The Facts of Life

Dwight Eisenhower, usually punctual and usually smiling on such occasions, was late and crisply serious when he walked into the Indian Treaty Room of the old State Department Building for his press conference last week. The reporters, 133 strong, had waited 30 minutes while Ike studied messages from John Foster Dulles in Paris and kept congressional leaders in an overtime strategy huddle at the White House.

The President announced that President Syngman Rhee would arrive in Washington on July 26 to talk about the failure of the Geneva Conference to unify Korea, gave the newsmen a little lecture about the importance of his omnibus tax-reform bill, and threw the conference open to questions. As the reporters tried to draw him out on what was going on in Paris, he parried the questions in general terms.

The People Lost. But when domestic issues cropped up, the President plainly showed how upset he was at the cavalier treatment some of his proposals were getting in Congress. Asked to comment on the House's action in killing the Administration's health-reinsurance plan, the President stared ahead for a moment, his mouth turned sternly down. As he answered, his fist drummed the desk, his voice rose angrily. Clearly indicating that he regards his health plan as the last barrier against socialized medicine, Ike warned that the public was going to get better care one way or the other. Said he: "I am sure that the people that voted against this bill just don't understand what are the facts of American life. I don't consider that anyone lost yesterday except the American people . . . This is only a temporary defeat; this thing will be carried forward as long as I am in office."

The Faded Bloom. The President's displeasure was again plainly evident when he was asked whether he thought the Senate Agriculture Committee's vote to raise butter price supports from 75 to 85% of parity would cut consumption. The committee, he said, had made a grave error. Butter consumption had increased 7% after Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson cut price supports to 75% of parity. Now, the committee had wiped out most of the reason for that increase.

Only a fortnight ago, Ike had been pleased with the progress his program was making in Congress, and had a word for its prospects: rosy. Last week the bloom was clearly off the rose, and Dwight Eisenhower was uncommonly vigorous in scolding Congress.

Last week the President also:

P: Traveled to Pennsylvania State University with Mamie to attend the funeral of Helen Eisenhower, wife of the President's brother, Dr. Milton Eisenhower.

P: Signed Senate Bill 579, a measure to allow Chinese-born Wong You Henn to stay in the U.S. despite the fact that he could not prove he is the son of a naturalized citizen, now dead. The bill was one of the last sponsored by Ike's good friend and faithful majority leader, Robert Alphoriso Taft.

P: Patiently posed (separately) for pictures with eleven G.O.P. Congressmen facing tough or marginal election contests this year.

P: Signed, while Composer Irving Berlin and wife looked on, a bill authorizing a gold medal for Berlin's work in composing God Bless America and other patriotic songs. Asked what the President said to him, Berlin said: "I was so emotionally filled up I don't remember."

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