Thunder of His Feet

The Rev. William H. Alexander bounced springily around Oklahoma last week. His mellow voice swung low to squeeze a tear, lifted lightly to pick off a laugh, soared high with holy indignation. "In this crusade," cried Bill Alexander, as background music from a choir swelled behind him, "I see the magnificent march of the living God and I hear the thunder of His feet." He meant that he was running for the Senate against the Democrats' quiet, able Congressman Mike Monroney.

Democrats watched Alexander's skillful showmanship in exasperated frustration. Big (6 ft. 3 in.), handsome, and young (35), Bill Alexander already commanded a devoted following for his dynamic sermons. In his church, dressed in a cutaway, he prowls back & forth on the platform, crouching like a boxer (he was once an excellent amateur), leaping forward to his full height, gesticulating expressively, sweeping his listeners along. Sometimes he interrupts to point out his mother. "Stand up, Mama, and let the folks see you. There's my mom," he cries, as the congregation applauds. And then he tugs at heartstrings: "You all remember little redheaded Oliver Crockett who used to sit right down there and sing so loud every Sunday. Well, you will be shocked as I was when they called me last night to say he died fighting in Korea." Bill Alexander holds the Democrats responsible for the Korean war.

On the political platform, Bill Alexander explains that sin, socialism and the Fair Deal are all the same thing. "If things go on this way, we'll all be cremated equal," he cries. Alexander, a Democrat of long standing who became a Republican last spring, has also switched from World Federalism to isolationism. He would cut off foreign aid, because it has been used to promote foreign ideologies like socialism in Britain, would get out of a U.N. where Stalin has a veto. "I want to put a Christian into the U.S. Senate," says Alexander, meaning himself, of course, and ruling out Episcopalian Monroney. Alexander's devoted congregation, Oklahoma City's First Christian Church, is even willing to continue his $12,000-a-year salary while he is there.

Not all of Oklahoma's churchgoers were equally enraptured. Many Baptists were outraged when Bill Alexander introduced billiard tables and Sunday-night dances in his church recreation hall (to keep youngsters out of trouble, he explains). Others just plain disliked his flamboyance, thought a minister had no call to go riding around on elephants and making a holy show of himself. They remembered that he was once a nightclub master of ceremonies, that he had dressed up in a clawhammer coat and cowboy boots to marry Roy Rogers and Movie Actress Dale Evans. They didn't like his cross-country jaunting in a private plane to speak at women's clubs and businessmen's conventions, an activity that gave him a tidy $40,000-a-year income in lecturing fees. Alexander paid no attention.

Last week, campaigning tirelessly, he told reporters that he was too tired to say his prayers at night. "I just say 'Lord, you know how it is,' and roll into bed."

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