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Show KT XY ORBW PEARSON Truman-Hoover Plan DEGARDLESS of the G. O. P. defeat, it looks as if the Hoover commission on reorganization of the government was going to win out in the end. The plan was created by the "second "sec-ond worst congress" and sponsored by Senator Taft's spokesman. Congressman Con-gressman Clarence Brown of Ohio. Most Democrats figured the Hoover commission's work now would be junked. But it won't, and there are two good reasons why. One reason is Harry Truman. The other is Herbert Hoover. These two gentlemen have become be-come quite fond of each other. Despite De-spite the cracks he took at Hoover during the campaign (which came under the head of "campaign oratory"), ora-tory"), Truman really likes Hoover. And the feeling is reciprocated. Hoover had never set foo in the White House since the sad day he left It in 1933 until Truman Invited him back after Roosevelt's death. The fact that Truman called the ex-president ex-president in for consultation automatically auto-matically shielded him from the barbs and sting which the New Dealers had slung in his direction for 12 long years. No longer was Hoover their favorite punching-bag. Not only that but Truman had brought him before the p'ublio eye once again. And Hoover was so grateful he even requested re-quested the Gridiron club to let him speak. In order to pay special spe-cial tribute to his newfound friend. Truman, in turn, not only likes Hoover but plans to use Hoover's name to wrest from congress powers pow-ers which they refused to give Franklin Roosevelt. Congress Withheld Power Truman not only wants to be a good President, (but he is acutely sensitive to Dewey's charges that Washington needs a housecleaning. He has one in mind. But he has learned, far better than Dewey, that you can't clean house unless congress gives you the power to houseclean. FDR asked for housecleaning power, and Harry Truman, then only a junior senator, vividly recalls re-calls how the Republican press smeared it as the "dictatorship bill" and how a Democratic congress con-gress barely- passed a bill giving him severely restricted powers. So Truman wants to use Hoover's name to put through a new reorganization bill, and he wants Hoover's support in lining up conservative Republicans to back him. ' Furthermore, Truman believes that Hoover, like the supreme court, has read the election returns, and will not recommend anything which he, Truman, can't go along with. Since Hoover was also once a President, Presi-dent, conditioned by the White House background, they think somewhat alike on what is needed in the executive execu-tive branch of the government. There are only two living men who have any idea of the cares and wear and loneliness of the presidency. presi-dency. This bond makes the two men closer than party labels. That, perhaps, was one reason why Hoover Hoo-ver stayed out of the recent campaign. cam-paign. Furthermore, noover needs Truman even more than Trn-man Trn-man needs him. This is Herbert Hoover's last public service, ne has worked long, hard hours, and he wants this reorganization reorganiza-tion of government to be a final monument to his career. That is why he is leaning heavily heav-ily on Truman to rescue his last efforts from defeat. Unless Truman does so. and gives them a Democratic Demo-cratic label in the new Democratic congress, they will have no chance of passage. Little Aid for China Chiang Kai-shek's chances of receiving re-ceiving vast new appropriations from the incoming Democratic congress con-gress appear pretty slim, if energetic ener-getic Congressman Sol Bloom, new chairman of the house foreign affairs af-fairs committee, has his way. Quoth Sol privately to friends: "I'm not going to vote to give Chiang another gun or another dollar for war purposes until he cleans his own house. That Chinese government has corruption corrup-tion coming out Its ears and their 60-caIIed armr 1 the worst offender. "Furthermore," opined Bloom, "we ought to stop these phony American observers who go over to China for a month and then come back to tell us either what we already al-ready know about Chinese army graft, or only what Chiang wants us to know." ' Bloom was referring to William C. Bullitt, who can claim the unique distinction of having deserted desert-ed three American presidents and who, having jumped on the Dewey bandwagon, ducked off to China before be-fore the Truman administration could stop him. He was appointed by the Republicans before the elec tions as an "observer." |
