"Let's face it," he told reporters after a hearing this week, "it's nice to be able to battle for the programs you believe in, but it's not so nice if you're going to get blamed for raising taxes."

What has hit hardest is the elimination or drastic reduction of programs that flourished under the presidencies of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. Some congressional leaders took it even further back.

House Speaker Carl Albert (D-Okla) angrily claimed that the Nixon budget was "nothing less than the systematic dismantling and destruction of the great social programs and the great precedents of humanitarian government inaugurated by Franklin D. Roosevelt and advanced and enlarged by every Democratic President since then."

The obvious targets for the Democrats are the budget's abolition of the Office of Economic Opportunity, its phasing out of the public service employment program and its freeze on new housing funds.

OTHER TARGETS

Other items that will cause the most problems in Congress are the gudget proposals for:

-The dispersion of antipoverty programs into other agencies with many being phased out, including the key element in former President Johnson's war on poverty-the Community Action Program.

-Raising the costs of Medicare so hospital patients will pay more than double what they now pay for the average visit.

-The dismantling of most elementary and secondary education programs and their replacement with revenue-sharing funds earmarked for education.

-Severe cuts in rural housing subsidies and other Agriculture Department spending, including the special school milk program.

OPENING SKIRMISH

Each doomed program has its special interest group in Congress, and many legislators are waiting to cause Mr. Nixon some bad budget trouble.

While the budget controversy was going on, Congress, in fact, began the first battle in the spending war.

Two Senate subcommittees, one chaired by Sam Ervin, (D-NC) and the other by Lawton Chiles (D-Fla), began joint hearings on an Ervin bill to limit the President's power to impound appropriated funds.

NIXON VOW

While the senators collected favorable testimony from Democratic colleagues such as Hubert H. Humphrey (Minn), Edmund S. Muskie (Maine) and Thomas F. Eagleton (Mo), as well as consumer advocate Ralph Nader, Mr. Nixon girded for battle down on Pennsylvania ave.

At a surprise press conference, the President insisted he would continue to impound funds and that it was his constitutional right.

[From Washington Weekly, vol. II, No. 31 (1972)]

BARE BONES BUDGET: STORY OF BOMBS VS. BOOKS

(By Ron Hendren)

Washington-With the unveiling of President Nixon's "bare bones budget” as Senate Minority Leader Hugh D. Scott (R-Pa.) termed it, the stage has been set for one of the most historic and far-reaching confrontations between Congress and the White House in recent years.

Eight pages of the President's budget message were filled with the names of programs he plans to reduce or terminate. They read like a history book of Democratic administrations since Roosevelt, for the programs Mr. Nixon plans to scrap are primarily legacies from the New Deal, Fair Deal, New Frontier and Great Society of Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy and Johnson.

According to the President's view, people programs (such as federal grants to elementary and secondary school libraries) should not be funded by federal tax dollars. As these programs are phased out, his projected savings grow from $6.5 billion in the current fiscal year to $21.7 billion in Fiscal Year 1975.

At the same time, however, the President has called for an increase of $4.7 billion in the Defense Department budget, an amount which exceeds the total budget of the Office of Education.

While Mr. Nixon's message of frugality was delivered in the spirit of holding down taxes, interest rates and inflation-goals to which every politican and citizen aspire-that spirit was tainted with the harsh reality that Mr. Nixon, places domestic problems low on his totem pole of priorities.

A keystone in the White House strategy for winning the budget fight will be to secure the support of the nation's governors, mayors and other state and local elected officials. The golden carrot on the end of Mr. Nixon's stick is the promise of greatly increased revenue sharing, and already some of the country's most influential mayors are publicly licking their chops. The President apparently believes that with their support and by holding down taxes, he will be able to carry the day against Congress and the special interest groups which benefit from federal domestic spending.

What Congress will attempt to show, on the other hand, is that those special interest groups include the poor, the elderly, children in public schools-indeed, nearly all Americans. For example, the proposal to phase out library grants has already been termed "a disaster for our schools, which would set elementary library... development back ten years," by the president of the American Association of School Librarians. In plainer language, those grants have for years meant that children and adults in communities all across the land have had ready access to books. Without the aid, the story will rapidly change. Without books, what happens to education?

