The Pittsburgh Press (October 13, 1944)
Bricker urges world bases to protect U.S. interests
GOP candidate ends Oregon tour, begins in California tomorrow
Aboard Bricker campaign train (UP) –
Ohio Governor John W. Bricker wound up his campaign for Oregon’s six electoral votes today after coming out for U.S. maintenance of bases to protect American interests “around the world if necessary.”
The Republican vice-presidential nominee made only three rear-platform talks on the eve of his entrance into California, whose 25 electoral votes have remained a political prize since they topped the scales in favor of Woodrow Wilson in 1916.
Governor Bricker chatted with railroad station gatherings at Roseburg, Grants Pass and Medford during his final day in Oregon. He will meet California Governor Earl Warren at Sacramento tomorrow, speak at luncheon there, and appear at Richmond, Berkeley and Oakland before making a major address at San Francisco tomorrow night.
Clarifies stand on bases
Mr. Bricker’s endorsement of protective bases was made last night at Eugene, Oregon, when he told a press conference the United States “should maintain bases within our sphere of responsibility.”
In response to questions, he explained he meant “sphere of responsibility to trade and security.”
“We should maintain bases wherever our interests lie,” he said, adding that he did not necessarily mean military bases in every ocean and on every continent, but “bases from which we could protect our spheres everywhere.”
“And there’s no imperialistic design in that either,” he said.
Oregon students parade
Governor Bricker’s final formal speech in Oregon was delivered at the University of Oregon, where hundreds of students greeted him with a torchlight parade. He charged that bureaucrats were “stuffed to the suffocation point” through the nation and demanded that the bureaucratic system “patchwork” be “taken apart and streamlined government substituted.”