A Great Shake-Up

By rights, it was time for one great national yawn. The big eye of television was dull and glazed after keeping the U.S. up late through two political conventions. The last balloon had drifted to the floor of convention hall, the last "never before" was but an echo, and the last "man who" sagged into contemplation. But the U.S. was wide-awake. The conventions of 1960 had shaken up the country.

Amid the oompah and the hoopla that made for good box office, both major parties had reached down deep to their roots to explain themselves. By challenging the past and the future, they brought both into better focus. By searching their souls and summoning their followers to sacrifices, the politicos--in some wondrous alchemy of the tired convention process--had provoked the nation into contemplation of its character, its purpose and its goals.

Acknowledged Need. In the sense of long-range political dialogue, the Democrats posed the great questions. Three weeks ago in Los Angeles they condemned the Eisenhower Administration for sloth at home and ineptness abroad. They outlined the campaign's three main issues:

P: In economics, they demanded that Federal Government force the growth of the economy to pay for a welfare program that would go far to erase the last vestiges of hardship and inequity in U.S. life.

P: In defense, they charged that the U.S. had slipped to a position of second best,

P: In foreign affairs, they stressed the urgency of peace and disarmament, blamed the Eisenhower Administration for the U-2 imbroglio, implied that Ike was all too responsible for the summit failure.

And in his acceptance speech, Candidate Kennedy swiped at Vice President Nixon's record with a vicious perversion of Abraham Lincoln,* and scoffed at President Eisenhower for opening "his career by going to Korea [and concluding] it by staying away from Japan."

So provoked, the Republicans rang out their answers in Chicago last week with a clarity that surprised even themselves. Under the prodding of New York's Governor Nelson Rockefeller they accepted the challenge of economic growth, but located its roots in a free, incentive economy that made for greater liberty. They acknowledged the need for new defenses to meet new threats and abandoned any notion that budget limitations should control security--but found the basis for real security in a will to win the cold war. They rejected in a chorus of "No!" heard round the world the suggestion that the U.S. was second best. And President Eisenhower's fighting defense of his policies put an end to the post-summit period of above-the-battle presidential calm that had lent a faint color of truth to the Democratic charges.

Undisputed Control. Thus auspiciously launched, the 1960 campaign promised to be the most stirring in recent history. Both Jack Kennedy and Dick Nixon had taken undisputed control of their respective parties. Neither is a dominating personal figure like Franklin Roosevelt or Dwight Eisenhower, but each combines rare political talent with principle, and an ability for self-expression that could lead to a classic national debate on issues.

Their vice-presidential running mates, Republican Henry Cabot Lodge and Democrat Lyndon Johnson, are men of equally high quality. The issues should be those of enduring national interest, for in this day of intense press and TV coverage, a candidate can no longer be one thing in one region and another thing in another.

The face-to-face debate begins next week, when the Senate convenes for the special congressional session (the House convenes a week later). Jack Kennedy has pledged to unfurl a multi-billion-dollar legislative program--more for mutual security, housing, education, and generous medical aid for the aged--and then he will dare the Republicans to spurn it or President Eisenhower to veto it.

Realist Nixon well knows that the going will be tough. The Republicans are "starting behind," said he last week, and anyone who thinks otherwise has "a hole in his head." Not only do Democrats outnumber Republicans roughly 3 to 2 across the land, but Nixon's private polls show him trailing Jack Kennedy as much as 2 to 1 in urban centers that are usually Democratic. Nixon predicts that the election will be "the closest in this century in America." (Mark to shoot at: Woodrow Wilson's 1916 victory over Charles Evans Hughes by 591,385 popular and 23 electoral votes.)

Close or no, it seemed to be an election that the U.S. would surely benefit from.

* "We know that our opponents will invoke the name of Abraham Lincoln on behalf of their candidate," orated Kennedy, "despite the fact that his political career has often seemed to show charity towards none and malice for all."

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