THE 87TH CONGRESS: A BALKY BEAST

THE 87th Congress tried desperately hard to die last week--and could not even make a success of that. Just as the members were getting ready to leave Washington for the year, two Democratic Senators raised objections that held the session over until this week. One was Georgia's Richard Russell, making a last-minute fight for a federal laboratory to grade peanuts at Dawson, Ga. The other was Florida's George Smathers, working to save a bill that would grant tax relief to self-employed persons who set up pension plans for themselves.

The lingering end was characteristic of the 87th's second session. This was still the overwhelmingly Democratic Congress of which President Kennedy recently boasted: "No Congress in recent years has made a record of progress and compassion to match this." But Kennedy must have been smiling through his tears as it slowly drew to a close. From an Administration viewpoint, the 87th in 1962 could only be considered an obstinate, balky, frequently frustrating beast. It gave Kennedy one great victory and a few smaller ones; it was marked by a great batch of half-loaf compromises; and it turned the Administration down cold on many of its key requests. The record:

SUCCESSES

The shining hour of the 87th came when it passed the best, boldest foreign trade bill in U.S. history, giving the President long-term authority to slash all tariffs by at least 50% and to remove many tariffs completely. At a time when the reciprocal trade laws born in the 1930's have been proved totally inadequate, the new bill was realistically aimed at enabling the U.S. to compete and thrive in the world's marketplace.

Beyond that. Congress agreed to help bail the United Nations out of the indebtedness incurred in its special operations in the Congo and Middle East by buying up to $100 million in bonds, but not beyond the total purchased by all other U.N. member nations. It passed a threeyear, $435 million Administration program to retrain unemployed workers. After an embarrassing filibuster by Democratic Senate liberals, the Administration's plan to set up a private corporation to operate a communications satellite system was approved. After a mild Southern filibuster, Congress approved a constitutional amendment to outlaw poll taxes in federal elections, sent it on its lengthy route toward ratification by the states. With Berlin and Cuba still in the headlines, the Administration got all it really wanted for defense --and more: Congress insisted on authorizing funds the President did not want for development of the RS-70 aircraft and the National Guard.

COMPROMISES

The Congress finally settled on $3,928,900,000 for foreign aid--about $950 million less than the Administration requested, and that only after a furious fuss that put the program's whole future in grave doubt. Agriculture Secretary Freeman's request for strict production controls over feed grains was killed in the House. But in a second round, Freeman salvaged a much milder bill; essentially, it extended present farm programs, but it did provide for mandatory controls over wheat production by 1964. A tax revision bill, of sorts, was passed, providing for a 7% income tax credit on new equipment purchased by businessmen. But where Kennedy had presented a package that would have netted the Government $600 million in added revenue, a key provision for withholding taxes on interest and dividend payments was knocked out. and he got a bill that will cost the Government more than $200 million.

The President asked for an $800 million increase in postal rates, had to accept a $600 million package, and this revenue gain was more than offset by a $1 billion increase in federal employee pay raises. Kennedy got a special $500 million antirecession public works program; but he had asked for $2 billion, and the Congress refused him stand-by authority to put the plan in effect whenever he pleased.

FAILURES

The Administration's top-priority domestic proposal, the emotion-charged plan for medical aid to the aged under social security, died dismally in the Senate, where Democrats hold a two-thirds majority. Blocked in a House committee, frowned on by Harry Byrd's Senate Finance Committee, the bill was sent directly to the Senate floor as a rider on a welfare bill. The strategy was to get it approved in the Senate, force House members to answer a roll call on it, thus make it a big issue in the congressional elections. Enough Senators resented this tactic to kill it. Kennedy's plan for a Department of Urban Affairs died because of similar tactics. Despite all of the Administration's demands a year ago for federal aid to general education, no attempt was even made to pass the bill this year. A measure for college scholarships and certain college construction passed both houses, but a conference committee compromise was rejected by the House in a continuing controversy over the inclusion of religious institutions.

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