Ike Takes Over

Dwight D. Eisenhower squared his shoulders and told reporters: "A man in my position must take over."

At 8:15 one morning, rested and fit after his vacation, he appeared at his desk in Denver's Brown Palace Hotel, called a staff meeting. First of all, said Ike, he wanted everyone to wear "a ready grin . . . Confidence is required in any battle. I'm confident and I want all of you to be confident. In Europe, I sent some otherwise able leaders home because they went around all the time with long faces."

All week, Eisenhower conferred with advisers from all over the U.S., including Minnesota's Representative Walter Judd (who came to Denver to brief Ike on general policy issues), Paul Hoffman (economics), Kansas' Representative Clifford Hope (farm policy). At week's end, Ike sat down with 31 advisers to a major strategy conference. Ike began to hammer out the ideological positions he will take on various issues.

Strategy. Ike will take no chances and campaign as hard as possible. He promised to appear "in every nook and cranny . . ." Ike will campaign mostly by train, but there will also be some plane trips. He will make a maximum number of TV appearances.

Taft-lke Unity. Eisenhower made serious efforts to bring the Taftmen firmly into the campaign. To Denver came Senators Hugh Butler of Nebraska and Everett Dirksen of Illinois, both strong Taft backers. Both left announcing complete unity. At Columbus, Vice Presidential Nominee Dick Nixon spoke to the Ohio State Republican convention, composed mostly of Taftmen, who cheered him when he denounced Stevenson as "a captive candidate . . . Harry Truman's candidate."

Organization. The eager but hitherto uncoordinated groups around Eisenhower were being pulled together. The Citizens Committee for Eisenhower, whose enthusiastic political amateurs had whipped up Eisenhower support before the "convention, now wanted an independent role in the campaign.. Committee leaders argued that independent voters and disgruntled Democrats would not be attracted to the regular party organization. The citizens and the pros reached a compromise: the national committee will have the right to coordinate all activities, but the Citizens Committee will retain its separate identity.

The Republican campaign setup:

National Chairman (in effect, campaign manager): Arthur Summerfield.

Eisenhower's Personal Chief of Staff: Governor Sherman Adams of New Hampshire.

Eisenhower's Working Staff: includes Arthur Vandenberg, executive assistant; James Hagerty, press secretary; Abbott Washburn, correspondence secretary.

Republican Strategy Boafd, headed by Summerfield: Senator Dirksen; Representative Leonard Hall of New York, a Deweyman and chairman of the House Campaign Committee; Wayne Hood, Republican state chairman in Wisconsin; Robert Humphreys, former I.N.S. writer and Newsweek editor, in charge of publicity; Wesley Roberts, Kansas public-relations man who did brilliant work for Ike at Chicago, in charge of organization.

The Citizens Committee (2,900 Eisenhower clubs, 250,000 volunteer workers): headed by Seattle's Walter Williams and New York's Mary Lord.

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