School's Out

After House Speaker Sam Rayburn packed the Rules Committee with party liberals last February in order to unlock Administration bills, one of the committeemen counted on most was New York Congressman James J. Delaney. Last week Delaney demonstrated that even packed committees can pack a surprise. When the Rules Committee met to consider a series of aid-to-education bills, Delaney joined the conservative bloc, cast the key vote in a narrow, 8-7 decision that probably pigeonholed federal aid to schools for the remainder of the season.

Three separate school bills were in the package that came to the Rules Committee from Harlem Congressman Adam Clayton Powell's Labor and Education Committee. One, sponsored by the Kennedy Administration, provided $2.5 billion for public-school construction and teachers' salaries. The second, added after Roman Catholic protests, authorized $375 million in private-school construction loans. The third, among other considerations, earmarked $300 million in loans and grants for college scholarships and buildings.

Triple Taxation. All three bills faced tough sledding if they ever reached the floor of the House. A strong body of conservative Republicans and Southern Democrats opposed any federal aid to schools. Moreover, there was another clique of Southern Democrats who normally vote with the Administration, but who also come from staunchly Protestant districts that oppose aid to private schools. But it fell to Delaney, who represents a Queens County district that is 70% Catholic, to kill the bills.

Delaney's vote was not unexpected. Along with Massachusetts Democrat Thomas J. O'Neill Jr., the Queens Congressman had stubbornly stalled the public-school bill in the Rules Committee until the companion parochial-school bill appeared. Even then, Irish Catholic Delaney was not satisfied. He complained that federal aid to public schools meant triple taxation for his district; his people already paid local school taxes, supported parochial schools, would now have to pay increased federal levies on improvements that they did not use. Delaney was also irritated because the private-school bill would provide no money for teachers' salaries. He argued that the omission would make it difficult for parochial schools to compete for teachers, and would force them to close. Long before the 15-member committee gathered at its felt-covered table to consider the bills, Delaney's vote was a foregone conclusion.

Last Chance. President Kennedy tried to breathe new life into the bills. "I am hopeful." said he at his press conference next day, "that the members of Congress who support this will use those procedures which are available to them under the rules of the House to bring this to a vote." But the procedures, while available, are not particularly effective. The bills' supporters could petition to have the bills discharged from the Rules Committee, but such a move requires a difficult-to-get 219 signatures. Another tactic might be a "Calendar Wednesday" maneuver. This House tradition gives Adam Clayton Powell, as committee chairman, the privilege of calling any of the bills onto the House floor any Wednesday, even though the Rules Committee has not released them.

But under the same tradition, actions must be completed the same day, and school-aid opponents could easily talk the bills to death. Discussions on how to revive aid to education, however, were largely window dressing.

In another Congressional action last week, Arkansas' J. William Fulbright and his Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved (10-7) Kennedy proposals to bypass annual congressional authorization for foreign aid, and to borrow $8.8 billion from the Treasury for a five-year program. The committee authorized nearly everything the President wanted in the way of funds this year; its tremendous influence on Capitol Hill likely will shove the foreign-aid bill neatly through both houses. With the big bill for foreign aid and another big vote for defense coming up, Jack Kennedy was just as glad to be rid of the expensive and controversial school-aid legislation that almost certainly would not have passed anyhow.

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