America at war! (1941–) – Part 3

[NormanStewart]

Stokes: Corcoran pulls strings to get Douglas named

Plots Truman-Wallace tie to achieve goal
By Thomas L. Stokes, Scripps-Howard staff writer

Chicago, Illinois –
Intrigue of the devious and deep-dyed variety, such as never has been practiced in a vice-presidential nomination, is going on here, in hotel room conferences and by long-distance telephone, over the nomination of a running mate for President Roosevelt this year.

A vice-presidential candidate is usually picked by the leaders, at the last minute, as sort of an afterthought. But it is different this year. The stakes are high. The vice-presidential nomination, the only contest this year, has become the center of a struggle for party control between the conservatives and New Dealers on the broad scale, and a prize over which various factions among New Dealers are tugging for supremacy.

The whole story in detail must await the memoirs and subsequent scrappy revelations by the principals. But more than enough leaks out to prove that New Dealers, when they take up politicking, can be just as tricky as those who make it a profession, and with refinements to which the professional would not resort.

Mr. Fixit for a price

This applies particularly to one who left the New Deal administration for the more lucrative practice of “influence,” a Mr. Fixit for a Price, but who still operates within it, sometimes just as if he still were in the government. this is Thomas G. Corcoran. He is up to his ears in this vice-presidential melee, manipulating by remote control from Washington, and the reports of his machinations are very fantastic, but most of them are probably true.

As the time for the nomination of a vice-presidential candidate approaches – it will follow the renomination of Mr. Roosevelt which occurs tonight – the two leading candidates were Vice President Wallace and Senator Harry S. Truman, chairman of the Senate Investigating Committee which bears his name. they have become the victims of the last-minute intriguing – there was plenty previously revolving about other figures.

Wallace amateur politician

Mr. Wallace is the rankest amateur as a politician, and without guile. Senator Truman honestly does not want the job. If you know him, you know this is true. Friends of each are pulling the wires and doing the tricks.

The infighting waxed hot last night when Senator Joe Guffey (D-PA), one of the vice President’s managers, got out a blistering statement denouncing National Chairman Hannegan for trying to influence the nomination of his fellow Missourian, Senator Truman. National party chairmen are supposed to be impartial, and the Pennsylvania Senator had a point there.

Guffey’s challenge

Mr. Guffey challenged the chairman to give out the complete text of a letter Mr. Hannegan was purported to have from the President listing the Missouri Senator as among those who would be acceptable to him.

Senator Guffey concluded with a reference to Senator Truman as “the candidate of Hannegan, Kelly, Hague and Flynn,” the last three the well-known Chicago, Jersey and New York bosses, in order to raise the issue of bossism against Senator Truman and to insinuate it, for those who know their political history, directly against the Senator from Missouri who started in politics as a young man with the once notorious Pendergast machine of Kansas City, though he has long outlived this.

Now Mr. Corcoran enters the plot, as reported here.

It’s an old feud

“Tommy the Cork,” as he is familiar known, has been working a long time to defeat Vice President Wallace for renomination. His hostility goes a long way back. It’s an old feud. His candidate, as it was in 1940, is 45-year-old Justice William O. Douglas of the Supreme Court, who has many attractions as a candidate, being a vigorous, scrappy fellow well identified with New Deal philosophy.

Now Mr. Corcoran has close affiliations with both Senator Joe Guffey and Senator Pepper (D-FL), also identified with the Wallace movement here, both state bosses of no mean pretensions. He also has considerable influence with Secretary of the Interior Ickes, who is here on the ground maneuvering around ostensibly against Vice President Wallace on behalf of Mr. Corcoran.

Wants a deadlock

The essence of the Corcoran “plot” as related is that he is pulling strings behind the scenes to incite the Wallace and Truman forces against each other, so that they will smear each other sufficiently to defeat each and cause a deadlock, out of which Justice Douglas would emerge as the winner.

