Victory by Delay

Wearily and dispiritedly, Congress trudged toward adjournment. Up for debate was the liberalized Displaced Persons bill, which leaders in both parties were pledged to support. Blasted out of the Senate Judiciary Committee after nine months of dogged obstruction by Chairman Pat McCarran, the bill would remove the discriminatory provisions of the old D.P. act, and admit an additional 134,000 D.P.s in the next two years.

In a final delaying tactic, McCarran had departed for Europe for further "investigation" of the D.P. situation, and sent back a warning that "this country will be inundated with a flood of aliens." Michigan's Homer Ferguson patiently refuted his arguments, pointed out that 134,000 was scarcely an inundation, amounted to less than a fifth of one percent of the labor force. But McCarran's allies carried on. For nearly six hours, Washington's garrulous lightweight, Harry P. Cain, held the floor with a low-grade filibuster. The D.P. opponents talked on, counting on the dwindling attendance to aid their cause. At one time, only one Senator was left on the floor to hear North Dakota's William Langer.

Said Langer: "I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to sit while making my speech." There was no objection, and he sat. He crossed his legs, tilted back in his chair, laughed at his own attempts at wit, providing a spectacle without parallel in senatorial history. It was a shabby show.

But at a time when Senators were itching to shut up and go home, the talkdown worked. At week's end, by a vote of 36 to 30, the Senate sent the bill back to the Judiciary Committee. Nineteen Republicans joined 17 Democrats (mostly from the South) to put off the bill until next year.

Last week the Senate also: P: With House conferees, agreed on a bill raising minimum wages from 40-c- an hour to 75-c- an hour.

P:Voted the sliding-scale Anderson plan for support of farm prices, despite a hurried conference called by President Truman to urge costlier and rigid 90% supports. The bill deadlocked in conference with the House, which insisted on extension of 90% support level.

The House:

P: At the urging of the President, approved the $1,314,000,000 appropriation for military aid to Western Europe and other nations.

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