The debacle came, not in the form I had imagined, but worse. With shame I read President Eisenhower’s response to Khrushchev’s breaking up the summit and found it one of the most tedious and ineffective statements ever made by an American President. Where were the bold challenges that Teddy Roosevelt would have thrown down, the clear logic of right that Woodrow Wilson would have expounded, the ringing call to international decency that Franklin Roosevelt would have uttered, or the pedestrian, honest reaction of Harry Truman? Our nation looked most inadequate that day, and when, a few days later, our President retreated from Paris to Portugal to garner the meaningless plaudits of a commandeered crowd I wondered what our values were.
I took consolation from the fact that although as a nation we had suffered a body blow, the citizens had witnessed what had happened and were in a position to assess the blame.
At this point the Democrats received help from another quarter. Months before, I had been apprehensive about President Eisenhower’s intervention in the British elections. London newspapers had cynically termed him “Prime Minister Macmillan’s campaign manager,” and much of the Labour Party’s subsequent hostility to the United States stemmed from this unwarranted intrusion by our President. The only reason why there were no riots in the streets of London was that Englishmen tend to be gentlemen.
But when President Eisenhower tried the same gambit in Japan, seeking again to shore up a conservative party, which sought revision of the Japanese constitution, the roof fell in. Japanese leftists, in their weird snake dances and virulent chants of hatred, proved that they were not bound by the restraints that govern British gentlemen. I am sure that the Japanese did not resent President Eisenhower’s intervention any more deeply than had the British; they merely expressed that resentment in more violent ways. At the time I was widely questioned about the Japanese riots and replied consistently, “In the long run they mean very little. Merely that the Japanese won’t tolerate outside meddling in their internal political life.” When my interrogators expressed amazement at my lack of panic I added, “Watch. At the next election Japan will vote conservative, just as before.” And it did.
On the other hand, from the short-range view, the Japanese rioters had struck another lethal blow at Republican campaign claims, for it would now be difficult for that party to argue that it had organized the world into groups that supported us. All too visibly, the world was falling apart if an American President was unable to visit the capital of our nation’s principal bastion in the Far East. I remember thinking at the time, “Right now the general public doesn’t seem to realize the setbacks we’ve suffered. But later the pictures they’ve seen on television will return to their minds, and when the Democrats refer to these matters, the voters will understand.” I was convinced that the Republicans had suffered substantially from the events in Paris and Tokyo.
At the same time I had to admit that the Democrats had also absorbed two frightening body blows. When I heard the newscast that John Kennedy, while on tour somewhere in the West, had said something like, “President Eisenhower might have apologized to Khrushchev,” I was shocked. The news report was fairly garbled and I remember praying that I had not heard it correctly. This was the kind of unhappy phrase that could plague a candidate right down to the wire. Later, when the clarification came through, I felt that whereas Kennedy had offered an explanation, it did not constitute a justification, and I dreaded the repetitions of that phrase that I was bound to hear through the autumn months.
Even more damaging, I felt, was the French newspaperman’s report of his interview with Adlai Stevenson. I recall reading a very brief news story about this on an inside page in the Philadephia Inquirer, and I stopped cold when I saw it, for if what the Frenchman reported had truly been said by Stevenson, it did indeed constitute giving aid and comfort to the enemy on the eve of an important international convention. Specifically, it undercut our nation’s bargaining position. I refused to believe that Stevenson had made the remarks attributed to him, but I knew that the fat was in the fire. For the next several days I looked in vain for any follow-up on the story and felt considerable relief when it appeared to have been overlooked. But in politics I am a great believer in Murphy’s Law, “If something bad can happen, it will.” And before long the Republicans caught up with the damaging article and interrogated the French reporter, who defended the accuracy of the interview as printed; thus they had a vibrant fresh charge that Stevenson was soft on communism. At the time I felt reasonably sure that Mr. Stevenson did not say the things he was quoted as saying, but I also felt certain that he had further disqualified himself as the Democratic candidate. Republican orators would hound him to his political grave, chanting those words from Paris and conjuring up visions and images that would be as deadly as they were unfair.