Advanced as evidence is the Corcoran association with both Senators Guffey and Pepper, who has been busy in the intriguing, and with Mr. Ickes. The latter is known to have visited the Vice President in Washington not long ago ands asked him to withdraw. It was reported that last night he was trying to induce Vice President Wallace to take the floor and denounce boss Ed Kelly, Frank Hague, and Ed Flynn for trying to put over Senator Truman, which would, indeed, be a nice ruckus.

Sounds fantastic, to be true. It may be. But it fits in with the Corcoran technique.

Out of such intrigue, a vice-presidential candidate will emerge.

[NormanStewart]

Story behind Saint-Lô victory –
McGlincy: ‘God bless you, keep you,’ says letter beside a body

Also on the battlefield there is strewn other little things a man treasures
By James McGlincy, United Press staff writer

With U.S. forces in Normandy, France –
A photographer had just finished shooting a picture of it and there it lay – a helmet with a clip of cartridges next to it, and sticking out from under it a letter which ended, “God bless you and keep you until you are home in my arms again.”

This is the road to Saint-Lô, the road down which our task force stormed into the town. The helmet, the cartridges and the letter lie behind the hedgerow where the Americans had dug in for a while. On the other side of the hedgerow were German foxholes. On this side were ours.

Now all around them lies the debris of battle – yet it is more than that because the articles strewn about are such small, warm personal possessions. There are tubes of shaving cream, packs of cigarettes, razorblades, postcards of French towns, foot powder, newspaper clippings – and those letters.

One of the clippings is from a newspaper in Connecticut, a copy of a letter a boy had written while he was still in England. It wasn’t literary or flowery, just sincere. It read:

I’m tired of war and being away from hm. But we want to get it over with. I’ll be glad when we lick the Germans and the Japs.

Nearby is a letter from his wife. I shouldn’t read other people’s mail but somehow it seems that these letters ought to be told – plain, everyday letters that people write to the ones they love.

It’s one way of telling what happens here – of how bodies are mangled and lives are tangled so that the objective can be attained – a town like Saint-Lô.

That boy’s wife wrote:

I’m glad you like it, being you have to be there. I know it’s some pretty country over there and it will be quite an experience. You can tell me lots when you come home.

‘God bless you’

There is a writing pad with only a couple of lines scribbled on it in pencil: “Dear Julia: Here I am once more to say hello and let you know that I’m in the very best of health.” That was written before the deluge of fire.

But most pathetic of all was that letter under the helmet, which said:

Goodnight, Sweetheart. God bless you and keep you until you are home in my arms again. I love you more than anything or anyone in this world. Always, Lillian.

This is the story behind the headline, “Yanks Take Saint-Lô.”

[NormanStewart]

Chaplin’s first wife in critical condition

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Guam attacks carried into third week

Early invasion of island predicted

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Editorial: Clark’s victory

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Editorial: The Democratic ‘issue’

The oratory at the Democratic National Convention is of the old spread-eagle variety, packed with partisanship. Governor Kerr of Oklahoma, who gave the keynote last night, followed the party line laid down by the indispensable man. But he lacked the cleverness of the master politician who is running this convention from afar. He let too much corn creep in, and poison.

Nevertheless, it was an effective political speech which made the most out of the most vulnerable points in the Republican record.

Here are the Democratic campaign cries:

Save America from Harding, Coolidge and Hoover! Since Mr. Harding and Mr. Coolidge are dead, and Mr. Hoover is not a candidate, this appeal may be found somewhat lacking.

Governor Dewey was picked by Mr. Hoover! This is a little better. The Democrats can prove that Mr. Hoover knows Mr. Dewey and that Mr. Hoover was at the GOP convention. Of course, Mr. Hoover had no control over the choice of a candidate and has no power over Mr. Dewey, but if the story is dressed up properly, maybe a few hundred voters somewhere will believe it.

Keep this Democratic prosperity, which has made everybody fat – employer, labor, farmer! According to all the rules of politics, this is surefire stuff.

