Coulee City dispatch. [volume] (Coulee City, Wash.) 19??-19??, 1937-07-29
SEEN
HEARD
around the
NATIONAL
CAPITAL
By CarterFie ~
By Carter Field y


a possibility that the wages and
hours bill will 60 over until the
next session of congress. The prob
ability right along has been that it
would be enacted, in some form,
but the difficulties are great, the
lines of thought which must be rec
onciled are wide apart, and the
number of men in both houses who
would like to see the thing put over
is very large.
1t includes the new chairman OF
the house labor committee, Mary
T. Norton of Jersey City, who sue
ceeded to the Craftsmanship on the
death of William P. Connery OF
Massachusetts,.
If it were not for the Supreme
court enlargement bill fight in the
senate, the situation might be diff
ferent. But all house members know
that the senate is not going to have
much time this session to fool with
the wages and hours bill, and they
know perfectly well that the senate
is not going to rush through any
bill which the house may agree on
without extensive debate.
The thought of the house, there
fore, is that if they do a tremendous
job, surrender principles and opin-
ions in compromises to get some
thing through and perhaps put them
selves on record on things, which
may prove very embarrassing later
the whole thing may be wasted.
The senate just might decide not
to take the bill up this session.
The house members know that the
wages and hours regulation bill is
a subject on which there will be
widely varied opinions back in their
districts, with more than prob
ability that there may be consid
cradle numbers of their constitu-
ents to whom it just is the most i'm
portant measure on which congress
will vote. By the same token, some
one of these groups may be so
outraged by their congressman's
vote on this bill that they will be
inclined to vote against him at the
next primary and election regard
less of anything else he may have
done or failed to do.
Danger Multiplied
There is always the possibility Of
this sort of thing on any controver-
sial legislation. But in the wages
and hours measure this danger is
multiplied. 1t is a thing which
touches the lives and pocketbooks,
in one way or another, of a far
larger proportion of people than
the average measure. In fact, there
is probably more selfish interest in
it than any other legislation which
congress is called upon to consider
at this session.
Voters ought to be equally inter-
ested in a tax bill, for of course
every ones pocketbook is affected
by that, but there is quite a large
percentage of voters who do not
believe that their pocketbooks are
affected by a tax bill.
In the case of this wages and
hours bill it is not the outright op-
ponents of the measure who threat
en- to postpone action on it. AS
matter of fact, the number of out
right opponents is so small as to
be futile against the steam-roller
tactics possible, especially in the
house. 1t is just people who do not
want to take any unnecessary
chance, if they are sure that taking
IL 81 hi n
particular good.
Moreover, there are lot of mem
bers of the house who think that the
sensible thing for them to do while
the senate is wrangling over the
Supreme court enlargement bill is
to take a nice long recess, with a
gentlemen's agreement that moth
ing will be done and no roll calls
forced before a certain day. That
would give a lot of them a chance
to go home, or to the seashore,
or perhaps even to Europe.
Deep, Dark Stuff
Two jobs are going on under the
surface at Capitol Hill while the
SENATE engages LII q 0SOotS VII IilC
merits and demerits-or at least
that is what the debate is supposed
to be about-of the Supreme court
enlargement bill.
One of these is an attempt to COM
promise that measure itself. One
of the compromises being talked
about might easily be acceptable
to most of the opponents of the
measure-but the administration is
not ready to accept that yet. 1t may
never accept it, for the odds would
seem to favor the administration S
being able to break the filibuster if
it continues to press for such con-
summation, with no regard what
ever for consequences.
The other job is determining, in
private conferences between SEN
ators and representatives, the fate
of several other important meas
ures, which, under the stringent
rules being enforced in the effort
to break the cloture, cannot be
discussed seriously on the floor. That
is, under the strict letter of the
rules it cannot. Actually no attempt