ustxtxb_obs_1960_07_15_50_00001-00000_000.pdf

The one great rule of composition is to speak the truth. THOREAU We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to the truth as zee find it and the right as we see it. e ey ifa, ,,,,-0-.?’ 9 .,x , I a tea” ,9,..,. ,,, ‘3 ” 4e i ‘4 e 5- .,,,’, :,. _ ..ral Weekly Newspaper bserver Vol. 51 TEXAS, JULY 15, 1960 1Oc per copy No. 15 Jack Takes LBJ on Ticket Choice of Johnson Comes As Surprise LBJ Fights Hard, But Can’t Cash In LOS ANGELES From the moment his plane touched down in San Francisco and he predicted the Kennedy bandwagon would bog down in Disneyland, Senator Johnson fought the Massachusetts senator with all his resources. He charged himdirectly or indirectlywith Senate absenteeism, a latter-day liberal farm voting record, immaturity and inexperience, and called attention to his failure to vote for the McCarthy censure. He sandbagged the front-runner into a “debate” which attracted a huge gathering and assumed historic proportions the day before the convention. The last day, he even revived questions about the pro-Chamberlain sentiments of Kennedy’s father before World War IL In the end these stratagems came to nothing. Kennedy had the votes. Johnson himself realized this as the moment of truth neared. For instance, Wednesday morning he told the West Virginia delegation he would be glad to go to their state to speak to them, if they would invite him when the Senate was not in session. CONVENTION COVERAGE Pages 2, 3, 4 More Complete Coverage Next Week The moved, angry mass demonstrations for Adlai Stevenson, demonstrations which recalled the Willkie surge in 1940 but which occurred among outsiders, not the delegates, gave Johnsonians hope by Tuesday. Had the Stevenson feeling resulted in a more substantial firstballot vote for Stevenson, staving off Kennedy, Johnson’s people felt that Johnson, not Stevenson, would have had the best chance to become the nominee. This opinion, however, was regarded as absurd by most analysts and leaders of the party. The Democrats would not ‘nominate anyone who was not a strong liberal; Johnson’s strength, roughly a third of the convention, was about all he would get, they believed. Indeed, Kennedy’s strategy seems to have included the idea that if he could convince the delegates that his nemesis was Johnson, thereby keeping the Stevenson specter in the wings, he would have a better chance of winning. The Kennedy-Johnson debate Tuesday thus was not only Johnson’s major and desperate final play for attention and a break a break which the smooth and articulate Kennedy did not provide him. It also helped Kennedy keep Stevenson in the background. Senator Symington was never in serious contention. The “shape” of the convention from the first was triangular, not quadrangular. Kennedy was the leader; Johnson would finish a strong second; if Johnson, Symington, Stevenson, and the others could hold Kennedy off, the shifting would. begin. It seemed most reasonable that this shift would have turned toward Stevenson, particularly in LOS ANGELES Gov. Price Daniel indicated before Sen. Lyndon Johnson was nominated for the vicepresidency that he would vote, but would not campaign for Sen. John Kennedy for president. Most of the rest of the Texas delegation here indicated they plan to support Kennedy, although with various degrees of enthusiasm. At 10:45 p.m. Wednesday, Daniel announced, “Texas proudly casts 61 votes for Senator Lyndon B. Johnson.” Five minutes later, Wyoming shoved Kennedy over the necessary 761 votes. The Texas delegation sat stunned, still, and grim. No one rose to acclaim the new nominee. Rayburn grimaced and blinked his eyes severely, rubbing his eyelids. Gilbert Adams, Beaumont, said, “I think we just elected ourselves a Republican.” Some of the Texans slipped off the floor, evidently including Ed Drake, the Dallas county chairman, who was no more to be seen that night. As the roll call ended in great tumult, Missouri switched to Kennedy and moved to make his nomination unanimous. The Texas delegation, and the Arkansas delegation behind them, sat becalmed in the cheering, except for George Nokes, Waco attorney, who raised his arm and saidalmost to himself”I’ll vote for that.” As the ovation for Kennedy continued, however, Rayburn and John Connally rose, Connally turning to persons behind him and nodding his head affirmatively. The rest of the delegation rose except for Gov. Price Daniel. A network newsman asked him for comment, but he declined, saying he was too angry, and to wait until his blood pressure went down. His boy, Price Jr., leaned down over him and rose up shaking his head and saying “No.” After a few moments Daniel stood up. “I have no comment to make. . . . Senator Kennedy won,” he said with a gesture complementing the obviousness of the observation. “The chairman said he was gonna call these states that wanted to switch and he didn’t do it,” Daniel said angrily. Majority Rules Speaker Rayburn said, “The majority rules and ‘we’ve all got to stand ‘by it.” National ‘committeeman Byron Skelton said, “Well, we got to From Our Louisiana Legislative Correspondent. BATON ROUGE, La. Each Louisiana senator has two switches at the top right corner of his desk. One flashes a red “no” light, another a green “yes” light beside the senator’s name on a large tally board in front of the chamber. When Sen. William Cleveland, an auto dealer whose sixteen years as a legislator have earned