Evening star., 1923-09-22
PRESIDENT EAGER
TO SEELAFOLLETTE
Wisconsin Senator Sure of
Invitation to White House
on His Return.
BY FREDERIC WILLIAM VILE.

Senator Robert NJ La Toilette of
ICoolidge's visitors during the autumn,
according to reports current in ad-
ministration quarters. He is expected
to be invited to call at the White
House soon after his return from Eu-
rope. The significance of the La Fol-
lette call, while important in itself,
lies even deeper. 1t is part and parcel
of Calvin Coolidge's program to es-
tablish contact with all persons of
vision and experience, regardless of
their politics.
The President has been pursuing
that course, more or less unnoticed.
ever since he acceded to Office BY
far the larger part of his time during
the past six weeks has been devoted
TO 1t. Much oftener than the public
mas any idea of, Mr. Coolidge's
ference with him. Not all of them.
ny any means, are men who had axes
10 grind and sought his ear.
Borah mt White House.
Senator Borah of Idaho, who dined
AT the White House this week, was
the latest, but will not be the last,
nina consulted by President Cool
ldge. Though almost all of his major
activities are revealing him as a
master politician-some say the most
aStute who has been in the White
House since Roosevelt-Mr Coolidge
is often comforting with men who
cannot be of the slightest aid to, him
po1tlcaIly. Democrats like Rdpre-
sentative Jim" Gallivan of Massa-
chusetts and Senator Pat Harrison of
Mississippi come within that category.
The President sent for Boraht as he
is intending to send for La Toilette,
in order that he may have touch with
each and every angle" OF the CON
gressional situation
III Senator Brookhart should arrive
IN washington it is certain President
Coolidge would promptly receive him.
senator Magnus Johnson of Mime
sofa is assured of as cordial a well
come at the White House as Senator
Lodge himself might expect. The
word has been passed around that
Mr.. Coolidge is not only ready, but
anxious, to brush shoulders with any
man who can help him to grapple
with the countless governmental
problems he inherited from the Hard
ing administration.
Power Of La Toilette.
The prospective conference with La
Toilette will open up speculation in a
variety of directions. Phe leader of
the radical progressive group within
the republican party is credited with
followers enough in both Senate and
House to dictate" the organization
of each body in the Sixty eighth Con-
gress. The slender G. o. p. majority
1t both ends of the Capitol-sixteen
or seventeen in the House and five or
six in the Senate-includes men al
legged to be ready to do Robert Marion
La Follettes bidding. Magnus John
son declared openly in his triumphant
July campaign that he would be with
a nd EnN Nl IAEf l. fz.l- Il
thin. The more timorous of repub-
lican leaders fear that no administra-
tion program is assured of enactment
without La Follette's faithful old
guards They are frankly skeptical
whether important committee assign
ments can be made except with the
Wisconsin senator's approval and
consent. Senator Moses in his recent
California interview, asking Hiram
Johnson to vacate the republican
presidential track, asserted that La
Toilette, with 102 delegates in the
next republican national convention
will for the first time in his political
career hold a key position" There
are not likely to be cynical Kisses
when La Toilette delegations are
time Wisconsin voted for him at Chi
cago in 1920.
Wants to Get Views.
All of these considerations are de-
signed to elevate Senator La Fol-
lette's first meeting with President
Coolidge to the level of political
event of the first magnitude. The
President will, of course, be anxious
for Fighting Bob's" views on the
agricultural situation. These will
rot be entirely unfamiliar, because
Mr.. Coolidge. as presiding officer of
the Senate, has heard the little Ma
poleon from Madison hold forth by the
hour on the woes of the farmer and
the arch antiquities of the railroads.
La Toilette considers the rate
fixing provisions of the Esch Cum
minis transportation laws as one of the
primary causes of rural distress. and
he is certain to tell President Cool
idge that until section 15-A is wiped
from the statute books no real re-
lief. for the wheat grower, the corn
raiser or the cattleman is possible.
As it has just been indicated at the
White House, the President is not
discouraged in his consultation pro-
gram by the loQuacity of some of his
visitors. Nor has he veered visibly
from his original and temperamental
habit of letting them do most of the
talking. That's why, indeed. nearly
all of them are sent for. Calvin Cool