Intangibles

No engineering formula will solve the intangible problems of politics. Such problems last week beset President Hoover. He had been one year in office. The executive side of his administration was in good shape. The legislative side was not. Congress had given him only one measure, a Farm Relief Act. In the Senate the tariff blocked all other legislation (see p. 17). Important appropriation bills were stacking up. Both Wets and Drys in Congress were dissatisfied with his handling of Prohibition through the Wickersham Commission, editors began to write leaders about his loss of popularity.

To discuss his troubles with him, President Hoover twice last week summoned his best legislative friends to his White House breakfast table. There together they pondered the imponderable forces of politics that seemed to be working against the President. What concerned President Hoover was the Senate's protracted discussion of the Tariff, with its consequent delay to other important legislation. He spoke darkly of thousands of U. S. employes on public works who would have to be laid off unless Congress voted them money soon, then warned Congress not to spend more money than the budget authorized.

His dealings with the Senate were the most difficult, the least successful. It took, he realized, a politician to get along with politicians and there his predecessor had had a distinct advantage over him. The men who campaigned the hardest for him--Iowa's Brookhart, Idaho's Borah--were now his chief critics. The apparent uncertainty of his stand on tariff rates had become a standing Democratic joke, in spite of his careful explanation that it was not his duty to legislate on such matters. Some of his friends were urging him to exhibit a new and bold leadership, to carry his conflict with the Senate to the country by radio. Others advised him to continue his cautious neutrality.

P: Unlike other U. S. officials, President Hoover labored at his desk Washington's birthday. At noon he motored with Mrs. Hoover to Alexandria, Va., helped Virginia's Governor John Garland Pollard review a parade. Later he went on to Mt. Vernon to pay a three-minute, wordless visit to the first President's tomb.

P: To the White House went Charles Evans Hughes to thank the President for his appointment as Chief Justice. Afterwards at the Supreme Court Mr. Hughes took his oaths of office.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.