Election 1944: Pre-convention news

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Soldier vote compromise believe due

Federal ballot subject to state controls thought likely

Washington – (Jan. 29)
The capital today considered it likely that the Senate and House will accept a compromise on the soldier-vote issue and pass a bill providing for a federal ballot subject to state controls.

Senator Scott Lucas (D-IL), co-author of the Lucas-Green Bill, said he had taken an informal poll of the Senate which showed that the administration has strength enough to pass a federal-ballot bill “without crippling amendments.”

Rep. Eugene Worley (D-TX), sponsor of a companion measure, said there were “encouraging signs” to force a record of how House members stand.

The force of President Roosevelt’s message to Congress terming a straight state ballot a “fraud” on the troops is reported to have increased the public pressure on the Senate and the House to approve the federal ballot, although it angered many Congressmen.

The advantage of time, however, lies on the side of the advocates of the state ballot, for unless the Congress completes action on a soldier-vote bill next week, the War and Navy Departments will have to begin the distribution to the Armed Forces of postcard applications for state ballots, according to the terms of the 1942 soldier-vote law.

Senate debates compromise

The Senate is in the midst of debate on a bill providing for a uniform federal ballot and guaranteeing the right of election officials in the states to determine the validity of the ballots returned to them.

The House is about to open debate on the Rankin-Eastland Bill which the Senate passed before it decided to reconsider the issue and commence debate on the compromise bill. The Rankin-Eastland legislation keeps the voting in the hands of the states and revokes the provision in the 1942 voting act which suspended the poll tax and registration requirements.

The rule adopted by the House Rules Committee forbids the House on the floor to amend the Rankin-Eastland Bill, but the Committee of the Whole House may offer any number of amendments before the bill goes before the House for a vote.

Wary of recorded votes

The effect of this legislative device is to free members of the House from having to make a record vote on the different amendments. No roll calls are taken in the Committee of the Whole House. This will make it easier for Representatives to vote to change the nature of the Rankin-Eastland Bill.

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Editorial: Where is the leadership?

Republicans are doing their cause a good deal of harm by their dog-in-the-manger attitude on the soldier-vote issue.

They are showing a woeful lack of leadership and statesmanship.

Some of them are chagrined over the dismal exhibition which has characterized the activities of too many Republican Congressmen, as well as some Democrats, over this issue.

The first smokescreen thrown up by some Southern Democrats and joined in by many Republicans was the “states’ rights” bugaboo.

Now they have thrown up the fourth term as another smokescreen.

The issue is whether or not the members of the Armed Forces are to have every possible opportunity to cast a ballot in the presidential election.

This issue cannot be beclouded by the fourth term issue – that is another controversy entirely.

Republicans, if they choose, are free to accuse President Roosevelt of thinking in terms of the election campaign when he put out his recent blast at the “fraud” soldier-vote bill now before Congress.

They are free to let loose with all their ammunition and resources in opposing a fourth term.

But these things cannot be permitted to interfere with the enactment of a sensible, simple plan for enabling the Armed Forces to have the opportunity to vote.

Republicans will be in far better position to fight the fourth term if they display some evidences of statesmanship and leadership on the soldier-vote issue.

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Editorial: Dear Mr. President

They say, Mr. President, that you and Congress are feuding.

They say, for example, that you requested a national service law not particularly because you thought it was needed now or believed Congress would pass it, but rather to get yourself on record in case further labor strife crops up – so you may put the blame on Congress if that happens and if no such law is enacted.

They say, too, that the belief by some Congressmen that this is the case has added to Congressional resentment and made the feud more bitter.

They say – inevitably no doubt, but perhaps without justification – that your words and deeds relating to domestic policies are dictated by fourth-term strategy, and that the national service law proposal is a sample of such maneuvering. That you prefer to tackle the labor problem by indirection, as a face-saving gesture, rather than by frontal attack. That this is the adroit, the expedient, way of washing your hands of a vexing and politically delicate problem.

They say, Mr. President, that this is typical of your administration – that you have your eyes focused so firmly upon the history books that your capacity to deal with actualities is muscle-bound.

They say that if such were not the case, you’d be more willing to delegate authority and to retain or dismiss members of your official family on the basis of performance rather than by the measuring rod of personal loyalty.

They say, too, that if your viewpoint were altered ever so slightly in that respect, you’d be less sensitive to criticism, less anxious to call people Tories and copperheads and dunces, more positive and effective in decisions. That, in short, your great natural endowments would be able to function freely to your nation’s benefit.