And federal grants to libraries represent just one of the myriad of programs which the President proposes to end. Whether he will be able to have it his way depends in large part upon the determination of Congress to fulfill its Constitutional mandate to allocate federal funds. And if Congress' will in the months ahead is no stronger than it has been in the past, the picture will be grim indeed.

[From the Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Va., Feb. 4, 1973]

THEY'RE TRYING TO OPEN THE MONEY TAP

(By Don Hill)

WASHINGTON. ". . . We have nothing to do with policy. Much as we love the President, if Congress, in its omnipotence over appropriations and in accordance with its authority over policy, passed a law that garbage should be put on the White House steps, it would be our regrettable duty as a bureau, in an impartial, nonpolitical, and nonpartisan way to advise the executive and Congress as to how the largest amount of garbage could be spread in the most expeditious and economical manner."-Charles G. Dawes, first director of the Bureau of the Budget, now the Office of Management and Budget, 1921.

"There seems to me some irony in observing that one result of the water pol lution (funds) impoundment is to impose a three-year delay-for want of $83.7 million made available by the Congress-on the expansion and improvement of the Blue Plains sewage treatment facility for the Potomac River... had the Congress wished to deposit garbage on the White House steps, Mr. Chairman, it could not have done so more efficiently than the President has managed to do on his own."-Sen. Edmund S. Muskie, D-Me., chairman of the Senate Public Works Air and Water Pollution Subcommittee, 1973.

Years ago, in Portsmouth, a witness in an annexation case was defending the city's dumping of live sewage into the Elizabeth River during repairs on the sewage treatment plant.

"But it didn't smell," said the witness.

The cross-examining lawyer, then Norfolk State Sen. Edward L. Breeden Jr., chuckled wryly and dismissed the witness. "You-all must have a different kind of sewage over here in Portsmouth than we have in Norfolk," he said.

That was in the day when you could still get a chuckle, even a wry one, out of water pollution. Even then, the nation's cities and factories were dumping billions of gallons of poison a year into the waters upon which their lives depended. It's no laughing matter any more, if it ever was. Scientists, environmentalists, and water engineers have warned that America is fast running out of water-to drink, to bathe in, and to cleanse away the vitriol which technology smears about us everywhere.

In 1972, Congress took the warnings seriously enough to establish as a national goal that "the discharge of pollutants into the navigable waters be eliminated by 1985." And, untypically, Congress didn't just talk. It authorized expenditures of $18 billion for fiscal years 1973 through 1975.

President Nixon denounced the act as inflationary. He vetoed it, and he said, "even if this bill is rammed into law over the better judgment of the executiveeven if the Congress defaults its obligations to the taxpayers-I shall not default mine."

Congress overrode the veto by a vote in the House of 247-23 and in the Senate of 52-12. Despite this overwhelming mandate by the only branch of government permitted by the Constitution to make laws, President Nixon has announced he will refuse to implement most of the Water Pollution Control Act.

This means a cut to each of the states which would have received the money to build or upgrade sewage treatment plants. In Virginia, it will mean a reduction of $175 million and in North Carolina of $50 million. In most places, unlike Portsmouth, that means something's going to smell.

The doctrine under which President Nixon has moved to defy Congress is one which presidents since Thomas Jefferson have called “executive impoundment of funds." But this is one area in which a Nixon doctrine has gone farther than any other president's. In fiscal year 1972, alone he "impounded" $12 billion.

Last month, a Richmond based organization called Campaign Clean Water joined with lawyers from Ralph Nader's public citizen organization in Washington to sue the Nixon administration. Campaign Clean Water asked U.S. District Court in Richmond to order the "law and order" administration to obey the law and the constitution and to release Virginia's money.

