ustxtxb_obs_1967_02_03_50_00005-00000_000.pdf

that they have no floor leadership. Gone is the savvy of Bob Eckhardt, of Houston, who is now a Congressman. The 141-0 and 145-0 votes in the House have resulted, in some cases, because some of the liberals are inexperienced in the ways of the House; they would oppose the Ben Barnes machine were there an opportunity and if they were sure they would not be too much in the minority. Some say that they feel they must be careful in going against the powers that be at least until they see the way things are. V A case in point was the unanimously passed resolution in support of Gov. Connally and opposing the William Manchester book’s version of some aspects of President Kennedy’s trip to Texas. The resolution was passed in the House by a swiftly-called voice vote. V As if in retribution, one first term lib eral House member, Glenn Vickery of Houston, introduced a resolution praising U.S. Sen. Ralph Yarborough for his bill that will seek a Big Thicket National Park in Texas. The resolution received the same treatment as the Connally-Manchester measure a fast voice vote. It is believed that Speaker Ben Barnes, who has further political ambitions, let Vickerv’s resolution go on unimpeded rather than stall it and risk raising the ire of Yarborough supporters. It is thought that Barnes probably didn’t think the matter important enough to make an issue of it. The 139 House members who voted for the resolution signed their names to it and a copy was sent to the Senator in Washington. Yarborough was delighted. V Rep. Don Gladden, Fort Worth, has come forward with a bill to repeal the state’s right-to-work law. He says that organized labor, concerned this session with workmen’s and unemployment compensation law changes and the minimum wage, “has responded rather coolly” to his bill against right-to-work, but that he campaigned on a platform of repeal and he’s going forward with it. With a grin, Gladden said, “I told Hank Brown I was going to bring the labor movement kicking and screaming into the twentieth century.” \(Texas labor president Brown has similarly threatened the Texas EstablishV Rep. Jake Johnson of San Antonio said his poll of his House colleagues on his liquor-by-the-drink bill showed 67 for it, 41 against it, and 21 neutral. He thought his 67 supporters might be scaled down to 50 when the time came to step up to the bar on the issue, but, he said, “We’re aonna get a vote.” Johnson was full of irritation with the citizens’ commit tee that has formed to support liquor-by the-drink in Texas. He says that so far the citizens have not stimulated support from major cities other than San Antonio. Asked if he thought this might be because they’ve had too much liquor by the drink, he did not respond with the sense of humor sometimes characteristic of him. V If Ben Barnes doesn’t seek an un precedented third term in 1969, as House Speaker \(some suggest that he and Gene Fondren of Taylor seem to be the leading contenders for the post. Mutscher claims, privately, the support of more than 90 of the 150 present House members. V Close follower6 -Of banking, small loan, and savings and loan legislation profess astonishment in the legislature at the makeup of the House banking committee. Rep. Grant Jones, Abilene, is represented to be the most nearly liberal member thereof, the others as friends of one segment or the other of the industries the committee is concerned with. \(By comparison the Senate banking committee is less closely tied in with the financial comV A rundown on the more significant bills introduced in the House and Senate will be listed in the next issue of the Observer. Texans in D.C. V Texas has five chairmen of House committees with four others no lower than third in seniority. George Mahon of Lubbock leads the Appropriations Committee; Wright Patman of Texarkana, Banking and Currency; Omar Burleson of Anson, Administration; and Olin Teague of College Station, Veterans’ Affairs. Burleson would have won membership on the Ways and Means Committee, it is believed, were it not for several Alabama Democrats attending the inauguration of Mrs. Lurleen Wallace as governor. Burleson, in a Democratic caucus, lost the seat by two votes to a New Yorker. V Cong. Richard White of El Paso seeks to exempt his hometown from Central Standard Time. El Paso has been on Mountain Standard Time for 84 years. A federal law passed last year will go into effect on April 1, requiring that each state be completely within a single time zone. V Cong. Joe Pool of Dallas said he “might have broken even” after a Washington party he held to reduce the $25,000 in debts he said he owed after his 1966 campaign. Seth Kantor writes in the El Paso Herald-Post that a number of lobbyists attended at $25 a head; Kantor described the party as a “whiskey-flowing reception.” About 90 Texans, members of the “Congressman Pool Club,” flew to the capital for the event. Each of them put up $247.50 for the chartered prop-jet flight, food, lodging, and admission to the party. A testimonial dinner may be next, Pool has indicated. V Cong. J. J. Pickle of Austin said he will support new taxes for the Vietnam war, but the War on Poveety should be financed conditionally, depending on the nation’s “ability to pay under present conditions. We spend only about 1% of our budget on the poverty program,” Pickle says. “To tie it in to the national defense is a grossly unfair question.” V The Observer article “He Is Handicapped If We Take Away His Language” has been published in the Congressional Record at U.S. Sen. Ralph Yarborough’s instance. It was written by Ramon Garces, a Laredo newsman, and discusses a bilingual teaching project in the elementary grades. More on 1968 i/ Speculation that U.S. Sen. Ralph Yar borough might run against Gov. John Connally in 1968 persists in news reports. Bo Byers of the Houston Chronicle quotes Yarborough as saying in Dallas a couple of weeks ago: “My fight for my home state cannot be based alone in Washington because the greatest danger is here in Texas], and that danger is lying in the very air of this state. It is time that this smog of misinformation be cleared away. It is time for Texas to take its place in the sun, and I am enlisting in the fight to see that this is done within our lifetimes.” Yarborough’s Senate term runs through 1970, so he could run for governor without resigning. The senator threw another log on the fires of speculation when he said, also in mid-January, that he “would definitely run for the Texas governorship if I were not a U.S. Senator because Texas needs a governor. I haven’t decided, though, whether I will toss my hat into the ring, and one of the main factors which will determine that decision is my ten years seniority in the Senate.” Yarborough, commenting on new Texas Atty. Gen. Crawford Martin’s objections to a federal wage and hour law that would govern certain state-operated institutions, told the Observer that Martin “is following in the footsteps of Waggoner Carr and is a true follower of the Connally-Carr machine in fighting against a living wage for the working people of Texas.” Yarborough said the resolution of praise of Representatives shows, the Senator said to the Observer, the “weakening of Connally’s hold” on events in Austin. V And what of John Connally? Dick West of the Dallas News reports that the governor is now an even bet among “the most knowledgeable sources” to run for an unprecedented fourth term as gov ernor in 1968. West says that, three months ago, the chance of Connally doing February 3, 1967 5 V Rep. Rex Braun of Houston has filed a report on his sources of income. The statement, which Braun says is a complete one, lists assets totalling some $380,000. Braun, a first term liberal, said Former Cong. Lindley Beckworth of he filed the statement with the secretary Gladewater has been nominated by of state to indicate support of a new code.’ the President for a position on the U.S. of ethics bill proposed by Rep. Jim Nugezit Customs Court. of Kerrville. Nugent’s bill would,-require disclosure of potential conflicts of interest.