They say there’s no hope of any change, any improvement.

They say all that, and much more.

What do you say, Mr. President?

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The Pittsburgh Press (January 31, 1944)

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‘Removed’ or ‘resigned’ –
Court battle echo heard in Guffey’s case

Southern Democrats win as Senator leaves campaign job
By Lyle C. Wilson, United Press staff writer

Washington –
An angry echo of the battle over President Roosevelt’s 1937 Supreme Court reorganization bill sounded in the Senate today as Senator Joseph F. Guffey (D-PA) charged that he had been removed as chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

His statement was in contrast to an earlier announcement by Senate Democratic Leader Alben W. Barkley (D-KY) that the Pennsylvanian had “resigned” the committee chairmanship.

Talks fourth term

Mr. Guffey was a notable figure in the 1939-40 pre-convention campaign which assured a third term, nomination for Mr. Roosevelt. He was the earliest and has been the most insistent Senate advocate of a fourth term.

His “removal” from a position of only moderate prestige at most may be viewed by many persons as a conservative Democratic protest against an accomplished third term and a projected fourth.

But Congressional veterans explain there is little if any anti-fourth-term fuel in the Senate fire blazing around Mr. Guffey today.

Aim at associates

Southern Senators may not be noisily enthusiastic about Mr. Roosevelt’s renomination, but they will go along with it. They have proclaimed open season, however, on some of Mr. Roosevelt’s spokesmen and associates and they believe they have Mr. Guffey transfixed finally in their sights.

Mr. Guffey, a frequent White House spokesman, first offended some of his colleagues Aug. 20, 1937, in a radio address in which he said that Democrats who refused to support the court bill were “ingrates” who by implication, had no place in the Democratic Party.

In a session of stormy protest, Senator Joseph C. O’Mahoney (D-WY) and others who had opposed the court bill, denounced Mr. Guffey in the Senate and demanded that he be removed as chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

Named by Barkley

But Mr. Guffey had been named to that position by Mr. Barkley and the administration had sufficient

Mr. Bailey said looking straight at Mr. Guffey:

Pennsylvania has produced some lofty men. Ben Franklin, William Penn – and then it has produced some others – Thad Stevens, Boies Penrose, Mr. (William S.) Vare and the Junior Senator from Pennsylvania.

But Mr. Guffey held on and Mr. Barkley made no effort to remove him until last week when it was disclosed that in seeking a job in the District of Columbia government for a Russian-born friend, Dr. Eugene de Savitsch, Mr. Guffey had threatened the District commissioners with a Senate investigation unless his man was put on the payroll.

Mr. Byrd charged immediately that the Pennsylvanian was using the prestige of his office to make “reprehensible” patronage demands upon officials here. Saturday Mr. Byrd predicted that Mr. Guffey would be removed from his campaign chairmanship if he did not first resign.

Guffey’s status uncertain

The Senator’s status just now is somewhat uncertain. He told questioners that he would have no comment at present “on the action of Senator Barkley in removing me as chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.” Mr. Barkley said merely that Mr. Guffey “had resigned.”

In any event, it appears that Mr. Guffey is or soon will be an ex-chairman. Most prominently mentioned to succeed him is Mr. O’Mahoney.

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One-candidate plan offered by Browder

Cleveland, Ohio (UP) –
Earl Browder, general secretary of the Communist Party USA, called upon Democratic and Republican leaders last night to “explore the possibility” of a single 1944 presidential candidate.

Browder, in a speech commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Daily Worker, the party’s official organ, urged the “unprecedented measure to meet an unprecedented emergency.”

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Tammany chief mum on 4th term issue

New York (UP) –
Edward V. Loughlin, taking office today as the new leader of Tammany Hall, pledged “unswerving allegiance to our Commander-in-Chief,” but refused to say whether he would instruct the Tammany delegation to the Democratic National Convention to support a fourth term for President Roosevelt.

Mr. Loughlin said:

In times such as these, we are all Americans before we are partisans and accordingly owe unswerving allegiance to our Commander-in-Chief.

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Ickes’ former aide pleads ‘not guilty’

Washington (UP) –
George N. Briggs, suspended aide to Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes, pleaded not guilty today to indictments charging him with being the forger of the “Harry Hopkins” letter.

Briggs was arraigned before Chief Justice Edward E. Eicher in District Court and denied all charges, which include alleged use of the mails to defraud.

