Election 1944: Pre-convention news

[NormanStewart]

Labor headed for wide split in 1944 election

By Fred W. Perkins, Pittsburgh Press staff writer

Washington –
Feelers of the national political pulse are beginning to note symptoms of an extension into the 1944 presidential campaign of the AFL-CIO split in organized labor.

The CIO is steadily becoming more identified with a fourth-term drive for President Roosevelt, while the AFL is repeating and expanding criticisms of the administration.

For instance, the AFL’s weekly news service today, following up an attack by John P. Frey, president of the federation’s Metal Trades Department, blamed wartime labor troubles on the lack of “a clear and consistent national labor policy.”

The blunt truth

It continued:

The public should understand that most disputes which lead to strikes these days do not involve quarrels between management and labor. The blunt truth is that the fight is between labor and the government’s policy, as it is contradictorily administered by federal agencies.

The article concluded:

We still think that strikes under any circumstances are indefensible in wartime. But when workers are driven to strike under such conditions, the blame should be put where it belongs – on the government.

The CIO has made no such inclusive charges, although it has joined with the AFL in an attempt to discredit the cost of living figures of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and to force an upward revision of the War Labor Board’s wage-freeze formula.

Now the MESA

Criticisms of the Roosevelt administration have also been made by spokesmen for large groups of organized workers not members of the AFL or CIO. These include the railway brotherhoods and John L. Lewis’ United Mine Workers.

A third group which asserts it isn’t being treated right is made up of independent unions built around the Mechanics Educational Society of America, now in a row with the War Labor Board over that body’s policy of confining labor representation in its membership to representatives of the AFL and the CIO.

These developments have produced the opinions in the minds of political observers that Mr. Roosevelt, if he is a nominee, cannot be sure of the great mass of labor support he has had in three campaigns; that if the labor-sponsored criticisms continue, the support for the two major candidates may be in approximate balance.

[NormanStewart]

The Pittsburgh Press (February 11, 1944)

Strike ban urged –
Bricker extends a friendly hand to Congressmen

Reversing Willkie’s tactics, Ohio Governor seeks to play legislators against a ‘weak’ executive
By Lyle C. Wilson, United Press staff writer

Washington –
Governor John W. Bricker’s Lincoln Day speech proposal for absolute prohibition of wartime strikes aroused top interest here today among the issues discussed by the Ohioan in his pre-convention campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.

But Governor Bricker’s bid for consideration in this political hotspot proved to be a combination of bitter denunciation of the Roosevelt administration and of significantly kind words for Congress. He pegged his appeal on domestic issues, but did propose that the United States “should take her place in a cooperative organization among sovereign nations after this war.”

Differs from Willkie

His tactics were in contrast with those of Wendell L. Willkie, the Ohio Governor’s most active opponent, who occasionally undertakes to shake Congress by the ears, losing more than a few friends thereby.

Governor Bricker challenged “weakness of the New Deal in handling labor relations” and said:

A law should be enacted by Congress laying down fundamental principles for the administration and adjudication of labor disputes and the prohibition of strikes in time of war.

He said it was too late now to consider a national service act as proposed by Mr. Roosevelt.

In a final major appearance here today, Governor Bricker told the National Press Club at a luncheon that he proposed that the term of the President be limited to one six-year term or two four-year terms. He preferred the latter, he said, but in any event believed that the tenure “must be restricted.”

Express Democratic help

Rep. Joseph W. Martin (R-MA), introducing Governor Bricker to the Mayflower Hotel audience, said it was the largest Republican gathering held here in a dozen years. He predicted victory in this year’s elections, but said it would not be Republican victory alone.

He said:

Victory will come because millions of honest, sincere, patriotic Jeffersonian Democrats will submerge part to the welfare of their country and because independent voters will unite with us.

He told last night’s audience that Mr. Roosevelt’s policies were leading the country to socialism, if not communism.

Proposes fiscal program

In his prepared text, he proposed a new fiscal program linked with early post-war balancing of the budget art a rate of spending approximating $15 billion a year. Here is Governor Bricker’s substitute for what he termed Mr. Roosevelt’s policy of “spend, waste, borrow and tax:”

• Simplify and stabilize the tax laws.
• Use the tax power to raise necessary revenue and not “as an undercover method of effecting social changes.”
• Limit federal taxation so that adequate revenue sources will remain to the states and local governments.
• Adhere to fiscal and tax policies which will stimulate private enterprise and venture capital.
• Reduce federal taxes as soon as possible after victory.

We’re all in the war

Charging that the Roosevelt administration has “bewildered and oppressed” the people, Governor Bricker said:

The New Deal is the American counterpart of the sweep of absolutism which has destroyed so much liberty around the world.

He sought to rebuke Mr. Roosevelt for personifying his administration as “Dr. Win-the-War.”

Mr. Bricker said:

Winning the war is not a partisan opportunity. It is an American responsibility.

Governor Bricker’s bid for Congressional friendship and support was direct and full of sympathy. He said:

The time has come to take the policymaking of government out of the hands of the arrogant bureaucrats and return it to the hands of the elected representatives of the people.

Willkie wants party to look forward

Seattle, Washington (UP) –
Wendell L. Willkie, 1940 Republican presidential candidate, accused the administration of “fighting a soft war” last night and said the people would willingly bear an increased tax burden if the government made an effort to halt the “reckless expenditure of their money.”

Mr. Willkie told a Lincoln Day audience of 2,500 persons:

After the war, we should reverse our taxation system in order to stimulate our economy and prove the largest possible national income.

If the Republican nominee is a forward-looking leader, the rank and file of the party will rally as a unit in his support.

Statement is explained

He confirmed a statement attributed to him at Baker, Oregon, earlier in the day in which he was quoted:

I’m going to be nominated for the Presidency on the Republican ticket.

He smilingly recounted the incident, saying about 300 persons gathered at his train when it stopped in Baker briefly.

He said:

I made a few remarks and among other things said, “I’m going to take you into my confidence – I’m going to be the Republican nominee for President.” You wouldn’t expect me to tell them I was not going to be the nominee, would you?

