Buzz-Buzz In Ohio

In downtown Columbus, Ohio last week, the popular greeting was: "Have you been mentioned for Senator yet?" In Seattle, Wash., spectators along the route at the Governors' Conference parade shouted at Ohio's tousle-haired Frank Lausche: "Who are you going to pick?"

Such was the interest, in Ohio and throughout the U.S., in selection of a man to fill Robert A. Taft's Senate seat. The interest was heightened because Democrat Lausche, 57, an emotional man some times given to tears, rebuked anyone who tried to discuss the subject with him. Always deliberate about appointments, Lausche seemed likely to wait until almost everyone in Ohio was mentioned.

But while Lausche kept silent, Ohio dopesters passed the time with some fancy theorizing, based on Lausche's possible political ambitions:

P: If Lausche wants to stay on as governor, he might appoint either Toledo's Mike Di Salle, former U.S. price boss, or Cleveland's Mayor Thomas A. Burke, and thus give the appointee a running start for election in 1954.

P: If Lausche wants the Democratic nomination for President or Vice President in 1956, he might appoint a high-carat Democratic stalwart to please party powers.

P: If Lausche wants a federal judgeship, as has been rumored, he would appoint someone pleasing to the Eisenhower Administration. Names mentioned: Republican Arthur Flemming, director of the U.S. Office of Defense Mobilization (whose appointment was called "as certain as death" by the Middletown, Ohio Journal last week); Author-Farmer Louis Bromfield and General Curtis E. LeMay, head of the Strategic Air Command.

P: If Lausche wants to run for the Senate himself in 1954, he probably will appoint Burke to serve out the remaining 16 months of Taft's term and then make a deal to have Burke run for governor next year. Many an Ohio pundit believes that Vote-Getter Lausche, an independent, conservative Democrat who controls the state party organization, could win the senatorial nomination easily and beat any Republican in sight.

Before the week was out, the buzz-buzz in Ohio was amplified to a crescendo by another tidbit: Governor Lausche flew from Washington to Seattle in the presidential plane with Dwight Eisenhower. Surely, the pundits reasoned, the President and the governor talked about what everyone else in Ohio was talking about. Suppose they came to an agreement?

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