ustxtxb_obs_1964_02_21_50_00002-00000_000.pdf

things you don’t like and I imagine I’ll do some more that won’t please you in the futureI hope there won’t be too many.” But, he said, he was for better technical and vocational education, the education of illiterates and the children of migrant workers, full employment, low-cost health insurance under the “Texas 65” program, care for the mentally ill. Then he said: “There are those in your ranks who insist that you give personal support only to those public voices who speak your views to the exclusion of others. There never has been a shortage of opportunists in the political wings who are only too eager to pledge that voice in barter for your aid. . . . there always have been the pied-pipers of passion, the prophets of prejudice, those who inflame and divide for personal gain without regard to the interest of our society as a whole. “It is, of course, the American privilege for any who desire to seek public office. And it is your right, and duty, to support whom you wish. As for myself, I think you know that I cannot be that voice of passion, that I cannot be the blind captive spokesman of any group or views, and keep faith with ten million Texans.” / He asked the delegates to “join with me on whatever grounds you can whenever you can.” He got a good hand. Afterwards he said to reporters, “Obviously I want the support of this group and every other group. I think I made it clear to them I would be their friend.” DON YARBOROUGH had to decide beforehand whether to come out slugging this early, so soon after his announcement in the face of sympathy for Connally’s injuries Nov. 22. Obviously he had decided that Connally had blundered as to Shivers and Sen. Yarborough and that this was the time to start the real contest for the governor’s office. He told the delegates he knew they were people who put principle above personality, “no matter what pressure may be attempted to be exerted upon them, no matter how many deals may be made.” At once he laced into the lobbyists who “have been running the state since Allan Shivers,” and into “that same diabolical machine.” Touching issues, he said Texas, the sixth industrial state, yet has a “bottom of the list” per capita income, “sub-human wages” 44th lowest unemployment compensation benefit level, 400,000 injuries on the job every year, and “no one that cares” in top state office. “What kind of help did you get from your governor except weak platitudes that go along with his weak record?” Yarborough suddenly exclaimed. “How long does he expect us to” but then he was drowned in applause. He condemned the “conspiracy” between “the governor and Allan Shivers, trying to destroy one of the most brilliant public servants we’ve ever had,” Sen. Yarborough. “These two co-conspirators . . . have 2 The Texas Observer worked together hand and glove since the Port Arthur story,” he said. No labor man can back Connally without helping lobbyist “Preston Weatherred destroy the labor movement,” he said. “John Connally is nothing more than their tool! Nothing more than their tool!” Delegates called out, “Pour it on,” and “Lay it on, boy.” Yarborough accused Connally of making “a veiled threat” against Johnson by saying that he, the governor, would keep control of the Texas Democratic conventions. He said Connally had flopped on promises on education, delivering instead a “phony” study of education. “There’s no intention by the present administration to improve education . . . to raise the level of income. There is no intention . . . but to stand on the same lousy record that’s already compiled,” he said. “If the lobbyists and Shivers and Connally and that gang want to fight, I’m willing to fight right now and carry and expose their record to the people of Texas.” The delegates came to their feet for a standing ovation. Outside, before TV cameras, Don Yarborough carried his theme further. Connally is “controlled and tied in with Allan Shivers,” and he’s willing to debate both or either of them anytime. With Shivers letting it be known he may not back Johnson, “I think we’d better start watching Connally, too.” Without any public remarks, then, labor voted not to endorse any candidates for state office. Homer Moore, an oilworker delegate from Corpus Christi, expressed the spirit of many of the remarks one heard among the delegates when, in a later de. Incorporating the State Observer and the East Texas Democrat, which in turn incorporated the State Week and Austin ForumAdvocate. We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. We are dedicated to the whole truth, to human values above all interests, to the rights of man as the foundation of democracy; we will take orders from none but our own conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent the truth to serve the interests of the powerful or cater to the ignoble in the human spirit. Editor and General Manager, Ronnie Dugger. Partner, Mrs. R. D. Randolph. Business Manager, Sarah Payne. Contributing Editors, J. Frank Dobie, Larry Goodwyn, Franklin Jones, Lyman Jones, Willie Morris, Charles Ramsdell, Roger Shattuck, Dan Strawn, Tom Sutherland, Charles Alan Wright. Staff Artist, Charles Erickson. Contributing Photographer, Russell Lee. Subscription Representatives: Austin, Mrs. Helen C. Spear, 2615 Pecos, HO 5-1805; Dallas, Mrs. Cordye Hall, 5835 Ellsworth, TA 1-1205; Fort Worth, Mrs. Jesse Baker, 3212 Greene St., WA 7-2959; Houston, Mrs. Shirley Jay, 10306 Cliffwood Dr., PA 3-8682; Lubbock, Doris Blaisdell, 2515 24th St.; Midland, Eva Dennis, 4306 Douglas, OX 4-2825; Odessa, Enid Turner, 1706 Glenwood, EM 6-2269; Rio Grande Valley, Mrs. Jack Butler, 601 Houston, McAllen, MU 6-5675; bate, Moore said right out: “There has been so much arranged before we got here on 90% of it, and the other 10% was pretty much pressured. Gentlemen, it is my feeling that I have compromised everything but my wife and my soul in the governor’s race.” WITH THIS, Texas returns to the traditional preoccupations of its state-level politics: the state government’s, activities, the lobbyists, the Republican Democrats. But does it really? Connally’s problem is that the more he bids for support from the right, the more liberals he leaves behind him. Although he can of course move as much toward Shivers as he wishes, there is the question, why didn’t Shivers run against Sen. Yarborough? The senator says the polls show that Kilgore would not have had a chance. Would Shivers have? If so, why did he not run? That is the question the Republicans hope they have the answer to. They meet March 9 to decide on their straw vote among presidential candidates next May. The independent liberals, whose chairman in the Democratic Coalition is Franklin Jones, Sr., the Marshall attorney, are being called together, Jones says, to consider the governor’s race=probably late this month \(it was not settled at our press Voters, the organization that represents Negroes in the Coalition, holds its meeting in Fort Worth. Everyone Johnson, Shivers, Ccinnally, the Yarboroughs, the liberals, the Republicansseemed to know what they were doing. San Antonio, Mrs. Mae B. Tuggle, 531 Elmhurst, TA 2-7154; Tyler, Mrs. Erik Thomsen, 1209 So. Broadway, LY 4-4862. The editor has exclusive control over the editorial policies and contents of the Observer. None of the other people who are associated with the enterprise shares this responsibility with him. Writers are responsible for their own work, but not for anything they have not themselves written, and in publishing them the editor does not necessarily imply that he agrees with them, because this is a journal of free voices. The Observer publishes articles, essays, and creative work of the shorter forms having to do in various ways with this area. The pay depends; at present it is token. Unsolicited manuscripts must be accompanied by return postage. Unsigned articles are the editor’s. The ObserVer is published by Texas Observer Co., Ltd., biweekly from Austin, Texas. Entered as second-class matter April 26, 1937, at the Post Office at Austin, Texas, under the Act of March 3, 1879. Second class postage paid at Austin, Texas. Delivered postage prepaid $5.00 a year; two years, $9.50; three years, $13.00. Foreign rates on request. Single copies 25c; prices for ten or more for students, or bulk orders, on request. Editorial and Business Offices: The Texas Observer, 504 West 24th St., Austin 5, Texas. Telephone GR 7-0746. Change of Address: Please give old and new addresses tend allow -three weeks. THE TEXAS OBSERVER A Journal of Free Voices A Window to the South_ 58th YEAR ESTABLISHED 1906 Vol. 56, No. 4 7430′ February 21, 1964