Program outlined

Mr. Willkie revealed that following an address in Tacoma today and an appearance in Portland, he would fly to Sacramento Sunday and have lunch with Governor and Mrs. Earl Warren and make a radio address there Sunday afternoon. Mr. Willkie has agreed not to enter the California primary, in favor of Warren.

Denying to reporters that the Republican Party is divided, Mr. Willkie said it was natural for the party out of power to have leaders with diverse ideas, and added that the election of 26 governors and additional members of both houses of Congress had given the party “new vigor.”

Sees Roosevelt handicap

In support of his charge that the Democratic Party is divided, he cited refusal of “a committee of Democrats” to support the Treasury Department’s tax program, which he said was itself “wholly inadequate,” and the fact that the states’-rights soldier vote bill was prepared “by members of the President’s own party in opposition to the administration-supported federal ballot bill.”

The Democratic Party is “decadent and falling apart” and President Roosevelt, if reelected, would be frustrated by the division in its ranks, he insisted.

He said:

I am going to break this power in Washington if I can, for if I don’t, everything I hold precious will disappear.

Wallace puzzled by Johnston plaint

Minneapolis, Minnesota (UP) –
Vice President Henry A. Wallace said today that he had not talked to President Roosevelt regarding his candidacy for Vice President in the November elections.

Mr. Wallace, who stopped in the Twin-Cities for several hours when his Seattle to Chicago plane was grounded by storms southeast of here, said:

But then I did not consult with him in 1940 either.

Mr. Wallace said that he had found “an unusual sentiment in the West for a fourth term for Roosevelt.”

When informed that Eric A. Johnston, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, was critical of his speech at Seattle last night. Mr. Wallace said he could not “see any reason for that.” Mr. Wallace had labeled certain business interests as fascist in tendency.

In Washington, Mr. Johnston said Mr. Wallace was sowing “seeds of disunity… on the event of an invasion which will bring our most crucial military test.”

Mr. Johnston said:

Name calling by the Vice President of the United States is the wrong way to get national unity in this hour of crisis…

American business despises fascism. If there is a threat of it in this country, it is not to be found in big business, but in big government.

[NormanStewart]

Stokes: Bricker roars at the New Deal in its den, and (obviously) it was planned that way

By Thomas L. Stokes, Scripps-Howard staff writer

Washington –
Governor John W. Bricker of Ohio, who has been browsing around the outlying precincts as a sort of Ferdinand-the-bull candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, came to the capital, to the lair of the New Deal, to change all that – and how!

He shook his big frame – and he’s a husky specimen – and began to roar in all directions – at the White House, where that man still resides, at the government buildings, where there are too many folks, as he sees it, busy about “bureaucracy,” and he even had a few suggestions for Congress.

‘Go get ‘em’

No longer was he the careful, cautious gentleman, a little timid about issues, spouting generalities.

The unveiling of the new Bricker was carefully arranged in advance, perhaps a shade too obviously, for it was a bit of a shock to see the once-amiable fellow come out talking so loud, somewhat as if he had been studiously instructed and shoved out before the footlights. You could almost hear the stage whisper:

Now get out there and tell ‘em!

He did.

Strikes at hot issues

He stepped right into the midst of the middle on Capitol Hill, which has got President Roosevelt down for the moment. He came out for state ballots in soldier voting, which President Roosevelt has called “a fraud.” He came out against subsidies, over which the Senate is wrestling, taking direct issue with the President.

He demanded that Congress pass a law to prohibit strikes in time of war and laying down “fundamental principles for the administration and adjudication of labor disputes.”

Jumping right into current controversies, while they are not, is somewhat unusual for candidates for presidential nominations, even for Wendell Willkie, who spoke up about taxes after Congress had already acted, and espoused a federal Ballot for soldier voting too late for any effect.

Strictly Republican!

Governor Bricker’s credo is strictly conservative, old-school Republican, entirely acceptable to the Old Guard element which is backing him, including Senator Robert A. Taft of Ohio. He abhors the New Deal, lock, stock and barrel, and makes no bonds about it. He disagrees, he said, with the whole philosophy of the New Deal. He did not temper his Lincoln Day speech here to concede anything to the Roosevelt dispensation.

The two-day Bricker show here was quite an event for the candidate and the entourage which came on from Ohio to celebrate his launching here in the deep waters of national affairs.

Advance agents arrived days ago to pass out photographs of the candidate and his wife and their schedule to newspapers, to arrange for the press conferences of the Governor and Mrs. Bricker and for the Lincoln Day dinner last night.

Taft stands by

Republican members of House and Senate, as well as a few Democrats, filed by to shake his hand in a reception in the capital. The candidate beamed on all comers, and his henchmen glowed.

Senator Taft stood to one side, smiling. He has a stake in all this. If the Governor doesn’t make the grade, then the Senator is presumed to inherit back the organization which he has turned over for the Governor’s candidacy to use for himself at the convention.

[NormanStewart]

Editorial: Bricker goes to Washington

Governor Bricker of Ohio went to Washington last night to make a campaign speech. His indictment of bureaucracy and of concentration of power in the President was effective.

He read the record: Relegating Congress to an inferior position, attempting to pack the Supreme Court, moving into fields of state and local administration, expanding authority of the White House at the expense of coordinate branches of government. This process, he said, operates on pap and patronage – particularly the deficit financing of spend-waste-borrow-tax. Unless checked, it can destroy the autonomy of state governments, the federal system, and free enterprise.

Apparently, the President himself is aware of the public reaction on this subject, or he would not be so anxious to bury the New Deal label, which now evokes more moans than cheers.

Governor Bricker, for his domestic policy would eliminate overlapping boards and bureaus. He favors “a sound constructive post-war tax policy,” including simplification of returns stabilization, taxation for revenue rather than for social changes, adequate revenue sources for the states, encouragement of venture capital and private enterprise, and reduction of federal taxes “as soon as possible after victory.”

His foreign policy was hardly mentioned. To say that “we want no super-government,” but membership in a cooperative organization among sovereign nations, is clear so far as it goes.

