ustxtxb_obs_1968_04_12_50_00003-00000_000.pdf

typical of the Briscoe campaign technique. The sign over the podium said, “This is Briscoe country.” It was hardly an exaggeration. Briscoe’s parents both came from Fort Bend County, and many relatives still live in the area. Handsome young Briscoes heaped free barbecue on about 600 plates as the candidate, wearing rimless glasses and a red carnation, shook hands among the throng. Cousin Frank Briscoe, a former Houston district attorney and Dolph’s Houston campaign manager drove his family over from Houston where they joined the senior member of the clan, Mason Briscoe. After the barbecue was consumed and the western music turned off, the crowd listened to Briscoe explain his philosophy of government which he inherited from another Uvalde politician, the late John Nance Garner. The primary role of government is to “safeguard the lives and property of people,” Briscoe said. “The riots, looting_ and lawlessness that have happened in other states do not have to happen here … The best insurance against a breakdown is to say now that lawlessness will not be tolerated.” Second, Briscoe said, “man must have the opportunity to work out his destiny according to his talent.” He cited need for better education and more vocational and industrial training. Briscoe is the only gubernatorial candidate with a basically rural orientation. In most small towns he visits, he emphasizes that smaller communities must share in the industrial growth of the state His strongest appeal is among ranchers and farmers who know him as past president of the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, president of the Mohair Council of America and organizer of the Southwest Animal Health Research Foundation, which conducted a successful screw worm eradication program. As a member of the Texas House of Representatives, he cosponsored the Colson-Briscoe Act which created the farm-to-market road system for rural Texas. He has avid supporters among the -South Texas Chamber of Commerce, which he once headed. But when Briscoe gets out of South Texas and into the large urban areas, there is little to distinguish him from other conservative candidates. He speaks of law enforcement, traffic congestion, pollution and the evils of liquor by the drink. Eugene Locke Although Briscoe is one of the largest land holders in Texas, he, like Yarborough and Hill, insists that “the office of governor of Texas is not up for sale to the man who can spend the most.” That man, all three would agree, is Eugene Locke of the luxuriant blond eyebrows and the catchy jingle. The sum $3 million has been bandied about political circles as the amount Locke has to spend to win the governorship. Judge Merrill Connally, Locke’s campaign manager, told the Houston Chronicle that they expect to spend between $400,000 and $500,000 be fore the May 4 election. He called the $3 million estimate “absurd.” “I wish I had the money these people think I am spending,” Locke told the Observer. “If I did I would spend it without embarrassment or apology.” He added that he has no more billboards than Briscoe, Hill or Smith: “It’s just that my billboards are better placed and look better.” Although Locke calls himself an “independent,” he rarely misses a chance to emphasize his coziness with the Connally establishment. Last week a group of Democrats in Comanche, the home town of Locke’s wife, formed the first Connally for President Locke for Governor Club. On April 2, Locke appeared before the State Democratic Executive Committee to support the favorite son candidacy of Governor Connally. “The immediate stability and health of the Texas Democratic Party and the long range interests of our nation will be dramatically affected by Texas’ choice of a favorite son for the Presidential nomination,” he said. “The divisive elements that are threatening the unity of the National Democratic Party will not be without their champions in Texas … We cannot allow the reins of our government to slip from firm and responsible hands; nor can we ignore the opportunity we have to give direction and strength … No Governor in modern times has captured the hearts of Texans as has [Connally]; nor has any Governor had a more preceptive eye for the needs of this state.” Incorporating the State Observer and the East Texas Democrat, which in turn incorporated the State Week and Austin Forum-Advocate. 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, Greg Olds. Associate Editor, Kaye Northcott. Editor-at-large, Ronnie Dugger. Business Manager, Sarah Payne. Associate Manager, C. R. Olofson. Contributing Editors, Winston Bode, Bill Brammer, Lee Clark, Sue Horn Estes, Larry Goodwyn, Harris Green, Bill Helmer, Dave Hickey, Franklin Jones, Lyman Jones, Larry L. King, Georgia Earnest Klipple, Al Melinger, Robert L. N4ontgomery, Willie Morris, James Presley, Charles Ramsdell, John Rogers, Mary Beth Rogers, Roger Shattuck, Robert Sherrill, Dan Strawn, Tom Sutherland, Charles Alan Wright. 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. Unsigned articles are the editor’s. Locke, a former ambassador to Pakistan and deputy ambassador to South Viet Nam, also stresses his closeness to President Johnson and his support for Johnson’s Asian policies. His main campaign issues are education, and area in which he says he would follow Connally’s footsteps, and law and order. He says he will take the handcuffs off the police and put them on the criminals. Locke has said, “There are candidates in this race who now seem to be interested in law enforcement but who failed to do anything about our increasing crime rate when they were in a position to do so.” Waggoner Carr in turn has scored “the million-dollar, jingle-playing, unknown and untried candidate who has become an ‘expert’ on crime in just three monthsafter being out of Texas for years.” Waggoner Carr Carr, a former state attorney general, apparently is trying to present himself as the most conservative man in the Democratic race. His statements are stronger than they were during his losing campaign against Republican John Tower for the U.S. Senate in 1966. In speeches and television commericals, he blasts all forms of lawlessness. “If I become governor, we are not going to have any riots,” he says. “If we do, they are going to be put down with force.” But worse than rioters to Waggoner Carr are the users of narcotics. “In the last six weeks,” he said Subscription Representatives: A r ling t o n, George N. Green, 300 E. South College St., CR 70080; Austin, Mrs. Helen C. Spear, 2615 Pecos, HO 5-1805; Corpus Christi, Penny Dudley, 1224% Second St., TU 4-1460; Dallas, Mrs. Cordye Hall, 5835 Ellsworth, TA 1-1205; El Paso, Philip Himelstein, 331 Rainbow Circle, 584-3238; Ft. Worth, Dolores Jacobsen, 3025 Greene Ave., WA 4-9655; Houston, Mrs. Kitty Peacock, PO Box 13059, 523-0685; Lubbock, Doris Blaisdell, 2515 24th St.; Midland, Eva Dennis, 4306 Douglas, OX 4-2825; Snyder, Enid Turner, 2210 30th St., HI 3-9497 or HI 3-6061; San Antonio, Mrs. Mae B. Tuggle, 531 Elmhurst, TA 6-3583; Wichita Falls, Jerry Lewis, 2910 Speedway, 766-0409. The Observer is published by Texas Observer Publishing Co., Inc., 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 $6.00 a year; two years, $11.00; three years, $15.00. Foreigr 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, Texas 78705. Telephone GR 7-0746. Editor’s residence phone, GR 8-2333. Houston office: 1005 S. Shepherd Drive, Houston, Texas 77019. Telephone 523-0685. Change of Address: Please give old and new address and allow three weeks. Form 3579 regarding undelivered copies: Send to Texas Observer, 504 W. 24th, Austin, Texas 78705. THE TEXAS OBSERVER @ The Texas Observer Publishing Co. A Journal of Free Voices A Window to the South 62nd YEARESTABLISHED 1906 Vol LX, No. 7 70OPP April 12, 1968