"Upon the Winter Air"

On a fine fall day last week New York's Senator James M. Mead stood alone at the Hyde Park grave of Franklin Roosevelt. He stood there for a space, bare head bowed. Then 60-year-old Jim Mead, Democratic candidate for governor, went on to Poughkeepsie, where he spoke at the Nelson House, eulogizing the late President.

"My words will pass from this scene like breath upon the winter air," he told glum Dutchess County Democrats. "And so they are unimportant, except to quicken the spirit of deep affection that Franklin Roosevelt inscribed in the hearts of his fellow men."

His words may have quickened the affection of men for F.D.R., but they did not quicken the hopes of his fellow Democrats. From Poughkeepsie, Jim Mead plodded on through the last days of his all but lost campaign. All around him lay the decay of the once-great organization which had kept the Democrats in control for 14 years.

In another part of the state Mead's opponent, Tom Dewey, hustled on through his last days before election, breezing through Elmira, Fort Niagara, Binghamton, Rochester, Syracuse, Buffalo. He was mellow, he was casual, he even had a touch of bonhomie; he was scathing of his opponents' "ignorance." He acted as though he had the election in the bag. Mrs. Dewey went with him, wearing an expression of loving-kindness ennobled by boredom. Dewey's immediate objective was reelection as governor. His ultimate goal: the White House.

Strip, Rescind, Scrutinize. In this hopelessness and exhilaration Democrats and Republicans around the country went into the closing days of one of the strangest political campaigns on record. Republicans were confident now that they would win more than enough seats to give them control of the House of Representatives. Massachusetts' Joe Martin, already seeing himself Speaker of the House, went on the radio to tell what he would do.

He would call a meeting of the G.O.P. Steering Committee immediately. He would strip the Executive branch "of its emergency and wartime powers . . . take the meddling hands of political despots out of the kitchens of America, out of the farmhouses, out of the grocery stores," rescind some of "those 76,541 directives, grants, orders, permissions and prohibitions issued by the Executive Department," look into "the waste and graft," lower the taxes, and scrutinize foreign affairs for "secret executive agreements." Said Joe Martin: "We Republicans will be ready."

But on the Democratic side there was mostly silence. On the recommendation of his party leaders, Harry Truman did not even make a breath on the cold, unfriendly air. It was one of the strangest performances on record: with defeat staring his party in the face, Harry Truman figuratively taped his lips, apparently did not even intend to stump for hard-pressed Democrats in Missouri. One of his visitors last week reported that he was already talking in terms of what he will do when Republicans run the House.

The Freeze. But Henry Wallace spoke. He arrived with fanfare in California and spoke there on behalf of senatorial candidate Will Rogers Jr. (see below), who nevertheless kept the ousted Secretary of Commerce at arm's length. And even Wallace's words were strained through a screen: "It seems to me very definitely that our foreign policy has changed for the better." And his call to arms was not of a kind to arouse much ardor: "I know there are places where the Democratic candidates are not the ones to be proud of. I ask you to consider what is your choice."

P.A.C. was so restrained it was barely audible. Most A.F.L. leaders simply froze. The only labor leader who made any noise was labor's Great Gargoyle, John L. Lewis, who threatened a miners' walkout (see Labor).

The Voice. It was as if the Democrats realized that nothing they could say would do any good, anyhow. It was as if the Democrats hoped that in the silence an old voice might be heard again--Franklin Roosevelt's.

Occasionally it was heard. It was dubbed into a 40-minute film, Deadline for Action, put out by the Red-wired United Electrical Workers and run off in C.I.O. union halls. Said the voice of F.D.R.: "We ... are not making all this sacrifice of human effort and human lives to return to the kind of world we had after the last World War." But the film was really a buckshot charge against U.S. business; it deftly followed the Communist line.

P.A.C. radio recordings, distributed to Democratic candidates everywhere, invoked the late great name:

When F.D.R. was President, he talked right up and said:

"We've got to keep the prices down so folks can buy their bread."

The people heard him talkin' and they got an OP A

That kept the cost of living from runnin' clear away.

But it was no good and the Democrats knew it. The campaign rolled on to what exuberant Republicans saw as a triumphant end.

Many professionals, on both sides, had already discounted the election and were looking to 1948. The two men they watched were Tom Dewey and Henry Wallace. If Dewey rolled up the impressive victory which the polls were predicting for him, he would be the man all other Republicans would have to beat for the nomination. And Henry Wallace certainly hoped that he would either be, or control, the Democratic choice. Then the real battle would be on.

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