The Virginians thus joined some potent allies. The Missouri State Highway Commission is presently in the U.S. Court of Appeals seeking highway money it has been given by law and refused by the Nixon administration. North Carolina Sen. Sam Ervin and all the Democratic leaders of the Senate have filed a brief in support of Missouri. Ervin last week also conducted a series of hearings on his bill to control attempts by Nixon and future presidents to impound funds. The bill has been cosponsored by 51 others senators.

The Ervin hearings attracted press and TV coverage. The reports showed Edmund Muskie inveighing against the administration. They showed Hubert Humphrey pounding dramatically on blue and yellow copies of the fiscal year 1974 federal budget.

But they failed to rouse great public interest in the doctrine of executive impoundment, an esoteric political science question after all, or in the danger that the executive branch may be swooshing up power constitutionally intended for Congress, the people's branch.

The issue became easy to grasp at times during the hearings, however. Like when a North Carolina building contractor demonstrated how construction funds. impounded for "economy reasons," actually ended up costing the nation more. Or when Edmund Muskie noted that impounding Medicare funds doesn't economize on medical care, just shifts the cost to the feeble shoulders of the elderly.

But perhaps the easiest impoundment issue of all to understand is the one involving the Water Pollution Control Act.

That's the one after all that brings the stench of presidential usurpation of authority to the doorstep of us all.

[From the Evening Star and Daily News, Washington, D.C., January 1973]

NIXON SAYS RIGHT TO IMPOUND BASED ON U.S. CONSTITUTION
(By Garnett D. Horner)

President Nixon insists that his right not to spend money voted by Congress "is absolutely clear."

He told a press conference yesterday that Congress must decide whether it wants to "raise taxes in order to spend more" or to trim spending, as he is trying to do.

Declaring that he is going to stand for the "general interest" of the country rather than the "special interests" which congressmen represent, he defined the general interest as: "Don't break the family budget by raising taxes or raising prices."

Asked how he responds to criticism that his impoundment of funds abrogates power that the Constitution gave to Congress, Nixon said "the same way that Jefferson did, and Jackson did and Truman did."

HAVE TO BE RESPONSIBLE

He added that the constitutional right for a president not to spend money "is absolutely clear" when the spending would mean raising either prices or taxes. Noting that Congress wants to share responsibility, the President said "believe me it would be pleasant to have more sharing of responsibility by the Congress." But, he said, to have responsibility "You have to be responsible, and this Congress... has not been responsible on money."

Nixon advoided giving a direct answer to a question as to whether he had told a visitor recently that he believes former Secretary of the Treasury John B. Connally, who headed Democrats for Nixon in the 1972 election campaign, will be the Republican nominee for president in 1976.

TAKE OFF AND RUN

While he believes that Connally could handle any job in this country or in the world. Nixon said, "I would be out of my mind if I were to be endorsing anybody for the presidency at the present time."

On the matter of executive privilege, the President said his general attitude is to be "as liberal as possible" in making administration officials available to testify before congressional committees.

"We are not going to use executive privilege as a shield for conversations that might be just embarrassing to us," he said.

He told a questioner that he considered it proper for Air Force Secretary Robert Seamans to have invoked executive privilege in refusing to disclose before a congressional committee the White House role in the firing of Ernest A. Fitzgerald, a critic of Air Force cost overruns.

He confirmed, however, that he has approved the decision to fire Fitzgerald.

[From the Houston Post, Feb. 1, 1973]

PICKLE PUSHING BILL TO CUT BACK PRESIDENT'S POWER

WASHINGTON.-Warning that the nation faces "government by whim of a single man," Rep. J. J. "Jake" Pickle urged Congress Wednesday to curb a president's powers to impound funds appropriated for various projects.

Pickle, emphasizing he favors congressional spending restraints self-imposed, said the legitimacy of President Nixon's impoundment of funds is basically a constitutional question.

"I think that whether a program finally lives or dies is a matter to be settled in hearings before the elected representatives of the people here in Congressnot in a back room of the Executive Office Building far from public view," declared the Austin lawmaker.