But all the other Democratic slogans are secondary to this one: The indispensable man! Or, as streamlined by the man himself: The indispensable Commander-in-Chief!

[NormanStewart]

Editorial: Chaplains’ role

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Edson: Democrats look for ‘least undesirable’

By Peter Edson

Washington –
The peculiar embarrassment of the Democratic Party chieftains in trying to decide in a second-[lace candidate to run beside Franklin Delano Roosevelt is that they are not trying to put the finger on the best man to run, but on the man who will be the least objectionable. Everyone suggested for the job thus far is able enough in his own sweet way, but the catch is that one and all have political BO to some sensitive noses.

Merits and demerits of Henry Wallace are so well known as to require no detailed rehashing here. Admittedly brilliant and having to his credit many practical achievements that have contributed richly to improving American life, he is still branded as a visionary. The mere thought of his ever reaching the White House on a fluke starts many people screaming.

Sam Rayburn (D-TX) has made an excellent speaker of the House of Representatives, respected by both Republican opponents and Democratic followers. But he comes from the less-populous South and the belief that Northerners won’t vote for Southerners in high office is still hanging around as a hoodoo of political folklore that goes back to the tome of Andrew Johnson, even though Cactus Jack Garner did break thew spell in 1932. Furthermore, Mr. Rayburn is not widely known in the North and West and would have to sell himself to the voters.

Byrnes?

From his position as director of the Office of War Mobilization and “assistant President,” James F. Byrnes of South Carolina would seem to be a natural choice. He has behind him a distinguished record as a Senator and a short record as Supreme Court Justice. But My, Byrnes as boss of the war agencies has played a behind-the-scenes role, dodging the limelight as much as possible.

He, even more than Mr. Rayburn, would have to be sold to the voters. And like Mr. Rayburn, he is from the South.

There is considerable Northern enthusiasm for Senator Harry Flood Byrd (D-VA). But he is no favorite of the White House. Mr. Roosevelt, in fact, had so much legislative opposition from Mr. Garner that it is doubtful if the President would welcome any Southern conservative to preside over the Senate. Certainly, no such a vice-presidential candidate would be welcome to the New Dealers.

South says nix

As a reverse to this, a lot of Northerners in the party are not acceptable to the South, where anyone having even a slight suspicion of being New Deal is persona non grata, as the diplomats say. This curse works against not only Mr. Wallace, but also against such people as Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, Federal Circuit Judge Sherman Minton of Indiana, and War Manpower Commissioner Paul V. McNutt, the most kicked-around guy in the whole administration.

Any of these New Dealers would probably be acceptable as a second choice to the labor groups, particularly the CIO and its Political Action Committee. The PAC will definitely not support Mr. Dewey, but the vice-presidential nomination of an anti-labor conservative Southerner would alienate the affections of a powerful and growing political force.

One border state Senator who would be accepted to the Southerners and to labor too would be Senator Harry S. Truman (D-MO). He has made a national reputation as chairman of the Senate Committee to Investigate the War Effort.

But if this is to be an all-out carry-on-the-war campaign, Mr. Truman’s presence on the ticket would place the administration in a funny position for the simple reason that Mr. Truman is poison to the War and Navy Departments and to all the admirals and generals in Washington. They think his investigations and reports have hindered the war effort, rather than helped it.

What to do, what to do.

[NormanStewart]

Ferguson: Equal rights

By Mrs. Walter Ferguson

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[NormanStewart]

Background of news –
Renominating Presidents

By Bertram Benedict

An adage of American politics has it that an incumbent President can always get himself renominated. The adage has held true during this century; it did not always stand up in the previous century.

It held true in 1940, yet Mr. Roosevelt’s nomination for a third term was contested. Senator Carter Glass of Virginia placed James A. Farley in nomination. Others put in the running were Vice President Garner and Senator Tydings of Maryland. The roll call gave Mr. Roosevelt 946-plus of the 1,100 votes, Mr. Farley 72-plus, Mr. Garner 61, Mr. Tydings 9-plus, Secretary Hull 5-plus.

