The Herald

Thursday, May 29, 1952

STRAIGHT AHEAD
By Julius J. Adams

NEW YORK (Global)--Now we come to the matter of distinguishing between campaigning for an office and stating one's views on major issues affecting the people of the nation. It seems that some people just don't know the difference.

All along, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, a leading candidate for the Republican nomination for President of the United States, has said he would not campaign for the honor. This has led his critics and some of his supporters to assume this barred his giving public expression to his stand.

Just this past week when Gov. Thomas E. Dewey of New York, one of the first to come out for Eisenhower for president, asserted that he believed the General would make known his position on all issues before the convention, even so competent a reporter as James (Scotty) Reston, the gentleman from the New York Times, said he thought the governor's statement was in conflict with Eisenhower's pronouncements.

We ought to get the facts straight. As I understand campaigning, there is a vast difference between making a drive for an office, and simply telling the world what you believe in. In order to campaign, in the conventional sense, one has to do certain definite things. I would say Senator Robert A. Taft has been campaigning as has Senator Estes Kefauver. Yet, we must admit that either could have explained his views on every conceivable topic without even leaving Washington. Such could have been accomplished in one press conference or in one or two radio or television speeches.

As for General Eisenhower, while he has said he would not campaign . . . meaning, as I understand it, that he does not intend to go traveling all over the country buttonholing delegates, holding conferences with party and other leaders, and making speeches in scores of communities, yet, he has not said, as far as I have been able to learn, that he intended to remain in hiding after he returns home.

Just to prove that one may make clear where he stands on issues without campaigning, it is necessary only to realize that most people know where Congressman Jacob Javits stands on most, if not all, big issues, and I haven't heard that Jack is running for president. Or, to reduce the point a bit, I have expressed myself on many topics and surely I am not campaigning for anything--that is, not at the moment.

It isn't a question of where General Eisenhower stands on any particular issue that should be troubling the electorate. We know precisely where a number of men stand, including the president, if we are to accept at face value what they say. There is an old saying in politics. "If you don't have the power to deliver, promise anything." It is easy for the Democrats in the North to back civil rights legislation . . . even those who do not believe in it. They can always blame failure on the Southerners and will try to tie in some Republicans. As for the Republicans, they would not be able to shift the blame to Dixie, because if the party won a majority, it is unlikely that any appreciable number would come from the South. Certainly, the Republicans could hardly hope to elect a senator from the South in the near future. However, it is reasonable to assume that a Republican legislator from the South would hardly be as benighted as a Democrat, for the simple reason that a Southerner who could win a national office as a Republican would obviously have run on a more enlightened platform.