Wave of the Future?

From chilly Crescent City to the fur-nacelike Imperial Valley last week the skies were clear and charged with excitement as 3,750,000 California primary voters went to the polls in the major U.S. primary election of 1958. Setting an off-year primary record, 64% of California's Republicans and 60% of the Democrats turned out. And by nightfall the big news was that California Democrats, traditionally nonpartisan types who dissipated their big margin in registration (currently 990,000) by voting for well-known Republicans in California's cross-filing primary system, this year voted the straight Democratic ticket with unity. Result: the biggest California Democratic vote in any nonpresidential primary year.

As far as party nominations were concerned, everything went according to prediction. Attorney General Edmund Gerald ("Pat") Brown of San Francisco got the Democratic nomination for Governor over nondescript Democratic opposition. Senate Minority Leader William Fife Knowland, with no G.O.P. opposition, got the Republican nomination, and will fight out the governorship with Brown in November. In the battle for a Senate successor to Bill Knowland, Northern California's Congressman Clair Engle took the Democratic nomination. And G.O.P. Governor Goodwin J. Knight, who ran for the Senate after Knowland pressured him out of another term as Governor, won the Republican nomination over San Francisco's Mayor George Christopher.

The Lesser the Greater. But in its popularity-poll aspects, the vote told a remarkable story of resurgent Democratic strength. Items:

t| In the battle for Governor, Democrat Brown 1) bested Bill Knowland in the combined Republican-Democratic total by 606,000 votes, 2) ran ahead of Knowland in nearly all of California's 58 counties, 3) got a Democrat's largest vote since 1932, 4) took 23% of the Republican primary vote from an opponent who, six years ago, won both primaries and returned triumphantly to the Senate with the most votes (3,982,448) any California candidate ever got. Knowland polled 15% of the Democratic vote. "I'm Running Independently." No sooner were last week's totals posted than California Republicans began to scratch for explanations. Did Bill Knowland fare so badly because his job in the Senate had limited him to 14 days' pre-primary campaigning? Maybe, but by the same token, Congressman Engle, also based in Washington, led his Republican opponent handsomely, though he was far less of a statewide personality. Had Knowland stirred up a hornets' nest of organized-labor opposition with his unqualified stand for a state right-to-work law? Labor certainly was out to beat him. But Republican Goodie Knight, longtime friend of organized labor, trailed badly.

The whys could better be explained on such grounds as these: 1) In 1952 California gave some semblance of partisanship to its primary ballots by requiring that cross-filing candidates be identified by party. While Republicans waxed fat on well-tried personalities, the Democrats skillfully rebuilt a party machine to take advantage of the challenge. 2) The Democratic tide is running in California as it is elsewhere around the U.S. 3) Recession and general uneasiness over world affairs stirred a protest vote of sorts. 4) Republicans were split and confused by sub-rosa battling between Knowland and Knight factions.

So angry did the Knowland-Knight vendetta become in the last days of campaigning that in some scattered areas Knight's campaign aides drummed up Republican votes for Democrat Brown to embarrass Knowland, and Knowland workers performed the same service for Knight Opponent George Christopher. In the first flush of primary humiliation California Republicans showed signs of falling farther apart. Knowland at week's end had still avoided a direct Knight endorsement; Knight similarly ignored Big Bill. Appalled at the feuding, other G.O.P. nominees pulled back.

Said Modoc County Cattleman Harold J. ("Butch") Powers, incumbent Lieutenant governor who got the biggest vote (1,757,000) on the G.O.P. ticket: "Nobody that I know of has endorsed me, and I'm running independently." Even the low-lying Nixon forces were flirting with the idea of grabbing control of the November campaign from the Knowland-ites. There was talk that Vice President Nixon would step in, not only to restore order but to protect his own presidential chances lest a Democratic victory this fall pull important California out from under him.

While Republicans bickered, new Democratic Big Wheel Pat Brown rolled merrily eastward for conferences with party hierarchy. He was received in Washington as a man who already had November under his belt. Said he, blinking through his half-rimmed spectacles: "I'm not used to anything like this." Then, remembering his role as the wave of the future, he added: "But I will be."

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