F. O. B. Washington

Frail old Warren Hatcher heaved a sigh of relief one evening last week, put away a heavy bundle of 13 black rods surmounted by a silver eagle, and went home to dinner. And the sigh heaved by quiet Mr. Hatcher, Deputy Sergeant at Arms of the House of Representatives in charge of the Mace,* echoed the sentiments of many a U. S. citizen.

For at last, after 44 days and 1,000,000-plus words of high-and low-grade oratory, the second session of the 76th Congress was dispersing. Its achievements: 1) an historic change in the foreign policy of the U. S.; 2) a $222,000 appropriation to pay its own mileage expenses.

The Goods. To the White House last week went the leaders of the Congress to deliver the goods--the Neutrality Act that Franklin Roosevelt wanted--and see him scrawl his bold signature on it.

It had been excellent advice that ailing Pat Harrison had phoned to the White House in mid-September--to lie low, avoid dramatic moves, cajole the South. For once more the South's balance of power had been clearly demonstrated. Lacking Southern support, Franklin Roosevelt was beaten on every Congressional front in July and August (TIME, August 14); with it he won clearly in the Senate last fortnight, in the House last week--where 95 Southern votes were cast for repeal of the arms embargo, two against.

Delivery-Boys. For this victory Franklin Roosevelt could thank many a man, but particularly two--Jimmy Byrnes of South Carolina in the Senate, Lindsay Carter Warren of North Carolina in the House. Powerful Mr. Warren, a bull-built, blunt, 49-year-old country lawyer with a fine stand of black hair, may one day be Speaker of the House, notwithstanding the hankering of the White House Janizariat for John W. McCormack, of Boston's famous Ward 8. Last week Lindsay Warren, working glove-smooth with Leader Sam Rayburn of Texas, Whip Paddy Boland of Scranton, Pa., delivered the South bound-and-gagged to the New Deal. John McCormack broke a long and agonized silence on the embargo-repeal issue to deliver only a speech. In it he demanded that the U. S. recall its Ambassador from Moscow (see p. 15). Score at week's end: Warren I, McCormack 0.

Messrs. Warren & Co. followed the scheme laid down by agile-minded Jimmy Byrnes in the Senate: let the opposition talk its head off, then vote the bill through as is. The House version of the Great Debate sounded hotter than the Senate's --chiefly because of the necessary brevity of the speeches--but actually meant no more. That the vote was in the bag was conclusively demonstrated when wily old Speaker William Brockman Bankhead, Hamlet of the House, took the floor for a passionate defense of the measure: near the finish-post, he always cheers the winner.

As the finish-post was passed, Jockey Key Pittman of Nevada neatly unhorsed himself with the flat pronouncement that he did not expect Franklin Roosevelt to proclaim defined combat areas (next day the President did). Nothing dashed by this tumble, the lean Nevadan mounted again on the most improbably romantic idea of the week: that U. S. ships are to be provided with distinctive markings for each side: that the Germans would be advised of the markings on one side, while the Allies would be told of the other. The markings, said Mr. Pittman gravely, would be visible for five miles. Further, said Mr. Pittman solemnly, special "radio passwords" are to be given each U. S. ship, one set for the Allies, another set for the Germans, to be used when they are "spoken" by belligerent naval vessels. To this scheme of warfare made easy the Navy Department and the Maritime Commission merely nodded embarrassed heads, mumbled something about being "too busy right now."

Middlemen. House histrionics, the 1940 political situation, and the network of Washington intrigues meant little to one suffering group of U. S. citizens. All the shipping lines could see were the angular lines of the combat areas defined by the President, wherein no U. S. ship may deliver goods of any sort on penalty of $50,000 fine, five years in prison or both (see map). Through these forbidden seas lay the eight trade routes of 92 U. S. ships, with a Government investment of $195,061,000, an annual gross revenue of $52,500,000. There was plenty of open water elsewhere--notably around South America--but hardly a drop the shipping men could drink.