The delegations from 22 states, including Pennsylvania, many operating under the unit rule, went unanimously for Mr. Roosevelt. Of Mr. Farley’s 72-plus votes, 25 came from New York, 12½ from Massachusetts. Of Mr. Garner’s 61 votes, 46 came from Texas. Of the Tydings votes, 8½ came from Maryland; of the Hull votes, 4⅔ came from Virginia.

After the vote was announced, Texas shifted its 46 votes to Mr. Roosevelt, Mr. Tydings announced that Maryland’s 16 were shifted to Mr. Roosevelt, Massachusetts’ 34 went over to the President, and Mr. Farley, obtaining the floor, moved to suspend the rules and make Mr. Roosevelt’s nomination unanimous.

No roll call in 1936

In 1936, a motion was adopted to suspend the rules, abandon the roll call, and make Mr. Roosevelt’s nomination unanimous.

In 1932, at the Republican Convention, the only name in nomination besides Mr. Hoover’s was that of ex-Senator France of Maryland. The roll call showed:

Hoover	1126½
Senator Blaine	13
Calvin Coolidge	4½
Mr. France	4
Charles G. Dawes	1
Senator Wadsworth	1

A motion to make the Hoover nomination unanimous was adopted with some scattering “nays.”

In 1924, President Coolidge was nominated by vote of 1065–34 for the late Senator Robert M. La Follette of Wisconsin and 10 for Senator Hiram Johnson of California. In 1916, President Wilson was renominated by acclamation, but in 1912 President Taft got renomination only by a narrow margin, in a contest with former President Roosevelt. The latter charged that the nomination was withheld from him by fraud in seating delegates whose seats were contested.

In 1904, Mr. Roosevelt, then President, had been nominated unanimously, like William McKinley in 1900.

Record of previous conventions

In the 19th century, the following six Presidents were renominated under the convention system – Benjamin Harrison in 1892 (he had much opposition, receiving only 535 of the 905 votes on the first ballot), Cleveland in 1888 (unanimously), Grant in 1872 (unanimously), Lincoln in 1864 (the votes of Missouri were cast for Grant), Van Buren in 1840 (unanimously), Jackson in 1832 (unanimously).

But the following five Presidents failed in attempts at nomination:

1844: Tyler, a Democrat elected Vice President on the Whig ticket with W. H. Harrison, wasn’t mentioned at the Democratic Convention. He was nominated by a rump Democratic Convention, but withdrew.

1852: Fillmore, who, like Tyler, had gone to the White House on the death of a President (W. H. Harrison), led Winfield Scott on the first ballot at the Democratic Convention, but Scott was nominated on the 53rd.

1856: Pierce at the Democratic Convention on the first ballot ran second to Buchanan, who was nominated on the 17th.

1876: Grant had clearly implied that he was willing to be drafted for a third term, but the House of Representatives passed a resolution deploring third terms, and the President got no votes at the convention.

1884: Arthur, another President by reason of death (Garfield’s), on the first ballot ran second to Blaine, who was nominated on the 4th.

[NormanStewart]

Man who fought court-martial 45 years dies

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When fighting lads whistle, love scene is on the beam

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Roving Reporter

By Ernie Pyle

In Normandy, France – (by wireless)
Capt. John Jackson is an unusual fellow with an unusual job. It has fallen to his lot to be the guy who goes in and brings out German generals who think maybe they would like to surrender.

This happens because he speaks German, and because he is on the staff of the 9th Division, which captured the German generals commanding the Cherbourg area.

Capt. Jackson goes by the nickname “Brinck.” He is a bachelor, 32 years old. It is quite a coincidence that he was born in the town of Dinard. About 30 miles from Cherbourg. But he is straight American, for generations back. His folks just happened to be traveling over here at the time he showed up.

