Evening star., 1925-02-22
CONGRESS PAY RISE
HELD |NOPPORTUNE
Action in Face of Economy
Program Believed Likely
to Make Trouble.
BY DAVID LAWRENCE.

There are dozens of reasons why
members OF the House of Representa-
tives and the United States Senate
deserve an increase in salary, but
there are dozens of other reasons why
it may be politically embarrassing for
those who voted for added pay.
Introduced by Senator Ball of Della
ware, whose term expires on March 4,
and whose successor has already been
elected, the proposed bill had the
good fortune also 10 be passed in
both House and Senate without a roll
call showing who voted for and who
voted against ii.
1t had been expected that if nobody
else demanded a roll call, some of the
insurgents would, for the feeling be-
tween those who have been excluded
from the Republican party and those
who have essayed to control the party
councils is none too good.
Up in the executive end of the Gov
ernment, where the increase would
also apply to cabinet officers, there s
even greater uneasiness than in Con
Sress. While President Coolidge IS
carrying economy to the extreme by
demanding that the nickels and dimes
nc saved, members of the cabinet are
striving to emulate him as much as
possible. How. therefore. can cabinet
officers who have been dismissing
Government employees right and left
accept an increase in their own pay?
This same line of argument was ap-
piled to Congress, both Houses of
which have cut appropriations mate
rally.
Finds Hard Shedding.
Time was when salary increase
for Congress would have gone through
without dissent from any quarter.
That was just after war was de-
clared, when the cost of living shot
upward and most everybody was get
ting an increase in salary or wages.
Since the war there has been a ten
dency to debate, and in many indus
tries there have been reductions in
stead of increases. Professional sal
aries have not kept pace with the pay
in the industrial world, and there's no
doubt that the average member of
Congress finds it hard sledding on
$500 year
1t isn't that living in Washington
is higher than in New York or other
big cities, but that members of both
the House and Senate find themselves
obliged to spend money either enter
tanning constituents who come to
town or in extra clerical hire to care
for the multitude of details on which
constituents are demanding service.
Congress has always hesitate3
about increasing it's own pay, and the
truth is members privately are won
dering if they can get away with it,
this time. Some of the editorial ex-
pressions which have come in thus
far, however. indicate that while the
increase may be justified, Congress
has chosen an inopportune moment to
raise the issue
The mere knowledge" says the
Springfield tMass.) News. that Presi-
dent Coolidge is working to reduce
the cost of Government, and that the
people are pleased with his purpose.
should have been enough to defeat
the bill. And the added fact that or
dinary workers. in factories and
mills. are in general enduring a low
ering of their wages should have
made the congressman hesitate be-
fore increasing the estimate of their
own worth to the Nation"
There are favorable expressions
also, and there seems no doubt that
many of the diligent members of Con-
gresS who work day and night at
their jobs are wholly deserving, but
the nightmare which worries the
members today is what the opponents
of the incumbents will say on the
stump in the next primaries. ID
months hence, perhaps something like
this: Congressman Blank didn't get
an appropriation for our overcrowded
post office building or money to widen
our harbor, but he did get himself an
increase in pay"
8. The political side of the argument
is always uppermost with members of
Congress. and the passage of the in
crease pay bill marks one of the first
instances in which political caution
has been thrown to the winds in that
body.
Copyright, 1921