Shakedown Cruise

Testing out his 1956 campaign, Adlai Stevenson ranged across the U.S. last week on a shakedown cruise. From Detroit, Los Angeles, San Francisco and New Jersey he fired broadside after broadside at the Eisenhower Administration. On theDemocratic quarterdeck behind him stood the strategists, watching to see which salvo would be most damaging.

Sailing into Detroit's Cadillac Square for a Labor Day appearance, Stevenson drew aim on domestic issues. Before a crowd smaller in size and enthusiasm than those of other Detroit Labor Days, he blasted the G.O.P. for what he called "ugly patches of poverty and insecurity which still deny dignity, even decency, to the lives of almost one-fifth of all American families." To the Republicans he also assigned blame for reduced farm income and layoffs among Detroit auto workers. "When the Republican Secretary of Defense looks at these facts and says that he never liked kennel dogs anyway, when the Republican Secretary of the Treasury looks at them and then proposes a 5% sales tax, when the President's assistant looks at them and laughs about the right to suffer as one of the joys of a free economy--then I say it's time to take this government away from the people who know only how to count and turn it back to people who also care."

Cheers & Boos. Taking Running Mate Estes Kefauver aboard, Stevenson cruised next day to Los Angeles, where his attack on the Administration's defense and foreign policies was roundly booed by some of the 5,000 delegates and guests at the American Legion's national convention. The Legion listened silently as Stevenson angrily charged that "the claim that Democrats were responsible for the Korean war and that the Republicans stopped it ... is as miserable a fraud as has ever been used by a political party to confuse and embitter."

From legionnaires who one day later approved continuation of the peacetime draft he drew scattered applause by urging that "it is the national will . . . that the draft be ended at the earliest possible moment with the national safety." Some Democratic strategists hoped that Stevenson's end-the-draft call would draw the dramatic reaction of Ike's 1952 "I will go to Korea," but they were disappointed. The proposal was a dud; it was sharply criticized as a perilous panacea that would stir up neutralism abroad and preparedness letdown at home.

In contrast to his cool reception from the Legion, Adlai enjoyed a seven-minute, banner-waving, snake-dancing demonstration through the aisles by 1,500 delegates when he appeared at the International Association of Machinists' convention in San Francisco. Said he: "I've concluded after this demonstration to accept your nomination." In San Francisco Stevenson experienced another pleasure: ending 22 months' Army service, son Borden, 24, rejoined his father and brothers, Adlai III, 25, and John Fell, 20. Reunited after a 15-month separation, the Stevenson family went to the I.A.M. convention and flew home to Chicago together.*

Not G.O.P. but G.Y.P. Before 5,000 Ohio Democrats gathered in Columbus' shiny veterans memorial hall for their state convention, Stevenson banged still another salvo at the G.O.P. Across the U.S. he had found a feeling "of having been left out of what has been going on in the nation's affairs, a feeling that the administration now in Washington doesn't seem to know what people's problems are or doesn't understand them if it does know, or doesn't really care when it does understand."

In Palisades Park, N.J. Stevenson fired on. "Apparently the Republicans think we are not playing the game unless we echo their fatuous complacency," he said. "Well, I intend to go right on acting like a Democrat and an American, calling for improvement where I think improvement is needed." He had some thoughts about where it was needed: "It's no longer the G.O.P. but the G.Y.P., and you know what that spells." Attacking Republican "corruption" in New Jersey, Illinois and Pennsylvania, Stevenson said: "I wish this contagion of Republican misconduct and corruption were confined to state governments. It is not. It has marked the Eisenhower Administration from start to finish."

At week's end, after logging 5,619 miles, Adlai Stevenson ended his shakedown and hove to for an inspection of its accomplishments--such as they were. Reverting to a 1952 practice, Adlai had remained up far into the morning hours to polish his speeches. Once polished at the edges, they sometimes grew dull in the middle. For the most part, audience reaction had been tepid. There was considerable editorial criticism that his cries had become too shrill. Most important of all, there was no evidence that any direct and demolishing hits had been scored by the wild shakedown salvos.

*At week's end the boys disengaged themselves from the campaign caravan, prepared to return to school. All three will continue studies at Harvard, visit their Princetonian father on campaign weekends.

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