Casting up the harm done both sides, Paris and Tokyo versus “the apology” and the French “interview,” I felt that in superficial damage the four events were just about a stand-off. But when one considered the fundamental nature of the wounds, one found that half the Democratic losses involved only Stevenson, who was not going to be the candidate anyway, while the wound that Kennedy had suffered involved only vague words which could later be explained away. But the damage that the Republicans had suffered was visual. Most of the American electorate had seen on television the appalling events in Paris and the wild-eyed snake-dancers in Tokyo, and these wounds were not peripheral; they struck at the vital posture of the party. On the whole, I faced the nominating conventions with equanimity.
But on May 23 my complacency received a sharp shock. That evening I spoke in New York on the same program with Governor Nelson Rockefeller at a meeting to honor Shigeru Yoshida, the former prime minister of Japan, and it fell to me to speak first. I made a few undistinguished remarks and was followed immediately by the governor, who went out of his way seven times to comment on the brilliance and aptness of what I had said. I thought: “This man’s really running for the Presidency. He doesn’t know where I stand and he wants to be as congenial as possible.” As he spoke, I smiled wanly back at him and fought down the sick feeling that had taken control of my stomach. I thought: “I was absolutely right in Guatemala. This man’s going to get the Republican nomination and he’s going to win. Look at that audience!”
As Governor Rockefeller spoke, the large crowd poured out its adulation. When he ended, people surged about the table crying, “We want you for President.” I followed him as he moved through the crowd and saw how hundreds of strangers rushed up merely to touch him and to cry, “You’re our man, Rocky.” There was something terribly electric in the air, the unknown substance from which votes are compounded. I heard him say over and over, “Thank you, fellow. Thank you, fellow.” If I ever saw a man running for office, it was Nelson Rockefeller. Finally he gripped my hand and said, “Thank you, fellow. That was a great speech.” I thought: “Damn him. He can defeat Kennedy and he knows it.”
Later on I rejoined my wife, to find that while I was at the dais, she had been sitting with Emmett Hughes, one of my favorite politicians, the gray eminence of the Rockefeller team. I had first known him as an editor at Life, and he was one of the best. He had often worked on my material and I could always tell where he had added something because he had a penchant for alliteration and an uncontrollable fondness for the letter p. Often during the time that he wrote Eisenhower’s speeches I would listen to the President read off something like “our powerful posture of preparedness,” and I would say to myself, “That’s my boy, Emmett.” He was a tall, prematurely gray, extremely brilliant young man whose book America, the Vincible must have outraged the Republican administration, for it was a frontal attack on the Eisenhower foreign and defense policies. Now Hughes was supporting Rockefeller, and they made a formidable team.
That evening I asked Emmett some desultory questions and he replied in kind, and so well did he mask his feelings that I got the impression that he had given up on Rockefeller’s chances for the Re
publican nomination. The very next afternoon the governor released his famous statement concerning the direction in which his party ought to move. It constituted a direct attack on current Republican policies and an oblique attack on Nixon. It was a persuasive document, and it tore the Republican party apart. We were told that when Eisenhower saw it he growled, “Emmett Hughes wrote this.” When I read the strong alliterative passages I said the same thing, and we were both right. Then I read the vituperation from Republican headquarters and slowly realized that even though defeat seemed certain if the Republicans nominated Nixon, the professionals were determined to do so and to crush Rockefeller. I could not believe what I was witnessing.
“It looks as if Rocky won’t make it,” I told my wife.
“That’s too bad for the nation,” she said. “He’d be a fine President.”
“It’s good for Kennedy,” I replied.
When the conventions were over my optimism waned somewhat. It seemed to me that the Democratic convention had been a rather shabby affair, with Stevenson refusing to run openly yet borrowing help from Mrs. Roosevelt; with Lyndon Johnson trying to cram into a few days the work that should have occupied him over several months; with the disgraceful bumbling of Robert Meyner; with the lackluster keynote speech of Frank Church, which at times grew ludicrous; and most of all with the inept acceptance speech of John Kennedy.
