The Western news. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1933-current, 1937-12-30

zee ndHhicSS JOo
But there is no such assurance.
On the contrary, most congressman
believe positively that the President
would veto any one of the four pro-
posals that congress might enact.
And there is no disposition on the
part of the senators and represen-
tatives to undertake such thank
less job as to push such measures
through only to have them killed by
veto-especially as no one thinks
there would be a Chinaman's
chance of mastering the two-thirds
majority in both house and senate
that would be necessary to override
a veto. In the first place, there
is doubt If two-thirds, majorities
could be rolled up even If there
were no pressure from the White
House against rolling them up, or
from Jim Farley's machine.
Besides, there is no particular nu-
triment, politically, in doing battle
for the utilities. There are many
stockholders who would be pleased,
but it is not the kind of fight that
rouses popular enthusiasm. In the
present state of the public mind,
congressman say frankly that they
do not believe making such fight
would entail any particular danger.
1t would be down the same alley as
changing the tax laws to give cor
porations more voice in their own
management, which congress pro-
poses to do despite the Presidents
opposition.
But the best thing they would get
out of it would be very small, polit-
ically. Whereas it would encur the
enmity of the White House, mess up
their patronage situations, and start
the radicals singing them out as
Tories. All this might be risked,
many of them say, if the fight could
accomplish anything.
But the security holders writing
letters do not seem to realize the
difference between stopping a new
thing in congress, and repeating an
old one. Or, in brief, the difficulty
that overriding a veto adds to any
congressional fight.
Wage-Hour Bill
Eventual passage OF a hodgepodge
wage-hour regulation bill, satisfac-
tory to nobody and irritating to
more than it pleases, is still the
prospect as this is written. That it
is the prospect at all seems due far
more to bloc log-rolling than to
White House pressure, though get
ting the bill out OF its rules commit
tee pigeonhole was hailed by Demo-
cratic leaders as proving that the
much heralded revolt against the
administration had collapsed.
Before the alliance between the
city bloc, favoring the bill, and the
farm bloc, which, especially in the
South, had been opposed, it looked
as though the American Federation
of Labor was about to do the bill to
death. Its proposals to rewrite the
measure, it SO happened, would
have eliminated the differential in
favor of the South. This, it seemed,
would withdraw just enough support
to prevent passage. But the new
army of supporters, won from the
farm ranks by barter, changed this
whole picture.
The curious part of this situation
is that majority of members OF
the house are virtually pledged to
support this bill regardless OF its
form and regardless Of what
amendments may be adopted. This
is not literally true, but is what the
lineup will actually work out to be
unless some one discovers a trap
door somewhere, down which the
whole mess could be dropped.
Aad the trap-door hasn't appeared
yet.
This might not be SO strange il
anybody were really satisfied with
the farm bill, the life of which was
also saved by the log-rolling deal
In other words, if Southern Con.
gresham A, for example, though
the farm bill, which is to be passed
would be a boom to the country
would solve the agricultural prob
lem and make for better times in
the nation, he would be justified
perhaps, in agreeing to vote for q
wages and hours bill which he
thought fairly bad, if that were the
only way he could make sure Of
getting the farm bill.
Expect the Worst
But there is no such person as
this mythical congressman who
wants the farm bill badly enough
to vote for poor wages and hours
bill. II there is anybody on Capitol
Hill who really thinks that farm bill
is likely to be a good one when il
is finally enacted, some very indus
trious scouts have failed to find him
or her.
And the same thing, almost
double, goes for the wages and
hours regulation bills. There is d
possibility, of course, that this
wages and hours bill will be COM
pletely redrafted, rules to the con-
trary, Notwithstanding, by the con-