The court granted three weeks for filing of motions to change the pleas at the discretion of Briggs’ counsel.

The letter, purportedly written to Dr. Umphrey Lee, president of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, concerned the presidential nomination chance of Wendell Willkie. It was first made public by C. Nelson Sparks, former Mayor of Akron, Ohio, who referred to it in a book, One Man – Wendell Willkie.

If convicted on all counts, Briggs would face a maximum penalty of 53 years’ imprisonment and $8,000 fines.

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In Washington –
Soldier-vote state ballot veto is hinted

President concerned over measure, calls leaders to conference

Washington (UP) –
President Roosevelt, concerned over the fate of legislation to provide for federal soldier-vote ballots, conferred with Democratic Congressional leaders today as the Senate approached a showdown vote on the issue.

House Democratic Leader John W. McCormack (D-MA), one of those to see Mr. Roosevelt, said the President had expressed “considerable concern” lest soldiers not be given a chance to cast their ballots.

Asked if the President might veto a “state-ballot” bill if Congress passes such as administration-opposed plan, Mr. McCormack said only: “What do you think?”

Senate approval predicted

Senator Scott W. Lucas (D-IL), co-author of the Lucas-Green federal ballot bill, stood by his prediction that the measure would receive Senate approval, but conceded the showdown might be delayed by promised Republican amendments.

The federal bill was intended as a substitute for the state vote measure which the Senate passed on to the House in December.

Senator Lucas again accused his Republican opponents of injecting their fourth-term fears into the dispute after Senator Styles Bridges (R-NH) proposed an amendment under which the federal ballot would carry the full names of presidential and vice-presidential nominees, instead of mere blank write-in spaces. This would mean the ballots could not be shipped to overseas servicemen until after the Democratic nomination convention to be held sometime in July. The Republicans will name their candidate in June.

Bridges answers Roosevelt

Senator Bridges said the Democrats could make sure the ballots reached servicemen in ample time if they would agree to hold their convention in June. Replying to President Roosevelt’s charge that the opposition was blocking the passage of an adequate soldier-vote bill, Senator Bridges said:

If the President thinks we are stalling, this is one way he can prove that he isn’t.

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Interesting…

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The Pittsburgh Press (February 1, 1944)

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Willkie to tour West

New York –
Wendell L. Willkie will leave Friday for a speech-making tour through Oregon, Washington, Montana, Utah, Idaho, Minnesota and Iowa. He will speak chiefly for the Fourth War Loan Drive, but it was understood he would also make several political speeches.

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Taylor: Great interest roused abroad in U.S. election

Britons try hard to keep hands off in contest for Presidency
By Henry J. Taylor, Scripps-Howard staff writer

New York –
British leaders I saw in London, leaders in the neutral countries, French leaders in Algiers and the leftovers of the Italian regime in Italy all now show great interest in America’s forthcoming presidential election. To a man they are in an Information Please frame of mind. They lose no time in asking a traveling journalist many political questions.

It goes without saying that the British leaders hope Mr. Roosevelt is reelected. Nothing could be more neutral. Our President is a great future in England. Britons of all ranks are literally proud of him for what they regard as great wisdom and courage in his policy toward England in her darkest hours.

Most British leaders told me that until recently they took Mr. Roosevelt’s reelection for granted. American policy overseas features the President’s omnipotence. This is done in a widespread attempt to impress all foreigners with the finality and long-term effectiveness of whatever President Roosevelt says or does.

Congress-minded

But the British remain very Congress-minded. They learned a sharp lesson in the days of Woodrow Wilson. When Mr. Roosevelt’s party lost ground heavily in both the House and Senate, the British leaders began to sit up and take notice. And as the results of those last elections began to sink in, the British policymakers have, in the words of one of Temple Court’s most famous barristers, “started to reexamine the American political case.”

The British realize fully, and state openly, that it would be fatal for Britain to become in any way involved in America’s domestic politics, or even for Mr. Churchill to reveal a preference for any candidate.

‘Case of measles’

He told me:

I think the more of us who stay away from the United States until after the elections, the better.

Actually, this leader called our elections “America’s case of measles.”

I could find no leader in the British government who did not assume that Mr. Roosevelt would run again. This seems a settled matter as far as their information was concerned. Following our polls as they do, most of them seemed to believe Governor Thomas E. Dewey would be the Republican nominee and there was intense interest in London in him. Nearly every British government officer, industrial leader, union official or banker I met asked me something or other about Governor Dewey.

