THE CONGRESS: Leader Apparent

Most important political event in the U. S. since the election of Nov. 3 took place last week at a private luncheon and caucus of 24 of Pennsylvania’s 27 Democratic Congressmen in Washington’s Hotel Mayflower. Host was Pennsylvania’s Senator Joseph F. Guffey. Newshawks hovering about the doors of the suite waited for someone to break the news of what had happened. First to emerge was Representative J. Burrwood Daly of Philadelphia. He cut questioners short.

“Ask Senator Guffey about it,” he insisted. “Senator Guffey is the big cheese.”

The issue at stake was which way Pennsylvania, apparently the pivotal delegation, should vote for the next Democratic Leader of the House of Representatives. Since the Majority Leader always can claim to be the next Speaker, and since Speaker William Bankhead is not a well man, the Leadership of the next Congress is doubly important to the man who gets it and to the Administration.

For this important post there are two serious contenders. One is Tammany’s John Joseph O’Connor of Manhattan, brother of Franklin Roosevelt’s former law partner, 13 years a member of Congress, chairman of the all-important Rules Committee. During the last Congress Representative Bankhead, then Leader, was ill so much that Mr. O’Connor handled the duties of Leader for weeks at a time. When Speaker Byrns suddenly died in the last days of the session, Mr. Bankhead was promptly elected to succeed him, but the stormy question of whether Mr. O’Connor should become Leader was left undecided.

The other serious contender is Representative Sam Rayburn of Bonham, Tex. Mr. Rayburn, who will be 55 the day after the next Congress convenes, is ten years Mr. O’Connor’s senior in point of service, but until recently far less known. The reason is that, although Bonham is approximately the same distance from Uvalde that Detroit, Mich, is from Washington, D. C., they are both in the same State and for many years Sam Rayburn was overshadowed by John Nance Garner. He was in fact one of Garner’s able lieutenants. In the House he seldom makes speeches on the floor and often appears at the back of the chamber standing by the hour with his arms on the rail behind the rearmost row of seats, quietly keeping an eye on what is happening, conferring in whispers with colleagues.

Two years ago. when Speaker Henry Rainey died, Vice President Garner quietly pushed Mr. Rayburn forward for the job of Speaker. He lost because Senator Guffey, then as now big cheese in Pennsylvania, canvassed his House delegation, announced they would vote solidly for Joe Byrns. Thereafter Mr. Rayburn withdrew from the contest. This year matters are different. Sam Rayburn is better known, partly because he is head of the Interstate & Foreign Commerce Committee (he has no other committee assignments) and as such fathered the utility holding company (death sentence) bill. Doing so won him the approval of Franklin Roosevelt. Mr. O’Connor, as Chairman of the Rules Committee, refused to report a rule calling for a roll call on the death sentence—a roll call that would have put its opponents on the spot.

This refusal cost him White House favor.

Last week Sam Rayburn and John O’Connor were in Washington running an apparently neck & neck race. Each claimed he would have about 200 votes for Leader, which was one way of calling each other liar since there will be a maximum of 335 Democrats in the next House. Then Vice President Garner arrived unexpectedly in town, saying he had come by Franklin Roosevelt’s orders but refusing to explain their import. The secret was not long in coming out. Mr. Garner and wife drove to their apartment at the Hotel Washington. There was Sam Rayburn to shake his hand. Said Mr. Garner: “I am for Sam Rayburn 200%. . . . My guess is he will win, and I will contribute all I can for that purpose.” Mr. O’Connor hotly denied that he was anything save a loyal New Dealer, that the White House was in any way opposed to him. But behind Franklin Roosevelt’s profound neutrality there was, newshawks knew, a profound New Deal distrust of John O’Connor and his school of politics, a feeling that it was vital to the success of Franklin Roosevelt’s second term to have the House Leadership in the hands of a liberal whose loyalty could be relied on.

With the greatest danger to both sides from a rush for the winner’s bandwagon, Joe Guffey’s decision on whom he would back loomed as a deciding factor. O’Connor hopes were based on the fact that last spring he traded his support of the Guffey Coal Bill for a promise that Pennsylvania Representatives would support him for the Leadership. Rayburn hopes were pinned on the New Deal pressure that had been put upon Joe Guffey.

The “big cheese” of Pennsylvania, giving his Congressmen a fine luncheon, put them to the vote: Rayburn 18, O’Connor 6. Then they voted to bind themselves by the unit rule, one member only refusing to be bound. Washington observers declared the race was over, Rayburn as good as elected Leader. Strict New Dealers privately celebrated their victory in high glee. Mr. O’Connor, still hoping to stall the bandwagon, declared that the unit rule would not prove binding on the secret ballot for Leader, grumbled that the Senate [Garner and Guffey] had no right to interfere in the private affairs of the House, snorted in disgust: “The country got along pretty well when there were no Democrats from Pennsylvania.”