The Western news. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1933-current, 1937-09-02
SEEN and HEAR
around He
NATIONAL CAPITAL,
By Carter Field
FAMOUS WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT

Washington. - Just one more
change on the Supreme court bench
and folks will begin wondering why
President Roosevelt thought last
January that any packing was nee
essary Yet two or three more
changes are almost certain within a
year.
The court now stands as follows:
Left: Brandeis, Cardozo, Stone,
Black.
Middle: Hughes. Roberts.
Right: Sutherland, Butler, Nc
Reynolds.
So that to obtain a favorable FIVE
to four decision, any question need
only have a sufficient approach TO
being within the realm of federal
powers to win the votes of one of
the two middle Of the readers to be
assured of victory.
Which is the more significant
when it is realized that Black takes
the place of Justice VanDevanter,
who belonged in the extreme
right" division.
So that the difference is that the
three remaining conservatives,
Sutherland, Butler and McReynolds,
must now win the support of both
of the middle of the readers, Hughes
and Roberts, IN order to win.
Both middle of the readers will
probably serve on the court for a
long time, but all three of the con-
servatives are headed for retire
ment in the near future. AS mat
ter of fact, if there were not the
present bitter conflict all three
would have retired at the end OF the
term in June. This is regarded
as an undeniable fact by personal
friends of the three justices. It has
also been we'll known for some
time that Justice Brandeis would
like to retire.
Retirement of Brandeis, of
course, would not be much of a
change. True, Brandeis, with Car
dozo and every other member of
the court, voted the MIRA out the
window. Whereas Senator Black,
not only publicly, but in his pri-
vate conversations, denounced the
court for that decision.
But even if President Roosevelt
had been granted his six justice in
crease last January it would not
have affected the MIRA case, assum-
ing that precisely the same question
could have been presented to the
enlarged court For apparently
nine justices would have voted as
they did before, and the new six,
presumably. would have voted as
the man who appointed them want
ed.
That would have left it nine to six
against the new version of MIRA.
In the picking Of Black, of course.
the President came pretty close
as close as it was humanity possible
to come in calculating ahead-to
avoiding a fight in the senate on con-
firmation. Obviously any lawyer
who had expressed the views on
economic questions that Black has
would have encountered tremen-
dous fight.
So if Roosevelt wants to fill the
vacancies sure to come in a few
months by men holding Blacks
views, he will probably name other
senator's!
Cotton Plan Wrong
President Roosevelt is not ex-
planning the real reasons why he
consented to cotton loans after SO
positively telling the newspaper
men that there would be no loans
without crop control legislation. But
the tremendously important thing
about the whole business is that
from the point OF view of the econ
omist invoking the law OF supply
and demand, both the President and
the senators and representatives
who forced government cotton
loans over his protest, are wrong.
Either the Presidents plan or the
plan OF the congressman will lead
inevitably to disaster for the South,
in the opinion of every disinterest-
ed expert who has studied the situa-
ton. Either plan would lead to
holding the price of cotton up to IL
cents pound or better. In fact,
either plan aims at putting the
price higher than that.
Under the so-called parity
price" theory, the price OF cotton
should be about II cents a pound.
This parity price" figure is de-
termined by measuring the buying
power of a pound of cotton over the
years from 1909 to 19l4--the period
Immediately preceding the outbreak
of the World war.
The point is, how many cents
pound would cotton have to be now,
or at any given time in order to buy
the same amount of other commodi-
ties that the average sales price of
cotton would have bought in this
l9O9-l9l4 period?
If prices go up, Of course. the
parity price" moves up with them.
Presumably the whole effort Of the
administration should be to main