Evening star., 1946-10-27

Inside the formal exterior
found an informality like thai
clerks are members Of the fal
President who, if he is prudent
can never give his whole faith
to any one man.
OF cabinet officers Mr.. Daniels
quotes a friend as saying
They're all pretty good fellows
and some of them are damn able
men. But they act like COM
manders in the field and not
like staff officers helping the
President plan his strategy"
Jesse Jones developed forget
fulness as a fine art when deal
ing with the President, Mr..
Daniels writes. He describes
Harold Ickes as able to look mot
only like a belligerent sourpuss
but also like a shy child ready
to blush" And Mr.. Daniels adds
that some good men as well as
some bad bear scars from MIR.
Ickes' belligerent periods.
Henry Wallace, trying to bring
the practical and the spiritual
together, often seemed to Mr..
Daniels almost the symbol both
for American eagerness for GER
tainty as to its direction and the
continuing confusion which at
tends its purpose to possess the
full possibility of its powers"
A Monument to Confusion.
Up on the Hill Mr.. Daniels
found Congress providing the
continuity often missed else
where, although the Capitol is a
monument to confusion" But
in the center Speaker Rayburn
of the House did not seem con-
fused. -
Crossing to the Supreme Court.
Mr.. Daniels experiences the usual
difficulty in discussing the court
itself as separate from the build
ing of imperial grandeur it oc-
cupies. But he does find the
judges. concerned with only one
basic legal question: "The old
puzzle of minority rights and
majority rule"
Across East Capitol street in
the Library of Congress, before
Archibald MacLeish came to oc-
cupy the windowless painted
vault" which is the Office of the
librarian, that official handled
all the details without even a
full time secretary. The pres
ent librarian, Luther Evans,
describes Mr.. MacLeish's tenure
as "the brush of a comet" acI
cording to Mr.. Daniels. But the
brush became a broom, the au-
thor says, when the poetic Mr..
MacLeish arrived to find 1,500,-
900 volumes uncatalogued and
practically undertook to make it
possible to find the books.
Lobby of the White House.
Downtown again Mr.. Daniels
gives attention to lobbyists seiz-
ing the luncheon checks at the
Mayfower and the pressure
groups in the buildings around
Lafayette Square, "the lobby of
the White House" It is a pic
ture which reminds the reader
Of Mussolini's cooperative state.
But Mr.. Daniels suspects the
lobbyists client is cheated more
often than the Government.
These pressure groups are part
of what leads Mr.. Daniels to con-
slider Washington the frontier.
The pressures in pioneer days
were not on the prairies but on
the Capital, he says, and Wash
lngton remains the frontier be-
cause it has those things which
''willful, lusty, seeking Ameri-
cans want"
The War and Navy Depart
ments are considered more as
institutions than as collections
of individuals, although there is
an interesting portrait of Secre-
tary of the Navy Forrestal, taking
it for granted naval officers are
public servants. The Navy chap
ter is headed "U. S. S. Pinafore." :"
The Pentagon and the Army.
"Homesick House" is the title
for the chapter on the Pentagon
and the Army. There are por-
traits there, too, and a vignette
Of the amazingly expert Col.
Frank Mccarthy, secretary to
the general staff, who could even
remember to dispatch lemons to
London periodically during the
war to make sure Ambassador
Biddle did not get the scurvy.
The chapter ends with the
brief dialogue between the gen.
dral and the bright young officer
assigned to liason with the
Commander in Chiefs Office.
The general wanted to know
what the White House thought
Of a certain important matter.
The young officer answered.:
"'I don't know. Over there
today they've got those jars with
some kind of liquid and a wire
loop that throws bubbles. Every
body was playing with them
"Oh, yes,' said the general
I'VE heard about those. Will
you please get me one.'"
r.