Compromise for Sam

Democratic leaders of the U.S. Senate last week devised a compromise plan to save face for Speaker Sam Rayburn, who had rushed through the House of Representatives a bill calling for a flat $20-a-head income-tax cut (TIME, March 7). The compromise was proposed only after it became clear that defections among Senate Democrats would defeat the House scheme. As outlined by Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson, the Senate measure would give the head of each household a $20 tax reduction, plus $10 for each dependent other than a spouse.

Johnson blandly explained that the income-tax cut would not add a cent to the national deficit since his amendment also proposed to 1) continue the present excise and, corporation-tax rates for two years instead of the one-year extension requested by the Administration, and 2) take away the dividend credit granted by the 83rd Congress to stockholders.

Last week the Congress also:

P: Approved, by a 10-to-4 vote of the Senate Judiciary Committee, the nomination of John Marshall Harlan to succeed the late Justice Robert Jackson on the Supreme Court.

P: Passed, in the House of Representatives, and sent to the Senate a $746 million pay raise for enlisted men who stay in the armed forces for more than two years and officers who remain in service more than three years. The increases range from 6% to 25%, with junior officers getting the highest benefits. The measure is designed to provide incentive to career servicemen.

P: Voted 8 to 4 in the Senate Government Operations Committee to approve the nomination of former Atomic Energy Commissioner Joseph E. Campbell as U.S. Comptroller General. Democratic opposition to Campbell stemmed mostly from the fact that while on AEC he voted in favor of the Dixon-Yates contract.

P: Recommended, in the House Armed Services Committee, the construction of three more atomic-powered submarines (for a total of seven), a fifth supercarrier, and the conversion of more ships to guided-missile service.

P:Revived, by a 26-to-11 vote of the House Agriculture Committee, the rigid 90%-parity farm program that had been killed in the 83rd Congress. The high-parity bill faces a bitter fight in the House, probably defeat in the Senate.

P: Planned, in the Senate Permanent Investigations Subcommittee, to reopen the case of ex-Army Dentist Irving Peress, the chief bone of contention in last year's Army-McCarthy hearings.

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