killing job, efforts have been made to provide assistance. The project was seriously seri-ously undertaken, and perhaps if the theory set forth in the Brown-low Brown-low report of 1937 had been carried out as intended, the effort might have been successful. Originally it was intended that the presidential advisers shoul- be a group of highly paid experts, with no political affiliations affilia-tions or passionate devotion to any cause or crusade. The only passion they were supposed to possess was one for anonymity. But congress cut out the appropriation appro-priation for their salaries and the result was the selection of brilliant and devoted young enthusiasts who, whatever they may have done for the New Deal, never seemed to achieve the authority which would have made it possible for them to take over the responsibility for presidential decisions even in their own respective fields. Few could have been described as experts. Political Following Might Cause Clash A real assistant president would have to develop a certain following. follow-ing. That following could not help but take on the color of a political entity and, therefore, by its very nature, run head-on against the presidential authority itself. Warren was generally considered a wise choice as a candidate and a strong one. A leader in his own right. Many Democrats, thinking with the natural wishfulness to be expected, predicted that if he were elected vice president, the tail might wag the dog or, at least, might be inclined to register approval ap-proval at its end of the avenue while the head was growling at the other end of the avenue or vice versa. Garner broke with Roosevelt, not merely because he disapproved disap-proved of the third term, but because he was fundamentally opposed to many of the President's Presi-dent's policies, if not to his basic ba-sic political pholosophy. In the chamber of the upper house, Garner breathed a far more conservative air than that which circulated through the study and executive offices at 1600 Pennsylvania Pennsyl-vania avenue. And it was more, congenial to him. But when a vice president's political po-litical theories don't coincide with those of his boss in the White House, administrative bills are not likely to become laws. However, no such differences of opinion are likely to harass the Truman-Barkley team. The two men see pretty much eye-to-eye politically at least. And their respective re-spective jobs will be made easier by the fact that they have such tremendous Democratic backing in house and senate for the policies, both domestic and foreign, that they wish to promote. And although it may be hard for Barkley to accustom himself to the relative tranquility of the ice presidential pres-idential job, he doesn't have to worry about being lost in the shuffle. Not many former vice presidents presi-dents are remembered for statesmanship Calhoun is recalled re-called mainly because he quit the job after quarreling with President Jackson, and Thomas Thom-as R. Marshall for his clever crack that "what this country needs is a good five-cent cigar," ci-gar," Charles G. Dawes for his pipe, and so on. But Barkley has already made his mark. He deserves a pleasant four-year sojourn presiding over the upper nouse which he has served so ions and well. the Republican vice presidential nomination, for that matter. Warren, War-ren, in particular, put up a lot of sales resistance. Dewey during the night after his own nomination, conferred con-ferred with party leaders and came up with Warren's name for the vice presidency. Warren at first refused, but accepted ac-cepted after Dewey promised to give him cabinet status and administrative admin-istrative duties, if elected. As Dewey put it, he wanted Warren to have a "full partnership" in helping to run the government. Party loyalty was Alben Barkley's reason for accepting accept-ing the Job. He has been a hard worker in politics for 43 years. As senate Democratic leader for the past 11 years, he has faithfully steered administration administra-tion programs through the upper up-per house. Until the GOP captured cap-tured the senate in 1946, his power and prestige were immense. im-mense. He probably will be asked to attend at-tend cabinet meetings as former Vice President Garner was asked by Roosevelt. Before Garner accepted, ac-cepted, he made an agreement covering three things: "In the first place, in order to serve the President and the country coun-try in that capacity, I did not feel I should make a public statement, I also suggested that we agree during dur-ing my term in the vice presidency and association in the cabinet that I would not make any recommendation recommen-dation for public office unless I was asked for a recommendation. "The third part of the agreement was that I would not make any recommendation as to national policy unless I was asked." President Harding had extended ex-tended a similar invitation to his vice president, Calvin Cool-idge, Cool-idge, who didn't have to worry about the first part of the Garner Gar-ner agreement. According to the record he was not heard at these meet ngs, and at many of them he was not even seen. Vice President Dawes respectfully respect-fully declined the invitation to attend at-tend cabinet meetings. Curtis attended very seldom. Garner Didn't Get Far Out of Touch When Garner heard Mr. Dewey's statement regarding his conception of his running mate if he were elected, elect-ed, the sage of Uvalde said something some-thing to the effect that most of the time when he was vice president he was so worried that the Republican Repub-lican senators would put something over on him in case of a tie vote that he never dared to. get more than a block away from the Capitol steps. While it is quite true that the vice president is a member of the executive exec-utive branch of the government, his chief function is presiding over the senate and casting a vote like any other member of the upper house in case of a tie. If he were too closely associated with the executive branch of the government he might fail in his really important role, that of rallying rally-ing support for administration measures in his own party and doing do-ing what he can to keep the majority ma-jority party as favorably inclined to the White House as possible. Most vice-presidents with a sense of humor have been careful care-ful not to take themselves too seriously. Vice President Marshall Mar-shall (under Wilson) made a considerable contribution to the climate of Washington by in-Cu'g in-Cu'g ng in wisecracks and offering offer-ing a sharp contrast to Wilson's less frivolous utterances. Mr. Garner took a somewhat similar sim-ilar line when he said at the end of his first term: "The job is de-lighUul. de-lighUul. I like it But it is entirely en-tirely UErrv:r-tant." |