Others showed an interest in Governor John W. Bricker of Ohio. As for Wendell Willkie as a prospective successor to Mr. Roosevelt, the British have had an opportunity to see and meet Mr. Willkie on their own home ground and to reach much he has written – for his One World is now published in England – and therefore their curiosity is naturally not so evident.

Hand in hand with this current “reexamining of the American political case,” the betting odds at Lloyds on Mr. Roosevelt’s reelection have dropped to even money.

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Duff refusal puts a crimp in GOP plans

High command searches for likely man to oppose Davis

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania – (special)
The Republican high command was in a dither today as State Attorney General James H. Duff of Carnegie declined to become a candidate for the U.S. Senate.

Mr. Duff had a showdown meeting with Republicans in Philadelphia yesterday. Although they insisted that he throw his hat into the ring for the seat now held by Senator James J. Davis, the Attorney General said he would not seek the office.

A few hours later, Mr. Duff returned to Harrisburg and issued this brief statement:

To end any conjecture there may be respecting my attitude on the United States Senatorship: I am not and will not be a candidate.

Party leaders had been banking on Mr. Duff’s entrance into the Senate race at the April 25 primaries. They were so sure they could convince him to become a candidate that they shunned all other possible candidates – until last night.

Now, the time is running short – Saturday is the first legal day to circulate nominating petitions – and a suitable candidate must be found.

Shortly after Mr. Duff gave his final answer to former U.S. Senator Joseph R. Grundy and Joseph N. Pew Jr., organization leaders, Governor Martin and George I. Bloom, his secretary, left for Philadelphia to join the parleys.

Loaded for Guffey

On the surface, Mr. Duff’s withdrawal would appear to be a gain for Lieutenant Governor John C. Bell Jr. of Philadelphia, who would like to be the organization candidate in opposition to Senator Davis.

However, many of the state leaders feel that the candidate should come from Western Pennsylvania. This stems from their desire to run Col. Jay Cooke, former Philadelphia Republican leader, against U.S. Senator Joseph F. Guffey in 1946.

Col. Cooke is now overseas with the Armed Forces. He was defeated by Mr. Guffey in 1940.

In this connection, it was learned that some leaders have injected Secretary of Internal Affairs William S. Livengood Jr. of Somerset into the picture.

Four years to go

Mr. Livengood, who has been eyeing the governorship race two years hence would prefer to stay in his present post which pays $10,000 a year, the same as a Senator receives.

He started his present four-year term last spring.

It was reported here that Mr. Livengood had already declined to become a candidate for the Senate but had not closed the door to the idea if organization leaders insisted that he make the race in the interests of the Republican Party.

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In Washington –
GOP is hit by fact that soldier vote embarrasses ‘em

Taft and Brewster blame administrations for delay
By John L. Cutter, United Press staff writer

Washington –
Senators Robert A. Taft (R-OH) and Owen Brewster (R-ME) today blamed the administration for the delay in passage of soldier vote legislation.

They accused proponents of the compromise Green-Lucas Bill of prolonging debate by seeking passage of a substitute for legislation already approved by the Senate. The charge was voiced in reply to a plea by Senate Democratic Leader Alben W. Barkley (D-KY) that the Senate complete action today or tomorrow on the substitute – the Green-Lucas measure.

Pointing out that the Senate has debated the new bill more than a week, Senator Barkley protested that:

If it takes these soldiers and sailors as long to win… as it takes the Senate to provide them with a vote, the war will last until the presidential election of 1972.

Senator Taft charged that “all the delay is caused by the insistence of the administration that the Senate reverse its action of Dec. 3.” The Senate on that date passed a bill which recommended that the various states amend their absentee voting laws if necessary to facilitate soldier voting by state ballot.

Senator Brewster recalled that after President Roosevelt demanded speed, House Republican Leader Joseph W. Martin Jr. (R-MA) requested unanimous consent to take up the pending soldier-vote bill immediately, but Speaker Sam Rayburn refused to recognize him for such a purpose.

Democratic maneuver may force record vote on issue

By Thomas L. Stokes, Scripps-Howard staff writer

Washington –
House Republican leaders acknowledged today, by calling a party conference, that their membership had been maneuvered into an embarrassing position on the soldier-vote bill.

On the eve of consideration of the issue, they called the conference to try to ease the fears of some members that support of the Rankin “states’-rights” bill, which President Roosevelt has called a “fraud,” might endanger them politically.