But to say “an international cooperative organization, whatever precise form it may take, can solve the problems which lead to war and fulfill the hopes of our people for a peaceful and better world” means little or nothing. If he has knowledge of foreign affairs or conviction on foreign policy, he is keeping it quiet. Maybe he will speak out as the campaign progresses.

[NormanStewart]

Editorial: A clean fight won’t hurt

Republican manipulators whose money and activity have out them in positions of party leadership have decided against risking a primary fight in a year when they think they have a chance to carry Pennsylvania.

Specifically, they have decided against opposing U.S. Senator James J. Davis, who will be a candidate for renomination in the April primary, although they have consistently been against Mr. Davis in former elections.

Credit for this development must go to Governor Edward Martin and, from the standpoint of party interest and discipline, it was a magnanimous and intelligent decision. Mr. Martin has now love for Senator Davis, whom he fought for the governorship nomination in 1942.

The other two manipulators, Joseph R. Grundy, who symbolizes and directs the bulk of the so-called Old Guard faction of the party, and Joseph N. Pew of Philadelphia, who has contributed a disproportionate share of campaign expenses in recent years, also sacrificed some pride on coming to this conclusion – because they likewise haven’t had much time for Mr. Davis.

But the whole maneuver, despite the mutual buttering-up, was founded on expediency. It didn’t stem from any respect for Senator Davis’ statesmanship, but from fears that a vigorous primary battle might so cleave the party as to imperil success in the November election.

This type of thinking, which also characterizes the leadership in the Democratic Party, probably takes its roots from the 1938 primary when the Democrats, riding high up to that time, split in a bitter campaign and subsequently were decisively beaten in the November election.

But it wasn’t the mere fact that the Democrats disagreed over candidates in the primary which led to their downfall in Pennsylvania. Not even the vindictive mudslinging in which they engaged could be held solely accountable.

The Democrats were beaten in 1938 because they tried to scuttle the grand jury system. They were beaten because they abused and wasted the WPA. They were beaten because they became unreasonable and arrogant.

They would have been beaten, under these circumstances, even if their preceding primary had been a model of harmony and unity.

They beat themselves, but not because they indulged in a primary contest. That’s what primaries are for.

There is just as much reason for a party to get licked if it doesn’t put up its best candidates. And when the so-called party bosses grease the machinery so that all opposition is skidded out the door, the best candidates are seldom nominated.

A primary contest is a healthy thing. No party can long maintain virility without differences of opinion. And the place to settle those differences is in a free and open primary, not among a few self-constructed leaders in a backroom.

The primary need not degenerate into a mudslinging contest. Issues can be debated, constructively and informatively, as well as in a general election campaign.

The candidates who are nominated by the Republican Party in Pennsylvania – and the Democratic Party, too – should be nominated by the registered voters in that party, not by two or three scrapping leaders who get together and make a deal.

[NormanStewart]

Prohibition leader’s brother on probation

Los Angeles, California (UP) –
C. Arthur Watson, 48, brother of Claude Watson, Prohibition Party candidate for President, began two years of probation today following its conviction on charges of intoxication and drunken driving.

Watson, who said he was sorry to have caused any embarrassment to his brother, admitted in court that he had taken three alcoholic drinks early in the evening of Nov. 21, and said he had been taking codeine tablets for dental ailments. He said he did not know what effect the combination would produce.

[NormanStewart]

The Pittsburgh Press (February 12, 1944)

Bricker’s plea for strike ban meets apathy

Congressmen think time unripe for action at present
By Fred W. Perkins, Pittsburgh Press staff writer

Washington –
Prohibition of strikes in time of war, as recommended here by Governor John W. Bricker of Ohio, has not changed that majority Congressional disposition to move slowly on this subject, according to opinion samplings today.

Even some of the Ohio Republican Congressmen expressed privately a regret that the Governor had unveiled this dynamic issue at this time. Another Republican from the Midwest, who has been active in efforts at union-regulatory legislation, took the same stand, but said he thought Governor Bricker had expressed a demand that exists among a substantial number of plain citizens and men in the Armed Forces.

Reasons for apathy

Reasons for the Congressional apathy on the subject are two: No serious strikes are going on now; the House would probably pass such legislation, but the Senate would probably let it die.

A bill to prohibit all wartime strikes is in the House, but until the situation changes it will be “just another bill.” The bill introduced by Rep. Howard W. Smith (D-VA) provides penalties of revocation of rights under the National Labor Relations Act and other labor-protective statutes for any union whose members strike in wartime, whether or not the disturbance is “wildcat” or authorized by the union’s officers.

Political factor

The subject is linked up with the presidential campaign. Republicans see a chance to divide the administration’s labor support this year. Among the leading Republican possibilities, Governor Dewey has made no labor pronouncement, nor has Mr. Willkie.

On the Democratic side, the labor-politico picture may be affected by two oncoming developments:

• The Department of Justice will find it necessary to make a statement eventually on its investigation of charges that the War Labor Disputes Act has been violated by a collection of a $700,000 political campaign fund under direction of CIO president Philip Murray.

• Congressman Dies (D-TX) says he will tell the House within two weeks what his investigating committee has turned up regarding alleged cultivation of un-American subversive elements by the CIO’s “Political Action Committee.”

Miners’ protest

Criticism of the administration from the American Federation od Labor and the non-affiliated unions has increased. Among the latter is the United Mine Workers, headed by John L. Lewis, who supported Mr. Willkie in 1940, but might find it hard to do so in 1944. This union’s magazine says in the current issue:

There are any number of honest American labor leaders willing and anxious to vote the Republican ticket if the Republican Party can and will furnish the assurance that it is ready and willing to become the party of the people.

[NormanStewart]

Democrats select July 19 to open 4-day convention

Roosevelt’s nomination for fourth term expected on third night; battle for Vice Presidency expected
By Lyle C. Wilson, United Press staff writer

Washington –
Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s nomination for a fourth term can be expected with some confidence to become an accomplished fact at about 9:30 p.m. ET Friday, July 21 next.

