Muddling Through

THE PRESIDENCY

The nation's press had something important to tell its readers; it was getting a little worried about the new man in the White House. The news was written more in warning than in anger, but it had a definite bite and it came from all quarters.

The New York Times's Arthur Krock noted that the talk among Democrats in Washington was not so much about foreign affairs or domestic labor troubles as about the President's popularity and whether it was falling off. Pundit Krock thought it was. The Wall Street Journal reported that Harry Truman's performance as a peacetime President "is beginning to cause alarm among some of his ... advisers." And Business Week, which had looked uneasily on Franklin Roosevelt for twelve years, came right out and said that what the country apparently needs is "a return to one-man government for a while."

These were criticisms from men and journals which might be expected to sit in sharp judgment on a Democratic President. But Harry Truman got it even harder from his professed friends.

New Dealing Columnist Samuel Grafton wrote: "The President is in deep and serious trouble . . . because in a time of national indecision he embodies and personifies our indecision, rather than acts against it." C.I.O. President Phil Murray noted overtones in the Administration of ''the lazy housekeeper." The New Dealing Chicago Sun asked in a querulous tone: ''What is [the President] doing to make the issues plain to the people?"

Answering itself, the Sun said: "Instead of boldly dealing with industrial unrest ... he amiably advises people to 'cut out foolishness' and go to work. That is a phrase straight out of the Harding-Coolidge do-nothing era. . . . The President is dealing with monumental issues ... in a small-scale way."

Let Down. In Washington even the most devout Democrats regretfully observed that after six months in office and two months of peace, Harry Truman was doing little better than muddling through. Bouncy Maury Maverick, the Texas ex-Congressman now in charge of WPB's Smaller War Plants Corp., bought himself a dime-store compass and cracked: "There are so many times when I don't know in which direction I'm going that I have to take it out and look at it."

There were signs that Harry Truman was aware of this situation. Close friends quoted the President as saying that he longed to be back in the untroubling job of Senator from Missouri. And the President himself complained to some visitors that men in his official family had let him down.

But the President himself had chosen his official relatives, sometimes with a haste which now came back to haunt him. No matter how good a banker John Snyder had been, it was now clear even to his friends that the job of Reconversion Director was still too big for him. Secretary of State James F. Byrnes had failed miserably at London, and done little to elucidate U.S. foreign policy. Labor Secretary Schwellenbach, the big strong man from the West, had settled no labor quarrel, and was reported to be fed up with his job.

Moreover, the President had let tried and experienced men such as Economic Stabilizer Will Davis and FEA Boss Leo Crowley slip out of the Government just when he most needed men with governmental training and background.

Some of the President's other traits were coming clear:

P: Intent on putting responsibility back where it belongs, he apparently assumed that, once he had delegated someone to do a job, the job was thereby not only finished, but finished to everyone's satisfaction.

P: He liked to discuss problems and answer questions with short, offhand, decisive statements. But Washington was learning that the statements were not always followed by action.

P: He had an apparently irrepressible and often expressed belief that everything will always work itself out.

P: While he had injected some realism into foreign relations, he also seemed naive enough to believe that the promulgation of American realism was enough per se to solve all foreign problems.

P: He had apparently carried too far his well-intentioned determination not to dictate to Congress. He was getting no better results than Franklin Roosevelt had with his peremptory demands. Some Congressmen were already yearning out loud for the old F.D.R. days, when a Congressman got a lot of his thinking done for him.

In short, while Harry Truman was still brisk and cheerful, still enormously popular with the people, by Washington's judgment he had failed since V-J day to exhibit the qualities of bold and imaginative leadership which the U.S. people always hope to get from their Presidents. He had notably failed to resolve either the domestic discord on the labor front or the international discord between the U.S.'s allies.

The Chicago Sun summed up: "Mr. Truman earnestly wishes to be a good and faithful servant of the people. But to be an effective servant today means giving great leadership. How can the people see clearly if there is little vision in the White House?"

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