THE PRESIDENCY: The Uses of Adversity

New Orleans, Aug. 9—(AP)—Cotton broke more than $2 a bale here today on selling induced by the Government estimate of 15,593,000 bales for the 1937 crop.

Franklin Roosevelt sitting in his study, was less than human if he did not smile. Nature, which allowed the cotton farmer 170 lb. for his average acre during the ten years preceding 1933, was about to bestow a bountiful 223 lb. per acre, equal to 151 S's, highest yield in U. S. history. Reasons: Abandonment of less productive acres in favor of cash benefits; scientific seed improvement. Results: The price of cotton had tumbled from about 12¢ last spring to 10¢, cotton farmers' loud cries of "Do something!" were resounding in Southern Congressmen's ears.

Owners of those ears had already discovered that the only man who could very well do something was Franklin Roosevelt. In his Commodity Credit Corporation's purse he had $135,000,000 with which he could peg the price of cotton at 10¢ or 9¢. Long ago Congress had turned over control of that purse to the Executive Department. Cotton-conscious Congressmen squirmed and realized that they were the very ones who had stood or tried to stand in the way of Franklin Roosevelt's pet Wages & Hours and Housing Bills.

President Roosevelt had the opportunity to take immediate advantage of his opposition's adversity and demand whatever he wished. Without promising to release any pegging funds, he had so far contented himself with a sermon on the need of crop control.

Meantime, two of the nearly-extinct Southern New Dealers, Senators Black* of Alabama and Bilbo of Mississippi, who have to do a lot of interpreting of their liberalism when they get back home, sought to soothe their farmer constituents by doing something now. They trotted around petitioning for a special Congressional session in October for the express purpose of enacting a farm bill. Calling a special session is strictly the prerogative of the President but it was understood that Mr. Roosevelt did not object to the petition. He cared not whether his comprehensive farm legislation (ever-normal granary, etc.) is enacted now, in October or early in January (provided Congress promises to take it up as first business of 1938).

Senator Ellison D. ("Cotton Ed") Smith, chairman of the Senate Agriculture and Forestry Committee, plans a committee junket this fall into the farm hinterlands to study conditions first hand, then report a bill for enactment next session. Therefore, when he learned that Messrs. Bilbo and Black had 40 names on their petition Cotton Ed stormed into the Senate: "Mr. President ... I think it is unfair to the committee. . . . We are studying the problem and doing the best we can to solve it. The farmer himself is only afraid of suffering because of the act of God. He has reduced his acreage but he cannot control the seasons. . . . There is a law which empowers the Commodity Credit Corporation to meet the emergency."

In high good humor all week, Franklin Roosevelt could chuckle as he read these words and repaired to Hyde Park, leaving Congress to stew in Washington. Nature and Franklin Roosevelt make a combination hard to beat.