But if you want to bet and play it safe, make it not later than the same hour on the following day, Saturday, July 22, Chairman Robert E. Hannegan of the Democratic National Committee announced yesterday that the streamlined Democratic National Convention would meet Wednesday, July 19, in Chicago.

The committee, which chose the site at a meeting here last month and solicited Mr. Roosevelt to run again, left to Mr. Hannegan the fixing of a date.

Must reach soldiers

Mr. Hannegan would have liked to delay the convention until August but the hare facts of the soldiers’ ballot compelled a July selection.

The ballots cannot be distributed to the armed services until it has been officially established who the Republican and Democratic candidates will be. And if the Democratic nomination were delayed much beyond mid-July, it probably would not be possible for the troops to vote and get the ballots back to be counted.

By ordering the convention to start in mid-week, Hannegan sought to assure a short meeting. His announcement said it was expected that all proceedings would be completed in the remainder of that week – four days. The Republican Convention will begin Monday, June 26, in Chicago.

Vice-presidential battle

Barring a knockdown battle over the vice-presidential nomination, which is more than likely, the Democrats could nominate their ticket and adopt a platform in a couple of days. But both political parties have learned to arrange their convention schedules to take advantage of the best evening radio hours.

Therefore, it is expected that the Democratic keynote speaker – still to be named – will do his stuff on the first night, July 19. The permanent chairman could speak his piece on the evening of July 20 and the Resolutions Committee come in with the platform late Friday afternoon.

Adoption of the platform will probably be the prelude to the nomination of a presidential candidate.

Rayburn mentioned

Then, provided Mr. Roosevelt did not insist on having Mr. Wallace as a running mate again, the vice-presidential nomination could be given quickly to any one of a dozen party stalwarts, especially House Speaker Sam Rayburn. If the convention had serious vice-presidential problems, there would still be Saturday for their solution.

The convention could be run off that fast, or faster, provided good, gray Charlie Michelson does not again decide that each state should have an opportunity to make a seconding speech to Mr. Roosevelt’s nomination. Good, gray Charlie did it that way in Philadelphia in 1936 and it ran into a great deal of oratory.

All in confidence

The seconders clamored to be heard because Mr. Michelson, wily as he is good and gray, passed the word in confidence to everyone in the hall that the platform microphone was connected with a nationwide hookup and that the second speakers would be heard everywhere, including back home.

Some of them even signed off with a “Good night, Myrtle” after reporting that their state, too, was honored and then some to second the nomination of and so forth–.

The fact that there was actually no nationwide hookup always delighted Charlie and he felt that the seconders had just as much fun out of it as though they really had been on the air.

[NormanStewart]

GOP leaders divided on foreign policy

By Thomas L. Stokes, Scripps-Howard staff writer

Washington –
A real issue developing within the Republican Party on foreign policy was projected into sharp relief during the two-day visit here of Governor John W. Bricker of Ohio to promote his campaign for the party nomination for President.

It does not revolve about old-fashioned “isolationism,” as such, which Governor Bricker said is not an issue in the campaign. He added that anybody who charges isolationism in this campaign will be raising a “phony” issue.

The issue concerns how far the “international cooperation” to which the party had pledged itself in the Mackinac declaration of last September shall do, how it shall be implemented, and in this important question there is a basic cleavage within the party, one which must be fought out at the convention.

Governor Bricker is for international cooperation and collaboration, which he says should be implemented, but does not say how. He wants no superstate to “direct the course of American destiny,” but this country must remain free in international affairs and all nations must retain their sovereignty.

This raises the question, which is stressed by the other viewpoint within the party, as to how any country, including the United States, can associate itself in an international organization to keep the peace without giving up some of its freedom of action, or “sovereignty.”

This viewpoint is represented by Wendell L. Willkie; former Minnesota Governor Harold Stassen, who favors a United Nations organization with a parliament and an international police force; Senator Joseph Ball (R-MN) and others.

The Republican Post-War Advisory Council confronted the issue at Mackinac and compromised with its declaration for:

…responsible participation by the United States in post-war cooperative organization among sovereign nations to prevent military aggression and to attain permanent peace with organized justice in a free world.

Landon asks coalition to oust Roosevelt

Knoxville, Tennessee (UP) –
Former Kansas Governor Alf M. Landon last night called for a union of Republicans and Democrats in the November election to oust President Roosevelt and “clean house” in Washington.

In a Lincoln Day speech, the 1936 Republican presidential candidate asserted that:

It is painfully evident to an increasing number of real Democrats that they must turn their back temporarily on the political party of their fathers in order to keep American faith with their sons and daughters.

Mr. Landon attacked the President’s “win-the-war” slogan and said the claim of one man that one party had a monopoly on such a slogan was “the cheapest and sleaziest kind of politics.”

Called an insult

He said:

The President’s attempt to substitute “win-the-war” for the “New Deal” as a campaign slogan is an insult to every member of our fighting forces.

Mr. Landon said the issues which will be decided in the November elections can all be summed up as:

Will our country continue to move toward the national socialistic state which is the objective of the New Dealers, or will we keep the faith? – the faith of our fathers; the faith of our sons and daughters who fight the war.

He asserted:

Fascism is here in America and its name is the New Deal.

‘Hypnotic ringmaster’

Already the big and the petty bureaucrats of Washington are developing all the facets of an arbitrary regime. And that is fascism – no matter by what name it is called by its genial and hypnotic ringmaster.

He charged that Mr. Roosevelt had entered into agreements with foreign representatives without consulting the State Department and added that:

It is a matter of common knowledge that there are entirely too many agencies studying problems, arguing abstract issues, bickering among themselves and interfering with the miracle of production by farmers, labor and business.

[NormanStewart]

Wallace urges jobs authority

Milwaukee, Wisconsin (UP) –
“Jobs will be our number one economic problem the moment peace comes,” Vice President Henry A. Wallace said in an address here last night in which he proposed the creation of a jobs authority with responsibility and power subject only to the President and Congress.

He told an audience of 2,000 persons in the municipal auditorium:

We should have some sort of organization that can get at least as prompt action on behalf of jobs as the War Production Board got on behalf of fighting material.

