Show 0 national topics interpreted eted by william bruckart washington the information that we receive here in washington indicates that tho the up to the country at large la Is president rather sitting on tho the edge of 0 its chair waiting to see how president roosevelt Is going to play the hand he has received in Ws his now new deal which he asked equipped as he Is with the greatest powers ever accorded a president of the united states the situation surely la Is up to the president upon his administration tra tion his playing of the cards depends the result the success or the failure of the program it Is quite apparent since the smoke of battle cleared and congress closed up shop that the president suffered considerably from the riotous outbreak in the senate and the house over the veterans compensation pensa tion question I 1 mean that personally the president lost some of his prestige and his program so well planned was somewhat disrupted it must be explained however that the general principles which mr roosevelt laid down as the new deal have come through unscathed hence I 1 repeat that the chief executive Is confronted now only with the problem of making things move in accordance with the promised pledges in his campaign and to which lie he tried fried to adhere with all of the solemnity of an oath the president li Is wholly mindful of the responsibility he assumed fiss umed in asking congress in effect to make him general manager of about everything in the nation ne lie showed that quite unmistakably when lie he affixed his signature to the last grist of bills ground out by a rione none too will ing congress in a statement at that time sir air roosevelt Hoo sevelt described the national recovery public construction bill as the most important and far reaching legislation ever enacted by an american congress but lie he added that it if it were to succeed it demands the wholehearted whole hearted cooperation of industry labor and every citizen of tile the nation the president counseled patience as well as asked operation cooperation co and how low better could he show that the superhuman job lay ahead in two pieces of legislation particularly ticul arly has the president been given powers as wide as any ever accorded in wartime lie ile has been made master of our ag agricultural destiny in one and under the terms of the other lie he has assumed the job aa he be described it of putting the government in partnership with industry instead of the necessities of the situation in wartime however we find the work to be done Is that of encouraging consumption of foods and other commodities instead of rationing of foods and clothing and materials that might be needed for the forces at the front instead of specked up production we find the president with almost dictatorial tat orial lal powers to redu reduce ce production of agriculture the depression seems to have made things run backward 0 0 0 As the several agencies agen clea to administer the new powers are set up under the presidents possible guidance it ap difficulties pears more and more as though he Is going ko W meet with difficulty of a serious diameter character the president cannot keep his hand on the steering wheel of every one of the various machines that Is beyond human comprehension lie ho must delegate the work to others there are going to bo be many many mistakes these always occur it cannot be avoided but the president Is going to have to shoulder the blame for all of it what I 1 have been trying to present Is a picture of a situation in which tile the president Is the pivotal point let le t us pursue one or two of the possibilities the congress at the request of the president voted some in federal money as outright gifts to the states for relief when the president had the relief representatives of the states here recently lie told them that the federal government would not countenance the building of a lot of useless projects under the guise of reller relief mr roosevelt was emphatic in his declaration but the question one heard around hero here was how many of the state office lio holders lOers and politicians will see that such a policy is enforced another salient the industrial recovery section of tile the bill putting government into partnership with industry entails organized co opera tion of each of the numerous industries dus dust tries rles leaders in the individual lines of endeavor have been coming in here for conferences on codes of practice outwardly every one of them is sincere and be it said to their credit most of them are inwardly sincere in their effort to find some means to accomplish economic recovery but among those who are arc visiting washington for these conferences are some entirely willing to take advantage of circumstances or situations that will give their own firra firm or plant or factory an edge over their competitors it would seem difficult tor for that end to be attained where the conferences are above board and there Is a free discussion but the trouble Is that the reason some firms are larger than others Is that they have knowledge of a competitors weakness and dont believe tor for one moment that these same men will not watch for or such opportunities in framing the codes of practice codes of ethics really for tho the conduct of 0 bustness business that are to be employed in this new partnership arrangement 1 As a third example permit me ma to cite possibilities in the new farm mortgage arrangement that the tha president worked out to help debt ridden farmers far mora and congress enacted into law it provides that holders of 0 farm mortgages may under certain conditions exchange them tor for bonds of the federal land banks and allow farmers under prescribed conditions to borrow for refinance ing their debts aside from the mortgage no one doubts the sincerity of the program nor do does anyone question but that it Is needed and that it will be of 0 immense help to farmers yet attention was called during the debate in congress to loopholes through which a team and wagon can be driven As I 1 bald aid earlier observers here are convinced that mr roosevelt can check mal rely on ten sance in any of roosevelt velt tile the numerous directions if ions if he acts in time and with firmness ills loyal supporters insist he can and will sense any tendencies of that kind as they develop but ills his opponents or rather opponents of his programs claim he will be unable to discover them until the infection has become a festering sore I 1 do not propose to set down a conclusion respecting these arguments nor the probability or possibility that any of the conditions may eventuate sly my purpose solely Is to suggest what can happen and where we would be headed should the danger become real rather than theoretical I 1 called attention to the above fact that congress had somewhat disrupted the presidents program but that all in all it had given the president the widest powers ever ac corded in peace time the reason there was a breaking of party lines in congress was because some senators and representatives awakened toward the end of the extra session to the fact that they had voted away almost all of the powers they were supposed to exercise sir mr roosevelt was not entirely victorious in this battle lie ile succeeded far beyond expectations of many washington analysts but sore spots were created that are going to bo be hard to heal so it probably Is just as well that there will not bo be any meeting of congress again until january jannary 1934 the president can proceed to carry out the program he has in mind under authority which congress gave him biro upon his own responsibility 0 0 0 the roosevelt administration being now about tour four months old has disclosed s strong t r 0 n g keep public proclivities in tho the informed orned action ec tion of publicity tor for itself it seems to have adopted the title of a well known show of thee I 1 sing and the pee pul are going to be told in ill considerable detail of what is being done nearly all of the important branches of the government have taken capable newspaper men into their organizations that the proper supply of information may bo be made available to those writers who ile continue at their regular means of livell livelihood hood it has helped the unemployment situation among the writers anyway tor for where the government has hired men their places have been filled from among others whose salary checks have been small or have boon been missing altogether as a result of slack business for the tha newspapers administration leaders justify the policy on the ground that correspondents spon dents cannot be familiar with every phase of government and particularly ticul arly now that we have so many new laws and new activities resulting from the new deal the public is entitled to have the facts the leaders leader explain and the use ilse of high agh class newspaper men in publicity city jobs in the government there therefore ore constitute a service to the public c this attitude of 0 course b has s a basis in tact fact and there Is merit berlt in the argument but there la Is another side to the proposition it has been the record of other administrations that employed tin an array of writing talent that a considerable amount of plain unadulterated propaganda somehow managed to get into official statements and information released through these channels it Is the average writers function to report the news ile he or she cannot openly question the lie truth or the accuracy of an official statement consequently ly it if tile the statement be of 0 the propaganda sort there Is little the writer can do about it the decision has to be left to the editor of the th paper 0 1933 1023 costern newspaper union |