Only one boat slid out of New York's harbor as the President signed his proclamation -- the 5,029-ton freighter Black Gull, of the Black Diamond Lines, bound for Rotterdam and Antwerp via the English Channel. But within 48 hours the Maritime Commission had tentatively approved an application from the United States Lines to transfer registry of nine ships to the Republic of Panama. Under Panamanian registry they could go merrily on carrying cargoes to Europe's belligerents.

Jobbers. To one class of U. S. citizens, however, the new act brought no pain whatsoever. The mushrooming aircraft industry greeted the news with a figurative tooting of factory-whistles: hauled out blueprints for a big war trade, prepared to jump capacity to peak-load production and tie it there. The Big Three of California plane-making--Lockheed, Douglas, North American--prepared to take on from 2,000 to 10,000 men to get out $110,000,000 worth of accumulated orders, with millions more to come. Without plant expansion the numerous California companies can build more than 700 aircraft of all kinds monthly--more than 8,000 a year.

From California many British orders will be flown to Canada; French and other orders flown to New York for crating. With 626 planes ready for shipment in the U. S., with an additional $100,000,000 in plane orders reported on the way, with Canada preparing to buy 1,500 planes in which to begin training 25,000 Empire airmen during 1940, the plane outlook was rosy. Trading in aircraft stocks boomed on the nation's markets; day after day aircraft stocks led in turnover.

Nonwar industries faced no such pretty picture. Export business, now bad, got worse. The worst fears of the movie industry, already hard hit, were now confirmed. To the world Hollywood exports about $4,500,000 worth of film yearly, to the United Kingdom in 1937 $500,000. Similarly frightened were exporters of California's citrus fruits; the South's tobacco; Michigan's automobiles, the Midwest's grains and lard, the Northwest's hops.

Seven foreign missions converged on the U. S., checkbooks in hand. The War Department revealed the existence of a new agency to make certain that customers and jobbers get together, and to regulate the flow of arms orders: under bulky, bald Colonel Charles Hines, secretary of the Army and Navy Munitions Board, an interdepartmental committee whose job is supposed to be 1) to assist foreign buyers, 2) to see that the U. S. defense program is not sidetracked in the rush, 3) to build up a strong U. S. munitions industry. In the six States within the War Department's outlined triangle--Pittsburgh, Wilmington, Del., and Boston--where 60% of U. S.-made munitions are produced, almost 5,000 plants were ready to share in the war boom. Hines, 51, brother of Brig. General Frank T. Hines, Veterans' Administration chief, is an artillery officer who believes the industrial side of war is at least as important as tactics. Says Workhorse Hines: "You can't just go out and buy a machine gun."

The possibility that repeal of the embargo would mean a beginning of sabotage attempts roused red-browed Attorney General Frank Murphy to groom his FBI, to promise no general roundups of "subversive elements" but establishment of a protective system for U. S. industries involved.

Closely watched last week by the U. S. was Dr. Hans Thomsen, Charge d'Affaires at the German Embassy in Washington. But the more knowing kept their eyes on Thomsen's unofficial superior, handsome, slick-groomed Fritz Wiedemann, Nazi Consul General at San Francisco. Wiedemann landed last week at Union Air Terminal in Los Angeles, adjusted his monocle, strolled over to gaze at 15 bombers lined up for shipment to Britain and France. The man who was a World War I lieutenant in the company which Adolf Hitler served as dogrobber stared quietly for a moment, grinned, said: "Hmmmm. Nice looking." Then Wiedemann flew to Washington to talk with close-cropped Dr. Thomsen. Suavely Herr Wiedemann denied any connection between his arrival and the passage of the Neutrality Act.

* The Mace, symbol of the Speaker's authority, rests on a malachite table below the dais while the House sits, rests on the floor when the House meets in Committee of the Whole, is carried on high among the members in case of extreme disorders. In eleven sessions Mr. Hatcher has never been driven to extremes.

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