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At this meeting and several which followed the Janizaries decided, with Franklin Roosevelt's full knowledge and approval, that the Democratic ranks in Congress must be rid of unfaithfuls. that is, men like Chairman John J. O'Connor of the House Rules Committee, which was just then holding up the Wages-&-Hours Bill a second time. Putting over a reform program in Congress without a thoroughly obedient majority was tedious if not impossible. The Florida and Oregon primaries were coming up. The Janizaries would teach Democrats unfaithful to the New Deal to watch their step. The Janiz ary James Roosevelt publicly plumped for New Deal Senator Pepper against onetime Governor Sholtz in the Florida primary.
Mr. Pepper won. That jarred loose the Wages-&-Hours Bill, started it toward pas sage. Then Janizary Ickes publicly plumped for New Dealer Hess against Old Dealer Martin for Governor of Oregon.
Mr. Hess won. The Purge was on.
Head Janizaries. The early Brain Trust — Professors Moley, Tugwell, Warren, Berle, et al. — were economists. Among the Janizaries named above, not one is an economist. They are executives (Hopkins, Ickes), high-grade political go-betweens (Keenan, Niles, Son James) and smart lawyers (Jackson, Corcoran & Cohen). Among the President's original close advisers last winter were left only two economists, Adolf A. Berle Jr. (who resigned last fortnight†) and Leon Henderson, now attached to the Monopoly Investigation, member of the commission whose report last week on consumer incomes (see p. 59) is red-hot campaign ammunition. Only other original close adviser left was politically cautious Postmaster General Jim Farley. He distrusted the Purge idea. When that idea had taken root in the President's imagination, the Janizaries dominated the 1938 campaign.
Harry Hopkins, the social uplift zealot, remains today No. 1 Janizary but his position as head of WPA ties him down a bit. Jim Farley, converted last fortnight to the Purge—wherever it has a chance of working—remains Janizary No. 2 ex-officio, but his duties as Democratic National Chairman are gentle and routine, such as running to New England last week to beg Maine to "get in step." Solicitor General Jackson, now busy getting ready for the Monopoly Investigation, for a time was Janizary No. 3, but none of these can match in energy, facility or ubiquitousness the front man in the firm of Corcoran & Cohen. With nothing to tie him down except a general job on RFC's legal staff, he can come & go on a thousand purge missions without being unduly publicized. President Roosevelt likes him, listens to him, laughs with him, trusts him. delegates him. This makes "Tommy the Cork" (as the President calls him*) sound like a shrewd, insinuating schemer—which he is —but for reasons more tough-minded and lawyerlike than his critics credit. From his point of view, the firm of Corcoran & Cohen started out to do a job for a client —the President of the United States. If remaking the Democratic Party is part of that job, Partner Corcoran is well up to learning and playing politics tooth & nail.