The Washington times., 1938-10-14
MD. OBSERVERS
ARE P PUZZ ZLED
BY BRIDGE DEAL
Unable to Correctly
Place the Credit
By THEODORE HUNTLEY


If you can figure out this Nor
gantown bridge puzzle in Mary
land you're a better gueSser than
most MarylanderS.
Administrator Ickes' announce
ment that the money has been
found for the Potomac River
bridge above MorgantoWn comes
only a couple of weeks after he
threw it out the PWA window
with the laconic statement that
there was no money left to build
1t. To finance the Morgantown
project would run way over the
Maryland quota. No, it couldn't
be done this year-and anyway,
the bankers wouldn't do their part
in underwriting the other SIS per
cent of the cost not put up by
the PWA.
BATTLES EXPERTS
In picking up the pieces and
putting them together in a new
campaign picture rather obviously
ordered by the White House
even if you can't guess why-the
admirable IckeS has baffled more
than one self-constituted expert
who until now thought he knew
all the political answers.
Can Millard Tydings, whom you
may remember as the Senator who
wasn't purged, claim credit for it?
He cannot.
Did George Radcliffe, who can
call the President by his first
name and who once sat on the
same directorate with him, put it
over? He did not.
NOT FARLEY
Did Jim Farley, who wanted
Tydings purged above all others,
but who's for him now that hes
won, whether the President is or
not, Wangle the second bridge, |
following approval of the first one
over the Susquehanna River at
Eavre de Grace? Jim is in New
York, up to his ears in the State
and national campaigns.
Did Herbert O'Conor, running
for governor in Maryland, have
anything to do with it? So far as
anyone knows, he has never men
toned the bridges or taken any
interest in them.
UNRELATED FACTS
Now consider these, perhaps, un-
related facts
/. G. o. P. Governor Harry Nice
has been hot after the bridges tor
months past. 1t was he who first
presented the plan to the Presi-
cent, when they toured Southern
Maryland and stopped at Ludlow'S
Ferry and Morgantown together
during the primary campaign,
when the President was trying to
nominate little Davey Lewis. Little
Davey also was for the bridges
then bait for New Deal votes
against Tydings.
2. Governor Nice said in his
tour through Southern Maryland
the Morgantown bridge would be
built. He said again at Silver
Spring Wednesday night: And
we're going to get the Morgan
town bridge, too!"
WHO KNOWS?
Did the governor know some
thing? Does Little Davey Lewis
know something? And if so, what? |
In Baltimore Wednesday night,
at the monster Democratic rally
which launched the Democratic
campaign in the city, Senator Rad
cliffe spoke glowingly of President |
Roosevelt and got his biggest
hand when he did so, suggesting
the possibility of a postprimary
rapprochement between the PreSi.
dent and himself.
But yesterday, in town for
few hours in the afternoon, he
did not go near the White House,
nor have he or Tydings been in
vited to put their feet under the
White House table since the Tyd-
ings-Lewis fight, in which Sena-
tor Radcliffe managed the winner.
But why did the New Deal
come through, after Ickes said
there was no money? Answer that
If you cantor no one else has.
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