The Kennewick courier-reporter. [volume] (Kennewick, Wash.) 1914-1938, 1938-01-13
ECONOMIC H1GHL1GHrs

AS the regular session OF Con-
gress gets underway, the most sig
nificant political occurrence is the
growing cleavage in the majority
party. No President enjoyed a
longer or more complete honey
moon with Congress than did Mr..
Roosevelt-through his entire first
term he faced almost no opposition,
and for the first year. of his Sec
ond term the opposition was scat
tered and Intellectual. His leaders
in House and Senate experienced
little trouble in rounding up next
to-unanimous support for White
House measures, and DETECTING
Congressman were swiftly and def
initely punished. Today a differ
ent situation obtains, with a SUBJ
stantial part of the Democratic ma
jority in open revolt against Admin
istration detectives, and with a
larger part in quite, tacit revolt.
During latter part of the regular
session and the entire special ses-
sion the majority leaders worked
untiringly to heal wounds and bring
the dissenters back into the New
Deal fold-and they failed almost
completely. This was especially no.
ticeable in the Senate, where Mr..
Barley, successor to Mr.. Robinson,
met practically as much opposition
among the members of his own
party as among the Republicans.
The open cleavage began with the
Supreme Court bill. But trouble
had been brewing before, and the
introduction of this measure gave
Congressman who had been growing
FESTIVE and doubtful of Admins
trative policies the opportunity they
had looked for to split with the
White House. The Black appoint
ment marked another major blow
to the Presidents power and pres
tige. BY October, as Mark Sulli-
van pointed out recently, .it was
fair to estimate that Democrats in
Congress opposed to much of Mr..
Roosevelt's program, were at least
equal in number to those who sup
pored his program" Today the
latter group is probably actually in
the majority. The last important
White Mouse must measure"-the
wage and hours bill-typifies the
trend. It is no secret that every
possible tactic was used in an at
tempt to get this bill through. In
July, before the business recession,
it passed the Senate by a major
ity of exactly two to one. In De-
cember, a similar bill, changed
somewhat in wording but almost
identical in purpose, was beaten by
the House, ZIG to 1913. And it was
the Democrats, not the weak Re-
publican ranks, which beat it..
Some recent events have made the
split all the more dramatically clear.
It is a reasonable assumption that
the majority of the Democrats in
Congress want to help and cooper
ate with business. There is very
strong bloc which wishes to put tax
revision and friendly industrial leg
islation first on the calendar. While
the President is not actively oppos-
ed to this, his attitude is one of
GOODNESS; and he apparently believes
that such legislation is of minor
Importance, and should be deferred.
The anti-monopoly campaign, un-
der Robert Jackson, inaugurates a
new drive against big business. Sec
rotary Ickes has made a speech
which amounted to a sweeping at
tack on big business, and no one be-
lieveS a cabinet member would make
SO vital an address without the per-
mission of his Chief. In other
words, the administration seems to
be bent on going ahead with its
program, whose cardinal point Is
the radical revision of American in
dustry, and an increasing measure
of government control over business.
Many leading Democrats are largely
opposed to this. and feel that it
would very possibly force us into
another long depression, greater
rcentralization of government with
undermining of democratic insti-
buttons. It is over this point that
the struggle for control of the DEM
ocratic party, between New Dealers
on the one hand and the conserva-
tive wing on the other is now TAX
ing place.