Merger

The intellectual left had not done at all well for itself in the November elections. Brooding over the results, professional "liberals" in both the National Citizens Political Action Committee and the Independent Citizens' Committee of the Arts, Sciences and Professions convinced themselves that a merger might help. Last week in Manhattan, a joint meeting of the long-haired, politically wet-eared left heard some of the facts of political life from an independent who had made a go of it -- Fiorello LaGuardia. Said Butch:

"I have never been in any party more than 15 minutes. . . . We [liberals] are just a bunch of political prima donnas. . . . If everything doesn't go just our way, we bolt. . . . Let's not fool ourselves -- we have more than 57 varieties." Despite their differences, the country's "liberals," LaGuardia thought, could pull together for "a proper economic adjustment in our country to permit people to live properly and decently." All 57 varieties of his listeners agreed. Frank King-don's National Citizens P.A.C. voted to dissolve*; so did Sculptor Jo Davidson's I.C.C.A.S.P.

From the pooling of resentments and initials came I.C.P.A. -- Independent Citizens for Political Action. But the last two words, said westerners, had left a bad odor in voters' nostrils. So the 300 delegates reconsidered, settled on "Progressive Citizens of America," with Kingdon and Davidson as cochairmen. From Henry Wallace, who had yet to make a go of it as an independent, the amalgamated left got its keynote: "To prevent the Republican Congress and the laissez-faire big businessmen from leading us down the high road of boom, bust and war. . . ."

* Leaving the C.I.O.-P.A.C. separate, intact.

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