Berry Picked

Major George Leonard Berry of Tennessee came within three votes of beating "Brother Charlie" Bryan for the Democratic Vice-Presidential nomination at Madison Square Garden in 1924. Brother Charlie was, of course, not elected, but at least he was Governor of Nebraska. George Berry never got even that far in politics.

Until last week few people except George Leonard Berry could possibly have cared about that 1924 bubble in the stream of U. S. history. But it became significant last week when Tennessee's Governor Gordon Browning, after 13 days of playing "Senator, Senator, who would be Senator?'' (TIME, May 10), picked George Berry to occupy the late Nathan Lynn Bachman's seat in the U. S. Senate until Tennessee's regular election next year.

After Governor Browning visited the White House last fortnight, it was generally assumed that the one qualification positively demanded of Senator Bachman's successor was support of the President's Court Plan. There was never any doubt about George Berry's meeting that requirement. But wiseacres reported him "definitely eliminated" from the list when it came to light that he and three associates had filed a $1,633,000 claim against Tennessee Valley Authority for mineral rights on some of their property flooded by Norris Dam. No Congressman can prosecute a claim against the Government, and George Berry was threatening last fortnight to take his case to court unless it was satisfactorily arbitrated. But it was by no means certain last week that Major Berry must sacrifice $400,000, more or less, for his seat in the Senate. As an influential Senator, he may find the way to arbitration unexpectedly smooth. Also, there was nothing to prevent his selling his share of the claim in advance, letting his friends press the suit.

It has been the fashion in New Deal Washington to marvel at big, baldish, red-faced, hairy-fisted, loud-talking Major George L. Berry, late of the A. E. F. He made himself conspicuous at the start when, going up in 1933 to find a job with NRA, he refused to accept any salary. He continued conspicuous when, after the Supreme Court had axed the Blue Eagle, he kept up his pretensions to potency as keeper of its bones. His title of Coordinator for Industrial Co-operation sounded imposing, but about all he could do was call conferences from which Big Businessmen, knowing him for a professional Labor Leader, shied away in droves. And when he sounded off as chairman of Labor's Non-Partisan League for Roosevelt's re-election last year, everyone knew that the real power in the League was John L. Lewis.

Scoffers did well to reconsider George Berry last week. It was not safe to discount the political potentialities of a man who, orphaned at seven and working at everything from printing to prize fighting while most future bigwigs were going to school and college, had risen to his extraordinary place in the world. First rule of every political orator is to establish a bond with his audience. George Berry can speak to Labor as president since 1907 of the International Printing Pressmen & Assistants' Union of North America. George Berry can speak to Business as owner of the biggest color label-printing plant in the U. S. (at Rogersville, Tenn.), owner of three newspapers, controlling stockholder of one bank and director of another. George Berry can speak to Farmers as owner of the biggest farm (30,000 acres near Rogersville, Tenn.) in the U. S. Southeast.

Senator George Berry who wasted no time taking his seat this week, should prove a voluble rival of New York's Robert F. Wagner as champion of Labor. When President Roosevelt decides to push bills for regulation of wages and hours, the hardworking, plan-spouting onetime Coordinator for Industrial Co-operation would be an appropriate sponsor. Last week it might have been either far-fetched or farsighted to speculate on George Berry's position if & when John L. Lewis, who would reputedly rather be a Mark Hanna than a William McKinley, attains his full political stature.

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