THE HOUSE: Hoover’s Next-to-Worst

President Hoover went forth early Wednesday morning as usual to play with his Medicine Ball Cabinet on the south lawn of the White House, but he must have felt as though the heavy medicine ball had gotten inside his breast and lodged where his heart ought to be. Just two years after his arrival at the pinnacle of his career, the country had swung widely out from behind him. He had sat up until 11:25 on election night, watching the swing take place as the returns came in. Now, the morning after, the nightmarish news was not only confirmed but colored darker. Seat after seat of the Republican majorities in Congress were being swept away in what, accurately or not, was being called all over the country an Anti-Administration landslide. There had been bound to be some reaction from the Hoover landslide of 1928. Every one had expected the Senate to have six or eight more Democrats in it, narrowing the already narrow Administration margin there and redoubling the Insurgents’ balance-of-power. But that the Administration’s control of the House should be seriously threatened was unforeseen, unnerving.

After breakfast, however, at about 10:30 a. m., President Hoover breathed more easily. Returns then indicated that the worst (for him) had been averted. With only 40 districts to be heard from, the Democrats had only 183 House seats, 35 short of the vital figure of Majority. As the morning wore on, the Republican count crept slowly closer to that vital, fateful 218.

But the next-to-worst thing for the Administration still impended—the thing Speaker Longworth had feared and predicted: an upbuilding of Democratic strength to the point—204 seats—where the 15 insurgent Republicans of the House would possess a balance-of-power like that of their insurgent brethren in the Senate.

As control of the 72nd Congress continued to seesaw, Democrats, led by Chairman Jouett Shouse, continued to claim a full House majority of their own without insurgent Republican aid. They placed a heavy stake on Kentucky where a new law delayed the count which they hoped would put their party across and elevate Representative John Nance Garner of Texas to the Speakership.

(¶ The only new woman to gain admission to Congress was Effie Gene Locke Wingo, widow of Representative Otis Theodore Wingo, Arkansas Democrat, who died during the campaign. As a double mark of chivalry both parties gave Widow Wingo their nominations.

(¶ The lone Negro member of the 71st Congress will be the lone Negro member of the 72nd. No Democrat was strong enough to oust Republican Representative Oscar De Priest, pride of Chicago’s “Black Belt.”