Word: congress
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...certain as Congress is Congress (and Article I of the Constitution still says that it is), before too many months some of the dew will have dried and some of the fires banked. The U.S., in the wonderful sum total of its governmental parts, will be operating on a reasonably down-to-earth basis. And one of the big reasons will be that improbable stabilizer called the House of Representatives...
...gracious Wilbur Mills has a first-rate fiscal mind, is a Rayburn protege, ranks high on the list of possible future Speakers. But he is in a dangerous political situation: with Arkansas due to lose two Representatives after the 1960 census. Mills cannot risk being gerrymandered out of Congress by a legislature under the segregationist thumb of Governor Orval Faubus. Mills therefore has recently taken a strong segregationist position, this year masterminded the disputed House seating of Little Rock Segregationist Dale Alford, won respect for his political footwork, lost points for the speakership...
Indeed, the whole direction of the Congress can be changed by the committee assignments. The House has long behaved much more responsibly than the Senate on reciprocal trade -mostly because Mister Sam has a flat rule against electing anyone to Ways & Means who is not "safe" on the subject. This year, as the result of a deliberate Rayburn-Mills effort, the Education & Labor Committee, for many years controlled by a mossback conservative coalition, has a moderate-liberal majority, may soon become more than a society for discussing the iniquities of Walter Reuther...
Perhaps more than anyone else, McCormack will be guided this year by the 1958 election results. In the 85th Congress he knew that every time he scheduled a New Dealish labor or welfare bill for floor action, he could expect about 40 Southern conservatives to join with a big majority of the 200 House Republicans in blocking the legislation. But there are far fewer Republicans, far more liberal Democrats in the 86th Congress. "We have a good working majority," says McCormack. "The coalition will be ineffective." Another McCormack rule of thumb: the later in the session that a piece...
Down on the Farm. Last year, in the final hectic days of the 85th Congress, Rules Chairman Smith took no chances on being forced by a committee petition to call hearings. As a dozen major bills -relief for depressed areas, housing, mineral subsidies, etc. -piled up before Rules, Howard Smith simply disappeared from Washington. He returned a week later, smilingly explained that he had had some hay down on his farm that needed tending. Says he today: "There were about a dozen things thrown at the Rules Committee, and they would have cost the taxpayers about $10 billion. There...