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It was sweltering in Chicago, but in the Knickerbocker Hotel, the directors of the Progressive Citizens of America pondered earnestly and long while the spirit of Henry Wallace hovered over them.

P.C.A. had lived in a foggy world since it was formed last December by merging Dr. Frank Kingdon's National Citizens Political Action Committee and bearded Sculptor Jo Davidson's Independent Citizens' Committee of the Arts, Sciences, and Professions (TIME, Jan. 6). P.C.A. had refused to exclude Communists, had never had too clear a program.

But the attendance at P.C.A.-sponsored rallies for Wallace had warmed P.C.A. leaders. Now, through the shimmering heat, they saw "a mounting tide of popular opposition to the policies and leadership of both political parties." A new party might be necessary, they decided, to give the voters "a clear choice between progressive and reactionary candidates for President." Main economic plank in their program: the nationalization of coal mines, railroads, and electric power.

Having decided this, they still needed a new co-chairman to stand beside Dr. Kingdon;. from Paris, Sculptor Jo Davidson had wired that he would take his beard out of politics. P.C.A, quickly found a new man: California's fast-talking Robert Kenny, ex-state attorney general, onetime unsuccessful candidate for governor, leftist Democratic opponent of the state's Democratic right wing, and, of course, an eager supporter of Henry Wallace for President.

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