When Governor Meets Governor

The U.S. has 24 Republican Governors, 24 Democrats. Most of them met in Columbus, Ohio last week, found that they were in substantial agreement on the important issues of the day.

>They believe isolationism is dead. At convention's end, sentiment was unanimous that no man could win a Presidential nomination next year without a forthright declaration in favor of a vigorous, realistic, world-minded foreign policy.

>Not one had a kind word for Franklin Roosevelt's handling of domestic affairs. Chief targets: his food policy, his labor relations.

> They were opposed to the New Deal's centralization of government. Straw-in-the-wind: one of the strongest States' rights declarations came from Utah's Herbert B. Maw, longtime coattail-rider to the New Deal.

>By overwhelming majority, they favored a renewed emphasis on private initiative in the postwar world. Nebraska's Dwight Griswold said it best: "No system of government operation can produce goods and raise living standards as does a system of private industry. ... If industry following this war is to have a chance to make good, then certainly industry must have proper laws under which it can function. . . . Our lawmakers will need to be friendly to industry. . . ."

Looking toward '44. Politically, the Governors' Conference was an all-G.O.P. show--since 1) outside the national Administration, the color of U.S. politics is strongly Republican, 2) the Democrats already know who their '44 Presidential candidate will be. (Of the States with more than 20 electoral votes, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio and California have Republican Governors; only Texas has a Democrat.)

Of the Republican Governors who stand a chance for the Presidential nomination, Ohio's John W. Bricker seemed to lose ground because of his persistent refusal to speak out on issues large or small. (Day after the conference ended, he plumped belatedly for U.S. participation in an international organization to preserve peace.)

California's vigorous Earl Warren, in his first venture eastward, gained the most in stature, as the Washington political correspondents "discovered" him. But the real glamor boy was New York's Dewey.

Tom Dewey delivered the week's most telling criticism of the Roosevelt Administration, its most cogent plea for States' rights. He urged the G.O.P. to take the lead in international planning. From the start, he occupied the conference's leading role: once a group of 200 Ohio officeholders waited outside for two hours to cheer him when he emerged.

Yet Tom Dewey, talking to newsmen, stuck to his declaration of last November that he would not be a candidate. And he risked alienating corn-country support when he urged Midwestern farmers to reduce their pig population so that they could send feed to the East, thus avert an Eastern milk famine. At this point, many a newsman decided that Tom Dewey really was not seeking the nomination. Others thought he merely reflected the belief of most patriotic citizens that a quick solution of wartime problems is more important than political ambition.

At week's end Tom Dewey--candidate or not--still led the Gallup straw poll for Republicans with 37% (he had dropped a point). Next in line: Wendell Willkie 28%, General Douglas MacArthur 15%, Bricker 10%.

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