In contrast it seemed to me that the Republicans had got off to a rousing start. President Eisenhower’s speech was one of the best I had ever heard him give; it frightened me with its visions of the old soldier stumping the nation in October; he was going to be very persuasive indeed, and I suspected that his old magic would be doubly appealing with its necessary overtones of a President Washington’s farewell. Walter Judd’s keynote speech, compared to Frank Church’s, was a masterpiece, even though its policies dated back to the 1920’s. Governor Rockefeller’s graceful acceptance of the inevitable was beguiling and gave the picture, at least, of a united party. And I think no one could deny that the acceptance speech of Vice President Nixon was stirring, forceful, and well thought out. He created a most favorable impression on me—I vaguely sensed that he wasn’t saying much, but suspected that the details would be filled in later—and when I read that Senator Kennedy had agreed to share the same platform with the Vice President in public debate I told my wife, “Kennedy’s gonna be sorry he did that! This Nixon’s a born debater. I’m afraid hell cut our man to pieces.” Judging merely from the two acceptance speeches, I had every right to be apprehensive.
My wife, now solidly in the Kennedy camp, argued, “I think Kennedy’ll be able to take care of himself.” Like all Stevensonians, she had supported her plumed warrior right down to the last six inches of the lists, and when he fell unseated, tears came into her eyes and she did not want to talk. But unlike many of them she then vigorously supported Senator Kennedy and was responsible for gaining him many votes, for she was a tireless and a persuasive campaigner.
My native village contains two women who ought to be copyrighted by George Gallup, because by questioning them he could save a lot of money. They invariably express the average view on everything. I have known them for many years—they were good neighbors of my mother’s—and I have rarely known them to express a wrong opinion. If a new play opens in Philadelphia, they go to see it, and next morning the conversation goes something like this.
ME: I hear you went to the theater last night. How was it?
MISS OMWAKE: Interesting play.
ME: How will it do on Broadway?
MRS. DALE: It’s bound to flop.
ME: Why? Poor script?
MISS OMWAKE: That leading lady.
ME: Can’t she act?
MRS. DALE: She acts very well.
ME: She’s not sympathetic?
MRS. DALE: In the second act she wears a purple dress. And what do you suppose she wears for a scarf?
MISS OMWAKE: A yellow scarf!
MRS. DALE: The play won’t last a week in New York.
Invariably, the play flops. By some alchemy of mind, these two women isolate the irrelevant truths that illuminate the fundamental ones. They didn’t like one automobile because the handles looked like egg cups, and that model was a dismal failure. They don’t trust a man because his dog walks sideways, as if it was afraid of being kicked, and sooner or later the man embezzles $50,000. I have never been able to figure out how they know, but they know. They have mysterious pipelines to some deep reservoir of the American spirit, and they report with accuracy the taste of the times.
In 1956 they gave me an exhibition of their political insight when they recited a series of reasons why President Eisenhower was bound to be reëlected: “He never swears in the White House, the way President Truman did. His son was in uniform in Korea, not singing on a public stage the way some people we could name did when their father was in the White House. Besides he has as his Secretary of State a fine Christian gentleman like John Foster Dulles, a real religious man and not a crooked lawyer like Dean Acheson. Mrs. Eisenhower stays home the way she should instead of gallivanting around like Mrs. Roosevelt. And he goes to church on Sunday because you can see the photographs of him on Monday morning in the papers. And he went to Korea, just as he said he would. But most of all, James, if he has served us so faithfully after having suffered a heart attack, the least we can do is vote for him again.” For these reasons they were sure he was going to be reëlected, and they even told me by what margin in the electoral college.
Although I had started out reasonably certain that John Kennedy was going to be our next President, the two conventions had shaken me a bit, so I consulted my oracles, and what they told me gave me a positive jolt.
MRS. DALE: Nixon is going to win because President Eisenhower personally selected him, and if he’s good enough for the President, he ought to be good enough for the people.