They are also worried about the refusal of the House Rules Committee, dominated by a coalition of Republicans and Southern Democrats, to provide for a separate record vote on the federal-ballot bill of Rep. Worley (D-TX) backed by the President.

On today’s schedule

Mr. Roosevelt’s demanded that members “stand up and be counted” on this measure so their constituents could know how they voted.

Republicans must face this issue squarely when the House takes up the Rankin bill, scheduled for today.

For a group of Democrats, led by Rep. Anderson (D-NM), have worked a maneuver of their own to force the Republicans into the open. They have pledged more than enough members to require a record vote at the outset on their question whether there should be a record vote on the Worley bill, which will be offered as a substitute.

This motion may fail, but at least there will be a yea-and-nay vote on the question of secret voting, and administration leaders will interpret votes against a record vote as against the Worley bill. They will have this available for the fall campaign.

Republicans have become uneasy over their alliance with Southern Democrats behind the Rankin bill, which would leave voting to the diverse state laws, and which Secretaries Stimson and Knox have said could not be administered effectively.

Since President Roosevelt in his message tried to make support of the federal-ballot bill a party measure, there has been a softening in Southern Democratic ranks. Republicans were perturbed today by reports that some Southern Democrats might desert them in the question of keeping the vote secret, although most Southern Democrats will still back the Rankin bill.

White supremacy issue

Likewise, Republicans have been embarrassed by the motives behind Southern support of the “states’-rights” bill. Southerners are being accused of wanting to maintain state restrictions – poll-tax requirements, etc. – so that Negro soldiers cannot vote, and this does not fit well with Republican hopes to win back the Negro vote in Northern cities.

Senator Eastland (D-MA), co-sponsor with Rep. Rankin (D-MS) of the “states’-rights” bill, blurted this into the open in the Senate yesterday. He said Southern soldiers did not want the Green-Lucas bill – the Senate counterpart of the Worley federal-ballot bill – because it would threaten state control of election machinery.

He said:

They are fighting to maintain white supremacy and state control of election machinery.

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Guffey promises statement after soldier vote passes

By Robert Taylor, Press Washington correspondent

Washington –
U.S. Senator Joseph F. Guffey (D-PA), unceremoniously dropped as chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, will have more to say about that later – but not until the Senate has disposed of the soldier-vote bill.

Meanwhile, prominent Democratic leaders are predicting that Senator Joseph C. O’Mahoney (D-WY) will have been appointed to succeed him.

Mr. O’Mahoney said today that he was “definitely not a candidate,” but few believed he would turn down the offer if it came through a unanimous vote of the Democratic steering committee.

Fourth term is issue

The Wyoming Senator has not yet committed himself on the fourth-term question, and it is pointed out by some that he has not been extremely close to the administration since the Supreme Court revision fight in 1937.

Should he become chairman of the campaign committee, he would be placed in the position of fighting for President Roosevelt’s reelection should the President decide to run again.

Mr. Guffey said today he doesn’t want to jeopardize action on the soldier-vote measure by continuing, just now, either of two current arguments revolving around his activities.

But after the soldier-vote bill has passed the Senate, he said:

I intend to issue a full and complete statement concerning these matters, about which there has been so much confusion and misinformation.

The matters he will answer are as follows:

  • Majority Leader Alben W. Barkley’s action in removing Mr. Guffey as campaign chairman for the Senate Democrats.

  • Senator Harry F. Byrd’s assertion that Mr. Guffey’s action in trying to force District of Columbia officials to give an appointment to his personal physician was a “contemptible act.”

Mr. Guffey was apparently nettled by the outcome of his feud with the Southern wing of the Senate Democrats which brought demands from Senator Byrd for his replacement as campaign chairman, even though he had planned to relinquish the job long ago.

Mr. Byrd and other Southerners began demanding Mr. Guffey’s scalp after the Pennsylvania Senator charged the federal soldier-vote bill was killed by amendment by an “unholy alliance” of Southern Democrats and Northern Republicans.

At the time, Mr. Guffey let it be known that he had been trying to get rid of the job to which he was twice appointed, and expected to be replaced because one of Pennsylvania’s Senate seats is involved in this year’s election.

It was also reported at the time that Mr. Guffey had handed his resignation to Senator Barkley about Dec. 1. Several weeks ago, there were indications that administration forces, in a move to appease Southern Democrats, would dump Mr. Guffey. Mr. Barkley, who appoints the campaign chairman, wouldn’t comment.

