Report of the County Chairman (30 page)

TOTAL LEVITTOWN VOTE

It would thus seem that suburbia, after an exhilarating flirtation with the social respectability of Republicanism, found the experience a bit cloying and remembered the Democratic party of its parents. One of the explanations I heard repeated many times was, “When we moved out here my wife expected the gracious country living of the magazine advertisements, and we thought that the key to this was joining the Republican party. But when we did join all they wanted was our votes. The gracious country living escaped us and we realized with some embarrassment that we had been played for jerks. Or had played ourselves as jerks.”

One of the greatest surprises of the 1955-1960 period in the bigger suburbias was the discovery that a community might have enough vital Democrats with reasonably good table manners so that one could vote for Jack Kennedy, retain interesting friends, and still feel as if one were part of a socially acceptable world. Not a little of the credit for this transformation of thinking habits must be accorded to the amazing Kennedy girls, who toured suburbias wearing chic outfits, well-manicured nails and flashing white smiles. I had the humbling experience of addressing several very swanky morning affairs in the various suburbias where hundreds of obviously well-placed women listened in bored tolerance while I gave them the pitch, then filed in excited wonder past one of the Kennedy girls. As one of my captive audience said to me as she came away from meeting Mrs. Peter Lawford, “That girl has real class. It’s a privilege to be in the same room with her.” Somehow the class of the Kennedy girls rubbed
off onto the Democratic party and in suburbia it once more became fashionable to be a Democrat.

Whether the Democrats can hold the prodigals is a major problem for the party. One of the reasons why suburbia was willing to consider the Democratic party this time was Kennedy’s youthful vigor. In their own business, professional and intellectual lives, the young suburban families have begun to recognize that a certain amount of raw vigor is necessary if one is to survive. They discovered that the outward appearances of respectability are no substitute for inner vitality. If during its incumbency the Democratic party exhibits no vigor, it will lose these suburban voters. Year by year the average age of voting suburbia is going to increase until a natural conservatism begins to set in. If in the next four years the Democrats do not build strong allegiances, they may lose this powerful voting block forever. It is certainly available to the Republicans and they are going to work hard to win the suburbs back.

In 1956 the four great suburban counties that rim Philadelphia—Chester, Delaware, Montgomery, Bucks—gave President Eisenhower a total of 384,020 votes to Stevenson’s 199,617, a massive majority of 184,403. In 1960 those same four counties gave Mr. Nixon only 399,028 votes to Kennedy’s 304,192, a majority of only 94,836. The difference is accounted for by the changing patterns of suburbia, and I believe that it has been this shift which has helped the eastern big-city states to swing Democratic. It was not the cities alone that won for Kennedy.

From our vantage point in one of the typical counties we had an opportunity to assess the work of various politicians
and various stratagems. For example, we found that clergymen preaching politics from the pulpit were very effective insofar as their own flocks were concerned, but that they aroused bitter antagonisms among those who were not directly committed to them. Thus religion had a terribly divisive power when abused and the end result of any one action could not easily be anticipated. As I said earlier, in Bucks County it cost us about 9,000 votes, but no permanent social damage seems to have been done.

The effect of doctors’ being prevailed upon by their medical association to campaign among their patients for one party as opposed to the other was a different matter. A good many of my workers spoke with contempt of this procedure, and there was one sardonic cartoon circulated to good effect. It showed a group of white-masked doctors about to operate on a skinny nude man, and the caption read, “You still determined to vote for Kennedy?” I would suppose that whatever effectiveness the doctors had was in confirming the convictions of people already disposed to vote against what the doctors labeled socialized medicine, just as years before they had so labeled Blue Cross, Blue Shield and social security. Actually, I suspect that few doctors bothered with proselytizing. I would imagine, furthermore, that the effectiveness of the medical anti-Democrat lobby will be somewhat diminished in the next four years, a loss which I can view with perfect equanimity.

The most perplexing problem as to effectiveness on the Democratic side concerned Adlai Stevenson. I have told how I personally encouraged about one hundred dissidents
with whom I accomplished nothing into going into Philadelphia to hear the former standard-bearer advise his adherents to support Kennedy whole-heartedly. Other county chairmen, faced by the same problem, must have done the same, for we turned out one of the most excited crowds to hit Philadelphia for a long time. I sat near Mr. Stevenson and was deeply moved by the passionate loyalty he still evoked among his followers, and I could see my wife at one of the front tables rededicating herself to his cause.

But when he spoke I listened in vain for that strong, clear command to unity. His speech was witty, a tribute to a great mind, and thoroughly enjoyable, but I doubt if it convinced one of my wavering hundred. There come times, I think, in any campaign or in any life when one ought to speak out clearly and unequivocally. I am often reminded of long trips that I have taken across country where in the vast empty spaces of our land the radio signals from the big cities fade into a kind of static-filled jargon. One remembers that these are the good stations with the respectable news commentaries and the fine music, but the signal is so weak that one turns with gratitude to the nearest hillbilly station that is emitting a static-free signal. At least one can hear the music, second-rate though it is.

What I have just said is a terrible confession, and as it stands it is probably a self-indictment. But it is how the human mind reacts, and for better or worse, there it is.

The loss of Ohio stunned me. I still cannot understand how it was accomplished. The only reasonable explanation I have heard was that in a fiercely competitive election
any party that goes in with disorganized forces stands a good chance of losing, no matter what happens elsewhere in the country. Mike DeSalle and Frank Lausche did not unite, and Ohio was lost. In New York, on the other hand, in the midst of a bitter factional fight between Carmine DeSapio and Herbert Lehman, union to fight the national election was manipulated and victory was the result. But in California, as in Ohio, the Democratic forces did not coalesce and a totally unwarranted loss had to be endured.

