THE PRESIDENCY: Res Ipsa Loquitur

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Herbert Hoover last week made public comment on the shellacking Franklin Roosevelt took from the angry 76th Congress. It reminded Mr. Hoover of his own predicament in 1930-32 when his Republicans lost control of the House. "I don't believe," said Mr. Hoover wistfully at Salt Lake City, "that Mr. Roosevelt's problem is quite as difficult as mine was."

Mr. Roosevelt took his final beatings last week without further outbursts of petulance. Apparently he found solace in the thought that Congress would suffer in the end more than he, for after the House finally decapitated his flayed "Great White Rabbit of 1939" (the public works Spend-Lend Bill), he merely observed with sadness that this action would retard Recovery, raise the cost of Relief. Then he calmly pressed for a record vote on the Housing bill. When the House killed that too, he remarked sententiously, "Res Ipsa Loquitur" (the thing speaks for itself), and passed on to comment lightly on other matters, such as Senator Taft's talk about "sensible" men not coveting the "unpleasant" Presidential job after 1940 (seep. 16). Was the receptive Senator referring to the Senator's own candidacy? asked the experienced 32nd President.

To Vice President Garner and Speaker Bankhead, Mr. Roosevelt sent a polite note wishing all members of Congress "a pleasant vacation." One more gesture of amity and gameness: holding "open house" at the White House over the week end to say good-by to friend & foe alike.

> To speed up disposal of the vast lapful of legislation which Congress left him, the President had requested aides in the various departments and agencies affected to make reports and recommendations for him to follow on each bill. Some vetoes of the week fell upon: $50 a year for three years to Army reserve officers for uniforms; bronze grave markers for Army dead in private cemeteries; a five-day week for District of Columbia firemen; tax exemption for the American Friends Service Committee (Mrs. Roosevelt's favorite charity) on its Washington property; a bill prohibiting District of Columbia retailers from buying beer on credit; Senator Glass's bill to extend for another four years the time limit for banks to eliminate interlocking directorates.

> Chief bill signed last week by the President was Senator Hatch's act to purge pernicious politics. For the record, Mr. Roosevelt set out his and his Attorney General's interpretation of Federal employes' rights in politics under the act, called it "at least a step in the right direction."