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Willkie makes disunity charge

Tacoma, Washington (UP) –
The Roosevelt administration has forfeited its right to moral leadership because “it has lost the sense of the importance of unity which has saved us in previous national crises,” Wendell Willkie declared last night.

Mr. Willkie told the Pierce Country Republican Club at a pre-Lincoln Day observance:

Only in the Republican Party can the nation reforge a feeling of national unity, strong enough to stand the tests that lie ahead of us.

He assured the administration of promoting disunity and cited as an example the recent railroad strike call which he said was brought on by the President’s “equivocal answers, broken promises and delaying tactics.”

[NormanStewart]

McCormick lifts hat from ring

Chicago, Illinois (UP) –
Robert R. McCormick, publisher of The Chicago Tribune, said today he has sent Secretary of State Edward J. Hughes a formal request to withdraw his name from the presidential preference primary in Illinois April 11.

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Congressman to resign

Lafayette, Louisiana –
Congressman James Domengeaux (D-LA) said today that he had passed an Army pre-induction examination and will return to Washington to resign as representative from Louisiana’s 3rd Congressional district before entering the Armed Forces.

[NormanStewart]

Editorial: That non-partisan plank

Since it was first proposed some months ago that foreign policy be taken out of the political campaign by Republicans and Democrats accepting the same foreign plank in their platforms, more and more politicians have shied away from the idea.

It is not orthodox. Anyway, the old-line bosses cannot make up their minds which party it would help most – and, as usual, they put partisan considerations first.

The people are more intelligent; they are thinking about the country first. At least that is the indication of the recent Gallup Poll of Republican voters.

They were asked:

Do you think that both Republicans and Democrats should take exactly the same stand for an active part in world affairs in their party platforms in 1944?

With 21% undecided, 58% answered Yes and only 21% No.

The reasons given by the majority were as significant as the vote:

First, world affairs should be treated by a complete nation, not by political parties;

Second, if our political parties squabble among themselves over foreign policy, other nations may take advantage of the disunity in such a way as to harm American interests.

What can the politicians say to that?

[NormanStewart]

Editorial: How soldiers get a vote

Some time ago, the U.S. Senate passed the Eastland “states’ rights” soldier-vote bill.

Last week, the House amended the Eastland bill and passed it, sending it back to the Senate.

This week, the Senate vote to lay aside the Green-Lucas soldier-vote bill, which provided for a federal ballot and take up the House-amended Eastland bill.

Senator Barkley, the Democratic Leader, then offered the Green-Lucas bill as an amendment to the House-amended Eastland bill.

Senator Ferguson of Michigan then offered an amendment to Senator’s Barkley’s amendment – in other words, an amendment to an amendment to an amendment. It was adopted.

Senator Taft of Ohio then offered an amendment to the Barkley amendment. It was rejected.

So, the Senate adopted the Barkley amendment, as amended by Senator Ferguson, thus writing the Green-Lucas bill, which had been laid aside, into the Eastland bill.

Senator Taft then reoffered his amendment as an amendment to the whole works, and was defeated again.

Then, for the second time, the Senate adopted the Eastland bill, which now included the Green-Lucas bill, which the Senate previously laid aside, after both the House and the Senate had amended the Eastland bill.

The whole business then went back to the House which rejected it. Now delegates from each house are trying to determine where they stand.

[NormanStewart]

The Pittsburgh Press (February 13, 1944)

In honor of Lincoln –
New Deal foes told to rally to GOP cause

Governor Martin makes plea for ‘American way’ for veterans

GOP Lincoln Day orators called on dissident Democrats last night to help Republicans unseat the Roosevelt administration, win the war, abolish bureaucratic restrictions, and “restore” constitutional government.

They accused President Roosevelt of bungling foreign and domestic affairs, destroying American liberties, and creating a set of conditions which only Republicans can correct.

Not a few hurled the word “fascist” at him, all said he was seeking a fourth term, and all predicted a Republican victory in November.

Governor Martin speaks

Only once did the soldier vote issue rate a prominent place in the Republican discussions.

Speaking from the same platform with Ohio Governor John W. Bricker, Pennsylvania Governor Edward Martin said that:

This is no time to play politics with the Armed Forces who are fighting on nearly 100 fronts and have fought a thousand battles in the air and on the land and sea.

Governor Martin said:

They are not thinking of political alignments. They want and we want a free government of men. There will be times when peace can be maintained only by force. It may be necessary for America to supply that force to save ourselves from another day of blood, terror and tears.

Insolvency to be avoided

A government to win the war and also win a lasting power must be financially strong with budgets balanced and debts under control, the Pennsylvania executive said.

Governor Martin continued:

Our federal debt is alarming. On June 30, 1933, it announced to $22,500,000. It promises, by the end of the war, to reach the astronomical total of $300 billion, an amount greater than the combined debt of all our Allies and all our enemies.

Great sums for making war are imperative, but prudence and patriotism demand elimination of all waste and unnecessary governmental activity. This war must be won without national insolvency.

Generals, admirals praised

Governor Martin found no fault with the conduct of the war in the field. He said:

Our war strategy has been magnificent. This has been in the hands of our high-ranking military and naval men. The President deserves full credit for selecting them. But our home front strategy has not been magnificent. Chaos and confusion have marked our policies.

The Pennsylvania executive pointed out that the government has been taking over the lands of the people and that “federal tax-eaters and drones are overwhelming us.”

He said:

In June 1930, we had 500,000 federal employees. Today we have more than three million, or three times the peak number in the First World War.

The federal government is doing more labor “feather-bedding” and is hoarding and wasting more manpower than any industry or group of industries. Administration labor policies have broken down. Buying off strikes is un-American.

We all want to win the war quickly and decisively, but we intend at the same time to keep our American way of life.

Speaking at Wheeling, West Virginia, House Republican Leader Joseph W. Martin Jr. (R-MA) said Republicans had to assume the burdens of reconstruction after the war last and, having done it before, “We can do it again.”

Calling for stripping the war effort of “political maneuvering,” Mr. Martin pledged Republicans to winning the war, defending the Constitution, abolishing waste, tax simplification, employment and care for veterans, preservation of free enterprise, reduction of bureaucracy and regimentation, better care of the aged and elimination of “class prejudices and class preferences.”

