The Ev Show

"Every man must change his views as times and events change." says Senate, Minority Leader Everett McKinley Dirksen, invoking the golden tones that make him one of the few orators left on Capitol Hill who can still entice a quorum into, the press gallery. In more than a quarter of a century in the House and Senate, Dirksen has changed his position from time to time on such vital matters as foreign policy, foreign aid. military matters and agricultural legislation. But where less nimble politicians would have tripped. Ev Dirksen, at 66, is soft-shoeing his way across the New Frontier with greater success than ever. His qualities of flexibility, political shrewdness, willingness to com promise, and above all the realization that times and events do change, have made him the most effective Senate Republican leader in years.

Upset. Dirksen comes up for re-election this November. Mesmerized by Dirksen's rhetoric, his disheveled thatch of white hair and his prominence on the na tional scene, Illinois voters have already sent him to the Senate twice (he spent 16 years in the House). This year Dirksen will face seven-term Democratic Congressman Sidney Yates, 52, an energetic liberal picked by Chicago Mayor Richard Daley's powerful political machine.

Last week, in Illinois' primary elections, the results indicated that Dirksen will be a hard man to beat. While Dirksen ran up a 7-to-1 plurality (totaling 700,000 votes) against his token G.O.P. opponent, Democrat Yates ran into unexpected trouble. Not only did his "token" opponent, a perennial also-ran named Lar Daly, compile 200,000 votes, but also the Daley machine, on which Yates's chances in November depend, was handed a stunning bond issue defeat. In a tax-time tantrum, more than 45% of Chicago's voters turned out to reject $66 million worth of proposed bonds for urban renewal, sewers and the like; Mayor Daley had predicted that the bond issues would pass by at least 2 1/2 to 1.

Out-photoed. Little known even after seven terms in Congress, Yates faces the hard task of competing with Dirksen for exposure. Last week he rushed to Washington to have his picture taken with President Kennedy--only to be out-photoed by Dirksen, who was seen with the President at a congressional party and a ball game. Yates has contrasted his record of 97% support of Kennedy with Dirksen's 27%--but such statistics are meaningless, and Dirksen is vastly appreciated by the White House as a highly responsible, often cooperative member of the loyal opposition. Last fortnight, for example, Dirksen dramatically and successfully intervened against fellow Republicans on behalf of the President's United Nations bond issue proposals. Cried Ev: "I haven't forfeited my faith in John Fitzgerald Kennedy."

In fact, Dirksen has become so friendly with the Kennedy Administration (despite his frequent jabs at it in the Senate and on the weekly "Ev and Charlie Show") that many in his own party are openly disgruntled. "That fellow in the White House has certainly got Dirksen's number," says a top national Republican. "Ev goes down there to a foreign policy briefing and he comes out with stars in his eyes." Dirksen's answer to such criticism is that "you start from the broad premise that all of us have a common duty to the country to perform. Legislation is always the art of the possible. You could, of course, follow a course of solid opposition, of stalemate, but that is not in the interest of the country."

On Hand. This sort of talk has given the Kennedy Administration some serious doubts about whether it would really be a good thing to have Ev Dirksen defeated in November--particularly since his replacement as Minority Leader would almost certainly be tougher for the Administration to work with. But Kennedy feels obliged to campaign for Yates, and the White House has already promised Mayor Daley that the President will appear in Illinois in September and perhaps again in October or November. When Kennedy does get to Illinois, no one would be surprised to see Ev Dirksen at the airport-smiling for photographers as he bids the President hello.

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