Show highlights how will america vote on november amov ember 8 what factors will influence that botin voting and how will vill the newly elected congress be have lave newsweek recently put these questions to about two score po lotical correspondents representing daily newspapers of all shades of political opinion and to eight seasoned professional politicians including jim farley and john hamilton their answers tabulated in a late issue of the magazine cast an interesting light on a topic which with the elections just around the corner is engaging great interest at the present time the democrats have the largest congressional majority in history there are followers of the donkey in the house as against 89 parti of the elephant and 13 members of minor parties there are 77 democrats in the senate as against 15 lonely republicans and 4 members of minor parties predict gain of 0 50 seats the answers of the correspondents responding to News weeks luery when averaged revealed that they believed the republicans would gain exactly 50 seats in the louse house the democrats would lose 50 and the representation of minor parties would remain at 13 the eight politicians replies when averaged forecast that the republicans public ans would gain 52 seats the democrats would lose 50 and the minor parties would lose 2 both groups forecast a gain of 4 seats in the senate by the republicans public ans at the expense of the democrats if these predictions are borne out the republicans will thus make a decent showing in the election a gain of 50 seats even in an off year election cannot be di scouted however there would be nothing about that to cause excessive back slapping in the GOP ranks it is a significant fact that when newsweek New sent a similar group of questions to a similar group of politicians and political correspondents last april the consensus was that the republicans would gain 60 seats in the house thus on the basis of the two seats I 1 of predictions the republicans have lost strength since spring g recession influence going into the second question I 1 what factors will influence the iha voters 20 of the men replying said that the recession would b be e the principal factor and 12 ga gave ve it as the secondary factor eleven listed the traditional mid term wing swing away from the party parts in as their first choice 6 gave democratic dissension and 6 the administrations fiscal policies it is is a notable fact that none gave ho he adm ni qt rations foreign policy as first choice and only one F cave ave it as e ond choice which indi alo flint in this field the president has gained almost universal favor in answering the third thid question how will the newly eleckel con gross behave 6 correspondents said that congress would behave about as it did last session 7 thought it would be independent and 7 more thought it would be somewhere between 0 a little more and extremely into i I 1 pendent the great majority majori tv 33 in number bimber forecast it would be a little more independent summing up on the basis of News weeks survey tho the elections will mark the start of a mild come back for the GOP but will still leave the democrats with tremendous nien dous majorities in both branch os es coneless Con eress will be slightly less lees susceptible to white house demands but there will be no revolutionary lutio nary change chance ane trends news front from the business front is iq almost uniformly good typical comment carne came recently from alfred B sloan head of general motors who said 1 I feel encouraged for the first time in many years that american business and industry are headed for a long uphill pull inasmuch as mr sloan has of often ton tended to be very pessimistic si in the past this is regarded as being of exceptional significance for about ten successive weeks the business indicators have shown steady advances this is largely due to major improvement shown by the automobile industry whose new models are now coming on the market in one late week car output jumped 50 per cent monthly shipment rate it is expected will soon be at the point construction figures continue to be another bright spot in the pic residential nonresidential non building far above cure uro with both residential and the levels ot ol last year stil more substantial increases in all kinds of building including public works are anticipated for winter and spring retail trade aich hung behind industrial production during most of the summer months is on the rise now with christmas prospects in most parts of tile the country good it is an interesting fact that the wage hour law came into effect without causing much of a ripple in business one reason is is that most large businesses are unaffected by the laws minimums inasmuch as they have long exceeded them another is that most business men believe that moderate forms of this nature are inevitable and desirable |