Called failure

Speaking at Columbus, Ohio, Senator Chapman Revercomb (R-WV) accused the President of “dismal and tragic failure” in the field of foreign relations and of failing “in any step that should have been taken to avert war.”

Mr. Revercomb denounced “government by group” and accused the administration of playing politics with organized labor. Once the war is over, he added:

OPA must end and the bureaucrats at Washington must fold their tents and seek employment elsewhere.

Senator E. H. Moore (R-OK), speaking at Charleston, West Virginia, accused President Roosevelt of being “a fascist at heart.” Senator Moore, a Democrat until he ran for the Senate, called for a coalition campaign against the administration.

Federal vote assailed

Like Mr. Martin and Mr. Revercomb, Mr. Moore denounced the administration’s efforts to set up a federal soldier vote ballot. Such a ballot would be an unconstitutional invasion of states’ rights, he said, and the administration is proposing it in “an effort to steal this election.”

Senator Kenneth S. Wherry (R-NE), speaking at Huntington, West Virginia, said, “We must break this reign of Franklin D. Roosevelt” and called for lifting of “regimentation” and business restrictions the moment the war is over.

Novelist Clarence Budington Kelland, speaking as Republican National Committeeman for Arizona, declared at Dallas, Texas, that the administration has debauched American self-respect.

God and the New Deal

If Abraham Lincoln were alive today, Mr. Kelland told Lincoln Day dinner guests:

The thing that would arouse him to rage and denunciation would be the deliberate undermining of the American people by the New Deal administration. It would be the vicious teachings of this administration whose purpose it to destroy the self-reliance of our people and substitute for it a helpless, hapless, despicable belief that God, in the guise of the New Deal administration, will provide.

In New York City, Governor Thomas E. Dewey declared that the American people are rallying to the Republican Party to rescue the constitutional system of government from a menace as grave as that which faced it during Lincoln’s administration.

Governor Dewey said:

The menace Lincoln faced was violent; ours was subtle. He faced secession by the states. in our time, we have seen abdication by the states.

The New York executive declared the people were turning to the Republican Party before the war, and have been turning to it “at an accelerated pace since” because they are “desperately anxious” that “we built well and strongly in international cooperation after this war.”

Governor Dewey concluded:

The people realize that the only hope for America for world peace is that it be won by an administration which they know is not seeking power for the sake of power.

One speaker, however – Connecticut Governor Raymond E. Baldwin – warned his party against “wishful thinking” and told it bluntly that it has not thus far offered the nation an election-winning program.

Speaking at Boston, Governor Baldwin urged Republicans to explore the home front for constructive policies that would win votes. He suggested, for example, that the party “can offer a better and sounder method” for preventing inflation than the Democrats have been able to produce.

Palmer Hoyt, publisher of the Portland Oregonian, who has just returned from a six-month stay in Washington as head of the Domestic Branch of the Office of War Production, shared the platform with Wendell Willkie, at a Portland dinner.

Mr. Hoyt declared:

The Republican Party must know what its leaders are thinking and it can follow no leaders who lack the courage to face the problems of the day.

Too many Republican candidates today lack faith, both in themselves and in America. I refer to no candidate in particular, but it is obvious that too many candidates today with “rather be President than right.”

Mr. Willkie announced that he would file as a Republican nominee in the Oregon preferential primary May 19, and told northwest party leaders that “now is the time to change horses in the middle of the stream.”

Mr. Willkie declared:

Now is the time and not in the post-war era. Right now, the war is being waged under expert guidance of the Army and Navy. It would be easy to change horses now but it would be difficult after the war when conditions are bound to become uncertain.

[NormanStewart]

OWI ignores Bricker role as candidate

Just calls him ‘Governor of Ohio’ in stories sent overseas

Washington (UP) –
The Office of War Information covered Governor John W. Bricker’s press conference here Thursday, but for policy reasons did not identify the Ohio chief executive in the reports sent abroad as a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, Director Elmer Davis said today.

He was simply referred to as a “prominent Republican and Governor of Ohio” in the OWI dispatches sent to Africa, Britain and Australia.

The press conference was covered by an OWI editor and his story was cleared personally by Mr. Davis. It was transmitted to OWI outposts in London, Algiers and Sydney for redistribution.

Political angle cited

Mr. Davis said the omission of any reference to Mr. Bricker’s announced candidacy was in line with the agency’s policy in handling political news the last few months when it was difficult, he said, to ascertain who presidential candidate actually were.

The OWI chief said:

That was the period when a lot of men were standing around waiting for lightning to strike and it was considered best not to mention political aspirations in our reports.

Now that the elections are drawing closer and the political picture is coming into sharper focus, Mr. Davis said, a new policy in this matter will be drawn up soon by himself and other OWI officials.

Must announce candidacy

Under the new policy, Mr. Davis said that if a candidate has publicly announced his candidacy, it will be mentioned in OWI overseas stories.

Mr. Davis said:

In some cases, of course, it will be necessary to say “considered by many to be a candidate for the office.”

The OWI story began by saying that Mr. Bricker “favored a foreign policy ‘along the general lines’” of the Mackinac Republican Conference statement.

It also included Mr. Bricker’s comment on a recent article in a British newspaper suggesting the reelection of President Roosevelt.

‘None of their business’

Mr. Bricker said in that connection:

I think we ought to elect our own President and it’s none of their business. I think we ought to take care of that matter without outside interference.

The story ended by quoting Mr. Bricker as saying that he differed with “the whole philosophy of the New Deal.”

The dispatch also carried Mr. Bricker’s stand in favor of state ballots for soldier voting but made no reference to his views that there should be a law which would outlaw wartime strikes.

[NormanStewart]

Editorial: The hardest way

By leaving it exclusively to the states to provide ways and means of enabling members of the Armed Forces to vote, as a majority in Congress seems determined to do, the statesmen in Washington are deciding that the hardest way is the right way.

The contrary is true. Voting is an inherent right, provided in the Constitution, the same Constitution which created Congress and details what it may and may not do.

