The House of Representatives' special "show-me" committee arrived last week in London. Seventeen Congressmen, plus ten consultants and two secretaries—all under the supervision of Massachusetts' stern and thoughtful Christian Herter—were there to see for themselves how badly off Europe was, and how much help England and the Continent needed.
The Congressmen cross-examined Food Minister John Strachey and were a little annoyed by his air of supercilious serenity. They were more impressed by Sir Stafford Cripps, president of the Board of Trade. Cripps said that Britain was bracing itself to get along without another U.S. dime, if necessary.
After lunching with U.S. Ambassador Lewis Douglas, the Congressmen flew off to Berlin. From there, General Lucius Clay's special train for V.I.P.s trundled them to Essen, and a motorcade took them to Villa Hügel, the family mansion of the Krupps.
The Note-Takers. More than half the Congressmen were seeing Europe for the first time. They looked hard at the barefoot children, at the surly men and wretched women living in Essen's rubble. They took out pads and pencils and made notes.
They split into smaller groups to visit mines, mills and workers' homes. That shook them. After a visit to a cellar where a whole family lived in one room, one congressional investigator remarked: "I wonder how long I would live like this before I became a Communist." A colleague cracked: "It wouldn't take two years of it to make Cox a Republican." But no one laughed. Georgia's ultra-reactionary Eugene ("Goober") Cox was so moved that when he got back to the train he gave his sweater, necktie, other odds & ends of clothing and all the chocolate he could buy to a group of Essen's children who had gathered at the train shouting: "Uncle, uncle, chocolate, chocolate."
What Do You Want? Aboard the train, the Congressmen compared notes and saw some eye-openers. One group had questioned the eleven-man council of Germans who represented the workers in Essen's coal mines.
Congressman: Are there any Communists in your mines?
Council chairman: Yes. I'm a Communist, about 40% of the miners are Communists, seven out of eleven of the council members are Communists.
Congressman: What do you want?
Chairman: Four thousand calories a day, four weeks' vacation a year and enough food for our families to fill the ration which they are supposed to get—1,500 calories a day.
Congressman: And what will you give?
Chairman: As much coal as before the war.
Observed a suave British officer of the North German Coal Control: "That would be an excellent bargain but we've not the food to give them."
General Clay's special train pulled out of Essen and trundled the Congressmen to Frankfort. There they all shook hands, split into teams and hurried off in all directions. This week the rest of the show-me committee was spread all over western Europe—in Paris, Brussels, Vienna, Rome—asking questions, taking notes.