Capt. Jackson’s mother lives in New Canaan, Connecticut, but he likes to think of New Mexico as home. For several years he has been a rancher out there and he loves it. His place is near Wagon Mound and Clines Corners, about 40 miles east of Santa Fe. The war has played hob with his business. Both he and his partner are overseas, and there’s nobody left to look after the business. They lost money last year for the first time.

Looks more like Russian soldier

Capt. Jackson is a short, dark man with a thin face. He wears a long trench coat with pack harness, and his helmet comes down over his ears, giving him the appearance of a Russian soldier rather than an American.

He speaks perfect French, but he says his German is only so-so. He says it is actually better in his job not to speak flawless German, for then the German officers would think he was a German turned American and would be so contemptuous they wouldn’t talk to him.

Another remarkable character is Pvt. Ivan Sanders.

Sanders is the “Mister Fixit” of the 9th Division. His actual job is that of electrician, but his native knack for fixing things has led him into a sort of haloed status that keeps him working like a dog 24 hours a day, doing things for other people.

No matter what gets out of fix, Sanders can fix it. Without previous experience he now repairs fountain pens, radios, electric razors, typewriters, broke knives, stoves and watches. He has become an institution. Everybody from the commanding general on down depends on him and yells for him whenever anything goes wrong.

There is just one thing about Sanders. Nobody can get him to clean up. He is a sight to behold. Even the commanding general just threw up his hands about a year ago and gave up. When distinguished visitors come, they try to hide Sanders.

Just never give him time to wash

But the funny part about Sanders’ deplorable condition is that he is eager to be clean. They just never give them to wash. They keep him too busy fixing things.

In civil life, Sanders was an auto mechanic. He comes for Vinton, Iowa. After the war, he guesses he will set up another auto repair shop. He figures there will be enough veterans with cars to keep him busy.

Another unusual thing about Sanders is that he doesn’t have to be over here at all. He is 43, and he has had three chances to go home. And do you know why he turned them down? It’s because he’s so conscientious he figures they couldn’t get anybody else to do his work properly!

Small-world stuff:

On evening I dropped past an ack-ack battery I know, and a Red Cross man who served in this brigade came over and introduced himself.

He did look vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t have told you who he was. And no wonder – it had been 21 years since I’d seen him.

His name was Byron Wallace. He was a freshman at Indiana University when I was a senior. He belonged to the Delta Upsilon Fraternity, and lived just across the alley from us. His home then was at Washington, Indiana.

Ever since college, he has been in recreational and physical-education work – in New York’s Bowery, in Los Angeles, in Pittsburgh. And now in Normandy. He came ashore on D+1. Her thinks he’s going to like it here all right.

[NormanStewart]

Pegler: Democratic Convention Day 2

By Westbrook Pegler

Chicago, Illinois –
The old-line, partisan, American Democrat at this convention is a bewildered and pathetic specimen who has an acute sense, as of a burr in his britches, that he is being played for a gullible fool by a few smart and tricky individuals, but can’t do anything about it.

This refers to Ed Kelly, Frank Hague, Ed Flynn and the machine Democrats of Connecticut, Kansas City and the South, and to Jim Farley, as an individual, as well as the unpretentious little people of the party, as they are often called in the patronizing jargon of their superiors who unmistakably regard themselves as the big people.

It has been several years since anyone with any political knowhow in Chicago believed that the working arrangement between Mayor Kelly and President Roosevelt was anything more than a practical, political deal and sordid on both sides.

Not even personally are they compatible, as politicians often are, who, nevertheless, fight one another at every turn in the spirit of a rough, and often painful, but sporting game. Kelly is a machine man whose machine has gears and wires and conduits reaching down into the underworld of handbooks and union rackets and tapping the rake-off on government contracts and legal handouts from the federal courts to politically deserving lawyers.

He is what he is, and he has never pretended to be a social worker, a bleeding heart or a statesman of world vision. It was Kelly who so to speak, drew a deadline with his toe across a sooty suburban field on a sunny Memorial Day a few years ago, dared the Communist labor leaders to cross it as they had during their successful reign of terror in Ohio and Michigan.