him crucial chairmanships and a rarelyquestioned leadership, saw “segregation bills” scrawled in the Special Order of the Day compartment on the calendar blackboard last week, he began to rummage through his desk. He found a yellow can, left by some lobbyist, which bore a label proclaiming the virtues of pure cane syrup. He weighed it pensively in his hand, then propped it against the “yes” switch on his desk, so that each time the speaker turned on the voting machines, the syrup can would push the switch down and have Cleveland constantly in the affirmative. His morning’s work done, he left his desk to chat with friends. Long Proposes Sen. Speedy 0. Long, a distant relative of the late. Kingfish, who represents four northern parishes and is legal consultant to the seg LOS ANGELES Senator Kennedy’s selection of Lyndon Johnson of Texas for his running mate was the surprise of the -1960 Democratic Convention. Johnson’s presence on the ticket assuages Southern resentment of the strongest civil rights plank in the party’s history. But it also threatens to alienate some Negro and labor voters. Gov. Price Daniel, who said upon Kennedy’s nomination that he would vote, but would not campaign for Kennedy, told the Observer on the convention floor after Johnson’s nomination for vice-president: “This ticket is one for which I can be more active and will be.” The Texans here generally believed the development improved the Democrats’ prospects in Texas. Daniel also said leaders of three Southern states told him they thought ‘this will save them” for the Democrats. There was dismay among bigstate delegations which had given Kennedy his basic strength. AFLCIO Chief George Meany and other labor leaders caucused afterwards to guage the impact of the sudden Johnson turn and agreed that much will depend on Johnson’s performance in the rest of the Congressional session. Wal regation Committee, gained the floor. In quick order he pushed through twenty bills with unanimous approval and little debate, most of the senators functioning as efficiently as Cleveland’s syrup can. The most noteworthy of the bills: permit Gov. Davis to close all schools in the state at once if any one school is threatened with implementation of federal court orders to integrate. establish teams of detectives to ferret out aid recipients who may be disqualified under new laws against common-law marriage or illegitimate parenthood. cut off public assistance to any child living in a home with a woman who has ever borne an illegitimate child, require identification by race of all candidates for public office on ballots, and authorize parishes .to aban don their police jury form of government in the event a Negro is elected to a police jury. Flag Protected The lawmakers chuckled as Long won passage of a bill establishing criminal penalties for desecration of the Confederate flag. “The next one’s for secession,” Sen. Adrian Duplantier of New Orleans said with a grin, as the field of green lights on the tally board showed unanimous approval of the flag bill. Long’s major achievement of ter Reuther of the Autoworkers was reported “unhappy.” Anger was reported to the Texas delegation among delegates from Pennsylvania, Illinois, New York, and California. Gov . Wily Rams of Michigan said Johnson’s nomination was a “mistake,” and Michigan delegates debated nominating Williams. The ‘District of Columbia delegates voted to nominate Gov. Orville Freeman of Minnesota, but Freeman rejected this bouquet of thorns and the D.C. delegates agreed instead to announce a 6-3 vote against Johnson. They never got a chance to do so. To prevent the undercurrent resentment from bursting into the open, Rep. John McCormack of Massachusetts moved to suspend the roll call of the states after Johnson had been nominated by Gov. David Lawrence of Pennsylvania and to make the choice unanimous. On the voice vote, Gov. Leroy Collins of Florida ruled that twothirds had voted aye. A substantial protest of noes was heard in the hall, however. Kennedy conferred with Johnson half an hour Thursday, but said discussion of the vice presidency was not specific. Then he talked to many union and party leaders during the day. Carmine the day, in potential importance, was the passage of a proposed constitutional amendment empowering vote registrars to judge the “good character” of persons applying to register. The amendment had been approved earlier in the lower house. If affirmed by the electorate in the November elections, it could be used to disfranchise thousands, especially Negroes. If the proposed change is voted into the state constitution, the following persons would be denied voting rights: illiterates, unless already registered persons sentenced to 90 days or more on each conviction for more than one misdemeanor within the five years prior to application for registration as an elector persons sentenced to six months on any misdemeanor within the year prior to application women who have given birth to illegitimate children within five years prior to application, and men proved or acknowledged to be the fathers of such children within the same period persons who have lived in common-law marriage within five years prior to application, and any person whose character is considered bad for any other reason’s. Jack Kennedy Lyndon Johnson THE 1960 TICKET BEFORE LYNDON’S NOMINATION .. . Daniel Says He’ll Vote, That’s All SYRUP CANS AND THE MASSES Louisiana Senate Goes for Broke