Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1920-06-08
A VAGRANT CONGRESS.

For it's superiority of political par tisanship and it's shortage of legis- lative artisanship the session of con- gress which has just adjourned stands unrivaled in our history, says the Commercial-Appeal It had more things of momentoas importance to do and did less probably than any other session on record One man oc- cupied more of its attention than did all the needs of all the other hundred odd millions of people in the country. The session began with concerted effort to overturn all. of the work done by President Woodrow Wilson at the Paris peace conference, and it ended with an attempt to restrict the constitutional powers of the same president in making appointments. In- stead of being absorbed in making a fight for the hnndred and more mill lions of citizens, the session was consumed in making fight against one man.
 It is no wonder, then, that Presi- dent Wilson should have despaired of getting any constructive measures for economic relief through the continu- ance of session which has been gov- erned wholly by political expendien- cy rather than lofty purpose to serve the public welfare" Nor it is in the least surprising that even Senator Walsh of Massachusetts should have denounced the inactivity of congress as presenting "a spectacle of indffer- ence that has seldom been surpassed since the courtiers of Louis XIV re- veled while the French peasants were eating grass"
 z When the republican party solicits the votes of the nation this fall its only reason for asking continuance of power can be to secure an indorse- ment of it's vagrancy. No real reme- { dial legislation dealing with the high cost of living has been passed, and the suggestion of the president for a revision of the tax laws as one means of lifting the burden of high prices has been ignored. Unnecessary delay in taking up the railroad problem and in attempting solution of the mat ter of a government-owned merchant marine have left disordered and cha otic situation. On top of this the sit uation for ourselves and for the world has been complicated by the faailure of the senate to either approve or to offer substitute for the basis of peace agreed upon by our own repre- sentatives of the other great powers of the world.
 In his speech in the senate the other day Senator Walsh reminded the coun- try of the fact that since last Octo- Der, when the Lever act was amend ed to include clothing, fertilizer and a few other things, only one measure that authorizing the sale of 5,OO0,OO0, barrels of government-owned flour, has been enacted with view to re- ducing food costs He showed that no action had been taken on the Ken yon-Kendrick and Gronna bills thata followed the suggestion of MT. Hoover and the federal trade commission for independent abattoirs and the separa- tion of packing houses and stock yards as means of reducing the price of meats, and told how several puni- tive measures against profiteers had been neglected. The do-nothing pol icy has left stranded the McNary bill, which would have compelled the stamping of the cost of manufacture upon the goods, whil numerous other beneficial measures had been neglect ed along with 200 or more executive appointments which remain unacted upon. Said Senator Walsh:
 On the 9th day of August, 1919, President Wilson, in his address to congress on the high cost of liv- ing, made six separate recommends tions for legislation to check profit eering. Two of these recommends. tions-the first for extending the lift