Fights in the Front Lines

I'm no statesman, says Illinois' Republican Representative Timothy Sheehan; "I vote the way the people want me to unless they're absolutely wrong." Tim Sheehan is no exception; last week, as the U.S. congressional campaigns neared an end, candidates everywhere were trying to figure out just what the people want. There were nearly as many answers as candidates, for each congressional district is an entity, with its own problems and personalities. The contest for the House, which now has 218 Republicans and 212 Democrats (with one member unaffiliated and with four vacancies), will not be decided on great national issues. Instead, the House will go to the party that manages to come up with the most candidates who have found the answers that appeal to the folks back home.

Whose Coattails? Candidates within each party have vastly different views as to what their attitudes should be toward, for example, Dwight Eisenhower. Illinois' Republican Candidate Richard Vail thinks his constituents are against Ike. Says he: "If they want their Congressman to go down to Washington for no other purpose than to genuflect every time Ike speaks, they've got the wrong man." In Washington State, when asked if G.O.P. Representative Thor Tollefson planned to attend the President's McNary Dam dedication, an aide replied: "Hell no, Thor doesn't want Ike to run on his coattails."

But far more candidates take a position like that of Illinois' Republican Candidate Edward Jenison, a formerly staunch Taftman, who is basing his campaign on the Eisenhower popularity, has plastered Springfield with signs reading: "Help Ed, Help Ike, Help You." And California's Mrs. Harriet Enderle is only one of the many Democrats who is running on a Help Ike platform. Says she, in her campaign against G.O.P. Representative James Utt: "I have sought to persuade the voters of this district that I would be of more help to the Republican President than Mr. Utt. If that's riding on Mr. Eisenhower's coattails--and I don't think it is--then I guess that's what I've been doing."

Elemental Conspiracy. Some candidates have come up with the wrong answers--and are now in trouble. Ohio's Republican Representative Paul Schenck burned with righteous--and, he thought, politically profitable--indignation when his home town was insulted by a federal planner who said Dayton's slums were the worst on the U.S. mainland. Schenck demanded that the man be fired; then he got back home to learn that thousands of Daytonians agreed with the planner. Result: Schenck is in a close, hard race, with public housing as the biggest issue of all.

Democratic Candidates George Christopher in Missouri and Torbert Mac-Donald in Massachusetts seem almost fashioned by fate to win in their widely disparate districts. Christopher, who has nine children, is running against Republican Jeffrey Hillelson in Missouri's Fourth District. The farm vote is decisive there, and Christopher was a tenant farmer for 21 years before scraping together enough money to make a down payment on his own place. Even the elements have conspired against Hillelson. Says Christopher: "We've been plagued by one year of flood, three years of drought and two years of Benson."

In contrast to Farmer Christopher, Massachusetts' MacDonald is running in a suburban Boston district--and he certainly has the proper credentials: he is a onetime Harvard football captain; he was Senator John Kennedy's college roommate; he has a lovely wife, former movie actress Phyllis Brooks, who ladles out pink, nonalcoholic punch with complete grace and aplomb.

Flickering Eyelash. Virginia's three Republican Representatives, Richard Poff, William Wampler and Joel Broyhill, all have done well enough in Congress and are good campaigners. Yet any of them, or all three of them, might lose just because they are Republicans and Virginia is normally Democratic. North Carolina's G.O.P. Representative Charles Raper Jonas is in only a slightly better position. In New York's 21st District, Jacob Javits was the one Republican who could win. Now Javits is running for state attorney general, and Republican Candidate Floyd Cramer has little chance. The Republicans may drop a seat in California's 13th District because of the aroma left behind by G.O.P. Representative Ernest Bramblett, whose salary kickback case is still in the courts.* Pennsylvania's Representative Hugh Scott has won by an eyelash for years, all the time watching helplessly while more and more Democrats move into his district.

Nationally, some of the congressional factors seem insignificant. But in the districts, they take on awesome proportions. Illinois' Republican Representative Charles Vursell never tires of pointing with pride to the fact that, during the Korean-war-shortage period, he obtained some steel for a school in his district.

California's Democratic Candidate Ross Mclntire is given an outside chance to win only because San Diego is a Navy town and he is a retired admiral (he was President Roosevelt's doctor). Connecticut's Republican Representative Antoni Sadlak, running at large, has been helped by Polish defections from the opposition. Reason: the Democrats failed to nominate a Pole for the race. Colorado's Republican Representative J. Edgar Chenoweth is having trouble because he is blamed for the failure of the G.O.P. Congress to approve an Arkansas River reclamation bill that he himself introduced. Idaho's Democratic Representative Grade Pfost is ahead because she advocates public power at Hell's Canyon.

This is the varied stuff congressional elections are made of. Such issues call not for statesmen but for mass-mind readers. Top party strategy is still important, but it has to be custom-tailored to fit hundreds of special situations in hundreds of districts. From the sum of all this cutting and trimming and pinning will come the 84th Congress of the U.S.

* To replace Representative Douglas Stringfellow, who withdrew from the race in his district after confessing that his oft-told story of war heroism was a hoax, Utah Republicans last week nominated Henry Aldous Dixon, popular president of Utah State Agricultural College.

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