The Battle Starts

The battle for New York's 47 electoral votes in 1944 began last week. The state's highest court ordered that an election be held in November to pick a successor to Lieut. Governor Thomas W. Wallace, a Republican, who died last July.

In almost any other state such a by-election for a relatively unimportant position would have little national meaning. But in New York, home state of Franklin Roosevelt and Thomas E. Dewey, it is full of significance.

Much more than the lieutenant-governorship is at stake. Closely tied up with the election are: 1) the prestige of Franklin Roosevelt and the Fourth Term movement; 2) the Presidential aspirations of Tom Dewey, front-runner in the race for the 1944 G.O.P. nomination.

Should a Democrat win, it would spike any attempt to draft Tom Dewey at next year's G.O.P. convention. Reason: he could not afford to turn the state over to a Democrat. Such a result would also give Democrats a chance to boast that the Republican tide which set in last year with Tom Dewey has begun to ebb.

A Republican victory might have even more dramatic effects on the saga of Tom Dewey. He will campaign for the G.O.P. candidate. Franklin Roosevelt will throw his prestige and political power behind the Democrat. If Tom Dewey can win that fight, his name will grow great among the delegates to the Republican national convention, sitting to name a candidate who has even a fighting chance to head off the Fourth Term.

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