THE CONGRESS: Congress' Week, Jul. 7, 1947

Waiting for the Senate's weekend recess, newsmen heard a crackling noise from the main corridor of the Senate wing. The old English Minton floor tiles, laid in the 1850s and now irreplaceable, had begun to heave upward. They buckled into a ridge 20 feet long. Capitol architects guessed the cause was a sudden change of temperature. Reporters happily accepted the theory that someone had opened a door from the Senate chamber and let out a blast of hot air.

For two days Democratic Senators had kept temperatures up with long-winded assaults on the presidential succession...