Revolt

Texas Democrats went all the way. New Dealers never had a chance. Months before the Democratic state convention, smooth, affable George A. Butler, a Houston lawyer who heads the Democratic executive committee, had politicked all over Texas lining up anti-Fourth Term delegates.

When the convention opened in the granite Senate chamber of the capitol at Austin last week, George Butler had the votes to crack the whip. Every speech, every motion the New Dealers made was drowned out in boos and catcalls. When handsome, New Dealing Representative Lyndon B. Johnson hovered near the platform to prompt pro-Roosevelt speakers, the Texans shouted, "Throw Roosevelt's pin-up boy out of there. Get that yes man off the platform."

The first test came on picking a keynoter. Boss Butler's choice was onetime Governor Dan Moody, who waited outside the chamber nervously chewing a cigar. (When a friend gave him a congratulatory slap on the back, Dan Moody accidentally swallowed the butt, rushed to the drugstore for sodium bicarbonate.) Up rose Alvin J. Wirtz, red-hot Fourth Termer, to propose the name of onetime Governor James V. Allred. His voice was barely heard above the shouting. When the vote came, anti-Fourth Termers had won, 940-to-774. On a second vote, to pledge Texas electors absolutely to vote for the Democratic nominee, Fourth Termers took a worse drubbing, 951-to-695.

"God Be with You." Then came the open break. To the platform marched a Mrs. Alfred Taylor of Austin, a political unknown even among county delegates. The booing subsided. She shouted: "You've been given two opportunities to show your loyalty to the Democratic Party. I call for a bolt. All who are for Roosevelt follow me across the hall." A railroad union lobbyist grabbed up a picture of Roosevelt, and the march was on. As the convention organist played God Be with You Till We Meet Again, some 300 delegates traipsed off to the House chamber.

After one futile effort at reconciliation, the Fourth Termers organized their own party, denounced the opposition as "Republicans" and "evil men," and went on to name their own rival slate of delegates to the national convention.

"Merrily We Roll Along." In the Senate chamber, while the organist struck up Merrily We Roll Along, the anti-Fourth Termers settled down to business with a whoop & a holler. Without debate, they rushed through resolutions demanding that the Democratic national convention: 1) seat their delegates; 2) restore the old two-thirds rule; 3) go on record for white supremacy. All three resolutions had a powerful snapper: should the Democratic national convention refuse these Texas demands, then Texas' 23 electors will not consider themselves bound to vote for the Democratic Presidential nominee.

This was the key to the revolt, and the key to a new anti-Roosevelt strategy in the South.

The strategy has caught on. South Carolina Democrats cagily postponed selection of their electors until after the Democratic convention. Mississippi's Democrats, chafing under New Deal domination, promised a knockdown fight at their convention next week. Said one anti-Fourth Termer: "On the night of June 7 the name of Mississippi will be emblazoned on front pages all over the U.S."

It looked as if the Democratic convention, which only a few weeks ago seemed sure to be cut & dried, might be a battle royal after all.

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