f the Executive Committee
of the FPA-WAC, and also a member of the CFR.

Chapter 4

COMMITTEE FOR ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

On June 20, 1961, _The San Francisco Examiner_ published a United Press
International news story with a June 19, Washington, D. C. date line,
under the headline "J.F.K. Backs Tax Cut Plan."

Here are portions of the article:

"President Kennedy today urged Congress and the people to give a
close study to a monetary reform proposal which would empower him
to cut income taxes in recession periods.

"He issued the statement after receiving a bulky report from the
Commission of [sic] Money and Credit....

"The 27-member commission was set up in 1957 by the Committee for
Economic Development (CED). Its three-year study was financed by
$1.3 million in grants from the CED and the Ford and Merrill
Foundation.

"One of the key recommendations was to give the President limited
power to cut the 20 percent tax rate on the first $2000 of personal
income, if needed to help the economy....

"The report also recommended extensive changes in the Federal
Reserve System, set up in 1913 as the core of the Nation's banking
system...."

This _San Francisco Examiner_ article is a classic example of propaganda
disguised as straight news reporting.

* * * * *

A story about the President supporting a plan for reducing taxes could
not fail to command sympathetic attention. But the truth is that the
tax reform proposals of the Commission on Money and Credit would give
the President as much power and leeway to _raise_ taxes as to lower
them.

In its 282-page report, the Commission made 87 separate proposals. One
would permit the President (on his own initiative) to reduce the basic
income-tax rate (the one that applies to practically every person who
has any income at all) from 20% to 15%. It would also permit the
President to raise the basic rate from 20% to 25%.

The idea of giving the President such power is as alien to American
political principles as communism itself is. The proposed "machinery"
for granting such Presidential power would violate every basic principle
of our constitutional system. Under the Commission's proposal, the
President would announce that he was going to increase or decrease
taxes. If, within sixty days, Congress did not veto the plan, it would
become law, effecti