The Wilmington morning star., 1944-04-03
Manpower
BY MARY HORNADAY

By MARY HORNADAY
Critical dangers ahead in manpower, it
appears now, will be settled by drafting
4-Fs, though the Army considers this only
a stop-gap and will continue to plug for a
National Service Act.
For several days, now, the Costello SUBJ
committee of the House has served as a
forum for various Government chiefs to tell
how the Nations need for new flexibility in
It's labor force could best be achieved in a
minimum of time
What seemed to be divergent opinions
finally came to a head today when Under
secretary of War Robert Patterson and Ralph
A. Bard, Assistant Secretary of the Navy,
said they would favor compulsory direction
OF Ais and non-fathers, SO to As, into essen
tlal war jobs. At the same time, they made
it clear that they still favor a National Ser
vice Act, too-as does President Roosevelt
1t has been odd how the plans for drafting
4-Fs have taken shape right in public view,
with Congress looking on and wondering what
1t should do. Normally, this kind of pro-
posal involving different agencies is work
ed out behind closed DOORS often at the
White House.
This time, Congress and the public have
been in on the whole development of policy
For several days, it looked as War Man
power Commissioner Paul V. McNutt, War
Production Chief Donald M. Nelson, and
Selective Service Director Lewis B. Harshey
were plugging for the At plan while the
Army was holding out for National Service
Act
The National Service proposal, involving
legal power to direct all civilian men and
women into jobs, with authority to draft
them in case they balk, has never been popu-
lar with labor. The general public has been
generally lukewarn. At least Congress has
not felt the pressure from back home indi-
eating that such law was imperative.
Presumably, a bill authorizing direction
and ultimate compulsion over F's could get
through Congress faster than could a gen
eral service act
Bills by Representative Clare Boothe Luce
(R) of Connecticut authorizing the Army to
form corps of ATS and average men for
harvesting, numbering, canning, and other
seasonal activities are pending in the House.
The new proposal is modification of the
Luce plan. Those ATS capable of limited
service and non-fathers between 80 and As
not already holding essential jobs would be
directed into places in railroading lumber
ing, coal mining, cotton-textile manufa ctur-
ing, whose workers have been drafted or
have moved on into more essential jobs in
the war-equipment programs.
There is no real overall manpower short
age now, but there is, and will continue to
be a need for men who can be quickly moved
about and thrown into the breach where
emergencies arise. Women won't do because
they can't move around from place to place
and aren't suited to many of the jobs where
the chief shortages will exist.
Military men favored the National Service
Act because it would furnish the necessary
mn n 10, r.
think there would be more resistance to COM
pulsion in a general organized labor group
than there would be among the ATS who
are unregimented merely because the Army
and Navy have high physical standards and
will take only small number for limited
service.
The Army is now demanding younger,
more vigorous men to stand the strain of
wa. That is why Selective Service has found
it necessary to draft in the next few months
approximately 100000 men between 10 and
26 who hold industrial deferments.
are wondering how they are
going to find requirements. Army men Won
der, too, because they know that if these
orders will not be filled. Yet they can't cut
their goal of 100000 men in the armed
forces by July l, either, and may even need
more men if casualties are heavy
War is always a gamble. When the inva.
sion starts, the military planners will be able
to see better how to budget. From now on
changes in contracts and manpower require
ments will be made rapidly The home front
must be ready to jump into each breach
The alacrity with which officials with diff
ferent viewpoints have managed to get to-
gether on a middle-of-th e-road plan in the
face of looming crisis shows what can be
done in Washington when situation is de-
1t is not often that the public and
Congress have the chance to see just how
policies develop, though.-Christian Science
Monitor.