Show economic highlights 11 I 1 gh lights As the regular session of congress gets underway the most significant ant political occure occur occurrence nee ence la is the growing cleavage in the majority party no president enjoyed a longer or more complete comple tc honeymoon with congress thua did mr roose velt throughout his entire first term lie ho faced almost no opposition and for tho first year of big second term tho the opposition was scattered and ineffectual ills leaders lit in house and senate experienced little trouble in rounding up next to unanimous support for white house measures and deflecting congressmen were swiftly and definitely punished today D a different situation obtains with a substantial I 1 part of the democratic majority in open revolt against administration objectives and with a larger part in quiet tacit revolt during tile the latter part of the reg ular session and the entire special session the majority leaders worked d untiringly to heal wounds and bring the dissenters back into the new deal fo fold id and they failed almost completely this was waa especially noticeable in the senate where mr barkely successor to mr Koll met practically as much opposition among the members of his own party as among the republicans the open cleavage began with the supreme court bill but trouble had been brewing before and tho the introduction of this measure gave congressmen who had been growing restive and doubtful df administration policies the opportunity they had looked for to split with the whito white house the black appointment marked another major blow to the presidents power and prestige by october as aa mark sullivan pointed out recently it ib was fair to estimate that the democrats in congress opposed to much of mr Roosevel ts program were at least equal in number to those who supported his hia program today the latter group la is ly actually in the majority the last important white bouse must measure tho the wage and hours bill typifies the trend it Is no secret that every poablo tactic was waa used in an attempt to get this bill through in july before the business recession it passed the senate by a majority of exactly two to one in december a bill changed somewhat in wording but almost identical la p purpose was beaten ly by tho the house to and it was the democrats not tho the weak republican ranks which beat it somo some recent events havo have made the split all the more dramatically clar it Is a reasonable assumption that the majority of the democrats lit in congress i want to help and cooperate with business there la is a very strong bloc which wishes to put tax revision and friendly industrial du legislation first on the calendar while the president la not actively opposed to this hla his attitude la Is one of coolness and he be a apparently p patently ly believes that such legislation Is of minor importance and should be deferred the anti antl mon campaign under prider robert kobert jackson luau grates a now new drive against big business secretary ickes has made a speech which amounted to it i sweeping attack on oa big business and no one believes a cabinet member would make so vital an address without the permission of hla his chief in other words the administration seems to toe be bent on going ahead with its program whose cardinal point Is the radical revision of american industry and an increasing measure of government control over oer business many loading leading democrats aro are largely opposed to this and fool feel that it would very possibly force us into another long depression greater centralization of government with ing ng of democratic it if la Is over this point that tho the struggle for control of the democratic party between new dealers on the one hd hand and the conservative wing on theother the tho other Is now taking place the elections lato late this year will determine the outcome in the primaries la in many places new deal democrats will be opposed to anti new deal democrats la in a frank fight for power in the mea meantime nUme congress Con gresa will continue to be torn by the opposed schools of thought which means that there will be a great deal more talk than action and that major legislation Is likely to become stalemated stale mated in the business field there are some signs of betterment demand for durable goods has haa tended to increase christmas trade this year in excess of marking a slight advance for the country as a whole over 1037 1937 extremely interesting Is the rp port of the national unemployment me nt census made to the president on january 1 while the method of making this census Is certainly open to criticism it does constitute the first survey of the tEe jobless with any pretense to accuracy according to it 11 the unemployment ent total ranges between a minimum of and a maximum of STO about two million of these are women since that census was taken mid november unemployment has increased worst recent event in this field was the shutting down of a number of automobile plants plant |