The Libertyville Express

Adlai Stevenson's Libertyville Express rolled onto the main line for Chicago last week, and headed down the tracks with throttle widened and lights blinking green ahead as far as the eye could see. Only an earth-shaking derailment could keep Stevenson from rolling right into the nomination next week--probably on the first ballot.

Things began to go Adlai's way right after Estes Kefauver retired from the presidential race and attached his little red caboose to the end of Stevenson's impressive string of delegate cars (including a few sleepers). After canvassing the 54 delegations bound for the convention (see box), TIME correspondents reported results at week's end that added up to this first-ballot total (with 686 1/2 needed to nominate):

Adlai Stevenson: 666 1/2 Averell Harriman: 178 Favorite Sons & Others: 357 1/2 Fence Sitters: 170

Counting the Stevenson leaners and potential switchmen, Stevenson could emerge from the first ballot with more than 900 votes.

Veterans Together. Stevenson's triumphal, whistle-tooting week began when Estes Kefauver called a press conference in the Congressional Room of Washington's venerable Willard Hotel--the same room where he had launched his campaign last December. There, standing by accident beneath an EXIT sign and flanked by grim-faced Manager Florence ("Jiggs") Donohue and onetime Truman Attorney General J. Howard McGrath, Estes sadly read off his statement. Stevenson, "alone with me," fought his way through the primaries, said Estes; Stevenson had polled "over 600,000 votes more than I." Since Estes did not want to see a deadlock at the convention (and, by inference, the possible victory of someone who was not a veteran of the primary wars), he was withdrawing in Stevenson's favor. There were "no deals." He hoped that his delegates (estimated at 260 by Kefauver, at 200 by others) would go along with him.

The Harriman forces were stunned. Harriman had been dickering hard for Kefauver support, had. moreover, been wooing Kefauver delegates. In Chicago, when Harriman's national campaign director, Loyd Benefield, got wind of the Kefauver abdication, he worked around the clock to corral Kefauver strays, wound up with some success in such farm states as Minnesota, Wisconsin. Iowa. Iowa Democratic Chairman Jake More, Kefauverite leader of the 48-man convention delegation, announced that he was switching to Harriman. And by some mysterious magic, Harriman's convention strategist, ex-National Chairman Frank McKinney, arrived at the conclusion that Harriman would still get 450 on the first ballot.

There was no such joy in Albany, where 2,200 dutiful New York Democrats turned out for a $50-a-plate Harriman testimonial dinner. Everything seemed off-key. When Rabbi Julius K. Guttman of Troy rose to say the blessing, the band broke into Happy Days Are Here Again. Hoped for by Ave and his aides but never received: a message of good will from Harry Truman (see below).

The candidate himself pounded away during the week at his favorite argument: no "moderate" should head the Democratic ticket; only a thoroughgoing, yard-wide New Dealer has a chance to beat Dwight Eisenhower. And only Harriman stands "for the principles of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman, the only principles which will win in this campaign." (Retorted Stevenson, with an assenting nod from Eleanor Roosevelt: "I protest Mr. Harriman's claim that he has any exclusive rights to those principles.")

Strength Through Desertion. In bowing out for the presidency, Kefauver had added himself to the active list of live vice-presidential possibilities (TIME, Aug. 6)--not so much for the headlines he brought Stevenson at a critical time, but for the strength he left behind him in the critical farm states. In those states--which most Democrats admit they must carry to have a chance in November--Kefauver has the advantage of being a well-known name, of standing for 100% parity for the small farmer, of owning a live, grass-roots organization. Kefauver is not Adlai's type; the Deep South dislikes him and so does his own Tennessee delegation; congressional Democrats disown him. But the power of the November arithmetic is mighty.

Adlai wasn't talking much. He was very grateful to Kefauver for his "gracious, spontaneous expression of support." He thought Kefauver was only one among "many qualified candidates for Vice President." It was a long way from an endorsement of anybody--arithmetic or no. In fact, it was something like a friendly wave from the cab as the engineer rolls along the iron without even having to look at his pocket watch to see what time it is.

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