Since voting is a basic right, it follows as a fundamental corollary that the qualifications for voting, the methods for voting and the rules for voting should be as simple as possible.

Democracy functions through free suffrage. If suffrage is not free, the functioning of democracy is restricted if not actually endangered.

Any obstacle thrown in the way of full opportunity for suffrage on the part of any group of free citizens is an interference with democracy.

The opponents of a uniform, simply ballot for use of the Armed Forces claim any regulation of voting, save the 48 different systems set by the states, is unconstitutional.

But the Constitution does not say so. It says laws governing the election of members of Congress shall be prescribed by the states, but it also says Congress may “at any time” alter such regulations.

It also says that neither Congress nor the states may abridge the right to vote because of race, color or “previous condition of servitude.” And in another amendment, it forbids abridgement of the right to vote because of sex.

In both articles, Congress is charged with the duty of enacting legislation which will make these prohibitions effective.

Isn’t it logical, then, that Congress also has the power to enact legislation which will prevent the abridgement of the right to vote for other reasons, such as the conglomeration of state regulations which will prevent hundreds of thousands of voters in the Armed Forces from exercising their franchise?

If the opposition Congressmen will read the instructions issued the other day by the Army for the benefit of voters in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Nebraska and Louisiana, they will find an irrefragable example of how to keep the Armed Forces from voting.

Pennsylvania voters in the military and naval forces must apply for a military ballot within the 20-day period which occurs not more than 50 days before the election and not less than 30 days before the election. Election officials must then mail these ballots at least 15 days before the election “to the address furnished by the elector in his application.”

With Pennsylvania voters scattered in hundreds of places around the world, many of them bound to change addresses between the time they apply and the time ballots are mailed, it is manifestly impossible to provide more than a fraction of them with ballots, even if they were thoroughly acquainted with the law.

Nebraska is even worse, for the elector from that state also must apply for a form on which to apply for a ballot!

As the Army suggests:

It is not desirable to burden overseas airmail with applications for ballots where the time interval is manifestly too short to accomplish receipt, execution and return of the ballot.

There is nothing more constitutional than the right to vote. Let’s make the Constitution work by providing a simple, uniform method by which the Armed Forces may exercise their constitutional franchise. Let’s make it as easy as possible for them to vote, not as hard as possible.

[NormanStewart]

Casey: Sneers and smut

By Lee Casey, the Rocky Mountain News

I am becoming excessively weary of listening to unfunny off-color anecdotes, most of them well-worn, about President and Mrs. Roosevelt.

To be sure, this is a campaign year, and in a campaign, we are told, everything goes. Such is the American way. We have always indulged in jesting and even sneering at those in high office.

It is true that some of the current anecdotes have survived the campaigns of 1932, of 1936 and 1940. But, as for these representing any kind of American tradition, even a bad one, I just don’t believe it.

That abuse that was heaped upon Abraham Lincoln offers no parallel. That abuse, unjustified as it proved to be, at least was done in the open. It came from newspapers, from ministers and from politicians speaking in public – in short, from individuals and publications that could be held accountable for their words and acts. It was all wrong, as we now know, but at least it was not speaking.

The lip-to-ear attacks upon President and Mrs. Roosevelt are both wrong and sneaking. They are especially offensive because, for the first time in American history so far as I can discover, these sneaking attacks are being made upon a woman.

Pegler’s duty

Let me try to be very clear upon one point. I’m not remotely suggesting that Mrs. Roosevelt’s activities, insofar as they have a public bearing, should not be subject to the closest scrutiny, examination and criticism. She is different from any other mistress of the White House in that she has deliberately made herself a political figure. Her words and deeds are, therefore, deserving of the same approval or disapproval as the words and deeds of any man or woman in public life.

Westbrook Pegler has been emphatic about this, in accord with his duty as a commentator upon national affairs. He has challenged, and properly challenged, Mrs. Roosevelt’s occupancy under a priority order of a place on a military transport plane. He has challenged, and properly challenged, her right to make distant journeys in military planes as a representative of the American Red Cross. He has challenged Mrs. Roosevelt’s partiality in labor disputes, has charged that her affiliation with groups sympathetic with communism has tended to give administrative sanction to the communist movement.

All this has been done directly, openly – and forcefully, Mr. Pegler has criticized and challenged Mrs. Roosevelt in her public capacity. That is not only his right but his duty. That is the business he is in.

Bogus wit

Mr. Pegler’s way and not the way of innuendo, is the true American way.

The slyness, the bogus wit – yes, and the smut – are not characteristic of this country. Those who use such methods are this country’s disgrace.

Some of the supposed witticisms designed to besmirch the President and his wife touch upon the interest both he and Mrs. Roosevelt have shown in protecting the rights of minority groups of citizens. The intended effect is to belittle and sneer at the fact that President and Mrs. Roosevelt are showing the same interest in the welfare of their fellow-citizens that is characteristic of any civilized human being.

The whispering campaign against Al Smith when he was a candidate was slimy enough. So was that against Warren G. Harding. This one is more pernicious than either because it carries smut along with slander. It is doubly despicable because it is hidden. As Edmund Burke asked, who can refute a sneer?

Approval or disapproval of the administration’s policies has nothing to do with one’s attitude toward this sniping from undercover. Decent people owe it to their own decency to refuse to listen to such pernicious chatter. It seems to me the campaign of falsehood and malice disguised as humor should come to a sudden end.

[NormanStewart]

The Pittsburgh Press (February 14, 1944)

Democrats face convention fight on Wallace vote

Vice President actively campaigning for renomination; conservatives want party stalwart on ticket
By Lyle C. Wilson, United Press staff writer

Washington –
Vice President Henry A. Wallace’s active campaigning for renomination on his transcontinental tour foreshadows a bitter contest at the forthcoming Democratic National Convention.

Conservative Democrats, finding themselves unable even to impede momentarily the fourth-term nomination of President Roosevelt, may attempt to wreak their vengeance on Mr. Wallace – if they can. They want a party stalwart on the ticket.

