ustxtxb_obs_1962_06_23_50_00001-00000_000.pdf

The Texas ”’7erver An Independent-Liberal Weeiily 134N`I ter A Window to the South 1?V 9s, 00 TEXAS, JUNE 23, 1962 15c per Copy Number 12 Volume 54 ROWN’S TENURE 1 I I I I Demo Unity Plea GOP Hits Duval LIBERAL CLAIMS EXODUS AUSTIN Duval County, Freedom-inAction, Lyndon Johnson, and campaign expenditures promise to be among the largest issues of the general election campaign if the opening exchanges between Democrat John Connally and Republican Jack Cox prove typical. Meanwhile, the announcement by a leading Don Yarborough campaigner, David Copeland of Waco, that liberal Democrats plan to desert Connally in substantial numbers brought into the political dialogue the principal threat to Connally’s ea rly position as a favorite. Connally faces the dual task of keeping conservative Democrats who voted for him in the run-off and liberal Democrats who largely supported Yarborough reasonably satisfied. On the theory that Texas Republicans can easily count on a hard-core vote of over 400,000 \(John Tower got 325,000 votes in the six-way opening prithe Democratic nominee recognizes the advantage of the largest possible overall turnout. Estimates this early in the campaign range from around one million to 1.6 million. What tactics will Connally employ to keep the badly splintered, traditionally amorphous Texas Democrats reasonably intact? How far to the left can he move without alienating the conservatives? Whatever happens, the appeal for party unity, a mightily badgered proposition in Texas since Tower’s election last year, will be a major clarion of the campaign. Cox’s task is similar. Hinting this week that he acknowledges the need for dissenting liberal votes, he may temper his attacks on President Kennedy himself and concentrate on Vice-President Johnson, who is unpopular with many Texas liberals. How effective will he be in attracting many conservative Democrats who votcd for Connally earlier this month? Schroeder Featured The Democratic and GOP state committees met in Austin and Fort Worth, respectively, over the weekend. While Connally, appearing on the same platform with Gov. Price Daniel in a nice display of fidelity, assailed Cox’s affiliations with Freedom-in-Action \(“a dangerous secret political playing backseat to Clarence Shroeder. Shroeder, chairman of the new GOP organization in Duval County who was jailed for having his copy of the party’s primary election records photostated before turning them over to a jury \(Obs., in himself a significant Texas issue. In this pivotal year, Texas liberalism,” waged “a splendid fight.” His vote “was an impressive display of liberal strength in a state hardly noted for liberalism. It was even more memorable in view of the failure of the White House to help Yarborough. The White House played possum even though Yarborough ran as an allout Kennedy Democrat while Connally declared his opposition to several aspects of the Kennedy program. “Had the President,” the Post believed, “given the nod to Yarborough, many decisive Negro and Latin-American votes would in all likelihood have gone to him instead of Connally. A liberal victory in Texas,” the paper said, “would have had healthy repercussions throughout the South. One would have thought that was what the President wanted . . . Given a choice between two conservatives, Texas voters may again vote GOP” and the President “may long remember and regret his stand.” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch found “the mix-up in Texas politics just about as big as Texas” and said the “major question” is whether the Yarborough liberal’s, who are “opposed to the economic groups behind Connally” will defect or support the nominee. “The Bean Awaits Sentencing In Tax Case AUSTIN El Paso County Judge Woodrow Bean pleaded guilty this week to five counts of willful failure to file income tax returns for the last five years. Federal Judge Ben Rice, in whose court Bean appeared, has deferred sentencing until June 27. Maximum penalty for the offense could be five years in prison and $50,000 in fines. Bean, three-term former member of the Texas House and the unsuccessful run-off candidate for congressman-at-large this month against Joe Pool of Dallas, resigned his county judgeship later in the week “as a matter of public policy and in the interest of all concerned.” He remains free on $2,500 bond until June 27. The El Paso Herald-Post, a paper which has been friendly to Bean but withdrew its endorsement in the congressional race when he admitted he had not filed returns since 1952, said the court action this week “marked another chapter in the career of one of the most colorful and most active public officials who has appeared on the Texas Beene _in thisg -eneration.” His administration as county judge, the Herald-Post commented, “set an all-time record for action on all fronts on which the office has jurisdiction.” It cited his fight for a new international bridge into Mexico, a new county hospital, a mental hospital for both inand out-patients, a network of county roads, and a juvenile program. principle significance of all this appears to be that Texas is growing more conservative, regardless of party label.” From one aspect, commented the Cleveland Plain-Dealer, it was a victory for the New Frontier, because of Connally’s connections with Vice-President Jo h n s o n. From another aspect, however, “it was a defeat for the New Frontier because Connally came out against federal aid to education and health care for the elderly under social security” and also “criticized excessive spending by the Kennedy administration.” Texas is different from other states, the Plain-Dealer said, because “it really has three major political parties instead of two, the Conservative Democrats, the Liberal Democrats, and the Republicans.” The big question now: what will the liberals do in November? “Since the liberals and conservatives have been known to knife each other in the past, we wouldn’t like to make a guess on the outcome.” The Winston-Salem Journal said Texas “has seceded from the ranks of the solidly Democratic and moderate to conservative