PRIDE GOETH

The unprecedented smoothness of a Senate session that has seen the passage of two controversial measures important as the World Court adherence and the tax reduction bill, leaves the Republican majority with a sense of serenity and power. It seems somewhat to have affected Republican correspondents also. Theodore G. Joslin of the Boston Transcript writes in cheerful style that "years have passed since the Democrats have experienced so much difficulty in finding an issue".

He writes also that there are before the Senate, ten measures, which the majority can call up as they wish. He names four: the appropriation bill, the confirmation of certain appointments, the Italian debt settlement, and the aluminum investigation. Of these, he finds only the last two controversial. But he relies on quiescent public opinion to make Senator Walsh drop the aluminum inquiry and on the fear among northern Democrats of losing Italian votes, to silence opposition to the administration's Italian debt settlement. Thus the stage is set for a true Republican triumph and an adjournment by the first of June.

Yet, the Republican glee overlooks two things. The first and most obvious is that La Follette, Johnson, and Borah have agreed to no tacit truce as the eastern democrats seem to have done. And the several western Democrats led by Walsh, will undoubtedly join the Insurgents in an assault on the aluminum trust and an effort at a definite farm relief bill.

The second omission is that the passive conduct of the Democrats does not necessarily portend Republican success in coming elections. By not taking issue, the Democrats may make some very good issues. Although Democratic voters in general will approve the entrance into the World Court, the repeal of the estate tax and the mere fact of the aluminum controversy added to the perennial tariff issue and viewed in the light of a distinct Democratic Party not leagued with the Insurgents, can give the Republicans the usual trouble at mid-term elections.