Stassen's Shocker

Blond, burly young Governor Harold Edward Stassen tossed a time bomb into Minnesota politics last week. If re-elected in November, he said, he would serve through the legislative session, then resign in April 1943 to serve as a lieutenant commander in the Navy.

Not even the most cynical politician suspected that Governor Stassen was trying to improve his chances for the 1942 gubernatorial election; he was a cold cinch for re-election anyway. But the statement spurred all three of Minnesota's parties (Republican, Democrat, Farmer-Labor) into sudden frenzy. If Stassen is re-elected and then goes off to war the following spring, the man elected Lieutenant Governor next November will be Minnesota's Governor within six months. And, though even cynics admitted that Governor Stassen's patriotism was perfectly virtuous, they also pointed out that that virtue might well bring more than its own reward: a bemedaled young hero who had helped win World War II might look good to many a 1944 President-maker.

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