The Spirit of '52

It was a week that might have been plucked out of the 1952 campaign. President Eisenhower moved fast, covered 2,000 miles in the space of 48 hours. He spoke often to cheering audiences. Perched on the back seats of shiny convertibles, he rode through streets swirling with confetti and draped in bunting, waving to the crowds. He patted the backs of deserving candidates. In flight, he worked on speeches, changed his clothes, catnapped. For Ike, it was more than a flashback to 1952: it was the harbinger of things to come. In the next seven months, until the elections of 1954 are history, his weeks will be filled with more of the same.

Respects for the Daughters. The President interrupted his peaceful spring vacation and flew north from Georgia for a speech before the American Newspaper Publishers Association in Manhattan. When he boarded the plane, Ike wore grey flannel slacks and a natty blue jacket; when he set down in Washington two hours later, he was clad in a sober dark blue suit, ready for business. In his brief (62 min.) stopover in the capital, Ike paid his respects in Constitution Hall to the Daughters of the American Revolution, who gave him an uproarious welcome, listened raptly to his off-the-cuff remarks, then went back to the business of passing resolutions, some of them aimed at Eisenhower policies.

In New York City, on the drive into Manhattan from LaGuardia Airport, a police helicopter hovered over the presidential car, a detail of 1,000 policemen guarded the President and his travel route. At the dinner, Ike looked beamingly relaxed, his starched, gleaming shirt front and white tie accentuated his healthy tan, and he fairly leaped to his feet to lead the applause for ex-President Herbert Hoover. When a cadet chorus from West Point serenaded him with its version of Once in Love with Amy (amended to "Mamie"), Ike chuckled with delight. But when his turn came to speak, the President was as sober as his words.

Lesson from Lincoln. "Mankind hungers for peace," he told the publishers. "This universal hunger must be satisfied. Either the nations will build a cooperative peace, or, one by one, they will be forced to accept an imposed peace, now sought by the Communist powers as it was by Hitler." Free men can have such a peace, he said, only if they will cooperate: "It is not a question of turning the press, radio, television and newsreels into media of sugar-coated propaganda, 'selling' America to the Frenchman, France to the German, and Britain to the American. It is quite different from that . . . For understanding, we need the facts and the perspective within which they fit ... Free men do not lose their patience, their courage, their faith because the obstacles are mountainous, the path uncharted. Given understanding, they invariably rise to the challenge."

After his address, Ike flew back to Washington for a night's rest at the White House. Next morning he was off again, for Kentucky. With him aboard the Columbine was able John Sherman Cooper, who faces as tough an election fight as any GOP Senator next fall, with the venerable (76) Veep, Alben Barkley, as his opponent. At Fort Knox, Ike reviewed an impressive parade of tanks to the roaring accompaniment of a 21-gun salute. At Elizabethtown (pop. 5,800), Ike and Cooper rode under soggy skies through swarming streets in a red Lincoln convertible. Again and again, Ike responded to the curbside cheers with his famed two-armed victory salute. At the Lincoln National Historical Park near Hodgenville, the President toured the tiny one-room log cabin which is believed to be Lincoln's birthplace (it was Eisenhower's addition to the itinerary). For the large crowd that gathered on the lawn outside the shrine, Ike had a pointed lesson from Lincoln's life. "I would like to remind you of the methods he used in leadership. You can find no instance when he stood up in public and excoriated another American."

In Hodgenville (pop. 1,700), Ike lunched at the local Women's Club, admired a cheese pudding so much (he ate two helpings) that he asked for and got the recipe.* "He ate," said one of the ladies contentedly, "like he hadn't eaten in a couple of days." Then Ike & Co. returned to Fort Knox for the flight to Lexington. At the Blue Grass Airport, along with Governor Lawrence Wetherby, was an unexpected welcomer: Alben Barkley. Ike and the Veep swapped grins, shook hands amiably. Lexington offered more crowds, cheers, a Negro girls' brass band, bunting and streamers. It looked more and more like a campaign. At Transylvania College, Ike dedicated the new library, gave a rambling speech to an audience of 6,000 seated in folding chairs on the campus. Very much in evidence beside him on the platform was John Cooper (Barkley had to take a second-row seat). After a quick tour of the new library, Ike said goodbye to Cooper and Kentucky, flew back to Augusta for two more days of vacation before returning to Washington this week, where a backlog of appointments and work awaited him. Soon there would be more trips around the country in aid of his party. For the President, the 1954 campaign had begun.

Last week and this week the President also:

P: Asked General James Van Fleet to go to the Far East as his personal representative (with the civilian rank of ambassador), to seek ways & means of stiffening anti-Communist resistance in Asia. For Van Fleet, an old hand at repairing anti-Communist dikes (in Greece, Korea), the new assignment may well be his toughest.

P: Got anti-discrimination action from his Committee on Government Contracts. Henceforth, announced the committee, all firms doing contractual business with the Federal Government must satisfy the President's rigid non-discrimination standards by inserting in their contracts the sentence, "In connection with the performance of work under this contract, the contractor agrees not to discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, religion, color or national origin."

P: Welcomed the governors of 47 states and of Alaska, Guam, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands to Washington (for a conference) at a full-dress White House dinner.

P: Greeted the annual convention of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce with some confident words: "A long face never solved any difficult problem. As you approach [the problems of today] you must do so in the certainty that you are striving for the positive factors of happiness . . . and not in the mere negative idea that we are avoiding destruction or disaster this one day."

*In a baking dish, place a layer of rolled cracker crumbs, moisten well with a medium cream sauce. Add a layer of grated American cheese, a layer of grated pimentos and a layer of grated hard-boiled eggs. Repeat layers, top with buttered crumbs. Bake until pudding is heated thoroughly.

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