73rd Sits

In the House, for the first hour after Speaker Rainey banged it to order at high noon, pomp was scarce. The Assistant Sergeant-at-Arms placed the mace on the Speaker's desk in the midst of what looked like a camp meeting. There was much slapping of backs, swapping of stories, speculating about November when all 435 members will have to stand for reelection, sniffing at the lady members' bouquets, sniffling over the six who had died since the special session ended in June.

In the Senate ("World's Greatest Club"), the scene was less proletarian. Camaraderie of a more formal sort marked the occasion, whose dignity was impaired only for an instant when cut-awayed Col. Halsey, the Senate's popular secretary, lost a garter.

Also called to order at noon, 88 Senators answered their roll. At 1:20 the Senators, led by Vice President Garner, marched out of their chamber two-by-two, passed down the Capitol's central corridor. In front of the main door of the House, the procession came to a halt.

"The Senate of the United States!" cried House Doorkeeper Joseph Sinnott, swinging wide the baize & leather portals. The Senators had not been a minute too soon, for the clock over the Speaker's desk said 1:38 when President Roosevelt took his place beneath it, amid 60 seconds' wild cheering, to address the 73rd Congress in joint session.

State of the Union. "I come before you," began the strong, persuasive voice which filled the room and rang around the world by radio, "not to make requests for special or detailed items of legislation; I come, rather, to counsel with you. ... It is sufficient that I should speak in broad terms of the results of our common counsel."

Some broad terms:

Credit. "The credit of the Government has been fortified by drastic reduction in the cost of its permanent agencies through the Economy Act."

Stabilization. "Careful investigation and constant study prove that in the matter of foreign exchange rates, certain of our sister nations find themselves so handicapped by internal and other conditions that they feel unable at this time to enter into stabilization discussions based on permanent and world-wide objectives." (For foreign rage at this blame-laying, see p. 25.)

Labor. "Several millions of our unemployed have been restored to work."

Child Labor "is abolished."

Agriculture. "Actual experience . . . leads to my belief that thus far the experiment of seeking a balance between production and consumption is succeeding."

Readjustment. "It is to the eternal credit of the American people that this tremendous readjustment of our national life is being accomplished peacefully. . . . Viewed in the large, it is designed to save from destruction and to keep for the future the genuinely important values created by modern society. The vicious and wasteful parts of that society we could not save if we wished; they have chosen the way of self-destruction. We would save useful mechanical invention, machine production, industrial efficiency, modern means of communication, broad education. . . . But the unnecessary expansion of industrial plants, the waste of natural resources, the exploitation of consumers of natural monopolies, the accumulation of stagnant surpluses, child labor and the ruthless exploitation of all labor . . . these were consumed in the fires that they themselves kindled: we must make sure that as we reconstruct our life there be no soil in which such weeds can grow again."

Personal. "A final personal word. . . . Out of these friendly contacts we are, fortunately, building a strong personal tie between the legislative and executive branches of the Government. The letter of the Constitution wisely declared a separation, but the impulse of common purpose declares a union."

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