Evening star., 1940-09-07
Tempus Fuqit

President Roosevelt's comment to
the press yesterday on the slow prog
ress of pending defense legislation
was phrased in Latin, but its mean
ing will not be lost on members of
Congress or on their constituents.
Time flies, indeed, and as it sped
on yesterday in the House precious
hours were wasted in debating vari-
Gus sorts of CONSUMPTION bill amend
ments, some of which should never
have been introduced, and in wran-
Cling over such an unrelated matter
as the recent trade of destroyers for
bases. Several undesirable amend
ments were voted down, one useless
amendment was adopted. Nearly an
hour was used up in debating an
amendment to eliminate the provi-
sion eXempting members of Con-
greSS from compulsory military Serv-
ice under the Burke WadSworth bill.
Yet every legislator knows that under
another section of the proposed law
he undoubtedly would be exempted
by the Draft Board anyway, Gin the
national interest" because Of the
Importance of keeping the legislative
branch of the Government function
ing in time of emergency. And every
member knows that he would be free
to resign from Congress and volun-
teer his services if he were so in
clined, for the bill as passed by the
Senate and as approved by the House
Military Affairs Committee would
permit voluntary enlistment by any
man between the age of eighteen
and thirty-five. The House finally
defeated the move to lift congress
Sional immunity. An unnecessary
amendment which was adopted
would make it mandatory" on the
Army to provide adequate housing
and medical care for all conscripts-
a meaningless gesture unless the
House intended to imply that these
necessities would not be provided
without congressional mandate.
On the credit side of the House
ledger yesterday was the defeat Of
efforts to narrow the conscription
age limits, which, in the House bill,
are twenty-one to forty-four, in
elusive. The Senate bill restricts
service to men from twenty-one to
thirty, inclusive. One of the impor-
tant decisions yet to be made when
the House quit yesterday was what
to do about the So-called draft" of
industry. There are hopeful indica-
tions that the House will show more
wisdom than the Senate did when it
almost casually adopted the drastic
Russell -Overton amendment, empow-
ering the Government to condemn
and acquire permanently not only
defense plants, but underlined "facil-
tiles" when the owners fail to CO.
operate in the defense program. The
House will consider substitute pro-
posals restricting conflscatory pro-
ceedings to plants engaged in the
manufacture of implements of war
and other defense necessities and
providing for return of the properties
to their owners after the emergency
has passed. A substitute of this sort
is desirable and should be enacted in
place of the Senate proposal.
Another decision which the House
faces, and one which it should not
shirk, Is whether to have a roll-call
vote on the dangerously short-sight-
ed Fish amendment, under which
conscription of man power would be
postponed for two months-until
after the election-pending a test
of voluntary recruiting methods.
One hundred and eighty-f1ve men,
bers voted for this delaying amend
ment under cloak of a teller vote
which hid their Identities. They
should be compelled to place them
selves on record, one by one, on this
fateful, risky plan-which is wholly
uncalled for in view of the provision
for volunteering previously included
in the bill. The sole effect of the
amendment would be to defer the
probably inevitable draft for two
vital months. Meanwhile, the time
In which we might raise and train
an Army for defense against threat
ened aggression would be flying