And when they did cross it, smashed the challenge to the authority of government, with a toll of a dozen lives. Capt. Mooney, of his police department, took the immediate responsibility and the main blow of the abuse, but he acted on Ed Kelly’s authority. Kelly upheld him, and the challenge has never been repeated in Chicago.

Their opposition to Wallace political

Kelly, like Hague in New Jersey, remains the boss in Chicago and he is running the festivities and arrangements of the actual convention. Like the rest of the old-style machine bosses, he is concerned only with his own interests in his own jurisdiction and, like them, he ignores the old sneers, now expediently silenced, of the poseurs and ideologists of the New Deal, about the uncouthness of his political character and his methods.

If such men as Kelly and Hague opposed Henry Wallace, however, their decision was strictly political, not personal or philosophical. Their function is to get out the votes and elect the ticket and all the machine politicians who have turned down Wallace did so only because they believed he would be dead weight.

But actually, it may be seriously doubted that, when they enter their polling booths next fall, they will personally vote for President.

There are many less prominent Democrats at this convention who reveal an inner doubt and fear of the future should their own party win again. They try to balance in their minds the glib catalog of New Deal achievements compiled a few months ago by Senator Alben Barkley of Kentucky, to take the sting out of his furious denunciation of President Roosevelt in the tax law dispute, and find it alarmingly outweighed by invasions of their freedom.

Something is coming

If Roosevelt gave unions the right to bargain with employers, he also robbed the people, who, after all, are the true, living body of American labor, of their right to work without submitting themselves to the private codes, laws and taxing powers of the unions and to their brutal, erratic and overbearing discipline.

Moreover, these Americans, even Kelly and Hague and the little people wearing the badges, know that nowadays, under pretext of the war emergency but without authority in law, Mr. Roosevelt has decreed that no American male civilian may take a new job in any line, whatever, except by permission of the United States Employment Service.

Here they find a furtive and mysterious stranger, Sidney Hillman, a continental ideologist, holding forth in an official political command post as boss of the Political Action Committee of the CIO, which is largely composed of New York Communists, and issuing decrees to their own party’s convention, issuing decrees to them, with the blessing of the President and Mrs. Roosevelt.

These bosses and little people of the Democratic Party do not know Sidney Hillman or accept his authority or leadership and, though they may play out the game in the big hall for lack of any alternative, they will not necessarily go home pleased or confident.

They may be superficially impressed by the personal presence of ostentatious, pushful nightclub celebrities from New York, billed as authors and thinkers and “glamorous” Hollywood personalities, but that need not mean that they will accept them and Hillman as eminent Americans, qualified to rule their old Democratic Party and regulate their employment, their earnings and lives, and rule their country as counselors of government for four years.

Hillman! In God’s name, how came this non-toiling, sedentary conspirator who never held American office or worked in the Democratic organization, to give orders to the Democrats of the United States?

Something is cooking at this strange convention and it may turn out to be a mess.

[NormanStewart]

Maj. de Seversky: Air potentialities

By Maj. Alexander P. de Seversky

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Biting bear just snoozes as curious crowd looks on

Central Park animal to remain in zoo; Soc healthy, docile temper back

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Pyle gets strange requests – from buttons to camels

Letters galore also pile in on Ernie who reads, but can’t answer, them
By Henry T. Gorrell, United Press staff writer

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Allen: Wallace shouldn’t run with weak supporters

George once did and he almost got caught with – well, anyway, it’s dangerous
By Gracie Allen

Chicago, Illinois –
In my first column from the Democratic Convention, I more or less challenged the Democrats to send as many handsome men to Chicago as the Republicans had. Well – we’re now going into the second day of the convention and I don’t think they’ve quite met the test. Of course, I guess the Democrats don’t need good looks – they have careers.

Also, my husband George is with me this time and I automatically compare every man to him. It’s pretty hard for a man to stand next to George Burns and look handsome… George moves away.

