Decade's End

Last week the correspondents of Washington went on a speculative spree. As discordantly as the horns of New Year's Eve their conflicting stories of what 1940 would bring rang throngh the wintry Capital, left Presidential booms busting like toy balloons, the paper streamers of old prophecies littering the streets. Correspondents said that the session of Congress would be short and asserted, with equal vehemence, that it would be long. Peering into the New Year they could see through the darkness as far as an election--it will be a lively one, said the New York Times, "in which hard words will scorch the air and the ether, but it will be an election, not a revolution." And although many an editorial writer looked searchingly back on the '30s, no Washington correspondent pointed out that for President Roosevelt it was a historic midnight that marked the end, not of a year, but of a decade.

Ten years ago he made a statement for the day that marked the beginning of the '30s. He was then Governor of New York; his New Year's speech for the first day of 1930 was his address to the Legislature. It was calm, unimaginative, matter-of-fact. It dealt with local issues -- power rates, antiquated traffic laws, highway improvements. Last week he worked on his message to Congress. But if, like many a U. S. citizen, he looked back over the years between those speeches, it was to contemplate a period that future historians may well call the Age of Distrust. As the unsteady '20s had been the years of indifference, of wasted time and missed opportunities--when prosperity obscured blotches in the social system, gaping flaws in the economic structure--so the '305 were the years when U. S. citizens trusted neither themselves, their social system, nor the world.

Last week Washington correspondents hammering out their forecasts could not agree on a name for the '30s as apt as the title of the Tragic Era had been for Reconstruction. But their prophecies and backward looks combined to give the raw material that would enable future historians to characterize that decade--a purgatorial period that followed a fool's paradise, a time of confusion and panic, of scrimping, self-pity, despair, of painful reform of the social system, a time when Al Capone and Richard Whitney at last went to jail and many a liberal as stubborn as George Norris at last got a hearing--a time, above all. when suspicion flourished as wildly as had the speculative fever in the days before 1929. No two correspondents could agree about President Roosevelt and the budget, the Congress, the third term. But none of them doubted that he was the man of the '30s, of the decade that ended in a fever of speculation--political and not financial--about what the new decade would bring.

Last week the President: > Promised a non-partisan speech at the Jackson Day Dinner (Jan. 8). Overwhelmed was Republican House Leader Joe Martin to receive an invitation. So were Republicans Charles Linza McNary of Oregon and Warren Austin of Vermont. Such a thing had never been heard of in the years in which Democrats had celebrated Jackson Day to raise Party funds. Just four days before Congress assembled, these three Republicans from way back opened their mail to read: "It may seem a bit unusual to send you the enclosed invitation to attend, as an honored guest, the Jackson Day banquet . . . but these are unusual days. The President is of course aware of this letter and I am authorized to say that he not only hopes that you will attend but that his address on that occasion will be strictly non-partisan in character."

Republican Leader Martin was not so overwhelmed that he forgot to tell reporters he was afraid he would be busy that night. "I was reminded," said he, "that as a child my parents warned me to beware of Greeks bearing gifts." Said owlish Senator McNary, making a quick recovery, "I don't think I could add anything to the letter." Said Senator Austin, "I don't know what this is all about, but I certainly would like to know."

> Made cheerful Daniel Wafena* Bell Under Secretary of the Treasury to succeed John Hanes. Only 48, Daniel Bell has been with the Treasury 28 years, got a stenographic job in 1911 ($700), took the title of Acting Director of the Budget, when he succeeded Lewis Douglas, so he would not lose the Civil Service status that would entitle him to a pension. A specialist in foreign loans and war debts, he is leaned on by Secretary Morgenthau, answers questions at press conferences, dazzles reporters with his memory for figures. So popular was his appointment that recently resigned John Hanes proposed that Daniel Bell be made Under Secretary for life. Conservative, optimistic, modest, Daniel Bell plays golf at the Manor Club (where plays Justice William Douglas), lives quietly, has a 17-year-old daughter, a plump wife who recently sighed matter-of-factly as she looked in the mirror: "I'm getting as big as the budget.

> Showed off his newest grandson, nine-month-old John Roosevelt Boettiger, to White House correspondents, who promptly gave "Little Johnny" a card in their association. Papa John Boettiger ponied up the $1 membership fee, announced that the new correspondent would represent his Daddy's (and Mr. Hearst's) Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

*An Indian name his mother thought up. Mr.

Bell never uses it, does not know what tribe it belonged to or why his mother picked it.

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