THE PRESIDENCY: Waiting for History.

• Share

Waiting for History.

President Roosevelt sat at his desk in the White House all one day last week happy in the thought that before another dawn he would get rid of Congress for six months. Towards evening he paused to dictate the customary letter of farewell and appreciation from the President to his co-workers at the Capitol:

"My Dear Mr. Speaker

". . . This Congress will go down into history as one of large accomplishment for the national good. . . ."

But the President was disappointed. The 73rd Congress was not destined to go down in history that evening. Shortly after 11 P. M. Majority Leader Robinson telephoned the White House to report that the venerable gentlemen of the Senate, their tempers frayed after 14 hours continuous session, were in a parliamentary snarl as tangled as a mermaid's hair and were going home for the night.

Sticking cigaret after cigaret in his long holder, the President settled down to await the Congressional pleasure. Forty-eight hours later that pleasure was to adjourn, after giving him more social legislation than he had asked for. The railway labor bill he might approve; Huey Long's farm mortgage moratorium bill he would probably veto (see p. 11). ¶The President took out a three-week old letter and read it to correspondents gathered around him. It was an account of some arithmetic done by George Peek, his Special Adviser on Foreign Trade. Mr. Peek had written that the U. S. ought to keep an exact balance sheet of its transactions with other countries, to know whether its trade was profitable. Economists have made this sensible point before. From the figures and estimates available Mr. Peek offered a tentative balance. Since 1896 he calculated that foreign nations should be debited with:

$121 billions of U. S. goods shipped

abroad

26 for services rendered to

foreigners.

$147 billions total.

Foreign nations should be credited with: $85 billions of goods shipped to the

U. S. 19 of goods sold to U. S.

tourists abroad. 19 for services rendered to

U. S. citizens, 2 worth of gold shipped to the U. S.

$125 billions total.

Although some of the figures were disputable estimates, all were an old story to economists. Calling attention to the $22,000,000,000 difference between value rendered and value received, Mr. Peek concluded that "our foreign trade has been cumulatively disadvantageous to us." This was something of a figure of speech, for the $22,000,000,000 does not represent a net loss. It represents money still owing to the U. S.—private investments of U. S. citizens abroad and $10,300,000,000 of war debts. Obvious, though not explicit, was the point that the President was trying to drive home: the U. S. will have to take more foreign-made goods or stop shipping so much U. S. goods abroad. Once the President got that fact firmly in the public mind, he would have an easier time cutting tariff rates under the law Congress gave him fortnight ago.