THE EDITOR RESERVES THE LAST COLUMN
The Editor Reserves . . . The Last Column HENRY WALLACE may have paid exorbitant tuition at the Democratic National Convention at Chicago, but he does seem to have learned a few lessons in...
...Clayton refuse to bring pressure on the President...
...Wallace's Chicago wounds with a super-assignment for the Administration—if the President is reelected—the Vice .President did not give out with a joyous cry of thanks...
...Roosevelt has been told, the liberal vote is in his pocket, Mr...
...Roosevelt was planning to salve Mr...
...The outcry of a liberal press that was genuinely independent, and not just a "me too" echo for the Democratic National Committee, might have and might yet rekindle an old fire...
...The conflict over the Kilgore Bill versus the George Bill illustrates.my point...
...Wallace's cooperation with any future Roosevelt Administration will depend not alone on the wishes of the electorate in November, but on the kind of administration Mr...
...It denounced Senators who voted for the George Bill as "reactionaries" and worse, and redoubled its demand for a fourth term...
...It has not been too proud to work both sides of the street...
...Clayton nor fight for anything like the Kilgore Bill as long as the forces in America which want the Kilgore Bill and don't want Mr...
...Roosevelt will play again to the conservatives...
...But the simple, incontrovertible fact remains that the Roosevelt Administration still was not behind the Kilgore Bill, made no fight for it, and allowed its chief lieutenants to work against its passage...
...No, indeed...
...If, as Mr...
...The same holds true for the other phase of the reconversion problem—disposal of surplus war property...
...He has had an opportunity to observe at close range a growing reluctance on the part of the Administration to go to bat for progressive principles and to fight through for liberal legislation...
...Despite all this, the slavishly pro-Roosevelt spokesmen continue to speak and write as if defeat of the Kilgore Bill were a blow to the Administration...
...Wallace's current uneasiness is not solely the result of the Chicago knifings...
...James B. Reston, a careful reporter who is on the Washington staff of the New York Times, put it this way: "It is understood that the extent of Mr...
...he wanted to know whether a fourth term would be the kind of Administration a liberal would like to serve...
...The so-called liberal press is fighting, and rightly so, for legislation which will prevent a hundred billion dollars worth of Government-owned factories, materials, and land from falling into the hands of monopolies...
...A Good Example Mr...
...The pro-Roosevelt press in the East has shouted lustily for the Kilgore Bill...
...And yet, this man whose activities are rightly denounced daily by the CIO and the Roosevelt press holds his office at the appointment of President Roosevelt and could be fired at 10 minutes after 8 tomorrow morning if Mr...
...Wallace has been finding out, most of the noise has been coming from the Tories, and the President has adapted his arrangements accordingly...
...He said nothing himself, but his friends let the word get out that Mr...
...Roosevelt wanted him out of his Administration...
...Roosevelt intends to have...
...According to friends of the Vice President, he will seek to discover .. . details of the program the President intends to follow if reelected...
...Wallace was getting slightly inquisitive...
...Thus, when it was reported recently that Mr...
...M.H.R...
...Take this whole rumpus over reconversion and disposal of surplus war property as an example...
...The Editor Reserves . . . The Last Column HENRY WALLACE may have paid exorbitant tuition at the Democratic National Convention at Chicago, but he does seem to have learned a few lessons in politics...
...When the George Bill reached the House, James F. Byrnes, the President's number one spokesman on domestic issues, actually testified as spokesman for the Administration in support of the George Bill with one major modification on unemployment compensation...
...The President, it has been said, plays politics by ear...
...The latter, however, in modified and expanded form, passed the Senate and awaits concurrence in the House as this is being written...
...Thumbing A Ride Their principal target is Will Clayton, currently Surplus Property Administrator, who is slated to be top boss of the whole program if Congressional Tories have their way...
...Despite several basic flaws, the Kilgore Bill was far more socially-minded and forward-looking than its competitor, the George Bill...
...The Vice President is not quite so inclined to expose his neck for the Roosevelt Administration, and he is reported to have developed the habit of asking questions instead of merely accepting, with blind faith, everything that comes from the White House...
...Certainly this issue is one of the deepest-going of our time, yet the Administration's record is one of ducking and dodging...
...All too tragically, as Mr...
...But there is only the deadly sound of tired warriors climbing aboard a passing bandwagon...
...But the President will neither fire Mr...
...Wallace indicated to the Chicago convention that rejected his candidacy for renomination that he believed the Democratic Party had turned away from the 'liberal' policies of the first two Roosevelt Administrations...
...Clayton is the millionaire Texas cotton broker and former Liberty Leaguer whose rulings in his present high Government post have infuriated progressives in Washington...
Vol. 8 • September 1944 • No. 36
