The Junior Partners

In Twin Falls, Idaho, Vice President Spiro T. Agnew attended a cocktail party for the men he has often used as foils: the reporters who cover him. Relaxed, smiling and exchanging wisecracks, he accepted the gag gift of a policeman's whistle from newsmen. That night, as he was heckled at the College of Southern Idaho, Agnew suddenly blew a piercing blast with his new toy and shouted: "Wrong!" The startled audience gasped, then broke into loud applause.

Bursting into a swimsuit factory in Passaic, N.J., Sargent Shriver merrily shook hands with sewing-machine operators, accepted a bouquet of roses without looking silly, then responded to a dare by stitching up a bikini top. As delighted women crowded around to squeeze Shriver's arms and pummel him, one of his aides, Mark Shields, said happily: "It's carnal. Positively carnal."

In this unexciting campaign, it is the junior partners rather than the presidential candidates who lend color to the proceedings. Agnew, obviously seeking a new image, has for the most part dropped his old shrillness in favor of a more judicious, lighthearted and confident style. Shriver, oddly, often comes across almost as bombastic as the old Agnew; yet there is an ebullience about him that makes him the liveliest of the top four candidates.

Traveling in his comfortable jet, Michelle Ann III (named for his granddaughter), Agnew is campaigning at a rather stately pace, but nevertheless, he has hit 32 states and covered more than 35,000 miles. He sprinkles his stump speeches with light sallies. In Columbus, Ga., Agnew contended that "McGovern couldn't carry the South if Rhett Butler were his running mate." Firing at Ted Kennedy, Agnew replied in Idaho to Kennedy's criticism of the Administration's farm policy by terming him "that great son of the soil," and adding: "They learn a good deal about farming in Harvard Yard."

Although Agnew has chosen his appearances before young people with care, selecting such conservative campuses as Brigham Young University and Michigan's Calvin College, he has been harassed by hecklers at many stops. When some students at Calvin College chanted, "Dump Nixon!", Agnew said "Since you are unable to think independently, I'll lead," and waved his arm to direct the chorus. The crowd loved it. In Syracuse, he gibed at demonstrators who were walking out on his talk: "Bye! Don't forget your bottle before you go to bed."

Agnew attacks McGovern by implying that the Democratic candidate favors the coddling of criminals, permissiveness toward drugs, loafing on welfare and the street antics of radicals. At other times, he haughtily dismisses Nixon's opponent. "McGovernism," he predicts, "will be nothing more than an obscure footnote in the pages of history." Still often patronizing and rigidly righteous, Agnew has changed more in style than in substance.

Shriver has the advantage of being a fresh face. He was thrust unprepared into the campaign, speaking out too sharply, before he had mastered the issues. When he said bluntly that Senator Thomas Eagleton had been dropped from the ticket because he had become a burden, Shriver was chastised by McGovern's staff. "We've got no control over him," one strategist lamented. But Shriver, a hard worker and quick study, soon got in tune.

Working as many as 21 hours a day and flying about in his chartered jet, The Fighting Lucky Seven, named after his family, Shriver sets a frantic pace. He draws on his past connections in the poverty program, the Peace Corps and Kennedy political campaigns to carry out his assignment of bringing defecting Democrats back into the fold. He appeals for money one night at a dinner of chic artists and intellectuals at Author William Styron's exurban Connecticut home. Next night he tours a Spanish area of Brooklyn, plugging McGovern plans to ease poverty, and drawing excited cries of "!Ese es! !Ese es!" (He's the one! He's the one!).

Bucks or Bombs. Shriver's crowds have been smaller than those of the other three ticket headers. His staff unabashedly admits, "We're No. 4." Yet his listeners respond enthusiastically, as when he attacks political spying by Republican agents. "The era of Big Brother is arriving not in 1984 but in 1972!" Shriver cries. "If he knew this was going on, President Nixon is guilty of immoral and illegal acts. If he did not, President Nixon has proved himself impotent and incompetent." Although he draws cheers, Shriver can be accused of an Agnewism when he denounces Nixon as "a man obsessed with power. What he cares about is money and military power, bucks or bombs."

Shriver is at his best when he speaks, often eloquently, of the need for a more compassionate society. An unlikely advocate for the poor in his Cardin suit, he gracefully acknowledges his Kennedy connection, but does not flaunt it. An acquaintance recently recalled an incident at Hyannis Port when a Shriver boy fell hard in a game and began to cry. A cousin reminded the child that "Kennedys don't cry." Shriver stepped in: "He's a Shriver, and he can cry if he wants to."

If the campaign were more closely contested, the activities of the vice-presidential candidates would have much greater impact. With Nixon mainly above the battle, Agnew has effectively carried the party flag into all parts of the nation, soothed the right wing, and plugged hard for local Republican candidates--a matter Nixon has largely ignored. Shriver has given his best to his mission of rekindling old Democratic loyalties, cozily touring Chicago, for example, with Mayor Richard Daley. It is neither candidate's fault that, in the end, their efforts probably will have made little difference.

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