‘Mudslinging’ hit –
Dewey pleads for return of ‘integrity’
President indispensable to bosses, he says
Aboard Dewey campaign train (UP) –
Governor Thomas E. Dewey called upon the American people today to elect him president in November to “restore integrity to the White House.”
The Republican presidential nominee wound up a seven-speech coast-to-coast campaign tour in Oklahoma City last night with a charge that integrity had been lacking in the 12 years of President Roosevelt’s administration and in his opening bid for an unprecedented fourth term.
Fightingest speech yet
It was Governor Dewey’s fightingest speech to date and his audience, estimated at 15,000, was the most boisterously responsive.
Governor Dewey appeared confident that his plea would be answered, he predicted that the American people will “restore integrity to the White House so that its spoken word can be trusted again.”
He said the President’s speech Saturday night completely ignored his pledge on acceptance of the 1944 nomination that he would not campaign in the usual sense and was one of “mudslinging, ridicule and wisecracks.”
Demagogy charged
He charged:
It plumbed the depths of demagogy by dragging into this campaign the names of Hitler and Goebbels; it descended to quoting from Mein Kampf and to reckless charges of “fraud” and “falsehood.”
Governor Dewey promised that he personally would not resort to such tactics.
He said:
The winning of this war and the achievement of a people’s peace are too sacred to be cast off with frivolous language.
Then, with an explanation that his opponent has “made the charges, asked for it, and here it is,” Governor Dewey took up, point by point, the subjects of President Roosevelt’s opening campaign speech.
‘Countless lives lost’
Governor Dewey accused Mr. Roosevelt of failure to prepare for war and said it had “cost countless American lives; it has caused untold misery.”
He recalled that in 1937, Mr. Roosevelt remarked:
How happy we are that the circumstances of the moment permit us to put our money into bridges and boulevards… rather than into huge standing armies and vast implements of war.
Governor Dewey continued:
But the war came just two years later. It was in January of 1940 that I publicly called for a two-ocean navy for the defense of America. It was that statement of mine which Mr. Roosevelt called, and I quote his words, “Just plain dumb.”
‘Indispensable man’
Then, Governor Dewey took up the issue of the “indispensable man.” He pointed out that neither Senator Harry S. Truman nor Mayor Edward J. Kelly of Chicago has been repudiated for his statement that Mr. Roosevelt’s reelection is vital to future peace and prosperity and salvation of the nation.
Governor Dewey conceded:
The man who wants to be President for 16 years is indeed indispensable. He is indispensable to Harry Hopkins, to Madam Perkins, Harold Ickes, to a host of other political jobholders. He is indispensable to Sidney Hillman and the Political Action Committee. to Earl Browder, the ex-convict and pardoned Communist leader.
Wife’s hometown welcomes Dewey
Sapulpa, Oklahoma (UP) –
Governor Thomas E. Dewey carried his campaign into his wife’s childhood hometown today. asking Republicans and “good Democrats” to join him in a complete housecleaning of the federal government.
After a short talk at Bristow, Oklahoma, in his first stop before reaching Sapulpa, Mr. Dewey turned the spotlight on his wife, the former Francis Eileen Hutt.
A huge reception was held at the local high school, from which Mrs. Dewey was graduated as class valedictorian 20 years ago.
A crowd estimated at 25,000 persons – twice the town’s normal population – greeted the Deweys.
“You are here to do honor to the lady who is my wife,” Governor Dewey said. He thanked citizens of Sapulpa for the friendliness, the education and the love shown to his wife but said the best thing they did was “let her go to New York where I found her and have kept her ever since.”