THE CONGRESS: The Hazards of Whizzing

Mostly because of his political talent for getting out in front of other Democrats and Republicans with fast answers to national problems, e.g., a flock of antirecession spending bills, Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson has had things pretty much his own way during the 8th Congress, Second Session. Not only has Johnson had most Senate Democrats under his thumb, but Senate Republicans have been notably reluctant to tackle him. Last week, for the first time this year, Lyndon began getting arguments from both sides of the aisle.

It began when he arose on the Senate floor to pat himself on the back. The week just past, said Johnson, referring to his success at ramming pump-priming antirecession bills through the Senate, was “one of the most productive and constructive” of his Senate career. That was too much for Republican Leader William Fife Knowland. “It is only in the dictatorships of the world,” rumbled Knowland, “that legislation whizzes through.” Even Indiana’s ponderous Republican Senator Homer Capehart got in on the act, complaining that Johnson was moving so fast that Republicans did not have a chance to be heard. Said Capehart: “I, for one, am going to fight it from this day on because I am sick and tired of it.”

Jangled Nerves. Unfazed, Lyndon Johnson proceeded to order a new spending bill, sponsored by Arkansas’ Democratic Senator William Fulbright, railroaded through Fulbright’s Banking and Currency Committee for fast floor action. The Fulbright bill would expand the federal Community Facilities Administration, which makes modest loans for smalltown public works such as sewers and water mains. It proposed to 1) swell CFA’s loan authorization from $100 million to a gaudy $2 billion; 2) slash interest rates on CFA loans; and 3) make all kinds of community projects eligible, from parks to parking lots.

But, as it happened, the Johnson directive sorely jangled the nerves of Illinois Democrat Paul Douglas and Maine Republican Frederick Payne. Reason: Douglas and Payne have pet bills of their own, both aimed at fattening federal aid to depressed areas, which Banking Chairman Fulbright has kept bottled up for months. Democrat Douglas and Republican Payne got together and vowed to get area assistance unbottled as the price for considering the Fulbright bill. Committee Republicans joined the plot; so did Democrat Joseph Clark, who is keenly interested in getting more federal aid for depressed Pennsylvania towns.

Deepfreeze Artist. The result was a shouting, table-pounding committee session, with Democrats Douglas and Fulbright trading insults. Fulbright, cried Douglas, had shoved his bill into a “stacked” subcommittee, where “the guillotine would fall, its head would be chopped off. [Fulbright] is a Deepfreeze artist.” Fulbright insisted that his bill was merely a “very small amendment” to an already existing program. Shouted Douglas: “Two billions may seem small to the Senator from Arkansas, but it seems rather large to the Senator from Illinois.” Retorted Fulbright, dragging in the massive embezzlements uncovered in Illinois’ Republican state administration in 1956: “I know Illinois is a poor little state. You steal this much out of your public treasury there, don’t you, and you never miss it.” Roared Douglas, with a biting reference to Fulbright’s unbroken silence on the segregation issue in Little Rock: “I speak out against these things-and against some of the occurrences in the State of Arkansas!”

The result of the whole fracas was that not even Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson’s priority order was enough to get Fulbright’s bill out of committee without a humiliating compromise. By an 8-to-5 vote, the committee rammed down Fulbright’s throat a resolution making area assistance. Douglas-Payne style, the first order of business after the Fulbright measure.

On the House side of the Capitol, antirecession activity went more smoothly. The House:

¶ Passed, after adding a one-year limit, a Senate bill freezing farm-price supports at 1957’s high levels. Breaking G.O.P. ranks, 44 farm-state Republicans voted aye. Okaying the one-year provision, the Senate sent the bill to the White House, where it faces a probable veto.

¶ Shouted onward, without debate, a Senate bill making an extra $1.8 billion in federal money available for housing loans.

¶ Adopted two Senate resolutions calling upon the Eisenhower Administration to do what it is already doing: speed up spending of already authorized funds.