The midland journal., 1946-10-25

simple; people who expect a decl-
sion on an important matter won't
take it from anyone but the Presi-
dent himself.
Must Keep Close
Check on Aides
A pitiful example of the break
down of the White House machinery
was the recent Wallace ruckus. The
President never need have been
placed in the position he was.
1t is not Presidents job to read
over every document submitted to
him. No head of business as big
as the government would dream of
trying to do that. But somebody
should have read both the Wallace
memorandum on foreign policy and
the Wallace speech and apprised the
President of what they contained
and implied. Whether it is the Pres
ident's fault that he didn't have
properly experienced hired help, is
another matter. That his hired
help didn't function, caused the
damage.
An explanation, if not an excuse,
has been offered in this case. The
job of reading over public state
ments of administration men
bers to see that they didn't conflict
was handled by the owl during the
war. Before that the White House
machinery had always taken care
Of such matters. That machin-
cry had not been again set in mo-
ton when owl ceased to function.
The fault was not that the Presi-
dent didn't prevent the Wallace
Byrnes clash, but that he was not
prevented from preventing it.
I can think of only one similar bad
mistake made by President Roose-
velt which parallels the Wallace
mix-up and it was due to a similar
but not the same cause. 1t involved
the highly technical question of the
public debt. An assistant" sup
posed to be an expert, furnished the
figures on which the President based
an important public statement. The
eagle-eyed financial writer's caught
it. The expert was called to ac-
count; he furnished new figures,
was wrong again and caught again.
The President was forced to make
a second public correction.
The duties of President are SIM
ply too great for any one man. So
Presidents have always had person
al advisors, some times they were
given an office, some times they
had no official title-like Colonel
House in the Wilson regime. To-
day we hear little about presidential
administrative assistants" but we
hear great deal about group of
advisors" who have failed to func-
ton properly in spite of the fact that
unlike the executive assistants they
lack authority. These advisors are
too "close" to the President. And
they have been criticized by other
members of the administration for
standing between department heads,
the congressional and party leaders.
They are all old, close, personal
friends of the President. They are
inexperienced in government.
Whether President Truman's little
circle of "cronies' has helped or
hindered him is beside the question.
No one can dispute the fact that
they were chosen because of their
loyalty rather than because of their
experience. The question is wheth-
er presidential duties, as they exist
today, can be delegated even to a
well-trained, highly capable staff.
They can, is the answer, IF such
staff is not blocked by higher au-
thorities who, from motives of love,
hate, politics, religion, tempera-
ment, taste or previous condition of
servitude, use such authority, 9TH
er than in the public good.
Telephone calls at the rate of four
a minute asking answers to radio
quiz questions were reported de-
stroying the morale of a Brooklyn
library. From now on the line is
quizzy.
The President has a new "Sacred
Cow" The winged ruminant as it
browses in the Washington airport
puts the other big transport planes
in the caf-class.