A new rule is found

When he announced the forthcoming change, however, Mr. Barkley said Mr. Guffey had resigned, and promised a further statement in a few days. Mr. Guffey promptly said he had been removed, and said he would make his statement later.

In the delicate maneuvering to avoid hurting anybody’s feelings, a brand-new Senate precedent was discovered – that a campaign chairman can’t serve when an election is underway in his own state. Previously, the practice was to replace the campaign chairman only when his own seat was up for election, some Senators contended, and that was why Mr. Guffey stepped out of the post in 1940 when he was reelected.

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Editorial: The party line

Earl Browder, America’s No. 1 Communist, is urging the Republican and Democratic parties to “explore the possibility” of a single presidential candidate in 1944.

Mr. Browder says thus “unprecedented measure” should be taken to “meet an unprecedented emergency.”

Being unlike any other, this war, of course, is posing unprecedented problems for Americans which they are meeting with unprecedented measures.

But even these unprecedented measures must lie within the basic framework of democracy or we should be guilty of scuttling the very thing we fight to preserve.

There is never – and can never be – such an unprecedented emergency that the people of a democracy must yield the fundamental right to choose their representative and, above all, their chief representative – the President.

Whether Mr. Roosevelt is to receive a fourth term, or whether some Republican or some other Democrat is to be entrusted with the Presidency, is for the people to decide.

An election campaign which would present but one candidate to the people would be a denial of the democratic concept of freedom of choice.

It would, in fact, constitute a scrapping of democracy for the “one-party line” of the Communists.

Editorial: An insult to whom?

Senator Taft calls President Roosevelt’s soldier-vote message an “insult to Congress.”

Maybe so. But what would you call Congress’ mismanagement of this issue?

It will be an insult, and more, to the Armed Forces if they are deprived in the least degree of an opportunity to vote.

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Background of news –
New Dealers woo Farley

By George Van Slyke, North American Newspaper Alliance

New York –
President Roosevelt’s bid for a truce with the conservative branch of the Democratic Party marks a complete reversal of the politics of his two preceding national campaigns and is accepted today by leaders in both the New Deal and right-wing camps as confession of concern over the fourth-term candidacy.

If the White House were not alarmed over the deep split in the party ranks, it is regarded as certain that the national committee dominated completely by the President would not have about-faced in its sessions Jan. 22 in Washington and made its amazing appeal to James A. Farley to forget the past and come back home.

For the first time since the long battle was waged through the President’s second term to purge the Supreme Court and old-line Democratic Senators and Congressmen has Mr. Roosevelt made such a move for harmony.

Party unity deemed essential

Second only in political importance to the formal launching of the fourth-term campaign six months in advance of the original White House schedule, the overture to Mr. Farley as head and front of the anti-fourth-term candidacy is the most significant move so far made by the New Dealers.

Following Mr. Farley’s battle against the third term in the 1940 convention, he fell into disfavor with the President and New Deal politicians and was dropped without ceremony or apology.

It has been an open secret for the last year that Mr. Farley was the driving power behind the anti-New Deal campaign against a fourth term. Now that the campaign is actually underway, the fourth-term managers have recognized that Mr. Roosevelt must have a unanimous party behind him in the 1944 election if he is to overcome the losses he had sustained on the home front in the last four years.

This is the first definite move initiated by New Dealers in more than six years to bridge the old party split, most serious in the Democratic ranks since the Prohibition fight in the 1928 campaign with Al Smith as the nominee.

Post-election brushoff expected

Judging from all surface indications, the old party chiefs with the exception of the Hague-Flynn-Kelly combination are distinctly cool to the New Deal overture. Evidently, they regard it as a mere gesture which would hold through the campaign this year by […] Mr. Roosevelt’s candidacy and the New Deal bosses and then collapse and […] further assurance on that subject.

Mr. Farley has made no comment on the action of the Democrats in lauding him to the skies as their greatest leader. It has not been possible to reach him for comment which in itself is unusual as he is as a rule approachable on any political subject.

He is leaving in a few days for a six weeks’ business trip across the country and his office has stated it was to be strictly a business tour. However, it will not be surprising if the Democrats flock around to see him in every state he enters.