But don’t get the impression that there aren’t any handsome Democrats… There are plenty of them… and what charming men! Especially those Southerners. Most Democrats seem to come from the South. I mentioned this to a Republican and he said:

Don’t let ‘em fool you, Gracie. In July, you think they all come from the South, but in November they come from every direction.

Secedes from conversation

Speaking of charming Southerners, I met Senator Claude Pepper of Florida. With an accent that simply dripped honey, he flattered me almost out of my wits. Well, naturally, I wanted to say something nice right back to the Senator from Florida so I said:

“What a lovely sun tan, Senator – when did you find time to get to California?” Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say because he seceded from the conversation.

Wallace’s handicap

The big question at the convention continued to be – “Who will be nominated Vice President?” They tell me there’s going to be a terrific race between Wallace and Truman and that Wallace’s supporters seem to be weakening. My goodness, he shouldn’t try to run a race with weak supporters. George did that once and got caught with his – well, anyway, it’s dangerous.

One thing, the Democrats are getting much cooler weather than the Republicans had. Those poor Republicans really got a roasting at their convention. Come to think of it, they’re getting quite a roasting at this convention, too.

That’s all for now – more political news tomorrow.

[NormanStewart]

Radio Pauls ‘do something about the weather’

Order music penned to fit programs
By Si Steinhauser

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[NormanStewart]

1944 Democratic Party Platform

Introduction

The Democratic Party stands on its record in peace and in war.

To speed victory, establish and maintain peace, guarantee full employment and provide prosperity – this is its platform.

We do not here detail scores of planks. We cite action.

Domestic Policy

Beginning March 1933, the Democratic administration took a series of actions which saved our system of free enterprise.

It brought that system out of collapse and thereafter eliminated abuses which had imperiled it.

It used the powers of government to provide employment in industry and to save agriculture.

It wrote a new Magna Carta for labor.

It provided social security, including old-age pensions, unemployment insurance, security for crippled and dependent children and the blind. It established employment offices. It provided federal bank deposit insurance, flood prevention, soil conservation, and prevented abuses in the security markets. It saved farms and homes from foreclosure, and secured profitable prices for farm products.

It adopted an effective program of reclamation, hydroelectric power, and mineral development.

It found the road to prosperity through production and employment.

We pledge the continuance and improvement of these programs.

War Policy

Before war came, the Democratic administration awakened the nation, in time, to the dangers that threatened its very existence.

It succeeded in building, in time, the best-trained and equipped army in the world, the most powerful navy in the world, the greatest air force in the world, and the largest merchant marine in the world.

It gained for our country, and it saved for our country, powerful allies.

When war came, it succeeded in working out with those allies an effective grand strategy against the enemy.

It set that strategy in motion, and the tide of battle was turned.

It held the line against wartime inflation.

It ensured a fair share-and-share-alike distribution of food and other essentials.

It is leading our country to certain victory.

The primary and imperative duty of the United States is to wage the war with every resource available to final triumph over our enemies, and we pledge that we will continue to fight side by side with the United Nations until this supreme objective shall have been attained and thereafter to secure a just and lasting peace.

International Peace

That the world may not again be drenched in blood by international outlaws and criminals, we pledge:

To join with the other United Nations in the establishment of an international organization based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all peace-loving states, open to membership by all such states, large and small, for the prevention of aggression and the maintenance of international peace and security.

To make all necessary and effective agreements and arrangements through which the nations would maintain adequate forces to meet the needs of preventing war and of making impossible the preparation for war and which would have such forces available for joint action when necessary.

Such organization must be endowed with power to employ armed forces when necessary to prevent aggression and preserve peace.

We favor the maintenance of an international court of justice of which the United States shall be a member and the employment of diplomacy, conciliation, arbitration and other like methods where appropriate in the settlement of international disputes.

