Evening star., 1932-07-11
RELIEF ISSUE SETS
! KEY OF CAMPAIGN
Garner'S Aims Declared to Be
to Represent His Party as
"the Little Fellows"
BY MARK SULLIVAN.

The judgment is universal in both
parties that the issue Speaker Garner
has raised with the President, and the
deliberately conspicuous manner OF
Garners action, was designed to and
will have the effect of contributing to
setting the key of the campaign in
which Mr. Garner and Mr.. Hoover will
run on opposing tickets. The intention
is to picture the Democratic as the
''little fellow. d party.
BY no mans all the Democrats are
happy about it. Five Democratic
Senators voted and one was paired
against Garners proposal that the
Government Reconstruction Finance
Corporation extend its loaning to private
individuals and private corporations, TO
any person" Several more condemned
it privately with bitterness. Some
Democrats who voted for the proposal
Gid so only because they were unwilling
publicly to disavow the vice presidential
candidate of their party. Forceful
private pleas were made to Garner to
Tecede.
Outside the Senate the number of
Democrats who deplore the Speakers
1nsistence are large in number and i'm
portant in standing. They are dismayed
by Gamers position both on merit and
as politics. The Democratic Baltimore
Sun says as to merit that there has
been no showing of necessity for this
revolutionary STEP AS to politics the
same paper says that Mr.. Hoover seems
to be playing better politics than Mr..
Garner
Reversal of Tradition
The regret Of Democratic leaders goes
in many cases to strong feeling against
to such a project. They feel that to put
millions OF individuals in the position
of borrowing money from and thereby
owing debts to the Federal Government
is about the fartheSt possible departure
from fundamental Democratic doctrine.
They feel that the Garner proposal
would put the Government in the bank
ing and lending business to an extent
never before dreamed. and that this
would be an equally unwholeSome re-
Vcrsal of Democratic tradition. They do
not like the idea of making consider
able addition to the Governments bu-
reaucratic army at this time.
They fear the public will see the idea
was fundamentally fantastic and blame
the Democrats for holding out hope
that could hardly be intended to be
fulfilled. One of their objections is that
every Congressman would have on his
back hundreds or thousands of constitu-
ents requesting that he help them pro-
cure loans. 1t would be duplicate of
veterans asking Congressman to help
them get compensation. Another OBJ
lection was the probable lack of safety
q many of the loans. In the nature of
things. the persons borrowing from the
Government would be mainly or only
those who had been refused by banks
In spite of these views strongly held
by some highly placed Democrats, only
few were willing actually to vote
against the Garner measure They
made forceful private pleas to Garner
personally to recede. but they were un-
willing publicly to vote to disavow their
own candidate for Vice President.
AS for Garner, he clung with great
confidence to the view that his attitude
was good politics. 1t is doubtful if he
really disagrees seriously with the other
Democratic leaders on the merit or tha
practicability of his proposal He says
that he, with Democratic Leader Rainey,
were the only two who held out" for
his position.
Expected to Be Defeated
He has been careful to make it clear
that he expected to be defeated, and
that if defeated, he would not then
IGSlSJ pdSSdSe Ol q Ulll 10 FEeSl-
cent Hoover's view. From the circum-
stances, it is tenable to infer that Gar
ner's primary wish was to bring spec
tacularly before the country a contrast
alleged by him to exist between his at
titude and President Hoovers He pic
tured President Hoover as wanting to
make loans only to preferential
class" and himself as willing to lean
to everybody.
The original conception of the Re
construction Finance Corporation was
that it should make loans at two classes
OF key points. One class of loans was
designed to enable banks, insurance
companies and the like to keep solvent
for the benefit of their millions of de-
positors and policy holders The other
objective was to make loans where they
would result in immediate employment
of large numbers of persons. An ex-
ample of the latter was a loan to the
Pennsylvania Railroad for electrifica-
ton of its New York Washington line.
The theory was that this would start
employment and benefit trade and shops
along the line more quickly and effec-
lively than thousands of loans to shop
keepers on the Garner plan. Another
category of loans indorsed by the PreSi-
dent is to States. cities and other pub
lie or semi-public or private corpora
tions to build self-liquidating public
works such as tunnels, bridges and
water works.
(Copyrieht 1922