THE WEEK IN REVIEW
THE WEEK IN REVIEW MEMBERS of Congress headed for Washington this weekend to face a swollen agenda of peacetime legislation when they are called to order Wednesday, Sept. 5. A host of home-front...
...MOST of the other witnesses heard during the first week were far less hesitant...
...Charging that neither Congress nor the Administration did anything about reconversion and unemployment until panicked by a Socialist victory in Britain and the sudden ending of the war, Socialist leader Norman Thomas protested the Senate Committee's refusal to grant time for Socialist testimony at the hearings on the Murray Full Employment Bill...
...Truman when the Administration sought, and received by near unanimous votes, the wartime extensions of Lend-Lease...
...It was then stated categorically and announced publicly to the nation and our Allies that Lend-Lease would end with the war...
...High on the list of urgent domestic legislation are measures to speed and ease the process of reconversion to peacetime economy and to provide for a prompt and orderly demobilization and redeployment of the nation's armed forces...
...The ending of Lend-Lease constitutes a major step toward liquidating wartime executive rule and restoring the policy-making power to Congress...
...The War Labor Board has announced that the Little Steel Formula will now be operative only in cases where wage increases would require an increase in prices...
...6Adoption of a Federal housing program based on ? the report recently submitted by the Taft Committee and providing for extensive Federal encouragement of private and public housing programs...
...2The Full Employment Bill, which would require ? the President to submit an annual production and employment budget to Congress, If unemployment is predicted, recommendations would be made for stimulating business, by private and public investment...
...Reconversion...
...Contrary to those who fear that private enterprise will be endangered by planning to avoid employment," he said, "we believe that it will be greatly benefited...
...Said Crowley: "We never guaranteed to keep the Lend-Lease pipeline going forever...
...2. Creating a Full Employment Finance Authority to lend money to stimulate production by non-profit corporations and cooperatives...
...Truman's aide said he didn't think so, and added that while he considered the late President a remarkable man, he believed "that after a diet of caviar it was good to get back to ham and eggs...
...7Liberalization and clarification of veterans' leg...
...Many of those who received burns cannot survive the wounds because of the uncanny effects which the atomic bomb produced on the human body...
...U. S. population has increased to 139,-682,000, a gain of more than eight million in the last five years, the Census Bureau announced last week.^ * * * v Atomic Bomb Toll...
...tive action this far, including measures for establishing a permanent Fair Employment Practices Commission, a Missouri Valley Authority, the St...
...Administration spokesmen, in and out of the White House, made it clear that the termination of Lend-Lease was in complete conformity with clear-cut pledges given Congress by the late President Roosevelt and by Mr...
...Leo T. Crowley, head of the Foreign Economic Administration which administered Lend-Lease, promptly executed President Truman's cease lending and leasing order...
...THE measure which has claimed most public attention thus far is the Full Employment Bill, public hearings on which began last week...
...charge of men and women in the armed forces, establish basic policy for the redeployment to theaters of occupation, and set the limits of the strength of the Army and Navy...
...Nelson A. Rockefeller, Assistant Secretary of State in charge of Latin American affairs, was replaced last week by Spruille Braden, U. S. ambassador to Argentina and an outspoken critic of the Argentine Government...
...Getting a job is the greatest concern of the returning veteran, Bradley said, adding that "a lot of men are not going to be satisfied to go back to their old jobs— they want something better...
...3. Raising family incomes by 5 per cent through wage increases and increased production...
...Present benefit rates and duration periods vary greatly in the various states...
...Even if it were appropriate to do so, I do not feel qualified to state whether the bill would accomplish the purpose for which it is intended or whether^ from the political or economic aspect, it would be desirable...
...Legislation certain to get early attention includes the following : 1Proposals to end Selective Service, speed the dis...
...Discussing returning servicemen, Vaughan was reported to have said that those who have gone through combat will not want to talk about it while "the soldiers from the mahogany foxhole in the Pentagon will be delighted about their experiences in war...
...Emphatic opposition came from American Socialists...
...5Establishment of fundamental national policy re...
...THE Lend-Lease program, through which the United States provided her Allies, principally Great Britain and Soviet Russia, with more than 41 billion dollars worth of munitions, materials, food, and clothing during the war, became an explosive domestic and international issue this week...
...I have a lot of admiration for the action taken by the President...
...5. A host of home-front problems will be first on the schedule, but many a delicate foreign policy issue, involving far-reaching decisions in Europe, Africa, and Asia, will confront this Congress before it finally adjourns...
...A number of American newspapers, led by the New York Times, speculated on the theory that Administration ending of Lend-Lease was designed to throw difficulties in the way of Britain's new Labor Government...
...Omar N. Bradley, new boss of the Veterans Administration...
...It took a lot more courage to shut off Lend-Lease than it would have to close one's eyes and continue a program Congress intended to operate only during the war...
...Several members of Congress have announced that they propose to introduce legislation as soon as Congress convenes, while the Administration is reported working on its own program...
