On to 1968

An exterminator worried about state regulation of his trade. A banker wanted more state deposits. A trucker complained about the weights and measures system at highway truck stations. One by one, the Arkansans recited their problems to their Governor, who met them privately, took notes, offered explanations. Incessantly mopping his broad face in the summer heat, Winthrop Rockefeller for four weeks has been roaming his adopted state, from the northeast, where the Ozark foothills blend into the Mississippi River flatlands, to the southwest plains, where watermelon is king. Last week he toured the Central Valley, a region studded with pulp and paper mills. The week before, he turned up in the high plateau country of the northwest, where he paid a call in Huntsville on Orval Faubus, his predecessor. Instead of lodging a complaint, Citizen Faubus heard one: Rockefeller had not received the past two issues of Faubus' newspaper, the Madison County Record.

By September, the nation's richest Governor (unless it's Brother Nelson in New York, who, like Winthrop, has a private fortune of more than $200 million) will have planted his high-heeled cowboy boots in every Arkansas county during the course of 14 "nonpolitical" regional tours. Said a state tax official in Pocahontas, a town of old cotton and new industry: "This is the first time that anybody, even a tax commissioner, has visited with us." With ease, Rockefeller was redeeming last fall's campaign slogan: "When Win Wins, He'll Be Back."

Frustrations. During his six months in office, the state's first Republican Governor in 93 years has been somewhat less successful in opening the "era of excellence" that he talked about in his inaugural. "We're making progress every bit as fast as I hoped," he insists, "though quite obviously there have been some frustrations."

Frustration has sometimes seemed to exceed progress. Rockefeller's term started with a bitter aftertaste of Faubus' twelve-year reign. The Democratic legislature--there are only three Republicans, v. 132 Democrats, in the two houses--confirmed 93 of Faubus' lame-duck appointments to state agencies, then attempted to block Rockefeller's nominees. The Governor had to go to court to make good an appointment to the public service commission. Like Arkansas Razorbacks crunching opposition ball carriers, the legislators downed one Rockefeller proposal after another: an audit of the corruption-tainted highway department, reform of jury selection, a $1-an-hour minimum wage, regulation of state employees' political activities. In a private aside that became embarrassingly public, Rockefeller said of the legislators: "I wish the bastards would go home."

Psychological Advantage. Yet there have been some victories. When Rockefeller cracked down on illegal gambling in Hot Springs, the lawmakers responded with a bill to legalize casino operations. Rockefeller vetoed the measure and made the veto stick despite a threat to override it.* He won a much needed increase in teachers' salaries, a raise in welfare payments, creation of a department of administration to modernize operations of the state's 187 agencies, and establishment of a commission to study constitutional revision.

More important than any specific achievement, however, is the psychological edge over the legislature that Rockefeller seems to have established. The Arkansas Gazette, which broke its Democratic tradition to support Rockefeller last year, editorialized that the Democrats antics "strengthen the argument for a two-party system in the legislature as well as in gubernatorial politics." When the Governor visited Pocahontas, Farmer John Waldron, a Democrat, observed: "The way the legislature 'did' Rockefeller down there helped him a lot around here."

Rockefeller plans to summon a special session of the legislature next winter to press his reform programs anew. That will be merely a prelude to his 1968 campaign for a second two-year term, in which he can ask for the electorate's assistance in solving his problems, e.g. by sending him some new legislators.

* Some covert gambling, however, does continue. Last week Democratic Representative Wright Patman of Texas, who dislikes gambling--and Rockefellers--described Winthrop as a "cufflinks cowboy" who had failed to suppress gambling as promised.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.