The big surprise to many of us in a county like Bucks, but not to me for reasons I have already cited, was the contribution of Lyndon Johnson to the Democratic victory. When the results were in, a good many of my northern liberal friends were surprised by Johnson’s performance in helping to hold so much of the South and particularly Texas, but they were also disturbed over the fact that Johnson probably emerged from the campaign as the single most powerful political force in the party. In mid-September few could have foreseen this outcome. His strength, I think, derived from his being first of all a fine politician. I think we tend to forget how important it is in a democracy to have strong, clever, and able politicians; for the holding together of any federal union or any state with sharply divergent components requires marked skill, and those who have it deserve well of their nation.

I rather think that of all I have written in the last five years, one of the very best things was a series I did for a Honolulu newspaper following the divisive first state election in 1959. It was a series praising politicians and drawing to the attention of the people of Hawaii the remarkable
contributions made by a group of men and women not normally hailed as cultural heroes. I selected a millionaire who took time off to whip his Republican party into an effective machine that defeated my side at the polls; a Japanese housewife who took a job so that her husband could carry on an effective campaign for the legislature; a brilliant young governor who started out like the most venal of all spoils politicians, but who got his party organized on a solid base of legitimate patronage; and a young mother who set up an unbeatable headquarters which elected her father to the Senate against what seemed at first insuperable odds.

There are people who merit praise in a democracy, and I am very happy that in Lyndon Johnson I early recognized such an operator. If a complex body like a senate of a hundred prima donnas requires organizing, I want a man who can do it effectively and creatively. Such a man is more valuable to his nation than a scientist, a successful novelist, or a business leader. I have always had the feeling that had I been in the last Senate I might have joined with Senator Proxmire of Wisconsin in fighting Lyndon Johnson as a party leader who was a little too arrogant and dictatorial for my taste. But I am certainly glad he was able to control those attributes and to contribute them to the victory of my party. And I suppose that the Senate, with someone else at the head of the majority party, will be a less efficient instrument than it was when Lyndon Johnson controlled it.

In Bucks County we were still of the opinion that the Republicans should have won the national election. To us it seemed as if they had every initial advantage. The
country was at peace; there was reasonable prosperity; there was no great unemployment; their party already held the Presidency; there was a general aura of satisfaction with the manner in which Mr. Eisenhower had operated; an overwhelming percentage of the press favored the Republicans; in a long campaign they could afford more radio and television time; the unanticipated twists and turns of foreign affairs seemed likely to aid them and damage the Democrats; Senator Kennedy was relatively unknown; and he was a Catholic.

For Mr. Nixon, starting with these advantages, to lose would require, we felt, gross mismanagement. To our surprise that mismanagement was forthcoming and what should have been a Republican victory was transformed into defeat. I am not diminishing the extraordinary work of Senator Kennedy and his entire team when I say that good as they were they could not have won had the Republicans mounted a first-rate campaign. It is obvious that under even the most adverse conditions Senator Kennedy would have made a gallant effort, but if the Republicans had been on their toes, his effort would have remained no more than a commendable try. I do not believe that Senator Kennedy won; I believe that Vice President Nixon lost. From what we saw in Bucks County, these were the contributing factors to the Republican defeat.

The enormous prestige of President Eisenhower’s position and personality was not utilized constructively. Frequently throughout this report I have indicated points at which we were afraid the President would throw his great weight against some position taken by Senator Kennedy, and I have told how each time we breathed easily when
the crisis passed without any Presidential interference. It was also apparent to us that President Eisenhower could certainly have held Pennsylvania and probably New Jersey in the Republican column if only he had campaigned diligently in those states. Finally, if he had gone on television four or five times during the campaign to deny categorically one Kennedy position after another, he would surely have swayed many of the voters with whom I was arguing. In fact, if he had only stated early and unequivocally that he wanted Mr. Nixon to win, he could well have achieved that effect.

In the post-election period numerous news stories have been circulated to the effect that President Eisenhower was deeply distressed at the Democratic victory, and he has belatedly said that he had wanted Mr. Nixon to win in 1960 and that he hoped the Vice President would run again in 1964. I can only say as a common workman in the political vineyard and as a man who followed every twist and turn of the campaign, that during the campaign Mr. Eisenhower failed to convey that impression to the general public. I believe that my strongest argument with Republicans was my constantly repeated statement, “Of course we all know that Mr. Eisenhower is not really happy with Mr. Nixon as the Republican standard-bearer.” A single word from the President could have killed that claim. As things stood, however, every time I made the comment, Republicans all over the audience ruefully agreed. When, late in the campaign, Mr. Eisenhower did make strong statements in favor of his candidate, Democrats and Republicans alike interpreted his remarks as those of a man who had been grudgingly maneuvered into
the inevitable. It is a curious fact that the man who could have swung the election in October actually damaged his candidate when he spoke out for him too late in November. It seemed to all of us who followed these matters closely that Mr. Nixon was badly treated by his President; but we also felt that Mr. Nixon behaved impeccably in this trying situation. If I and my friends misread the relationship between Eisenhower and Nixon it was not through malice; it was because Mr. Eisenhower permitted this ambiguity to develop and to exist. Republicans remarked upon it more than did we Democrats.