Hay for the Goats

George Corley Wallace's double-knit-clad workers do not talk about alienation. Their current word for the mood of the voters is "disenchantment." Another term at the Alabama Governor's Montgomery headquarters is "protracted politics"--not a bad description of Wallace's dogged, divisive presidential candidacy, now making its third appearance in eight years. Whatever it is, it is working: Hubert Humphrey edged him by a scant 5% margin in Indiana; George McGovern has carefully ducked him in Florida and Michigan, where busing is a hot issue; Scoop Jackson could never catch fire once Wallace got going. Wallace won last week's Tennessee primary two to one, and at week's end looked like a big winner over moderate ex-Governor Terry Sanford in North Carolina.

"It's either Wallace, Humphrey or McGovern--one of us three," Wallace proclaimed cheerfully after a screaming, stomping, Confederate-flag-waving rally last week at Houston's jammed Convention Center Music Hall. After the Indiana primary, Wallace proudly noted that Theodore White (The Making of the President) had observed on TV: "This means they'll have to deal with George Wallace at the convention." Says Wallace: "I think we surely have the balance of power, but I think I have an excellent chance of getting the nomination." Really? "Or a good chance." Sure? "I mean a chance."

He now has more than 200 delegates committed or leaning to him, and nobody is looking forward more gleefully to next week's primaries in Michigan and Maryland. Michigan is the Northern state most affected by court-ordered busing, and its restless voters could well make it George Wallace's kind of country. Maryland is friendly Border state country where he polled a solid 42% in the 1964 primary. After Michigan and Maryland, the strategy will shift toward coddling delegates from nonprimary states. He is ready to edify conventions large or small with a half-hour film and pep-talk program, and delegates will also get a pictorial biography of the candidate showing him getting an honorary degree from Troy State University, snuggling Girl Scouts, shooting skeet, chatting with cops, and even posing as Santa Claus.

On the Beach. Wallace is determined to arrive at Miami Beach with enough delegates to elbow his way into the top Democratic councils. For one thing, he wants to insist on platform planks that could include reconfirmation of Supreme Court Justices every six years and local election of U.S. district court judges. "They're going to treat me with deference," he says, "not as an individual but because of the people I represent. They better think about that, because they can't win without those folks." He still has his cutting humor, too: "I want some hotel rooms on the beach. They've given people hotel rooms on the beach who don't have a delegate."

Charles Snider, Wallace's campaign manager, offers a scenario of a deadlocked convention that turns to Wallace in an access of patriotic fervor. But there are plenty of signs that Wallace does not take his presidential candidacy all that seriously. He failed to file in California and New York, the two states with the largest delegations. His organizations in the primary states compare poorly with Humphrey's and McGovern's; his campaign manager in Indiana works nights as a freight agent at the Indianapolis airport, so he had little energy for politics. Wallace has rarely tried all-out organizational drives in nonprimary states. He explains: "The kind of people who support me are out working in the mines and on the farms. They don't have the time for organization." Some suspect that Wallace may really be angling for the vice-presidential nomination, a subject about which he displays a kind of eager coyness. Says Snider: "The Democratic hierarchy knows no way to win without George Wallace on the tickets." Wallace is almost diffident. "I don't have much strategy," he says. "I'm just putting the hay down where the goats can get it."

TIME Correspondent Jess Cook spent some time aboard Wallace's chartered Jet Commander last week, exploring the A labaman's stand on the issues. His report:

What would President George Wallace do in his first 100 days in the White House? "Well," he begins, "I'd hope the war would be over by then. If not, I'd try and wind it down. I'd go to Congress with a tax-relief bill. I'd institute a program to start screening welfare recipients. I'd start talking to our NATO allies about sharing more of the costs." The voice trails off, then brightens: "What did you think about Pennsylvania? I just made one speech." A sharp nudge. Getting down to cases with the Governor of Alabama is about as easy as getting the seeds out of cotton without a gin. On some subjects the answers come, such as they are, but for the most part--whether out of political shrewdness or intellectual boredom--Wallace is as diffuse as the clouds outside.

He would tax foundations and church commercial property, raise the personal exemption to $1,200, reduce the oil depletion allowance. Would he redistribute the wealth? "I'm not for sharing the wealth, leveling everybody. I just want everybody to pay their share." He would take the $40 billion that he claims is in the foreign aid pipeline and put it into rapid transit and superhighways. Farm price parities would go to 85%, even 90%. He is vague about his program for defense: "I'm not warlike at all. I just don't believe in gambling with American security."

If elected, says Wallace, he would put together a top staff of advisers --maybe even from Harvard. "I'm not against intellectuals, just pseudo intellectuals," he says. His campaign staff now includes three researchers and many bright aides, but he makes little use of experts. Says Wallace triumphantly: "Who's been advising Kennedy and all these Presidents? None of their advice has been any good."

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