World peace is of transcendent importance. Our gallant sons are dying on land, on sea, and in the air. They do not die as Republicans. They do not die as Democrats. They die as Americans. We pledge that their blood shall not have been shed in vain. America has the opportunity to lead the world in this great service to mankind. The United States must meet the challenge. Under Divine Providence, she must move forward to her high destiny.

Foreign Relations

We pledge our support to the Atlantic Charter and the Four Freedoms and the application of the principles enunciated therein to the United Nations and other peace-loving nations, large and small.

We shall uphold the Good-Neighbor Policy, and extend the trade policies initiated by the present administration.

We favor the opening of Palestine to unrestricted Jewish immigration and colonization, and such a policy as to result in the establishment there of a free and democratic Jewish commonwealth.

Equal Rights for Women

We favor legislation assuring equal pay for equal work, regardless of sex.

We recommend to Congress the submission of a constitutional amendment on equal rights for women.

Education and Industry

We favor federal aid to education administered by the states without interference by the federal government.

We favor federal legislation to assure stability of products, employment, distribution and prices in the bituminous coal industry, to create a proper balance between consumer, producer and mine worker.

We endorse the President’s statement recognizing the importance of the use of water in arid land states for domestic and irrigation purposes.

We favor non-discriminatory transportation charges and declare for the early correction of inequalities in such charges.

Territories

We favor enactment of legislation granting the fullest measure of self-government for Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico, and eventual statehood for Alaska and Hawaii.

We favor the extension of the right of suffrage to the people of the District of Columbia.

Post-War Programs

We offer these postwar programs:

A continuation of our policy of full benefits for ex-servicemen and women with special consideration for the disabled. We make it our first duty to assure employment and economic security to all who have served in the defense of our country.

Price guarantees and crop insurance to farmers with all practical steps:

To keep agriculture on a parity with industry and labor.

To foster the success of the small independent farmer.

To aid the home ownership of family-sized farms.

To extend rural electrification and develop broader domestic and foreign markets for agricultural products.

Adequate compensation for workers during demobilization.

The enactment of such additional humanitarian, labor, social and farm legislation as time and experience may require, including the amendment or repeal of any law enacted in recent years which has failed to accomplish its purpose.

Promotion of the success of small business. Earliest possible release of wartime controls.

Adaptation of tax laws to an expanding peacetime economy, with simplified structure and wartime taxes reduced or repealed as soon as possible.

Encouragement of risk capital, new enterprise, development of natural resources in the West and other parts of the country, and the immediate reopening of the gold and silver mines of the West as soon as manpower is available.

We reassert our faith in competitive private enterprise, free from control by monopolies, cartels, or any arbitrary private or public authority.

The Four Freedoms

We assert that mankind believes in the Four Freedoms.

We believe that the country which has the greatest measure of social justice is capable of the greatest achievements.

We believe that racial and religious minorities have the right to live, develop and vote equally with all citizens and share the rights that are guaranteed by our Constitution. Congress should exert its full constitutional powers to protect those rights.

We believe that without loss of sovereignty, world development and lasting peace are within humanity’s grasp. They will come with the greater enjoyment of those freedoms by the peoples of the world, and with the freer flow among them of ideas and goods.

We believe in the world right of all men to write, send and publish news at uniform communication rates and without interference by governmental or private monopoly and that right should be protected by treaty.

To these beliefs the Democratic Party subscribes.

These principles the Democratic Party pledges itself in solemn sincerity to maintain.

Vote of Confidence in the President

Finally, this Convention sends its affectionate greetings to our beloved and matchless leader and President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

He stands before the nation and the world, the champion of human liberty and dignity. He has rescued our people from the ravages of economic disaster. His rare foresight and magnificent courage have saved our nation from the assault of international brigands and dictators. Fulfilling the ardent hope of his life, he has already laid the foundation of enduring peace for a troubled world and the wellbeing of our nation. All mankind is his debtor. His life and services have been a great blessing to humanity.

That God may keep him strong in body and in spirit to carry on his yet unfinished work is our hope and our prayer.