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pegler

Pegler: Dewey campaign

By Westbrook Pegler

Albany, New York –
Quite a lot of trained observers, as reporters are sometimes called, will be dropping into Albany between now and June to take looks at Tom Dewey in the role of governor because it looks as though he will be the Republican nominee against his predecessor in the little office on the second floor of the great monstrous heap of a building called the State Capitol of New York. In some ways the situation resembles that of 1932 when Mr. Roosevelt was beginning to get hot and so many of us thought that if we could just have legalized light wine and beer most of our troubles would be solved. Governor Dewey hasn’t said he wants the nomination but neither has he said he will not accept it and you can sure he will because he will have to. How could he refuse?

Suppose then that in the election he wins and Mr. Roosevelt and Mrs. Roosevelt pack up and move back to New York or Hyde Park and the New Deal crowds go swarming out of town in a great exodus. That is not an easy supposition because even Mr. Dewey’s best friends won’t claim that against the Roosevelt organization and the soldier vote which would go to the C-in-C. Mr. Dewey has an even chance.

Something of a job

However, it might happen and in that case, a hard-working, conscientious ambitious young fellow of 42 would be pitched into a career of terrible responsibility, work, worry and heartache.

He would have to take over the presidency of an enormous nation in this awful war and replace thousands of New Deal people with his own, keep the war running to victory, get acquainted with Churchill, or Eden and Stalin, clean up the labor mess, stand off inflation, and finally, make a beginning at least in the appalling problem of bringing the fighters home from Europe, if not from Asia, India and the South Pacific, and easing them back into jobs, not on public payrolls but in private industry in such a way as to stand off commotions.

It is not a job that any honest man would court out of vanity or an ambition to be historic or for any other motive but a deep desire to serve his country and his people.

A gleaming, black eye

Mr. Dewey is campaigning, if you care to say so, by keeping right on top of his job as governor and turning in a remarkably fine performance, getting along well with politicians and others, running a good state and just doing his work. He always ran a good office as District Attorney in New York where he and his staff were an enthusiastic team very little bothered by jealously or friction and the only had press he received was traceable to personal dislike of him because he has a way of putting the eye on you with those gleaming back orbs which seem almost to pop when he gets enthusiastic or mad, or because he was inclined to be cocky as, indeed, he was, being a young fellow and very smart and full of success.

He is less cocky now and thoroughly mature and he offers remarks that government is a profession requiring experience and great, constant application, which hasn’t meant to me he was trying to improve himself in the art of government for the purpose of returning to private law practice. Young fellows who come in from the country and make good spectacularly in New York are inclined to throw weight about but if that was one of Mr. Dewey’s faults when he was throwing the New York racketeers and some of the toughest of the lowdown politicians into Sing Sing, he is grown up now.

It’s different now

I believe he would have been mangled if he, instead of Willkie, had been nominated in 1940 not only because he was still a little green but because the people would have shied away from the idea of a 40-year-old President, with the war turning up our street.

But at 42, Mr. Dewey has served a trick as governor of a state of tremendous interests and problems and all with a sure, confident hand and no faltering and has shown a disposition and the ability to reduce taxes and prevent squandering and to treat the people as citizens, not wards of the state or subjects of a ruler.

That soldier vote will be a great handicap, though. They don’t know him, they live from day to day in misery and doubt and it is natural to suppose that they will vote for the commander-in-chief, even for a fourth term, provided by November the war still goes as well as it does.

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The Pittsburgh Press (February 2, 1944)

americavotes1944

Verbal battle rages –
State curbs barred from soldier vote

Southerner’s amendments killed; Senator assails Roosevelt
By John L. Cutter, United Press staff writer

Washington –
President Roosevelt’s plea to Congress for enactment of soldier-vote legislation embodying a federal ballot was attacked anew in both House and Senate today, but the Upper Chamber beat down a series of amendments designed to make state voting laws paramount in determining validity of service ballots.

Rep. John E. Rankin (D-MS) brought many members of the House to their feet with an impassioned 45-minute speech defending the so-called “states’-rights” soldier vote bill, passed by the Senate and pending in the House. He attacked the new Lucas-Green federal-ballot bill pending in the Senate as a communist-propagandized and unconstitutional measure.

‘Whipping boy’

In the Upper Chamber, Senator John A. Danaher (R-CT) accused Mr. Roosevelt of making Congress a “whipping boy” in attempting to push legislation through to enactment and in what Senator Danaher viewed as the President’s current attempt to persuade voters to elect the kind of Congress he wants.

Senator Danaher declared:

The President has played labor against the Congress, the Executive against the Congress, and now the servicemen against the Congress.

