The Pittsburgh Press (November 5, 1944)
DEWEY CHARGES ‘WAR MEDDLING’
Morgenthau Plan cited as aid to Nazis
Governor promises end of incompetence
New York (UP) – (Nov. 4)
Governor Thomas E. Dewey, returning to scenes of past triumphs as the nation’s No. 1 rackets prosecutor, charged tonight that President Roosevelt by “confused incompetence,” has prolonged the war in Europe at the expense of “the lives of American men.”
Climaxing in his home city a fighting campaign for the Presidency, the Republican candidate addressed a cheering crowd in Madison Square Garden estimated by Chief Inspector John J. O’Connell of the New York police at 25,000.
To prolonged cheers, Governor Dewey promised if elected on Tuesday to “put a stop to the incompetence in Washington which is costing the lives of American men and delaying the day of final victory.”
Governor Dewey asserted the war was being prolonged by the “improvised meddling which is so much a part and parcel of the Roosevelt administration,” he also declared:
At the very moment when his own confused incompetence has thus prolonged the war in Europe, Franklin Roosevelt goes on the radio and claims for himself the credit for everything our engineers, our war workers, our industry, our farmers and our fighting sons have done.
Long way to go
Mr. Dewey said that Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower last Sept. 1 reiterated an early prediction that Germany could be beaten in 1944 “if everyone at home would do his part.”
“Yet,” he added, “last Thursday, Mr. Roosevelt decided to tell us the war had still a long way to go.”
Governor Dewey said Mr. Roosevelt took to his Québec Conference with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill “that master of military strategy and foreign affairs,” Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr., “with his private plan for disposing of the German people after the war.”
Claims plan aids Nazis
Mr. Dewey said:
The plan was so clumsy that Mr. Roosevelt himself finally dropped it – but the damage was done.
The publishing of this plan while everything else was kept secret was just what the Nazi propagandists needed. That was as good as 10 fresh German divisions. It put fight back into the German Army; it stiffened the will of the German nation to resist. Almost overnight, the headlong retreat of the Germans stopped. They stood and fought fanatically.
Mr. Dewey asked “What does this mean?” and answered:
It means that the blood of our fighting men is paying for this improvised meddling which is so much part and parcel of the Roosevelt administration.
Dedicated to 3 propositions
He summed up the campaign situation this way:
All over the world tonight, Americans are fighting for the tight of free men to govern themselves. Here at home, we are waging a political campaign to make secure the liberties for which they fight.
He said he and Governor John Bricker, GOP vice-presidential candidate, were dedicated to these propositions:
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“To speed total victory and the prompt return of our fighting men.”
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“To provide American leadership in the world for an effective organization among all nations to prevent future wars.”
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“To achieve jobs and opportunity for every American.”
To accomplish these ends, he added:
We shall put an end to one-man rule; we shall unite our people in teamwork and harmony behind a President and a Congress that can and will work together to realize the limitless promise of America.
These objectives, Mr. Dewey said, “can never be attained under the tired and quarrelsome administration that has been in office for 12 long years. They can only be attained under a new, vigorous administration that comes fresh from the people.”
In blaming the New Deal for prolonging the war, Mr. Dewey asked what had happened “in two months to cancel Gen. Eisenhower’s prediction.”
Left behind Hull, Stimson
“Mr. Roosevelt,” he said, “has not told us the whole story.”
He criticized the President for leaving behind, when he went to Québec, Secretary of State Cordell Hull and Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson and taking “in their stead” Secretary Morgenthau.
Mr. Dewey did not say what Mr. Morgenthau’s plan for Germany was, but a high Treasury official in Washington recently described it as a proposal to eliminate heavy industry from the Reich, leaving Germans a light industry and agricultural state. In addition to being completely disarmed and deprived of the power to make war, Germany would be required to give up the Saar area to France and submit to international control of the Ruhr industrial valley, according to this explanation of the Morgenthau Plan.
Fanatical resistance cited
The Republican candidate buttressed his argument that the Morgenthau Plan stiffened German resistance by quoting an article in Newsweek Magazine as saying “this necromancy ruins Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s campaign.”
He also quoted a United Press front dispatch as saying that:
The home front talk about stern treatment for a defeated Germany has inspired bitter and fanatical resistance among German troops, in this sector at least, and the G.I.’s are a little bitter about it.
Mr. Dewey will make one more speech before next Tuesday’s voting when he broadcasts over all the major networks from Albany Monday night. He will return to New York to cast his ballot Nov. 7.
Assurance from associates
Mr. Dewey entered the last phase of his campaign with the assurance of his political associates that he will win New York’s 47 and Pennsylvania’s 35 electoral votes. In both states, he has been told, the big city Roosevelt pluralities of past election years will be whittled, down to the point where Republican pluralities in rural and smaller city areas will be decisive.
Republicans also say they believe they will capture Massachusetts, Minnesota and enough border states to swell the electoral total from so-called “sure” Dewey states.
20 major addresses
Mr. Dewey brought his campaign to a New York finish after a coast-to-coast stumping tour on which he traveled 15,000 to 20,000 miles and made 20 major addresses and numerous brief ones.
Since his nomination last June, he has campaigned in every section of the country except the Deep South and has promised, if elected, to bring about “the greatest housecleaning in the history of Washington.”