MISS OMWAKE: Senator Kennedy can never win because his wife is not appealing to the average American housewife.
MRS. DALE: But Mrs. Nixon is. She looks like any American woman you would meet anywhere. Our nation would be proud to have a woman like Mrs. Nixon in the White House. She looks like a President’s wife.
MISS OMWAKE: Mr. Nixon has been personally trained by the President. He has been responsible for most of the big decisions of the past four years.
MRS. DALE: And the way he stood up to that Khrushchev!
MISS OMWAKE: Wars always come in Democratic administrations, but the Republicans are men of peace.
MRS. DALE: And did you see how orderly everything was at the Republican convention and what a bunch of rabble the Democrats were?
MISS OMWAKE: President Eisenhower personally ended the war in Korea the way he said he would.
MRS. DALE: Mr. Nixon had to work for his money, like an honest man should. It isn’t right for a father who makes his money selling booze to give his sons a million each so that they can lord it over poor folks.
MISS OMWAKE: Mr. Nixon will protect the dollar. He knows the value of money.
MRS. DALE: The Republicans look more gentlemanly than the Democrats. Have you ever compared Ambassador Lodge with Senator Johnson. One is a polished gentleman. The other is a Texas bum.
MISS OMWAKE: President Eisenhower returned dignity to the White House, and Mr. Nixon is very dignified. Mr. Kennedy looks like a boy, and his wife with no hat is worse.
As I listened I became increasingly aware that I was hearing the fundamental issues upon which much of the electorate was going to base its decision and I became afraid. If Miss Omwake and Mrs. Dale spoke for America, and I was satisfied that they did, at least for large segments, this election was bound to be much closer than I had anticipated; and yet as they talked I felt that they were for the first time in many years not telling me all the truth. I charged them with this and finally they spoke of what really troubled them.
MRS. DALE: The truth of the matter is, James, I could never bring myself to vote for a Catholic.
M
ISS OMWAKE: Don’t ask me why. It’s a feeling I have.
MRS. DALE: I’ll tell you why. I used to be a secretary in Philadelphia. For many years. And week after week we would see in the paper pictures of Denis Cardinal Dougherty. And Cardinal Dougherty was saying, “You can’t go to this movie.” And Cardinal Dougherty was saying, “All public schools are no good.” And Cardinal Dougherty was shouting, “If you do that you’ll be damned.” James, I just got sick to my stomach of hearing Cardinal Dougherty telling me what to do. Your Senator Kennedy may be as fine a man as you say, but he’s a Catholic and he’s got to put up with Cardinal Dougherty the same way I had to.
MISS OMWAKE: I would be afraid to tell you how many people in this town feel the way we do.
MRS. DALE: All the Lutherans. Most of the Baptists. Many of the Presbyterians. They all remember Cardinal Dougherty and his arrogant ways.
ME: Then no matter what I say, no matter what Senator Kennedy says, no matter what proofs he gives you, you still won’t vote for him because he’s a Catholic?
MRS. DALE: That’s right. In this world, if you fear something deeply enough, there’s probably a reason. And I fear the shadow of Cardinal Dougherty over the White House.
ME: But he’s dead.
MRS. DALE: His spirit goes on forever, telling Protestants what they can’t do.
I returned home deeply perturbed, and the more I talked with my neighbors, the more determined they became never to vote for a Catholic. Some were German Lutherans, and their historic animosity toward the Catholic Church was understandable. But many were ordinary Protestants with no special animus toward any other religion, yet the specter of a cardinal dominating White House policy was to them positively terrifying. With many of my neighbors I could not even argue. If I spoke of religion they changed the subject, and as the campaign edged toward the starting gun I began to realize that in my early assumption that only the crackpots on the fringes would be affected by the religious issue, I was wrong. Religion was going to be a major issue. This meant that all my assumptions about the election had to be revised, so I retired to my small room and asked myself, “All wishful thinking aside, how does the campaign look now?”