Me & Jack

Resplendent in a dark blue suit and a bright white smile, Florida's Democratic Senator George Smathers, 48, last week flew home for an easy go-round of politicking. Smathers is up for re-election this year to a third term in the Senate, but the handsome, New Jersey-born Floridian has no worries. He can easily beat his two Democratic primary opponents in the May 8 primary. As for his Republican opponent in the November elections--well, Emerson Rupert is his name, but winning is not his game.

Not, at least, against Smathers, who seems to have everything going for him. In Washington, Smathers is secretary to the Senate Democratic Conference, the No. 3 man among Senate Democrats after Majority Leader Mike Mansfield and Whip Hubert Humphrey. This entitles him to have breakfast at the White House every Tuesday morning with his fellow leaders and an old friend named John Kennedy. As young men in the House, Smathers and Kennedy occupied adjoining offices, often partied together. When Kennedy got married, Smathers ushered at the wedding.

Though he makes much of his palship with the President, Smathers more often than not votes against the President's programs in the Senate; of 124 roll calls involving Administration-backed bills, Smathers last year supported Kennedy only 47% of the time. Says one Democratic leader: "Every time we talk about one of these key bills with the President, Smathers just sits there and says, 'Well, I wish I could go along with the rest of you fellows on this one, but you know I can't.

My state's just too conservative.' " Thus, in Florida, where Kennedy is far more popular than his programs, Smathers has the best of both worlds. To this he adds a public manner that can charm the nuts off the coconut palms, and, as he travels in Florida, a drawl that sounds more and more as if he had been weaned on a Dixie cup.

All this makes for an unbeatable political formula, and Smathers is not about to change it--particularly the presidential ingredient. Says he: "I don't subscribe to all of the President's political beliefs, but he doesn't expect me to be with him on everything. He understands." Then: "We see each other a lot--and sometimes we argue and he gives me hell. But we understand each other. We have a lot of fun over it."

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