Always it’s the Congress he makes the whipping boy as he says to the American people. “You give me the kind of Congress I want and things will be different.”

‘People waking up’

But the American people are waking up to what’s going on and we Republicans have been picking up a few seats here and there in recent elections.

Rep. Rankin, applauded in the House, charged that the true author of the Lucas-Green-Worley measure was:

…one Herbert Wechsler down in the Justice Department who was a member of the National Lawyers Guild, legal arm of the Communist Party.

The first amendment defeated by the Senate would have provided that the validity of service ballots should be determined “in accordance with state law.” It was rejected 23–60.

It was the first vote on the bill since the Senate began debating it 10 days ago. Introduced by Senator John H. Overton (D-LA), the amendment was one of a series designed to guarantee state control over voting by armed service personnel.

It would have revised the section dealing with the validity of ballots. As written, this section proves that the proposed Federal War Ballot Commission will have no power to pass on the validity of ballot but that this determination shall “be made by the duly constituted election officials of the appropriate districts, precincts, counties, or other voting units of the several states.” The Overton amendment would have required that the validity determination be made “in accordance with state law” by the state voting units.

Second amendment

The Senate also rejected, by voice vote, a second Overton amendment which would have written into the law the stipulation that “qualifications of the voters shall be determined by state law.”

Mr. Overton’s third and last amendment was defeated 16–69. He said it was “aimed at tearing the heart out of sections one and two of the 1942 law.” Sections one and two of the 1942 Soldier Voting Act waived poll tax and registration requirements, notwithstanding any state laws, for soldier and sailor absentee voting for President and members of Congress.

The Senate adopted unanimously without debate an amendment by Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg (R-MI), instructing the Army and Navy to give state ballots the same transmission priorities accorded federal ballots as far as practicable without injury to the war effort.

Doubt as to effect

The Army and Navy said it would be difficult to handle state ballots, so there was doubt as to how much practical effect this amendment would have.

Meanwhile, the House continued to debate the soldier-vote issue in connection with a previous Senate-approved bill calling on the states to facilitate absentee balloting by service personnel. Final House action on the issue appeared unlikely before Thursday or perhaps Friday.

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americavotes1944

Bell believed set to oppose Senator Davis

Duff’s withdrawal leaves no other candidate for Grundy, Pew
By Kermit McFarland

Lieutenant Governor John C. Bell of Wynnewood, Montgomery County, is the leading probable as the anti-Davis candidate for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate.

Mr. Bell, a potential candidate all along, becomes the principal prospect as a result of the positive refusal of Attorney General James H. Duff to enter the race.

If he runs, Mr. Bell will be supported by Governor Martin, his chief political backer, former U.S. Senator Joseph R. Grundy, and Joseph N. Pew, wealthy Philadelphia oil man.

Mr. Bell is a Pew protégé and Mr. Grundy, up to now, has been averse to running him against U.S. Senator James J. Davis, who will seek renomination in the April primary.

No other candidate

But the refusal of Mr. Duff to run leaves the Grundy-Pew axis virtually without any other candidate.

Chief factors pointing to Mr. Bell’s selection are these:

  • He is the most available candidate.

  • He has the strong backing of Mr. Pew.

  • While he is not held in high favor by the Governor and Mr. Grundy, Mr. Grundy is so set on trying to beat Senator Davis he is likely to take any “reasonable” candidate.

Mr. Grundy was once a member of the U.S. Senate, by appointment of the late Governor John S. Fisher. But in his first campaign, Senator Davis beat him – and badly – for the Republican nomination.

Failure in past

Efforts of the Pew-Grundy combine to beat Mr. Davis six years ago ended in a similarly dismal result.

Mr. Bell is 51, a lawyer, finance chairman of the Republican campaign in 1938, Secretary of Banking in the James administration and Lieutenant Governor since January 1943. He belongs to the Old Guard faction of the party and is bitterly anti-New Deal, a qualification which rates first with Mr. Grundy and Mr. Pew.

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americavotes1944

Willkie, Dewey, Stassen in Wisconsin primary

Madison, Wisconsin (UP) –
A slate of Republican convention delegates pledged to former Governor Harold E. Stassen of Minnesota will be entered in the Wisconsin presidential preferential primary April 4, Dr. F. L. Gullickson, former GOP state chairman, announced today.

Governor Thomas E. Dewey of New York and Wendell L. Willkie will also be represented by slates of delegates in the primary election.