Show national topics interpreted Interpret ea ff na by william bruck washington the second session ol of the seventy second congress now pass ing into history A DO NOTHING ns as the last lame CONGRESS duck sessions Is cro crowning I 1 11 t s e I 1 H f with a newfound new found glory short sessions of congress in advance of a change la in administration are never expected to accomplish much but the current edition Is by all odds the winner when hen the race Is run towards the zero lero indeed those of ns its who are required not privileged by our duties to sit in the press galleries of the senate and the house day after day have indulged in a little game of attempting temp tim to locate some legislation which ight might b have bee been killed but was allowed to pass it just aint and to make the thing more ridiculous senate and house committees were excitedly holding hearings on this bill or that right up to the finish line taking testimony on account of which there Is always a tremendous stenographic bill in addition to the printing charges of thousands of dollars aud and inviting witnesses from here there and everywhere there was not a chance for those bills to be enacted into law and the bulk of the committee members admitted the fact privately cut but for the sake of the record they joined with others of their particular committee and went right ahead on their grand errand of futility the proponents of the hearings justify their course with the statement that they now have the data upon which to fashion legislation later they argue that the bulk of the le legislation hadis had something or other to 0 do with the whole program of lifting the country out of the mire of the depression pres slon and a survey shows this to be true in all respects it could be said therefore that the orgy of hearings in the short session was in preparation for greater things except that the records reveal new hearings always have been held beld regardless of what has transpired before when the tame same legislation Is introduced in a new session of congress whenever a congress ends all bills on the house and senate calendars of business die so the expiration of the second session Is also the expiration 0 of the seventy second congress and very every bill that was before either house or in the hands of 0 any committee of either house became null and void 0 0 0 no one seems to know why there vas as so much activity among the committees of the senate and house in the session it was apparent at the start and became more so as december berand and january passed and february rolled in that it would be a do noth lag ing session senators recognized the situation from the republican side came threats and jibes and jests that the th democrats were blocking anything mil and everything from file democratic side aide of the senate chamber came the same tune with just a slight variation in the chorus it was to the effect that the republicans had control which they did it if one counted as republicans public ans those who had bad deserted the republican candidate in the 1932 election for the support of sir mr roosevelt audi and so go it was in the house there was a clear democratic majority cut but something else was wrong in that body the plans of the leadership did not always carry and alq it if they did the legislation AJ passed only to run into the log jan jain in the senate some of the house democrats even went so far as to say their majority would not have held some of the legislation put through except for the knowledge that the bills would get snowbound in the senite senate A IV washington ashington correspondent for one of the great london dallies dailies cabled his newspaper that the american conka seems to be going in all dirac tills at the same time I 1 quote him bose there has been no more fitting description of the situation come to my T attention a mor it all it seems to me the clr cun Biance ought not be so BO surprising that t h a it the short WRITE YOUR session has done congressman nothing I 1 have inquired among a very ver real great number of senators and from leaders down to the newest and latest additions to the membership their answers to my question concerning the lack of tie ac varied so widely idely that I 1 concluded conda ded they must reflect minutely the feeling hell ng throughout the country retry ry one or nearly every one has had bad TOr arrles rles through the last three years find these worries have been be ac centuori in the last year the 0 own erg era 0 these worries whether they are important worries or just individual worrier sorrl looked around for some one to rocile their problems suddenly lenly they thought why there Is our congressman gres small or senator benator boand so III nig 1 mall from home has increased increase as the troubles trouble have bale grown not that he can do athing anything about most of the cases y yet i Is 1 is one D point upon which the spotlight focuses silently it is made to appear that senators and representatives bear go much bout the aad state of affairs UK suffering gartering the foreclosures fore closures the me bloed banks the bankrupt corpo rations radons the low price of 0 wheat of cotton of cattle end and hogs bogs and dairy products that they are actually going in all directions at the same time 1 I do not know whether that excuses them for their failure to get things done but assuredly it Is one of the factors in the situation which has been overlooked to a considerable extent 0 0 but as president hoover passes from the picture of national control it Is worth while HOOVERS to look back for TOUGH JOB a moment washington observers of all shades of opinion are coming around to the conclusion that whatever may have been his faults he has had one of the toughest jobs on his hands that ever was faced by a president especially was this true during the last two years of his administration during that time be h had a congress made up of a democratic house and a senate in which there never was a majority on either side on any question I 1 mean a majority that could be counted in advance and he was forced therefore to rio elo a lot of trading that mr hoover was able to get his reconstruction program as far under way as he did was due absolutely to the condition of the country and not through any control which he was able to exert As a matter of fact the congress for the last ten tell years has been an unbroken colt the senate during all of that time has been so close as regards the party division that a group of so called progressives progress ives have constantly wielded the balance of power being independent those 10 or 12 men on the republican side and a few less on the democratic side bide skated back and forth as their ideas dictated the result was a terrific casualty of well laid plans while the senate was in this condition the house was having its troubles and would have had more except for the extraordinary personality of the late nicholas cholas Ki longworth so it becomes rather obvious that whatever mr hoover may have lacked in political ability or acumen whatever were his shortcomings in statecraft or however many mistakes he made by refusing concessions the fact still remains that he held the job as president in a period x when lien few men would have succeeded for coupled with all of these factors there was and Is no measure within the power of the federal government to satisfy all of the diverse elements of these times the depression has made experience peri ence of bygone years as useless as the proverbial fifth wheel of the farm wagon in view of these facts therefore it ought to be a cheering prospect for mr roosevelt to NICE PROSPECT see not just a FOR ROOSEVELT working majority but a big majority of his own party in the congressional gress lonal membership when they get together the american government always has been a party government it thus has had to have a satisfactory majority of each house of congress of the same party as the president in order to work well mr Roose Roosevel veIrs ts first two years in the white house are assured of such a working control it if all who are la belled as democrats turn out to be democrats on the face of things it appears that mr roosevelt ought to be able to get whatever he be wants from the extra session and the succeeding sessions it Is a situation ideal for action there will be so few republicans that observers here fall to see how they can start any trouble even with the aid of progressives progress ives there have been suggest suggestions lons floating around to the effect that quite a number of trial SENDS UP TRIAL balloons h have a v e BALLOONS b been e e n sent up in the congressional atmosphere by mr roosevelt evelt while there la Is no method of confirmation available there has been one condition existing during the last three months that seems to confirm the opinion that the incoming president was testing out sentiment the condition la Is this mr roosevelt has kept hands off insofar as telling leaders of his party in congress what he wanted to have done in the short session he could have made his own pathway easier to travel after becoming president had he confided some of his views to the democratic leaders of the house houe and senate with reference to the suggestions of trial balloons however it la Is possible mr bir roosevelt did tell it a few of tits hla friends some of hla his ideas it has baa been observed here for example that possibly his suggestions were responsible for the consistently busy committees ily by introducing various and sundry pieces of legislation and holding hearings on them in committees it would be possible obviously to gain a perspective of the public attitude indeed such a period of experimentation would provide the new president with ith a most definite outline of what he be could expect in the way of a reception tor for his bis plans when lien they are formally offered to his bis own cengr congress ess 0 1111 1933 western newspaper union |