Whether the question of Mr. Wallace’s renomination reaches a convention floor showdown will depend on Mr. Roosevelt. If Mr. Roosevelt wants him again, he will have to lick the party regulars to put Mr. Wallace over.

Many observers here believe the President decided last summer to discard his 1940 running mate.

Clashed with Jones

That was when Secretary of Commerce Jesse H. Jones and Mr. Wallace disputed conduct of foreign economic policy. Mr. Wallace then was head of the Board of Economic Warfare and an important figure in Mr. Roosevelt’s war councils.

The President adjusted the dispute by relieving Mr. Jones of certain duties under circumstances entirely satisfactory to Mr. Jones and by stripping Mr. Wallace of every shred of power and authority except his elective office and the trivial ex officio duties pertaining to it.

But Mr. Wallace came up smiling and undertook a series of speaking engagements, frequently before labor or left-wing audiences, in which he has undoubtedly made himself solid politically with the New Deal wing of the political coalition which put Mr. Roosevelt in office in 1932 and has kept him there since.

Talks fourth term

Meanwhile, Mr. Roosevelt has been under occasional and scattered fire from the left. It is reasonable to believe that Mr. Wallace is attempting to establish his own political prestige with the left-wingers sufficiently to persuade Mr. Roosevelt to keep him on the 1944 ticket.

Mr. Wallace is making his own campaign almost synonymous with the movement to draft Mr. Roosevelt for a fourth term. On the West Coast and now on his return journey, Mr. Wallace is telling questioners that Mr. Roosevelt should be renominated.

There is no hint of White House displeasure over the persistent draft-Roosevelt campaign of which Mr. Wallace now seems to be the principal spokesman.

Farley, Garner put heads together

San Antonio, Texas (UP) –
Former Postmaster General James A. Farley visited former Vice President John Garner at Uvalde yesterday.

Mr. Farley said that they had talked of politics “past, present, and future,” but that none of their conversation was for publication.

Willkie outlines Far Eastern trade

San Francisco, California (UP) –
Immediate establishment of trade ties with Russia, China and other transpacific countries “without waiting for any post-war golden age” was advocated by Wendell Willkie last night.

In a radio address devoted largely to the industrial prospects of the Pacific Coast, Mr. Willkie said:

Narrow nationalism, domestic economic ineffectiveness and feeble leadership may well cause these hungry markets of the East to seek other sources of provisioning; for if we do not meet their needs, others will, and this section of the United States will be unimportant in the new economic pattern.”

Mr. Willkie spent yesterday afternoon in Sacramento with Governor and Mrs. Earl Warren, but refused to say whether they discussed political questions.

Browder: Retain Roosevelt

Boston, Massachusetts (UP) –
Earl Browder, Secretary of the Communist Party, said yesterday that the reelection of President Roosevelt in November and the strict enactment of the Tehran program are the only ways the world can reach security through victory and

Speaking at Symphony Hall, Browder said that:

Patriotic men and women of all parties must unite to convince Roosevelt that the country demands his continued leadership.

He said the Tehran program can be summed up in one word: “Security.”

And that means not only physical security which provides safety from attacks by aggressors. It also means economic security, social security, moral security – in a family of nations.

[NormanStewart]

In Washington –
Deadlock bogs soldiers’ vote in conference

Taft compromise for count by states given new consideration

Washington (UP) –
Prospects of a hopeless deadlock between House-Senate conferees on the soldier vote issue today revived interest in a compromise plan – already rejected three times by the Senate – placing the emphasis on state absentee ballots.

The conferees were expected to begin Wednesday their attempts at a compromise, but a stalemate appeared in the making because five of the 10 conferees were string supporters of the state ballot while the other five were equal ardent backers of the federal plan.

Plan another look

The conferees indicated that they would take another look at the thrice-rejected plan of Senator Robert A. Taft (R-OH), allowing use of a federal ballot by overseas service personnel only if they are unable to get their own state voting blanks.

Senator Taft’s plan was in the form of middle ground between the House-approved plan, which calls for use only of state ballots; and the Senate’s Green-Lucas bill, which provides that federal ballots for President, Vice President and members of Congress be used generally overseas.

Martin’s challenge

Meanwhile, House Republican Leader Joseph W. Martin Jr. (R-MA) challenged President Roosevelt to make the soldier vote fight an issue in the coming presidential election. Recalling that the President had denounced the states’ rights bill as a fraud, Mr. Martin said:

The Republicans will meet the issue head-on. We won’t run away – and we don’t fear the result.

[NormanStewart]

Editorial: An issue for the campaign

While the contest for the Republican nomination for President, and the ensuing battle for the presidential election in November will attract the headlines and the popular interest, this is also a year in which the full membership of the national House of Representatives and one-third the membership of the U.S. Senate will be at stake.

In the Congressional elections, equally important with the presidential contest, the principal issue will be the soldier-vote issue.

The Congressmen who have opposed a simple, uniform method of enabling the members of the Armed Forces to cast a ballot must be held accountable to their constituents, in the primaries and in the general election.

Pennsylvania’s primary will be held April 25. The campaign is already underway. Most of Pennsylvania’s Congressmen are already on record on the soldier-vote issue. Those who oppose them in the primary or in the general election should be required to announce their position on this issue.

Unfortunately for the Republican Party in this state, the majority Congressional delegation has voted solidly against a reasonable, effective plan for giving the Armed Forces a maximum opportunity to vote.

To make their position even worse, the Republican Congressmen from this state voted solidly against a “stand-up-and-be-counted” roll call on this issue.

In this district, the Congressmen who voted in this manner were D. Emmert Brumbaugh of Claysburg, Leon H. Gavin of Oil City, Louis E. Graham of Beaver, Robert L. Rodgers of Erie and Harve Tibbott of Ebensburg.

Congressional elections should be settled on issues, and independent of the presidential or any other contest. Here, then, is a basic issue, an issue which should be thoroughly exploited in the coming primary campaign – and again in the November campaign.

It transcends other issues because it involves a fundamental privilege of hundreds of thousands of free citizens who have demonstrated their willingness to make the supreme sacrifice for their country.