Word: rayburnisms
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Speaker Sam Rayburn used the same arguments on recalcitrant Democrats. When the revised ERP bill hit the House floor, it sailed through 193 to 27. Half of the cut in funds for occupied areas was also restored. It was a compromise designed to keep everybody happy: the House had had its fun, swinging the ax -and, in the end, ECA was probably not hurt badly, just nicked in the neck...
...right?"), then appeared himself. In a letter, Harry Truman replied: "I am much in the same frame of mind you are . . . The compromisers got nowhere as I was sure they wouldn't, and they never had any consideration for me." This sounded like a slap at Speaker Sam Rayburn, who tried to put over the compromise. Press Secretary Charles Ross hastily explained that there had been a double misprint. The letter should have read: "The compromises got nowhere . . . and they never had any consideration from...
...Speaker Rayburn had relinquished the chair and was prowling around the House, perching here & there, nervous and anxious. Minority Leader Joe Martin took the floor to defend the softened version of the Taft-Hartley Act (the Wood bill), which was backed by the Republican-Southern coalition. Then Rayburn's compromise package was introduced. Sam himself stepped out on the floor. Eloquently, somewhat defensively, he appealed for votes for his measure: "Let us not have one sector of Americans known as labor . . . believe that we would press down upon their brow a crown of thorns...
...Veteran Rayburn could tell from the dutiful applause that he had lost. In obedience to John Lewis' orders, some Democrats from Lewis' coal-mining districts slid over to the Republican side; Sam's proposition went down by a 211-to-183 vote. Then the House took a roll-call vote on the Wood bill. The coalition measure won its preliminary test...
That night Rayburn & aides went to work on Southern Democrats, pleading for votes against the Wood bill so that the Administration-controlled House Labor Committee would at least have a chance to frame a new law. They pointed out that passage of the Wood bill would be a complete surrender to the Republican minority. Some Southerners listened. Next day, ten who had voted for the Wood bill somersaulted and voted against it. It was breathtakingly close. Down went the Wood bill by a hairline vote...