The New House

Almost all the experts expected a Republican House. One of the big campaign arguments of the Republicans had been that a G.O.P. House would work best with a GOPresident. The 78th Congress had had 214 Democrats, 212 Republicans, two Progressives, one American Labor. But the people gave the President a Democratic House too: 205 Democrats, 118 Republicans, one Progressive, one American Labor. Once more the Democrats were firmly in the saddle, even though 110 seats were still in some doubt.

Speaker Sam Rayburn, Majority Leader John McCormack and Majority Whip Robert Ramspeck will be back to lead the 79th Congress. The man who never quite gets to be Speaker, Republican Leader Joseph W. Martin, was returned easily, to head a leaner minority.

The most newsworthy single contest resulted in the re-election of Republican Clare Boothe Luce in Connecticut. She campaigned nationally for Dewey, was strongly opposed in her own district by Newcomer Margaret Connors, who was backed by P.A.C., the President and many leading New Dealers. The vote was heavy. Score: 102,070-to-99,767.

The big overall news was the defeat of Republican isolationism and the re-elections of Republicans with non-isolationist or liberal record. In New York, to the nation's delight, down went rabid anti-Roosevelt isolationist Hamilton Fish, after 24 years in Congress. His successor: liberal Augustus W. Bennet, 47, Newburgh lawyer. Another surprise was the defeat of the Chicago Tribune's alter ego, isolationist stalwart Stephen A. Day. Against Day and the odds, intelligent, serious Emily Taft Douglas, wife of a Chicago economics professor (now in the Marines) won her first try at big-time politics. Rednecked Marine Colonel Melvin J. Maas of Minnesota, another isolationist, lost.

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