Old Rinds & Used Grounds

For a few days, early last week, Congress seemed to be going all in one direction, carried along by a suddenly rising tide. Bernard Baruch's espousal of immediate price controls (TIME, Aug. 7) had even persuaded many Republicans that Harry Truman ought to have not less but more control over the economy. But before the week was out, the tide had become a wild rip on which bounced all the old rinds and used coffee grounds of U.S. party politics.

Democrats and Republicans alike had been hearing from constituents who were overwhelmingly in favor of price controls, though not so eager for either wage controls or rationing--which both Harry Truman and Bernard Baruch agreed go hand in hand with price control. Pennsylvania's Republican John Kunkel announced in the House that he was going to introduce an all-out, Baruch-like control bill. Since this reversed the Republicans' previous stand, Truman Democrats suspected a trap. There was no machinery ready to ration all goods and police all prices across the land; the Administration feared chaos would result. Democrats well remembered their 1946 congressional defeat (when the G.O.P slogan was "Had enough?"); controls were apt to boomerang. On the other hand, if an uncontrolled economy did run away, Republicans could properly charge the Administration with irresponsibility.

Harry Truman reversed himself. He announced that, if Congress insisted, he would accept the authority to control prices--but only on a stand-by basis. House Banking & Currency Committee Chairman Brent Spence stitched together a new bill along these lines. Then the fight began over the rival Spence and Kunkel bills.

Some Confusion. Congressmen's heads began to swim. "There is confusion," the Republicans' Earl Michener shouted. "There is confusion on the floor."

"Not on our side," declared Majority Leader McCormack. "You do not know just where you are. You are all divided."

"We had not proceeded but a few steps," Michener persisted, "before there was confusion worse confounded on your side and on our side and on everybody's side . . ."

"I do not admit that all the House is in confusion," said McCormack. "I can see that most, but not all--but most of your side is in confusion."

Said Michener: "I admit I am confused."

Flotsam, Jetsam. He had not seen anything yet. Congressmen on both sides of the aisle with special interests to serve went to work on the Spence bill. They amended it to weaken it; they amended it to strengthen it. The House agreed to make price controls mandatory if the cost-of-living index went up 5% above the level of June 15 (food prices had already gone up 2% to 3%); the White House shuddered at such a notion. Other amendments got in the bill: to exempt radio, television, periodicals and insurance underwriters from price control; to chop out a provision for controlling commodity speculation. The real-estate lobby failed by only two votes to exempt real-estate credits from control.

Tentatively the House passed the whole bill, turned around the next day and voted the whole thing down, and was back where it started. The Senate, going through the same process in committee, got no further.

Battle Ended. After four weeks of brawling, sporadic debate, the Senate did pass the biggest single money bill ever approved, the $34 billion appropriation bill, in which was lumped for the first time all Government spending for the year.

A hundred amendments to that bill had been beaten down. Paul Douglas had lost his brave battle to get rid of millions of dollars of pork-barrel items. The only effective gesture at economizing was an amendment directing the Administration to shave 10%, some way, from all non-defense items, for an estimated saving of $525 million. Thus the onus of specific economies would fall on the Administration, while Congress took the credit.

By the time fixed charges (e.g., interest on the $257 billion national debt) were included and President Truman's new $4 billion for European military aid and $11.6 billion for additional arms were added, the U.S. budget would be in the neighborhood of $57 billion for this year.

Last week Congress also:

P: Applauded a speech delivered by Tokutaro Kitamura, leader of a visiting delegation from the Japanese Diet. Said Kitamura: "I should like to express our deepest regret for the tragic trouble we have caused to the people of the United States, the peoples of the European nations, the people of China, and also the people of the Australian nation."

P: Next day, applauded speeches delivered in both houses by Australia's visiting Prime Minister Robert Menzies, who promised troops to Korea. Said Menzies: "History, sir, is continuous, it is dynamic, and never more so than when a nation has pride, when it has courage, when it has responsibility. Sir, those are the reasons why the Prime Minister of a numerically small people may speak quite frankly to the Representatives of an enormous world power in brotherhood and with, as I believe, high mutual respect."

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