The Brooklyn Eagle (June 25, 1944)
Dewey managers seek first ballot nomination as opposition wavers
Assurance of Governor’s backers seen checkmating Bricker-Stassen challenge
By Lyle C. Wilson
Chicago, Illinois (UP) – (June 24)
Governor Dewey’s “draft” managers are driving tonight for his ballot nomination on the Republican ticket against opposition that seems unable to organize effectively.
The first big test for the Dewey managers was scheduled for 10:30 p.m. CT when Illinois leaders were to caucus the state’s 59-vote delegation.
Plans for the Republican National Convention meeting here June 26 have been streamlined for adoption of a platform and nomination of the ticket by June 28. The successful candidate is scheduled to accept the 1944 leadership of the Republican Party against the New Deal-Democratic Party Wednesday or Thursday.
Platform building is slowed by pulling and hauling over the foreign relations plank, but it is obvious that the convention will adopt some kind of pledge for post-war international cooperation.
Three names before delegates
At least three names will be before the delegates for the presidential nomination. The managers of Governor John W. Bricker of Ohio claim they have 200 to 225 first ballot votes. LtCdr. Harold E. Stassen’s supporters expect the former Minnesota Governor to poll about 65 votes on the first ballot.
Dewey backers are making no public claims and their smug assurance pinpricks the opposition. Bricker spokesmen estimate that Dewey will have 385 votes on the first ballot. Any candidate would need a bare majority of 529 to be nominated.
The Bricker-Stassen challenge to the Dewey “draft” probably will justify itself or collapse 12 to 24 hours before the convention meets when some of the big state delegations begin to caucus to decide with whom to ride on early ballots.
Hopes to hold Dewey
Bricker has a chance among all of them and there is the possibility that state leaders may decide to cast favorite-son votes on early ballots from a safe position on the fence. Bricker is counting on that, hoping to hold Dewey for a couple of ballots and then chip away his lead, as was done four years ago in Philadelphia.
Those tactics might easily lead to deadlock in which event a lot of smart money would be put down quickly on Senator Robert A. Taft (R-OH), whose stature in the party has risen steadily and is still going up.
California, Illinois and Pennsylvania apparently control the situation and they are expected to hold hotel room caucuses over the weekend to decide, in effect, whether the East or Midwest shall provide the man with whom the GOP will attempt for the third time to defeat President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
The party regulars are talking a Dewey-Warren ticket, insisting that Governor Earl Warren of California can be persuaded to accept the vice-presidential nomination despite his known disinclination for the assignment.
If Warren balks, there are a dozen other Republican governors who are willing and able to grace the ticket and Rep. Everett Dirksen (R-IL), who campaigned for the presidential nomination, is recognized now as a contender for second place.
Rep. Harold Knutson (R-MN) arrived today from ballyhooing a coalition ticket on which Senator Harry F. Byrd (D-VA), a notable anti-Roosevelt Southerner, would be nominated for Vice President. The party regulars are not impressed and some of the more sarcastic remark that they tried to win an election in 1940 with a Democrat on the Republican ticket and that it will not work. They refer to Wendell L. Willkie, the 1940 GOP presidential nominee, who was a Democrat before Mr. Roosevelt began making some changes in that party.