De-Porking

As remarkable as the sudden rebellious uprising in which pork-loving Congressmen had threatened to tear the Administration's Relief Bill apart only the week prior (TIME, June 7), was the willingness with which most of them toed the Administration mark last week.

When the bill first came up, a fierce battalion of pork-seekers took it to a committee-of-the-whole and earmarked $505,000,000 for flood and drought control, roads and public works. A hot battle began. With earmarkers in control, the House began to approve pork amendments one after the other. Baring their teeth, they passed an amendment knocking $2,000 off Relief Administrator Harry Hopkins' $12,000 salary. Administrator leaders had to filibuster to keep the earmarked bill from being passed. Finally, assured by Leader Rayburn that he had just talked with the President and could promise "an adjustment fair to every man, to every section, to every project," the rambunctious House agreed to put the bill aside for a week.

Just what was done for "every man, every section, every project" in the interim, no one would say definitely when the bill was taken up again one day last week. But that something had been done was immediately evident. Alabama's Joe Starnes, flood control bloc leader, let it be known that he had "positive assurance" that there would be flood control pork, earmarking or no earmarking. New York's Alfred Beiter declared the Public Works bloc had done "better than we bargained for." Texas' Marvin Jones did not conceal his opinion that he would get much more than he had asked for his drought control. Only Oklahoma's Wilburn Cartwright, who wanted his pork in the form of road construction, was still fighting for his amendment.

When these confident expressions got around to Minority Leader Bertrand Snell, he took the floor for a shot at the White House: "It seems to me . . . that the final analysis of his whole proposition is the President agrees he will spend practically the same amount of money as the members have decided they want to spend for the same purposes. If this is true . . . why does the President object to Congress earmarking the money and insist on reserving to himself the right to earmark it?" Another shot was added by Mr. Snell's New York colleague John Taber: "This bill was full of pork when it came out of the White House. It was full of pork when it came out of the committee, and it is full of pork now."

These shots might as well have been saved, for the House was assembled this time to pass the bill that the Administration wanted and it voted overwhelmingly to stay in session until it did so. Taking the usual 40 minutes for each roll call, the House went doggedly on into the night before a crowded gallery.* With roll call after roll call, the earmarking amendments were knocked out one by one until, when the final vote was taken, not even the amendment to reduce Administrator Hopkins' salary remained.

*After this tiring session, longest of the present Congress only because of the numerous roll calls, weary Maury Maverick of Texas began agitating for a mechanical vote-recording device in the House.

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