The Hoover Week

President Hoover last week kept the London Conference on Germany's economic rehabilitation under sharp White House focus. Because this was the first such European parley the U. S. had officially joined in a dozen years, he was at its outset slightly apprehensive. But when after 72 hours the seven-power meeting adopted his ideas of relief and adjourned without any political eruptions, the President was a happy and relieved man. Secretaries Stimson and Mellon, as U. S. delegates in London, agreed to a 90-day renewal of the $100,000,000 international loan to Germany and to a proposition whereby bankers would refrain from withdrawing their $1,200,000,000 short-term commercial credits from the Reich. Though Wall Street scowled disapproval at these limited results and foreign exchanges declined for a lack of a more constructive plan, President Hoover declared:

"The Conference has laid sound foundations for the establishment of stability in Germany. The major problem can best be solved by the voluntary co-operation of the bankers of the world rather than by the governments. The program supplements the suspension of intergovernmental debts. The combined effort should enable the German people to overcome temporary difficulties and restore their credit. The program contributes to expedite recovery from world-wide depression."

P: During the Conference one contretemps occurred which provoked the President and started talk of a Cabinet resignation. Fortnight ago President Hoover despatched to Secretary Stimson, then in Paris, an outline of what might be done for Germany. When the delegates met in London, the State Department in Washington released the text of the President's instructions to Delegate Stimson, declared it had been formally presented to the Conference. Acting Secretary of State Castle asserted that President Hoover was the sole author of this "American proposal." A muddle developed when Delegate Stimson denied that he had received any "new Hoover plan" or presented it to the Conference. The ideas, he declared, were the joint product of the U. S. and Great Britain, whose Prime Minister had outlined practically the same proposal in his opening address to the Conference. Mr. Castle reiterated that the President should have full credit for the plan, guessed that Mr. Stimson's statement was only a friendly diplomatic gesture to Great Britain as the Conference's host. The arch- Republican New York Herald Tribune reported rumors of Mr. Stimson's resignation, recalled that President Hoover had made Mr. Castle Undersecretary of State over Mr. Stimson's candidate for the job (Lawyer George Rublee of Washington, D. C. who drafted the London Naval Treaty). Declared President Hoover: "A tempest in a teapot!"

P: Published by the Associated Press last week was the historic, closely guarded letter which Germany's President Hindenburg wrote President Hoover the day the debt holiday plan was announced in June. Excerpts: "The dire distress of the German people which is now at its highest peak compels me to turn to you. . . . Every possibility of improving the situation by internal measures, without relief from the outside world, has been exhausted. The economic crisis strikes the German people who have been robbed of their reserves through the consequences of the War, with especial vehemence. . . . The ability, the will to work and the discipline of the German people justify a confidence that Germany will meet the private loans that rest upon her. Germany, however, is most urgently in need of relief. This relief must come immediately if disaster is not to befall us and others. . . ."

P: Henry Prather Fletcher informed President Hoover that he would resign as chairman of the Tariff Commission on Sept. 15 after one year's service. Mr. Fletcher simply does not like the job.

P: To every Secretary of a Cabinet department, to every chairman of an executive commission, to every chief of an independent bureau last week went a firmly worded letter from the White House insisting upon greater and greater economies. Unless the Budget is reduced, taxes might have to be raised. Higher taxes bring lower votes in presidential years, such as 1932.

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