FORCING THE PACE

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 41, 17 August 1921, Page 11

FORCING THE PACE

HARDING SPEEDS UP CONGRESS

TAXATION AND ARMAMENTS.

President Harding has found it necessary to apply the executive accelerator 1.0 Congress, writes David Lawrence in the Springfield Republican. He has been reluctant to follow in the footsteps of other Presidents who drove Congress with a firm band, and h« has resented the Suggestion that he should dictate to both Houses. But, after a lapse of two months and a half, it has become apparent that the extra session of Congress will be fruitless unless the President forgets his oftexpresßed ideas about the complete separation of the functions of the executive and legislative branches of the Government and accepts the role of party leader, which made it possible for Presidents Roosevelt and Wilson to get result* in the Congress, and which President Taft subsequently adinittedthat he, too, should have done early in his administration. The situation to-day is strikingly paral; lei to that which existed a few months after Mr. Taft was inaugurated. Congress was then led by Messrs. Aldrich and Cannon, who had pronounced views on the tariff, with which Mr. Tatt felt hesitant to take iesue. There are no two leaders in-Congress who „wie!d* as much power as Aldrich and Cannon, but in their places' have arisen strong groups representing class interests. Tho p danger to Mr Harding's legislative programme lies in the inability of the Republican leaders in either Houso to adjust the differences between the various groups. The leaders, thereforo; are really anxious 'for executive help. . '

So tingled has the, situation become that those Republican leaders who foresee trouble at the polls a year from this autumn, when the present House is up for re-election, have discussed among themselves the advisability of sending steering committees to .the White House to ask for help. Meanwhile, at practically every meeting of tlie Cabinet, the President has been urged' to take a hand vigorously and insist that Congress- shall concentrate on the tariff and taxation to the utter exclusion of every other legislatiye proposal, however important. Thus the situation has been discussed without tangible results. Mr. Harding has about decide! to do a'little driving, first, with a gentle hand, and later with a firmer application of executive pressure, if necessary. He realises Hiat the possible loss of the Congress to Democrats in the middle of his own term would mean certain disaster to his own political fortunes, lhe impatience of the country for action on its legislative programme has been so pronounccdj/that it is not exaggeration to say,_ that evidences of real worrk over the political outlook are beginning to accumulate on every side. Unquestionably, Mr. Harding will BO ck to convice members of Congress.that their fortunes are inseparably bound up with those of the executive in the common problem of satislying,the demands made bj the people in the last election for a restoration of normakar./Tlras.f W the House has proved itself more Tesponsive to popular feeling tnan the Senate. ■ . ■

By 3loßhin<r the military and naval-an-propriationa, considerable money has been saved, which a generous Senate would otherwise liave appropriated. There ia an undercurrent of sentiment, however m both Houses that if some progress had been made on international disarmament there might have'been an even greater economy. Disarmament talk is no longer regarded as the mutterings of a few. pacifists, but is- seriously looked upon as a matter of dollars and cents and taxes But while both Houses have been strugglmjf with the Appropriation Bill— which is, after all, a routine matter—no Bill has- been completed on the tariff or taxation. It had been confidentially oxEected that Congress would at least have rought the Tax Bill to the committee stag oi by Ist July, but the Bill haß not got that far, and. nobody in C6ngress has an accurate idea of just what kind of a revenue measure will eventually be passed ' ■ '

Judging by the legislative tangles which have.Varisen in handling;the tariff, there will be considerable delay in getting the Tax: Bill through both Houses. Many conflicting interests have shown a disposition to wrangle about the tariff, but the controversies thus far over "the tariff aro not a circumstance, compared to the trouble which is anticipated in framing a new Tax Bill. The President alone will be able to 1 -reconcile differences of Opinion. And he will do it largely by executive* insistence on: compromise, which would otherwise be refused if offered by Congressional leaders. In other.words, Concress needs executive guidance, and Mr. Harding- has made up his mind to fill the needs.