REPUBLICANS: Abdication on the Hill

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In the midst of the debate on censuring Joe McCarthy, one day last week, Senate Majority Leader William Knowland suddenly claimed the floor. Adjusting the lectern on his desk and fingering a prepared text, Knowland aroused momentary hope that at last some Republican leadership was about to be displayed on the McCarthy issue. What he had to say soon dashed that hope, startled his colleagues on both sides of the aisle.

Although he had urged the Senate to shun non-McCarthy matters during the special censure session, Knowland had an issue of "greater importance" to discuss. He feared that the U.S. was being lulled into a blind policy of coexistence with Soviet Russia that would ultimately lead to Communist conquest. Then he made an astonishing proposal: Committees of the 84th Congress, early next year, should "summon the State and Defense officials and the Joint Chiefs of Staff to fully inquire into our foreign and defense policy to find out where in their judgment it will take us and whether ... a basic change in the direction of our policy is warranted."

Delight Across the Aisle. Across the aisle, delighted Democrats (Texas' Lyndon Johnson, Missouri's Stuart Symington, Illinois' Paul Douglas) leaped up to congratulate and commend Knowland. They had good reason. No one on Capitol Hill had ever expected a majority leader of the U.S. Senate to 1) intimate that his own Administration's foreign and defense policies were dangerous, and 2) demand an investigation by committees controlled by the opposite party.

At the White House and at the State Department, President Eisenhower and Secretary of State Dulles had trouble containing their anger. Dulles thought foreign policy should be re-examined constantly, but he knew of no emergency that called for a congressional investigation. At the President's direction, Press Secretary James Hagerty issued a pointed statement : "The President has always believed that any Senator has a right to differing opinions from his own. He has often told me and said so publicly that he believes we have one of the wisest, most courageous and most dedicated men in our history as Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles."

Although Knowland's warning about the lulling effect of coexistence talk was worth voicing, he had blatantly disregarded the fact that he is not "any Senator." He is the majority leader, who is supposed to represent the Administration on Capitol Hill. This was by no means his first major open difference with Administration policy, e.g., he supported the Bricker amendment, and has repeatedly called for a break in diplomatic relations with Russia. It is not the Knowland practice to argue with Administration officials and then, if he must, publicly disagree. He takes his stand against the Administration without any apparent feeling for party cohesion. In 1944, when long-suffering Alben Barkley rose in the Senate to castigate Franklin Roosevelt's veto of a tax bill, he resigned as majority leader before he sat down. Knowland is unlikely to follow or even understand this example. He gets very little cooperation out of his fellow Republican Senators, partly because he displays no obligation toward the President or the party as a whole.