The Great Debate (/)

THE CONGRESS

The Great Debate (I)

Not since the circus days of Huey Long or before him, of James Thomas ("Tom-Tom") Heflin, had such long cues of curious citizens, four abreast and stretching far down the corridors, waited outside every glass paneled door leading into the Senate gallery. But now the attraction was not a clowning demagog. It was a real, earnest political fight, one of the biggest and bitterest in a generation; the battle of the Supreme Court, which last week was at last joined in the open on the Senate's floor.

Having been called in by the President, whose original Court enlargement plan (one new Justice for every member of the Court over 70 1/2 years) was hopelessly bogged down, Senator Joseph Taylor Robinson had been given the job of finding a Court compromise, getting it passed and saving Franklin Roosevelt's face (TIME, June 14 et seq.). Last week he called up the original bill, offered his substitute amendment (one new Justice for every member of the Court over 75, but not more than one appointment a year), and the historic debate finally began.

The argument continued uninterrupted all through the week. Not only did the Senate bestir itself to unaccustomed work on Saturday, but rather than sacrifice a whole day's debate to go to see an All-Star baseball game (see p. 31), it actually began work one morning at 10 a. m., two hours before normal. Since it seemed likely that the Senate's argument, regardless of any filibuster, would last to the exclusion of most other business, two or three weeks, House leaders announced that beginning next week the House may take a two-week recess.

Nerves. Anticipating bitter opposition, Senator Robinson launched his attack first. For three days running Senators Robinson, Hatch, Guffey, Minton and Logan, all advocates of the measure, held the floor. Promptly, sharply, continuously the opposition baited them with counterattacks. Before Senator Robinson had finished his opening speech, he was so pestered with questions and the debate had grown so heated that he completely forgot himself, took a cigar from his pocket, struck a match to light it on the sacred floor of the Senate. Catching himself in time he hastily threw down the match. "I am through!" he roared. "No more questions today. Good-by!" and rushed for the cloakroom.

Personalities, For the most part the first week's arguments had very little reference to the bill under debate. Senator Guffey's chief argument was that Chief Justice Hughes was a consummate politician who had been desperately active in trying to defeat the New Deal. Senator Logan deplored the sharp language of the Judiciary Committee's report on the President's bill and accused the seven Democrats who signed it of ingratitude. Said he: "Few of them, perhaps, would be here today, if at all, but for the friendship of the President of the U. S., but for his magnificent leadership. ... If the statements in this report are true and the inferences therein drawn are true, the President of the U. S. ought to be impeached. . . . They had a right to disagree with him, I grant that, and if they did disagree with him no one can complain. But when Caesar discovered that Brutus, his own friend, had turned against him, his great heart broke. He fell bleeding at the foot of the statue of Pompey."

To this classical plane other debaters failed to rise. Senator Wheeler took up the question of ingratitude by asking why, after the late Senator Bronson Cutting had left his party to campaign for Franklin Roosevelt, the New Deal turned around two years later and opposed his reelection. "Those of you," he shrilled in his rebuttal, "who rode in on the coat tails of the President will ride out on the coat tails of the President if that is the only reason you are here."

Suicide? Postmaster Farley, when he issued from the White House one day and told the press that the Roosevelt Court Bill was "in the bag," justified his claim by asking whether such Senators as Pat McCarran of Nevada and Joseph O'Mahoney of Wyoming could afford to vote against the bill if they ever again expected to come to him for patronage. Although supposedly off-the-record, one newshawk printed it, and by so doing made two more last-ditch enemies for the bill, both of whom last week spoke up. Most dramatic was Pat McCarran's appearance. Getting up from a sickbed, announcing that he was speaking against his doctor's orders, he cried: "I think this cause is worthy of any man's life. ... I do not believe the hour has come when members of our party can dare to cast off and say: 'Because you exercise the judgment that God Almighty gave you, therefore you are about to be read out of the Democratic party. . . .' When Farley said that when I asked for something for my humble State there would be a different viewpoint, he wrote my death warrant and he knew it, and I may today be delivering my valedictory by reason of a mandate of Mr. Farley."

Rules. The acerbity of the debate was sharpened less by jumpy nerves and persistent arguments ad hominem than by efforts of Senator Robinson to break the great unwritten rule of the Senate: that its written rules are not rigidly enforced. Some opponents of the Court bill had talked of filibustering to prevent its passage, but Senator Robinson last week began to use anti-filibuster tactics long before any real filibuster had begun. Had Vice President Garner been in Washington, a firm observer of the unwritten rules of the "World's Greatest Club," Senator Robinson might not have had great success, but with Mr. Garner on vacation in Texas and Senator Pittman, president pro tern, a loyal backer of the Administration in the chair, all the rulings were in favor of the backers of the bill.

When Senator Wheeler interrupted Senator Logan to charge that one of his statements was untrue, Senator Robinson made a point of order that under the generally ignored rules of the Senate a member "may yield for a question. But he may not yield to other Senators for speeches. . . ."

"I don't know anybody on this floor who violates that rule more than the Senator from Arkansas," snapped Senator Wheeler.

Another neglected rule which Mr. Robinson undertook suddenly to enforce was that no Senator shall be permitted to speak more than twice on the same day on any one measure. Senator Pittman interpreted this to mean twice in one "legislative day." Since the "legislative day" is a fiction which can if necessary be carried on for weeks at a time, this would prevent an extended filibuster.

Next day Senator Minton was speaking for the second time on behalf of the bill, yielded to permit a conference report on the War Department Appropriation bill to be made to the Senate. Senator Clark quickly made the point of order that since Mr. Minton had yielded for other than a question, his second opportunity to speak was ended and he must thereafter hold his peace. Senator Guffey was in the chair and for 20 minutes a desperate parliamentary wrangle raged. Then Senator Pittman returned to the chair and ruled that Mr. Minton was within his rights, could continue to speak. This was far closer to steamroller tactics than the U. S. Senate usually sees. Many of the elder members of the Club fumed with anger at the breach of etiquet.

Significance. Most observers in Washington credited Senator Robinson's boast that he had enough votes to pass his Court bill if it could be brought to a vote, but his margin was slim, depending heavily on freshmen Senators elected last autumn. Although he claimed upwards of 50 out of 96 Senators as supporters, the Democrats who led the 16 minority Republicans in opposition included some of the ablest, most experienced members of the Democratic ranks. They included many who had been expected to find reason for swinging back to the Administration's side on the compromise bill, such as Connally of Texas, Bankhead of Alabama, the President's personal friend, Radcliffe of Maryland. Although many of the opposition undoubtedly hoped to use the Court bill as a means of inflicting a defeat on Franklin Roosevelt, among such men as these, charges of personal animus only helped to create bitterness. Whether or not that bitterness would be effective in defeating the bill, it was of first-rate significance on its own account. Every day the bitter debate continued was a blow on a wedge splitting the hitherto solid ranks of Administration supporters.

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