The American Effort
Various descriptions, such as the creation of an Inner Cabinet, or a new War Cabinet, or the appointment of an Assistant-President, have been applied to President Roosevelt's action in instituting an Office of War Mobilisation, with Mr. James F. Byrnes, hitherto Director of Economic Stabilisation, as its head. The fact is that the new body, like so many brought into being during the war, has no place in the normal constitution. It is the result of a need acutely realised, and Mr. Roosevelt has won general commendation by his decision to shift on to other shoulders part of a burden that had grown too heavy for his own, or any single man's. The War Mobilisation Committee, by whom the Director of the new office will be assisted, consists of the Secretary of War, the Secretary of the Navy, the chairman of the War Production Board, the chairman of the Munitions Assignment-Board, and the new Director of Economic Stabilisation, Judge Fred Vinson. This is a compact and efficient body, and its powers—or, rather, the director's, for it is in him that supreme authority is vested—are immense. They involve nothing less than, as Mr. Byrnes himself put it, " responsibility for the direction of the home front war effort and essential civilian supplies," subject only to the President himself. A Congressional committee under Senator Truman has long been pressing for some such move as this, and criticisms of Mr. Roosevelt's failure to dele- gate executive tasks will be largely silenced. A great deal of co-
ordination between different branches of the war-effort and different Government departments is needed, and the new body should be capable of achieving that.