...3Legislation for Federal guarantee of $25 a week ? for at least 26 weeks as unemployment compensation...
...Many persons are dying daily from burns sustained during the raids," the Japanese reported...
...The prospects for passage of this group of bills is, unfortunately, not much brighter than they were before peace broke out...
...The appointment of Braden leaves only two of the six assistant secretaries appointed by President Roosevelt last year—William L. Clayton, in charge of economic affairs, and James C. Dunn, chief of political affairs...
...4. A far more adequate social security system from the cradle to the grave...
...Dozens of witnesses appeared before the Senate Banking Committee, most of them supporters of the legislation...
...Asked if he believed President Roosevelt's death had affected U. S. relations with Premier Stalin, Mr...
...Philip Murray, president of the Congress of Industrial Organizations, warned that unless full, employment is achieved, the American people "will recognize the failure of private capitalism" and demand Government operation of'war-built factories...
...Any condition insuring more or less continuous work opportunities for all persons who want to be employed" is to be commended, he said, but Bradley hastened to add: "This statement is made without any desire to indicate personal approval-or disapproval of the bill under consideration...
...They want to make use of the mechanical and other experience they have had in the armed forces, he said...
...Charles G. Bolte, chairman of the American Veterans Committee, a new, liberal group of returned service men, said his organization had endorsed the measure as "the most sensible proposal in sight for a good beginning" on the problem of providing job opportunities for everyone...
...Names And Notes In The News Raised Eyebrows...
...The way to avoid excess controls is to avoid the crisis conditions that lead people to call upon government for aid...
...Norman Thomas insisted that full employment could be achieved without regimentation and burea-cracy only by increasing production of goods and spending power by: 1. Democratic socialization through public corporations of money, banking, and credit, natural resources, public utilities, and other monopolies...
...In its first detailed report of the atomic bomb, Japan disclosed last week that 70,000 persons were killed outright, 120,000 wounded, 290,000 made homeless, and an unknown number missing from the two bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki...
...One non-committal witness was Gen...
...The Socialist spokesman declared, however, that the bill broke down by assuming that with a little aid from government, private capitalism can provide the full employment which it did not provide in America or anywhere else before the war...
...Steps to cushion the shock and provide extensive, long-term credits to our Allies were taken by Congress when it increased the resources of the Export-Import Bank to six billion dollars...
...Lawrence Water way, a public health program, and for abolishing payment of a poll tax as requirement of voting for candidates for national office...
...Even those who received minor burns and looked quite healthy at first, weakened after a few days for some unknown reason...
...President Truman touched off the explosion when he ordered the end of all further Lend-Lease operations and notified the Allied governments involved to take over through purchase some $2,000,000,000 of non-munitions and finished goods already contracted 'for in this country and to negotiate, if they desired, for another $1,500,000,000 worth in stockpiles throughout the world...
...Vaughan was equally frank on other subjects...
...At the time, earlier this year, when the act was extended and the appropriation granted, President Truman and I were impressed forcibly with this intention and we both made promises at that time which were kept when the President directed that immediate steps be taken early this week to terminate Lend-Lease...
...4The Pepper-La Follette proposal to raise the basic ? minimum wage from 40 to 65 cents an hour...
...President Truman announced last week that he will recommend legislation if it is found to be needed to continue the Selective Service job security clause for returning veterans...
...Rockefeller had urged cooperation with the Farrel regime on Argentina's promise to rid itself of fascism, but just before his resignation was announced, Rockefeller made a speech denouncing the Argentine Government and en-couraerincr the Argentine Deople to rid themselves of the regime...
...ALTHOUGH no opposition witnesses testified during the first week of hearings, the Committee disclosed it had received critical letters from business men, economists, and state and local officials^ An example of the position of the bill's critics appeared in a letter from Mayor Roger Lapham of San Francisco who wrote: "We should not look to Washington for bur bread and expect it to come back well buttered...
...Crowley made it clear last week that Great Britain, whence have come most of the protests over the termination of Lend-Lease, "could get $100,000,000, $200,000,000 or $300,000,000 by next Tuesday...
...8Other proposals which have been refused aff irma...
...This theory, however, was not taken seriously in England...
...President Truman has removed a model of a gun from his White House desk and has substituted a model of a plow...
...Thomas praised two features of the Murray Bill— its recognition that providing full employment is a legitimate concern of government and its job budget as a basis for constructive action...
...Population...
...The question of discontinuing Lend-Lease is one that was settled by Congress...
...Rockefeller Out...
...Official Washington raised its eyebrows last week when it read in the Washington Star that Brig...
...garding the control of atomic power...
...A London dispatch to the Chicago Sun made it clear that "informed opinion" there doesn't place any reliance on the truth of that kind of gossip...
...Harry W. Vaughan, military aide to President Truman, had characterized Winston Churchill as a "garrulous old gentleman" in a church speech...
Vol. 9 • September 1945 • No. 36
