Invitation to Debate

"It is worth remembering," said the President to the Congress last week, "that the purpose of this law challenged the imagination of the American people and received their overwhelming support." But that was nearly two years ago and Franklin Roosevelt was not fooling himself about the present status of NRA. In his message to Congress he was rehearsing all the good points he could think of in NRA's favor--its noble objectives, its more disputable accomplishments: "Giving re-employment to 4,000,000 people. . . . Collective Bargaining. . . . Lifting the curse of child labor . . . starvation wages . . . excessive hours of labor . . . dishonorable competition." In a more defensive mood than usual, he admitted that NRA was not perfect but: "The fundamental purposes and principles of the act are sound. To abandon them is unthinkable."

Thereupon he recommended giving the Recovery Act another two years of life from the date of its expiration, June 16 (TIME, Feb. 25). Like his reasons for renewal, his recommendations for changes in NRA were largely rhetorical generalities. Said he: "Detailed recommendations along the lines which I have indicated have been made to me by various departments and agencies charged with the execution of the present law. These are available for the consideration of the Congress, and, although not furnishing anything like a precise and finished draft of legislation, they may be helpful to you in your deliberations."

Thus Congress was left with the job of working out by itself fresh NRA legislation from the ground up. Shrewdly the President refrained from making a major issue out of the component parts of a measure Administration leaders will be obliged to pass eventually to save their own faces. Invited to debate, Congressmen can get their grievances against NRA out of their systems without taking a slap at the President. The widespread Congressional urge to "investigate" this prime piece of New Deal experimentation from a dozen different angles will doubtless spend itself harmlessly in the protracted House and Senate hearings. Then two or three months from now the White House will take weary committees in hand and subtly devise just the kind of NRA bill the President really wants.

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