Evening star., 1947-08-09
The Political Mn
Brewster-Huehes Charges
Should Be Sifted to End
Episode Seen Blow to Prestige of
Senate Committee
BY Gould Lincoln

Ahe eouiuy Has peen treated during the last
Two weeks to an amazing series of charges and
countercharges by Howard Hughes, million
aire aircraft manufacturer and Senator
breWester OF Maine-in the press and before
Senate War Investigating Subcommittee. It
Is now told the two main actors are tired of
calling each other liars-and to call it a day.
In view OF the seriousness of the charges,
1t is up to the Justice Department or to the
senate committee, acting through the United
States Attorney, to sift the thing to the end.
Mr.. Hughes accused Senator Brewster who is
the Republican chairman of the full War In
vestigating Committee, of having offered to
call OH the committee inquiry into the Hughes
wartime contracts for big flying boat and for
reconnaissance planes for the Army, provided
Mr.. Hughes would go along with merger of
Trans World Airlines, In which he is the big
gest stockholder, with Pan American Airways.
Senator Brewster. branding the Hughes charge
lie, asserted that Mr.. Hughes sought to in
timidate him In order to end all inquiry into
the Hughes contracts; that Mr.. Hughes en-
ployed Hugh D. Fulton. a former counsel of
the committee, and that Mr. Fulton came to
him, Senator Brewster, last April and warned
him If the inquiry was continued it might
cause brickbats to fly
Two Courses Possible
Two courses might be taken-a suit for
criminal libel which Senator Brewster has sug-
gested to the Justice Department but which
he admits it may be very difficult to get the
department to initiate, and an indictment for
perjury before the Senate subcommittee The
latter course, If followed would be initiated by
the committee itself
The entire episode has been detrimental to
the prestige of the Senate committee Mr..
Hughes, 1t Is true, was not able to substantiate
his charge that Senator Brewster had offered
to make deal to call off the inquiry into the
Hughes contracts. The airplane manufacturer
at first intimated that man he took with him
to see Senator Brewster-Edward J. Heffron-
could substantiate the charge. But Mr. Heff-
ron fatty denied that he had heard Senator
Brewster make any proposal of a deal to Mr..
Hughes or that he had heard any mention of
Pan American Airways. Mr. Hughes, however,
again and again f1outed the committee and
charged he was not being given a square deal
and the scene in the committee room became
at times almost farcical. Jim" Reed or
Tom Walsh of earlier Senate Investigations
would have made this impossible
This Is the Senate committee which did adj
mirable work during the war-and is probably
responsible for great savings in expenditures
to the Government and the taxpayers It was
as the heSd of this committee that President
Truman, then a Senator from Missouri, made
an enVlabe reputation and leaped into the
spotlight-eventually landing the vice presi-
Dental nomination at the hands of the Demo-
cratic National Convention in 1914 Over
Democratic opposition in the Senate the in
vestigating committee was gwen new life at
the opening of the Republican, controlled Con-
greSS last winter.
Brewster Led Fight
Senator Brewster made the hight for con-
tinuance of the committee and was made
chairman. To have him left now under sus-
picion-as will be the case should the dogfall,
name-calllng episode before the committee be
allowed to stand-will help neither Mr. Brew
ster nor the committee over which he pre-
Sides
The charge is made, too, that the commit
tee has engaged in a partisan political fishing
spree, in an effort to show that Brig. Gen. Ell
liott Roosevelt (he held the rank during the
war; had been bought by favors of Mr.. Hughes
and his companies to use his influence to have
the Hughes company awarded a contract in
volving $22,oOoo0o for reconnaissance planes.
Mr.. Roosevelt, before the committee, stoutly
denied that he had been so Influenced, or that
he had used any pressure on his father, the
late President Franklin D. Roosevelt, to approve
such contract.
However. there was unfolded in the commit
tee hearing story of lavish expenditures for
entertainment, charged to the Hughes COM
pany, which raises the question: How many
thousands and millions of dollars may have
been so used by companies seeking war con-
tracts-money which eventually came out Of
the pockets of the people? While Mr. Roose-
velt and the committee parted company with
the utmost good feeling expressed on both sides
this episode, too, leaves bad taste.
The committee is finally getting down to the
job of finding out why the $500 900 involved
in the Hughes contracts has so far failed to
produce successfully either flying boat or re-
connaissance planes Zone of the latter was
wrecked with Hughes at the controls). 1t looks
as though red herrirgs have been drawn across
the trail.