It Happened in '84

One of the traditions established by U.S. political history is that the party which elects a President also wins a majority in the Senate. Last exception to that rule was in 1884, when the voters sent Democrat Grover Cleveland to the White House in his first term and left the Senate with a Republican majority. There may well be another exception in 1952, if a Republican is elected President.

Of the 34 Senate seats to be filled this year, 20 are held by Republicans and only 14 by Democrats, five of them, from the solid South. To win control (present lineup: 50 Democrats, 46 Republicans), the Republicans must hold all 20 of their contested seats, and take three seats from the Democrats. This means that they would have to win more seats than they did in the landslide of 1946.

Democratic Soft Spots. With this handicap in mind, Republican strategists are looking hard for some Democratic soft spots. They see one in Maryland, where Democrat Herbert R. O'Conor tested the political winds and decided not to run for reelection. Leading Democratic contender for his seat is veteran Congressman Lansdale G. Sasscer. The Republicans' hottest prospect: popular fifth-term Congressman J. Glenn Beall. At this stage, the Republicans are ahead.

In Michigan, ex-Newsman Blair Moody faces the natural trouble of a Democrat who took over a Republican's expiring term in a Republican state. Moody has been cruising along the byways to get acquainted, standing before audiences for hours answering questions. The greatest threat to him is that the Republicans may get a candidate named Vandenberg. One possibility is Arthur H. Vandenberg Jr., son of the man whose death last year sent Moody to the Senate. A less likely possibility: General Hoyt Vandenberg, 53, chief of staff of the U.S. Air Force and nephew of the late Senator. The general's term is expiring, and some Michigan politicians have been talking to him about the Senate.

Connecticut's Democratic Senator William Benton, whose Ediphone has been whirling out hasty comment on a wide variety of issues while he neglected his political fences at home, is in trouble. Republican Banker Prescott Bush of Greenwich, who lost to Benton by only 1,102 votes in 1950, is warming up. If a Republican President is elected, Benton almost certainly will fall.

G.O.P. Weak Points. But there are weak points in the Republican ranks, too. In Nevada, long-winded George ("Molly") Malone, who spoke more words on the Senate floor last year than any other member, will have to do some fast talking to hold his seat. His probable opponent: Alan Bible, a handsome Reno lawyer and protege of Democratic Senator Pat McCarran.

Most of the Senate races will be affected by the presidential vote, and many a Republican leader feels that Nominee Dwight Eisenhower would help more candidates than Nominee Bob Taft. In Massachusetts, that fact is especially important. Senator Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., the Eisenhower campaign manager, could be expected to ride in easily with the general. But he may have trouble if Taft is nominated. Young (34) John Kennedy, a third-term Democratic Congressman from Boston, and son of Joseph P. Kennedy, onetime U.S. Ambassador to Britain, is tentatively eying Lodge's seat.

No senatorial contest has received more national attention than Missouri's. There James Kem, arch-conservative Republican, is expected to go after a second term. Attorney General J. E. Taylor, the only candidate so far for the Democratic nomination, offers no serious threat to Kem. But now Democrats are talking about W. Stuart Symington, the retiring RFC boss. Some liberal Republicans who don't like Kern's record, and a good many businessmen who normally would vote Republican, might go for Symington, onetime St. Louis industrialist. There has been speculation, too, that Kem might have to face the old master himself, that Harry Truman might step down and run for Kern's seat.

As the Senate campaigns warm up, arithmetic rather than political trends provides the greatest odds against the election of a Republican Senate this year. Perhaps the G.O.P.'s year won't come until 1954. Then, 22 Democratic and only ten Republican seats will be at stake.

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