Oil If

The big if in the oil situation last week was whether the railroads can step their oil deliveries to the East up another 200,000 barrels a day, average 1,000,000 barrels a day through the winter. Railroad men were sure they could, and oilmen agreed that such a feat--when & if achieved--would make fuel-oil rationing unnecessary.

But President Roosevelt, his oil boss Harold L. Ickes and most oilmen "from Missouri," were taking no chances. The President warned the Eastern seaboard that householders had better prepare for fuel-oil rationing. Ickes went beyond words to action, halted all deliveries of heating oil until Sept. 15 to build up stocks, warned 400,000 homeowners who burn oil in converted coal furnaces that they may not be allowed any oil at all and had better convert back to coal right away. So far, he said, fewer than 30,000 have done so.

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