He testified in Senate hearings on a bill sponsored by Sen. Sam J. Ervin, D-N.C., to limit the powers of a president to impound (refuse to spend) funds Congress has appropriated for any given project. Pickle is sponsoring similar legislation in the House.

"If the President can send a budget here, the Congress makes amendments and lawfully passes the final appropriation, and then the President spends money only as he originally intended to, then something is amiss." Pickle testified.

"A budget drawn up by the Office of Management and the Budget (OMB) seems to carry here the force of law. An act of Congress signed by the President does not. If the President goes on to cut off in mid-stream programs which even he has requested, then something is drastically wrong." said Pickle.

"We have a government by the whim of a single man-without hearings and without recourse," he declared.

He recalled he warned the Congress of the problems of impoundment five months ago and said if matters continue on their present course, "we might as well make paper planes out of the laws we pass."

"It would be humorous, if it were not so serious, but I am hard-pressed just to keep up with what congressional programs are being abolished daily with the stroke of an executive pen," Pickle told the Senate Judiciary Committee.

"At the heart of the matter is what kind of government we shall have one man rule or a Republic," he continued. "At the heart of a Republic is the issue of who shall control the spending of that government's tax moneys."

President Nixon believes he has the voice of the people behind him, said Pickle, because he is working to cut federal spending. But, he added, “everyone wants to cut federal spending.

"To decide where to cut, the President has ordered OMB to go over every · federal program. Anyone who opposes these cuts is branded as an irresponsible inflationary," he said.

"But that is just the point. To oppose the specific cuts the administration recommends is neither inflationary nor irresponsible," he said. "For it is the constitutional right and duty of Congress-not of a star chamber government composed of the President and his OMB-to make the final decision where federal funds shall be spent."

Pickle said he does not advocate wholesale spending, and he admitted Congress has failed in the past to maintain spending control on itself.

Congress must meet that responsibility now "or get out of the ballgame," he

said.

[The News and Observer, Raleigh, N.C., Dec. 27, 1972]

FARM PROGRAM DROPPED

(By Bill Humphries)

The Nixon administration, intent on holding 1973 budget outlays to $250 billion, is terminating a federal farm program that has pumped approximately a quarter billion dollars into the North Carolina economy over the 35 years. Tar Heel farm leaders terms the action "shocking" and “regrettable."

The program-once called the Agricultural Conservation Program (ACP) but most recently known as the Rural Environmental Assistance Program (REAP)——— provided payments to farmers for carrying out soil and water conservation practices. Generally, Uncle Sam and the farmer have shared the cost of such practices on a 50-50 basis.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced Tuesday in Washington that funding of the program was being terminated and no more requests for cost-sharing would be accepted. However, USDA said, commitments made under the program through last Friday will be honored.

The only other USDA activity referred to in the announcement was the Water Bank Program, which also is being terminated. This does not affect North Carolina.

PROGRAMS REVIEWED

The two programs were selected "after a review of federal programs to identify those of low priority that can be reduced or eliminated without serious economic consequences," the announcement said.

USDA said the income supplements provided under REAP "are no longer necessary" in view of the fact that realized net farm income this year will reach an all-time high of nearly $19 billion.

"In view of this and because of the general acceptance and profitability of certain practices,” the announcement said, “it is believed farmers will continue to implement a significant supplemental income from the federal government.” State Grange Master Mrs. Harry B. Caldwell, reached at her home in Greensboro, described termination of REAP as "a very shocking development" whose impact will be felt in North Carolina.

"We have felt it was a necessary and important program in North Carolina even though funds in recent years have been limited," Mrs. Caldwell said.

MISSING SUPPORT

The Grange leader said it had been evident for at least a year that REAP "just hasn't had the support of the administration."

N.C. Farm Bureau President B. C. Mangum of Rougement commented: "I regret this action very much. The North Carolina Farm Burau has always supported this program."

Mangum said many thousands of small Tar Heel farmers who could not take full advantage of other programs have benefited from ACP and REAP.

"I hate to see the program ended." he said. "I am afraid it will lead to a slowdown in the use of conservation practices by many of our small farmers."