Show manpower draft situation 0 Is nation s no I 1 problem political shadows darken vital issues confronting every family national service act subject to debate by analyst and commentator pervice ervice union trust nuil divic washington D C today a whole year stands between election day and the capital but the shadow ol of coming events cast their shadows before them like the dark patches on the ground when studding scudding scud ding clouds cross the sun the washington scene Is flecked with politics and there are issues this time which reach right into every home touch the family where there are men and women 0 of fighting or working age reach into the larder and the th tee lea box it Is hard for anyone to see these issues clearly because of the shadow of politics there Is the draft the manpower question closely interwoven with it there Is food its production its distribution trib ution rationing and prices it takes a keen eye to see where merit ends and politics begins when senator wheeler fathering the determent deferment of draft tor for pre pearl harbor fathers said the defeat of his measure would be a blow at morale and the nations children there was no reason to believe that he was in I 1 sincere certainly there was no insincerity about the army and navy bonds who opposed the measure explaining pla ining that there were just so many men ot of fighting age and physique and that a certain job had to be done gut but to a reporter who has been reporting the doings ot of mice and men for more than a quarter of a century I 1 could not help suspecting tome some of the folk who battled ed over this legislation what a juicy morsel morael it wits was for the vote genterl true the wheeler bill aimed to exempt those who with no foreknowledge of war produced families without a thought that babies to quoted quote the ancient wheeze like weather strips could keep beep them out of the draft but what about other fathers quite as aa pearl Har borish in their paternity whose offspring sprang after the deadline simply sim pl Y because b use time or op po rr fi y ald hail un fe d i presidents dents views there was no doubt what the prest dent thought when he talked about men with children who were doing no useful thing and who might tf if they wished immunity from military service easily get into a war industry they one opponent of the tha wheeler bill said were told that they had no responsibility re in the war effort at home or at the front of course urse this argument would not hold if the national service act that nightmare ot of politicians were passed the army wants it sena tor austin and representative wadsworth who introduced it and their followers toll want it atthe the white house has never spoken but ot of late is silent client when it Is said to be willing now politics long before the election winds started blowing has dulled meres mena minds on that subject manpower commissioner mcnutt has been willing but not emphatic perhaps you never read tho tha contents of a recent statement issued through the office of war information Ir from the Alan manpower power commis blon I 1 have treasured it and want to quote its first sentences better utilization of bur work force Is the primary means of getting the manpower needed to supply productive establishments of the nation you and I 1 can understand that despite the fine tour four and five syllable derivatives labor reserves in shortage areas have been exhausted and the common lack of community services and facilities in such areas usually makes it impossible or undesirable to bring brine in more workers also quite understandable on a little thought but would it make you rush out and hunt for a defense job where chete has been rapid mobilization t ot of manpower utilization Is not net always at its highest level this Is not necessarily a reflect reflection lon on employers pl when a plant has expanded its labor force several times examples of ineffective use of manpower are arc certain to follow there li Is a careful exposition of the situation for or youl now what could the man who wrote that be running tor for somewhere where there were a lot of toes to be stepped on it would seem tor for he be certainly waa pussy pussyfooting looting among the poly syllables situation Is serious and yet the manpower situation I 1 Is serious it is so serious that it ha has long worried war mobilization director byrnes indeed that Is s why he called on his friend bernard baruch banich the unofficial older elder statesman of the administration to advise him baruch advised him all right not wisely perhaps from a political standpoint and too well for the sensitive olfactory nerve of republican senator Vanden Lerg who used to be a newspaper man himself the wily michigander scented a rodent had he not you might never have heard barucho Ba words of wisdom among other things mr baruch commented on hoarding labor I 1 had heard of that subject in indignant letters from the wives of workers who wrote that their husbands were paid to loaf and senator wheeler made similar charges and recalled that senator truman and N his doughty investigators had found a lot of hoarding of labor with as a wheeler put it employees falling over each other and being paid for on the cost plus basis testimony before congress had instated insisted that there were no cost plus contracts under which labor hoarding would be profitable that was when arose and waved the baruch report which he had demanded and finally received froni from mr dyrnes byrnes mr read mr ba words on the subject of cost plus the government pays all the tha costs whatever they are since the government is tooting footing the bill there is no incentive for the manufacturers to economize in the use of ma aerial facilities or labor more workers are hired than needed workers stand idle it costs the manufacturer nothing much labor Is wasted political breezes this Is on lyone rone item in the tha long lone and forthright document n which has ha had considerable publicity city perhaps it might have been neglected if it had not been blown into the publics face by the political breezes stirred up by mr perhaps MT mr might not have hava generated those breezes it if mr baruch had not been pretty c critical of go government agencies that competed for po power perhaps mr baruch would not have been so frank if he had not thought that as he requested the report was not for publication mr byrnes when he sent the doc ament to dear van at the batters lat insistence said that it wai was not in tended derided for other than private use but that it was a splendid argument tn in favor of action taken by the war Mobil mobilization izat ion committee in regard to the labor situation on the west coast and he requested that it be placed in the congressional record which it was and so there it was for all to see with mr baruch presumably still the best of democratic pals but also the severest of critics lambasting lam basting jealous government agencies and calling manufacturers manufacture era and not productive establishments and apologizing for or nobody business men or bureaucrats thus the breezes blow sometimes in one direction tome some times in another though of course Inc inflection in election lection years the outs usually blow the loudest they are the prosecuting attorney and the ins are the defense however there is this satisfaction blow where it will it is art an ill III wind that blows nobody good |