Ready for Romney

Outwardly, the word from Michigan's George Romney on the 1968 Republican presidential nomination has not changed in recent weeks: "I want to take a long, hard look before deciding." Even as Romney-for-President clubs sprang up in Utah, Texas and Michigan, Romney insisted publicly that he was preparing only for his gubernatorial inauguration this week, and that he will wait six months before he tells a breathless world whether or not he will run.

"Social Visit." Fair enough. Still, hidden from the public's view, Romney is running--and running very hard. Last week, for example, the Governor turned up missing one day from the Statehouse in Lansing. When Michigan newsmen asked where he was Romney's press aide said that he was in New York on a "social visit." Sure enough, when New York reporters finally found him, he had been "socializing" for seven intensive hours in a suite at Manhattan's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. With him was a crew of old political friends who would certainly make up the nucleus of his campaign staff.

On hand were former G.O.P. National Chairman Leonard Hall; J. Willard Marriott, the Mormon millionaire owner of the Hot Shoppe restaurant chain and Marriott Motor Hotels; Clifford Folger, the Washington financier who was national Republican finance chairman for the presidential campaigns of 1956 and 1960; L. William Seidman, a wealthy Michigan accountant with offices around the world, who ran unsuccessfully for state auditor on Romney's ticket in 1962; Detroit Real Estate Millionaire Max Fisher, this year's national chairman of the United Jewish Appeal. Also present were Romney's attorney, Richard van Dusen, and two of his top administrative aides, Walter DeVries and Jack Mclntosh, a onetime (1957-59) G.O.P. Congressman from Michigan.

No Idle Chatter. Although Romney hustled out of the Waldorf without talking to reporters, Marriott announced candidly: "All of us think he is going to be a candidate. We think Romney has a better chance than anyone else." That is not just idle chatter, for Romney's operatives have already taken several seven-league steps along the path to prepare the way for his entry as a fullblown presidential candidate.

Direct contacts on Romney's behalf have been made with Republican leaders in New Hampshire, New York, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Mississippi. The Governor's aides have already made a straw count of convention delegates; they figure that they can now count on some 500 first-ballot votes, while Nixon probably controls around 550 (required for the nomination: 667). They have solicited New York Senator Jacob Javits to suggest a speechwriter. They have borrowed New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller's research files from his 1964 attempt to get the nomination.

Romney himself has not been among the overt solicitors of delegates. But shortly after the first of the year, following his message to the Michigan legislature, he plans to set out on a political odyssey that will take him out of the state for more than 100 days in 1967.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.