Changes?

This week, five days after the election, grizzled WLB Chairman William Hammatt Davis, 65, sent his resignation to Franklin Roosevelt. Promptly, two other public members of WLB, George W. Taylor and Frank P. Graham, followed suit. The difference between their action and all the customary tongue-in-cheek resignations which fluttered down, as usual, on

Franklin Roosevelt's desk was that they seemed to mean it. Rumors of other departures raced through Washington.

The hottest talk was over the Secretary of State. Cordell Hull, 73, has not resigned, and certainly would not, health permitting. But he had been at the Navy's Bethesda Hospital for three weeks with a bad throat; he had needed extended vacations in the last few years. For his place, if he were forced to quit, the dopesters had many candidates: Henry Wallace, Sumner Welles, Ambassador Winant, Under Secretary Stettinius. But as long as Cordell Hull wanted the job, Franklin Roosevelt would let him keep it.

Up again swirled the old, old rumors that this time Frances Perkins would finally be forced out of the Labor Department. Leaving a Cabinet session, she was asked by newsmen if she had resigned. Said Mme. Perkins: "You don't do that at a Cabinet meeting. It's like brushing your teeth; you do it in private." For her place the guessers offered WMC's able, hustling Anna Rosenberg, or the Teamsters Union's rosy-jowled President Dan Tobin.

Frank Walker, long weary of Washington, might resign the Postmaster Generalship, leaving the way clear for the customary political gesture: appointment of National Chairman Bob Hannegan as P.M.G.

The biggest vacancies: Ambassador to China, director of War Mobilization and Reconversion (sure to go to Economic Stabilizer Fred Vinson), chairman of the Communication Commission (for which Democratic Committee Publicity Chief Paul Porter had the inside track).

The Democratic sweep was such that Franklin Roosevelt had but a few lame ducks: Senators Guy Gillette of Iowa, Sam Jackson of Indiana and most notable of all, Henry Wallace. All the U.S. would watch to see what kind of job Mr. Wallace gets.

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