The Waterbury Democrat., 1945-03-15


 signed to practice law in Spartan burg for six. After being defeated on his first try, he was finally elect ed to the U. s. Senate in 1880 and he has been in Washington ever since. Even taking into considera- tion his 16 months on the Supreme Court, it is sometimes asked if Byrnes' background fits him for his position of power over the U. S. economy in wartime, closing race tracks, curfeWing night clubs, ban- ming conventions, browning -out theater entrances just to save coal. RNES DUCKS
 PUBLICITY SPOTLIGHT
 One of Byrnes first acts on be- ing named head of OWMR was to select Bernard Baruch as his ad- viser-in-chief-without compensa = tion. That was generally hailed as a step in the right direction.
 Baruch. with John Hancock, pre- pared manpower report calling for much more drastic controls. That was Shelved for a time, came out in September, 1943, to be followed in February with another Baruch- Hancock report on war mobilization and reconverSion.
 Baruch dropped out of the picture shortly after that and for six months the Office of War Mobiliza- ton and its director made no news that got into the papers. Actually Byrnes is credited with having forced government procurement agencies to scale down their de- mandS by 24 billion dollars. It was all done so quietly and so far be- hind the scenes that 1t never caused a public ripple. ByrneS is like that. He is interested in results, not pub licity. In the nearly two years he has been head of war mobilization he has held but 10 press confer ences. One of his operating aXioms is to let the other fellow announce the news and make the headlines.
 Last September Byrnes did an- nounce plan for reconversion. Eisenhower's armies were racing across France then, it looked as though the war would be over soon, and 1t was safe to talk about cut backs. Also, food Stockpiles were mounting and on the insistence of War Food Administrator Marvin Jones, who didn't want to be caught with huge surpluses, 17 foods were removed from the ration list. OPA was opposed to this move, but ByrneS took the responsibility and issued the order, to the joy of the consumers ana the consternation of the Republicans who hailed 1t as a cheap, Vote-getting political trick.
 When the war didn't end, all this had to be changed. At the end of September Byrnes was on the ail to say that wartime controls would have to stay for the duration. And after the election the 17 foods be- gan to go back on the ration list with much grief.
 PICKS BEST BRAINS
 AVAILABLE
 It was after the Office of Wal Mobilization and Reconversion had been given legal standing by Con- gresS and Byrnes had been named its director that he really started swinging.
 In December he named an oper- ating staff headed by Major Gen eral Lucius D. Clay, who had been director of procurement for Army, and by J. B. Hutson, who had been head of Commodity Credit Corpora tion in Agriculture. Byrnes' idea was that these deputy directors might be in position to carry on the reconVersion as well as the mo- bilization parts of his office. Byrnes sticks by his earlier announcement that he will leave after the defeat of Germany. Again Byrnes was picking on the best brains he could find for the job to be done. But Wiseacres saw in the appointment of General Clay evidence that the military had taken over and was now the dominant influence in the thinking and planning that went on in the east wing of the White House where Byrnes and his small staff have their carefully guarded offices
 Generally overlooked in all this master -minding were the facts that Won Rundstedt broke through on the western front in Europe, cap turing large stocks of U. s. supplies, and that the pace of the war in the Pacific was tremendously step- ped-up by MacArthur's successful invasion of the Philippines. Those were the things that forced Byrnes to start getting tough.