The Pittsburgh Press (September 17, 1944)
Taylor: FDR and Philadelphia
By Robert Taylor, Press Washington correspondent
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania –
Republican state campaign planners view Philadelphia as the No. 1 battleground of the Dewey-Roosevelt campaign and a good part of their effort will be devoted to cutting down the Roosevelt majority of the last two campaigns.
Unlike Allegheny County, which gives Democrats local offices and votes Democratic in state elections, Philadelphia is Republican territory. The New Deal sweep never engulfed its city administration or its principal county offices. Philadelphia votes Republican, although by small margins, in state elections.
Of five million potential voters in Pennsylvania, about one million are in Philadelphia and any success in stemming the Roosevelt vote here will enhance the chances of the small but numerous up-state counties of producing enough Republican votes to put the slate in the Dewey column.
The city has a checkered political record. It missed the New Deal bandwagon when it started out in 1932 by giving Herbert Hoover 70,816 majority out of nearly 600,000 votes, while Allegheny County was giving Mr. Roosevelt a majority of 37,500.
City stays Republican otherwise
Philadelphia made up for it later, however, by giving Mr. Roosevelt a majority of 209,876 in 1936, when he carried the state by 663,483, and producing 177,271 votes of the 1940 Roosevelt majority in the state of 281,187.
Meanwhile, the city remained safely Republican for local offices and gave small majorities to Republican candidates for Governor in 1934 and 1938, Two years ago, it split its vote for Governor: 317,962 for Governor Martin and 317,805 for F. Clair Ross – a majority of 157 for Mr. Martin.
Philadelphia’s powerful Republican organization – fed on City Hall patronage, political favors and ample campaign funds – is still intact and unregenerate, despite its inability to stem the New Deal tide in presidential years. Even in depression years, the city administration never sponsored any WPA projects, and remained bitterly anti-New Deal.
The organization’s job will be to counteract, if possible, the demonstrated appeal of the President for the city’s huge total of industrial workers, who are willing enough to go along with the organization in off years, but swing to FDR when his name appears on the ballot.
Pew still putting up money
Against this effort will be a determined campaign by the CIO Political Action Committee to marshal its members and their one-dollar contributions to put the state’s largest city, and fattest vote source, once again in the bag for the President.
The PAC campaign is a new wrinkle for the old organization to cope with, but Republicans are confident of putting as many workers into the battle for votes as the PAC and the Democratic organization combined – and of having as much cash as both of them.
The GOP’s open-handed Joseph N. Pew Jr., oil company executive who lives in suburban Montgomery County, has contributed heavily to past campaigns and, in the last financial reports, the Republican City Committee was heavily in debt to him.
Philadelphia’s vote will be crucial in this campaign, and may decide whether pivotal Pennsylvania swings for Mr. Dewey or Mr. Roosevelt. Political campaigns here, by custom, are organization fights, and this year’s fight promises to be a stiff one.