The Wilmington morning star., 1943-12-20
FDR AND CONGRESS
HAD MANY FIGHTS
Continued from Page One)

tvs strongest in years. COP lead
ers were claiming, as the session
neared an end, that they would pick
up four more seats in five special
elections to fill current vacancies.
Congress unstlntingly gave public
funds to the war effort during the
year. Total appropriations approx
mated $130, 900, 100000 including
history-making ST.. 900, 100000 fund
for the War Department.
To meet the staggering cost of
waging about glo5dl war and to
promote it's Successful conclusion,
Republicans and Democrats join
ed in boosting the national debt
limit, in extending the lend-lease
program, in continuing the Presi-
dents authority to negotiate re-
ciprocal trade agreements, and in
meeting the economic problems of
service men dependents by boost
ing allotments and allowances.
They stuck together, too, on leg
islation putting pre-war fathers at
the bottom of the draft pool repeal
ing restrictive statutes against
Chinese becoming citizens, and put
ting Congress on record as favoring
collaboration with other nations
| in working out a postwar plan
for world security and peace.
With legislation dealing with Ad-
ministration home front policies it
was an entirely different story.
An early major battle developed
over the RUM pay-as-you-go tax
plan, which House Republicans
backed almost to a man. 1t ended
in compromise which COP ex-
perts claimed was a rs per cent
victory for their cause.
In June. a month later, the Presi-
dent received one of the biggest leg
islative joltS Of his three terms in
the White House. He vetoed the
Smith-Connally war labor disputes
act, immediate outgrowth of the
coal strike, and in record time
both the Senate and the House
OVERRIDE the veto and put the leg
islation on the law books.
The President and his force far
ed better, though, en- legislation
outlawing the Administrations food
subsidy program. The coalition of
House Republicans and Democrats
VINO had written the ban into a
bill extending the life of the Com
modify Credit Corporation could
MT muster the votes needed to
override the veto.
A new fight over the same issue
will be left unsettled by adjourn
ment with an agreement to permit
the CCC to continue operating un-
til February Is.
The secord House vote to ban
subsidies was The first of series
of successive blows at the Admin
istration's Humiliation program.
The House followed up it's newest
top-heavy prohibition of subsidies
with a vote to require an increase
of IS cents per barrel in crude
oil prices, an increase denied by
the Office of Price administration
and by Economic Stabilizer Fred
M. Vinson Both actions await Sen
ate disposition when the second ses-
sion convenes on January 10.
The Senate, meanwhile, ignored
administr alton wishes and voted an
8-cents-an-hour wage boost for non
operating abroad workers.
| Unfinished business includes ac-
ton on the sharply-shaved tax bill
that fell far below administration
requests, House action on Senate
approved legislation providing for
mustering-out pay for discharged
members OF the armed services
and for system of balloting I'M
der which the armed forces may
vote next year, and Senate action
on House bill outlawing poll tax
payment as a prerequisite to voting
in fedora, election.
-V--
Music wac devised NV tho gods