The Pittsburgh Press (October 23, 1944)
Willkie adviser backs Roosevelt
New York (UP) –
Russell W. Davenport, personal adviser to the late Wendell Willkie during the latter’s 1940 campaign for President, said last night in a broadcast supporting the reelection of President Roosevelt that Mr. Willkie died while he was still pressing for clearer commitments on foreign policy from the two major political parties.
Asserting that Mr. Willkie had not accomplished his goal when he died, he added: “And no one in the world knows what his final position in this election would have been.”
Mr. Davenport, former managing editor of Fortune Magazine, said in the broadcast that he was “impressed” with the steps President Roosevelt had taken toward world peace since 1940.
He said he was “not satisfied with the pronouncements of either of the candidates in this election,” but that he felt that Republican candidate Thomas E. Dewey lacked the qualities of “foresight and determination in the cause of mutual action” for peace which had been displayed by President Roosevelt.