South and has become one of several large states in the union capable AUSTIN Hank Brown, the aggressive and outspoken president of Texas’ AFL-CIO, has been in the labor hotseat for a year and a half now. The internecine fight within labor’s ranks over the presidency last year left some chaffed and bitter feelings. Moving to consolidate his position, however, Brown has clearly emerged as a highly effective and widely respected union executive, and one of the most popular leaders in the Texas liberal movement. A labor insider who admires Brown’s achievements these last 18 months put it this way. “Hank’s not like the man who pointed to the mob and said, when I find out where they’re going, I’ll lead ’em. He’s a responsible leader. He’s not afraid to take a stand.” In the months following the controversy over the presidency, Brown travelled to labor leaders and locals all over the state and told them quite frankly: “You can hate Hank Brown all you want, but here are the programs we stand for. For the goo-1 of labor, I don’t see how you can quarrel with these programs.” Usually putting in a 16 or 17hour day, often seven days a week, Brown is out on the road most of the time. His administration has been a far-reaching one. On the wall of the state headquarters in Austin is a blackboard, and it shows where in the Ftate each of Brown’s co-workers Roy Evans, Sherman Miles, Lyman Jones, and the othersare to be found on any particular day. William S. White, the syndicated columnist, commented that “extremism on the Democratic farleft” threatens Connally’s general election effort and that “ultraliberals are privately threatening Connally with desertions in November to the deeply conservative Republican Jack Cox.” White called such a move “intellectual blackmail.” The Providence Journal commented: “Ironically, Connally may be to the left of Cox, although the term under the circumstancesis not significant . . . Connally faces the November loss of the genuine Texas liberals and may suffer from the loss of strongly conservative Democrats who prefer the Cox brand of political philosophy.” Liberals “may have to vote for Connally as the less extreme of two solid One day a couple of weeks ago the state leaders were as far afield as Lubbock, Beaumont, Denton, McAllen, and Texas City. Steady Rise Brown, 41, lanky, and blueeyed, has been a union man since he was 15. He was born and grew up in Pittsburgh, Penn., the son of a union steward in the steel mills. He witnessed the bloody disputes of the mid-1930’s in that industrial region. But at 15 he hit the road, bumming his way first to Florida, where he worked in a cannery, then slowly working his way to Texas via an assortment of jobs. He rolled into San Antonio aboard a “sidedoor pullman,” lucked into a job as apprentice to a plumber, and he was on his way in the Texas labor movement. In 1946, though admittedly unequipped ‘except for zeal, he was elected business manager of San Antonio Plumbers and Fitter Local 142. Seven years later, in his early thirties, he became education and research director of the Texas State Federation of Labor. _ and he held onto the post even after the AFL and CIO merged in 1957. But two years later he resigned to go back as business manager of his old local, and a couple of years ago he was made executive secretary of the Texas State Building and Construction Trades Council. Meanwhile, as he rose as a union spokesman, he was trying to rub off some of the rough edges by getting a piecemeal education. He earned his high school diploma partly with the aid of the American School \(a correspondence school feeding knowledge out of night course here and a correspondence course there, he scraped together the equivalent of two years of college. He was elected state president in January, 1961, succeeding Jerry Holleman, who moved up to assistant labor secretary. Then in August, in a stormy convention, he defeated state secretary-treasurer Fred Schmidt to retain the presidency. ‘Next Big Job’ Although he concedes there is a long way to go, Brown has been proudest, these last 18 months, of Texas labor’s program of “political education” which largely means orienting union people to their own political possibilities. “It’s not only a matter of carrying our programs to the top labor leadership,” he believes, “but to the secondary level as well.” A close study of the results in the statewide, Senate, and House primaries, he contends, would show that in those areas where COPE is most active, liberal candidates were most often successful. The House, he argues, would be “much more conservative” without these activities. A sub AUSTIN The 1962 Texas primaries were followed more closely by the national press than any Texas state election in recent history. Post-mortem comment was exceedingly diverse. Here is a sampling, with all political alignments represented: To the New York Times, the governor’s results showed “a surprisingly even split between the party’s conservative and liberal forces.” The New York Daily News believed the outcome does not give President Kennedy very much “to cheer about.” What happened, the Daily News observed, was that “the liberal Democrats didn’t win and the conservatives did.” Connally, “though a warm personal friend of JFK and Lyndon Johnson, doesn’t like their more radical ideas, and said so in his campaign.” Jack Cox, the Daily News predicts, will be a “powerful vote-getter,” and Texas “may be headed toward electing a GOP governor.” The New York Post saw in the Connally victory “no cause for liberal despair.” Though Connally, whom the paper described as “spokesman for the oil and gas interests,” won the election, Yarborough, “representative of Texas National Comments on the Primaries of going any of several ways on election day.” Yarborough “cannot help but be heartened by his near-miss.” Texas voters “haven’t declared themselves rigidly conservative, and the y haven’t crossed over into Republicanism. instead, Texas has simply joined California, New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois . . . as a state that really isn’t safe for anybody.” Labor’s President Views the Future