The Skyland post. [volume] (West Jefferson, N.C.) 193?-1988, 1939-02-02

pressure Of organized lobbyists
who want Federal funds spent
for their pet projects.
It is too early to predict wheth-
er the present Congress VIII
prove more immune to such pres
sure than its predecessors have
been, but if history repeats itself,
as it usually does, the determine
ton to economic with which NE
10th Congress started out will 60
the way of most New Years reso-
buttons.
There is no question about the
sincere desire of that block in
Congress-, which is composed of
anti-Administration Democrats
and the I'll Republican members
of House, to cut down Govern
ment expenditures. But it is ex-
tremely difficult for any Congress
to resist appeals which purport
to come from preponderent
mass of their constituents.
The first illustration of the way
in which public sentiment is
manufactured, for the national
legislators, was made for the
benefit of the members of this
new Congress on matter which
did not concern the subject of
spending, as it happens. In re-
spouse to a radio speech by Faith
er Coughlin literally hundreds
of thousands of kilograms and
letters were received by Senators
and Representatives, urging them
not to repeal the embargo on mu-
milton shipped to the participants
in the Spanish Civil War.
One of the new Republican
Senators .reported that he had
received some 10000 kilograms
and more than that number of
letters from voters in his own
state, urging him to follow Faith
er Coughlin's advice.
1t so happened that he was op-
posed to lifting the embargo, any
way, so these communications
were so much wasted ammunl-
ton.
But this Senator's comment,
based upon wide political expert
ence and intimate understanding
of the people of his state, was
that he certain that the question
of the Spanish arms embargo was
one to which his constituents
were entirely indifferent and that
this was an attempt to fool him
into believing that the voters
were all stirred up about it.
The demand 'liberalizing" Old
Age Pensions is likely to be one
of the most hotly-debated and
long-drawn- out discussions on
record, before this Congress ad-
journs
The hearing on the Social Sc
curity Act amendments, concern
ing which there is as yet no gen.
eral agreement except that the
laws as it stands is clumsy and
difficult to administer, will be-
come the formum for the discus
sion of the Townsend Plan and
probably other plans to give
everybody over a given age lib
eral living pension at the expense
of the taxpayers.
Will Study Schemes
Enough pressure was put on
candidates during the election
campaign to induce many of
them, Republicans and Demo
Gratis alike, to commit themselves
to at least a study of these vari-
Gus pension schemes. The extent
of public sentiment in the nation
for Federal assumption of re-
Sponsibility for the support is
unknown, but that efforts will
be made to respresent to Sena-
tors and Representatives that
they they will forfeit their po-
litical futures if they do not fall
in line with the Old Age Pension
program is not doubted by any
experienced Washington OBJ
server.
The Townsend Plan lobby is
rapidly becoming one of the most
powerful pressure groups in
Washington. Old-timers liken it
to the Anti-Saloon League lobby
which put over the Prohibition
amendment. 1t operates in much
the same way, with local clubs
or groups exerting pressure in
their respective states and Con-
gress districts upon legislators.
They are not yet as well or
ganized as was the Anti-Saloon
League, and they have no such
astute political leader as the late
Wayne B. Wheeler, but every
body who watches what is going
on under the surface of things
in Washington comedies they are