Candidates' Row

The Republican side of Candidates' Row was last week full of rumpus. The Democratic side was increasingly suave and smooth-running.

Mr. Willis. The Republican rumpus was really an explosion--the bursting of the Willis candidacy, which all along had reminded observers of the bullfrog who thought he could blow himself up to be a bull.

When the Hoover campaign entered Ohio last fortnight to take away from Candidate Willis some of the nucleus of delegates from which he had hoped to sprout a tail-end nomination like President Harding's, Candidate Willis blustered: "Personally, I have no fear of the results." He knew he was being laughed at in urbane Cincinnati, but he felt sure that, as champion orator of the Anti-Saloon League and loyal defender of the "Ohio Gang," he could count on Ohio's farmers, small-townsmen and patronage-seekers, and on big, semidry, well-organized Cleveland. His campaign manager, Col. Carmi Thompson of Cleveland, was thought to have thrilled upper Ohio, if not the whole continent, by announcing that the Willis Will-to-Win was "a pulsing, throbbing movement that is hourly gaining force throughout the country."

But the man whose privilege and duty it was to notify Candidate Willis how Cleveland felt, was not throaty Col. Thompson. It was a quiet, bald, astute, elderly person named Maurice Maschke, who for years, in his panelled study on the heights near Cleveland, has manipulated the clumsy fellows down in the city who call themselves politicians. Mr. Maschke is Ohio's National Republican Committeeman. When he wants to see the seeker or holder of an office, he is not above paying a call downtown, downstate or even down in Washington. In 1908, when Theodore E. Burton (now a Representative) was unexpectedly elected to the Senate, it was Maurice Maschke who did most of the "leg-work," but so quietly that none realized his power until the votes were counted.

When Maurice Maschke does not want to see some one, he just dictates a letter. Mr. Maschke dictated to Candidate Willis: ". . . All men who expect to be nominated for office on the Republican ticket here this fall, and the organization, almost to a unit, believe that our local political interests can best be advanced through nominating Mr. Hoover. . . ."

Mr. Maschke went to his club for a game of cards. In Washington, Candidate Willis heaved with indignation. ". . . In view of understandings which we have had," he wrote to Mr. Maschke, "and what

I supposed to be definite assurance of your support . . . etc., etc." Candidate Willis professed not to understand that Mr. Maschke had politely dropped him. Mr. Maschke elucidated: "Senator Willis' attitude has changed completely since he first talked with me on this matter in my home in November. At that time he said he wanted the compliment of being Ohio's candidate. . . . Since then he has taken the position that none of his delegates can vote for anyone else. . . ."

The Willis letter, continuing, revealed that he, a candidate for the Presidency, had stooped to discuss patronage: "... I have played the game square. ... I can only say this, in perfect good nature, that if in this contest the organization feels that what I have done is of so little importance as not to merit consideration, I shall, of course, feel in the remaining time I am in the Senate, that I will be fully justified in following a different course.

But the card game which Mr. Maschke was playing at his club was upstate whist,* requiring brains, not downstate poker, game of bluff. "I am not interested in anything Mr. Willis says. Anything he does is all right with me. . . . I'm through writing letters. But I'm going to make a speech one of these days and when I do I'll say a few things . . . ," said Mr. Maschke.

The Willis boom finally became a hollow frogskin when three other names--Lowden, Curtis, Watson--were given out as unofficial "second choice" men for whom Willis delegates might eventually vote. This made Ohio a microcosm of Republicanism all over the country--Hoover v. the Field. Candidate Dawes had the self-respect to forbid the Willis people to include his name on their auxiliary roster, saying he was still for his friend, Candidate Lowden.

Mr. Hoover. While the crucial preliminary to his larger affairs was progressing in Ohio, Candidate Hoover got off a train at Key West, Fla. "I will make no active personal campaign," he said, "but will devote myself to my duties as head of the Department of Commerce." Then he had a hook baited, paid out his line and before sunset had caught five fat dolphin, "one of which," remarked an alert news-gatherer, "looked remarkably like Candidate Willis." As a flashing, gamey kingfish was being drawn in on the Hoover line, up swirled a shark and tore the prize away. Some thought, though none would say it, that the shark resembled Candidate Dawes. After three days, Candidate Hoover abruptly stopped fishing, returned to Washington. Candidate Willis was grimly glad, having arranged for Candidate Hoover to appear before the Senate Commerce Committee to be quizzed, by Candidate Willis in person, on flood control. Enroute to Washington, Candidate Hoover nailed as false a report that he would enter no primary against a Favorite Son, except in Ohio. The fact was that his handlers had just arranged a nationwide radio "hookup" for a speech he was going to make at an engineering dinner in Manhattan.

Mr. Smith. The second Col. Theodore Roosevelt lately toured the Midwest, minus his dinnercoat, frothing with expletives, trying to discredit Candidate Smith and Tammany Hall as vicious, grafting plug-uglies. Mayor James J. Walker of New York City,* with 36 pairs of spats and a plenitude of evening shirts, morning shirts, afternoon shirts and silk pajamas instead of nightshirts, all most exquisitely cared for by Robert Abel, English valet, last week set out for the Mardi Gras at New Orleans. The theory: the Midwest may think what it has a mind to about Tammany Hall, but what the South thinks of Tammany is important. At Baltimore, Tammany's dandy lived up to his word that he had "nothing to sell" by not once mentioning Candidate Smith's name.

All he did was describe Candidate Smith, talk about Tolerance and "hope for the best at Houston." Mobile, Ala., threatened to waylay the Walker train if he did not stop there. Other eager cities were Winston-Salem, Montgomery, Birmingham. In New York, Candidate Smith pursued his policy of prayerful silence, hoping that Northern Negroes would understand why none of their race can be taken to Houston as delegates; hoping that the South will not mind if National Democratic Chair-man Clem L. Shaver should be ousted and replaced by Mayor Frank Hague of Jer sey City; hoping people noticed, last week, that John William Davis said: "Al Smith ... is highly acceptable to me;" hoping that it was wise to have let word go out, and it did go last week, that Candidate Smith will withdraw from the convention if not nominated by the tenth ballot; hoping that his refusal to fly with Col. Lindbergh ("No flying for me," he said) would not make him less popular.

Mr. Reed. To Dallas, Tex., rival of Houston, went Candidate Reed, rival of Smith. Frowning like a sulky Ulysses, he began a stumping tour with stumps at Tulsa, Kansas City, Denver (Feb. 23),* Albuquerque (Feb. 24), Phoenix (Feb. 26), Los Angeles (Feb. 27), San Francisco (March i), Reno (March 3), perhaps Salt Lake City, perhaps Omaha.

* He was engaged in a match against a combined team from New York and Detroit. Mr. Maschke's team lost, 27 boards to 25. But last June, Mr. Maschke and his three mates on the Cleveland Whist Club team won the U. S. auction bridge championship, at a tournament held in Hanover, N. H.

*Last week he refused to leave politics for a $150,000 cinema sinecure.

*This date and the following ones were tentative last week.