Honeymoon's End

When he took office Franklin D. Roosevelt may have hoped that his political honeymoon could be made to last forever. Few new Presidents had hoped for less. For a full twelve months he successfully held Congress in a state of passionate adoration. The country at large got the firm-fixed impression that he was invincible, that he was destined to go through one term and probably two the complete master of himself and Washington. But last week brought two events in close succession which showed that even a Franklin D. Roosevelt cannot win a family fight every time.

First event was a vote in the Senate on the St. Lawrence Waterway Treaty. Twice the President had sent messages urging its ratification. Several times he had told Senator Robinson, who manages the Administration's affairs in the Senate, that the treaty should and would be ratified. The Roosevelt prestige and popularity, if nothing else, would put it through. Last week when the roll call was taken only 46 votes, 13 short of the necessary two-thirds majority, were cast for it. Of the 42 votes against it, 22 were cast by Democrats. Senator James Hamilton Lewis of Illinois, a stanch Democrat, led the fight against the Administration.

From his first major defeat the President could pluck a few bits of comfort. The waterway project split the ranks of both parties, and votes were determined mainly by sectional issues. Said Funnyman Will Rogers: "Every Senator voted against it if it didn't run by his house." Although he had pressed firmly for the treaty's ratification the President did not at the last moment roll up his sleeves and try to whip reluctant Senators into line. Even Leader Robinson made no stirring final appeal. Because it has more important measures to ram through, the Administration refrained from putting the screws on its Senate followers, thus wasting Presidential strength and risking Presidential prestige. Real significance of the St. Lawrence defeat was that the President now recognized he had to husband his power, that a simple expression of his wishes was no longer the law and the gospel at the Capitol.

Second event, coming the same day to point the first, was the House's vote on the Independent Offices Appropriation. Two months ago with the House well under control it passed the original bill in the form the President wanted it. The Senate amended the measure by adding $118,000,000 for veterans' pensions and $215,000,000 for restoring the 15% Federal pay cut (TIME, March 19). If the Senate version became law, it would have nullified more than half the savings which the President made a year ago under the Economy Act. The President let the House know that he would veto the bill if it accepted the Senate amendments. Only a few days earlier the House had defied the threat of a veto in passing the greenback bonus bill. That, however, was only a political gesture for home consumption since no one expected the bonus bill to become law. Last week in what was not a gesture but a deliberate affront to the White House, the House voted 247 to 169 against a rule which, in effect, would have rejected the Senate's amendments. This step taken, the House cast regard for the Administration to the winds and proceeded to make the bill over to suit itself--a thing it did not dare to do two months ago. Neither black-browed Majority Leader Byrns nor white-crested Speaker Rainey could stem the tide. The House did not accept the Senate bill but it thoroughly upset the Administration program by voting $91,700,000 extra for veterans' pensions and $130.000.000 extra for Federal pay. Representatives grew so rambunctious that they were ready to take on the Senate as well as the President. Among other things they killed Senator Borah's amendment that the pay restoration should be limited to employes drawing less than $6,000 a year--an amendment which would have kept members of Congress from recovering their own pay cut. So the bill was batted back & forth between the House and Senate, Only approach to deference for the President's desires was a vote of 190 to 189 with which the House finally rejected the Senate's plan to spend $354,000.000 in favor of its own plan to spend only $243,000,000 more than the President wanted. Cause of this revolt was primarily the Congressional desire to placate the American Legion and Government employes before election next autumn--a desire which will probably grow stronger as the session draws to a close. To the President the pension and pay restoration was a bigger defeat than either the bonus bill or the St. Lawrence Treaty. It indicated that he might soon have to have Leaders Robinson and Byrns on the carpet for a heart-to-heart if he expected to shove through his domestic legislative program and get Congress out of Washington by May 15. And when scoldings begin honeymoons are at an end.

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