Tea & Sympathy

No sooner was Mark Hatfield elected Governor of Oregon last month than the energetic young (36) Republican dashed off a pro forma request to Oregon's eccentric Democratic Senator Wayne Morse. Said Hatfield: Would Morse, as senior member of the state's congressional delegation, arrange a conference so that Governor and delegation could discuss federal-state problems? Replied Wayne Morse: No, nothing could come of such a meeting. Undaunted, Hatfield went ahead and held his own man-to-man conferences. Last week he worked around to the other half of the Morseberger senatorial team, Morse's onetime protege and latterday whipping boy, Senator Richard Neuberger. Together Neuberger and Hatfield sat down for tea and a chat that left Wayne Morse frothing with anger.

The 40-minute conversation between Hatfield and Neuberger was polite and pleasant. While Maurine Neuberger and pert mother-to-be Antoinette Hatfield discussed draperies, Hatfield and Neuberger retired to the study of the Senator's rambling, green Portland home, spread papers on a coffee table, reached agreement on an all-for-Oregon, nine-point agenda, e.g., if increase in the state gasoline tax to assure federal highway funds, a development corporation for the Columbia River.

Oregonians agreed that the session was one more sign of Dick Neuberger's growing stature. Commented the Bend Bulletin: "Neuberger has become a good U.S. Senator from Oregon . . . Morse, on the other hand, has shown he still prefers to go the same old way, changing sides, grabbing headlines, but doing darned little effective work on major problems of Oregon." Possible long-range effect: as the hottest young Republican in the West, Governor Hatfield is almost certain to try eventually for a U.S. Senate seat. He might well decide to serve out his four-year term in the Statehouse, try for the Senate in 1962 against Morse, rather than in 1960 against Friend Neuberger.

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