National Reports: The Election California
MANKIEWICZ, FRANK
CALIFORNIA Not as Republican as it looks By Frank Mankietvicz SAN FRANCISCO VIRTUALLY EVERY political analyst seeking trends in this election (including, to my chagrin, John P. Roche in The New...
...J. Arthur Younger of San Mateo, who is getting opposition from his own party in a suburban San Francisco district because he isn't sufficiently pro-Eisenhower...
...Kuchel is colorless in comparison with his fellow-Californians Knowland, Nixon...
...Democratic chances are also strong to pick up six Congressional seats now held by the GOP...
...Warren and Knight...
...He supported the Bricker Amendment...
...That the State Democratic Committee should have chosen Bible is a tribute to the lasting influence of the late Senator...
...Former Representative Walter Baring, Democrat, seems likely to regain the Congressional seat he lost two years ago in the Ike blitz...
...He will be the victim of a massive split in the Republican party here, which seems to have caused organizational apathy...
...The Democrats, with their new-found unity in this state, are vigorously campaigning for the whole ticket??a rarity in California, where individual campaigning is generally the rule...
...In the Senate race, incumbent Thomas Kuchel, Republican, is opposed by Congressman Samuel W. Yorty...
...In addition, the Republicans are virtually resigned to Democratic capture of the seat vacated by Ernest Bramblett, currently in a legal battle over payroll-padding...
...and Yorty will benefit from this...
...Knight seems the chief victim of the Republican split I mentioned earlier...
...It is also partly a result of Knight's endorsement by the state AFL...
...There is a Democratic tide running here, and a reasonable forecast at this time would have the Democrats gaining a seat in the Senate, three or four seats in the House, and perhaps the Governorship and other state offices...
...After the primary election four months ago, Governor Goodwin Knight, seeking re-election, held a lead of nearly a million votes over Democrat Richard Graves...
...Nevada: Most observers concede that the state Supreme Court, when it ordered an election to fill the remainder of Senator McCarran's term, handed the seat to the Democrats...
...A consistent liberal in the House, his major lack of support comes from those elements in the Democratic party who cannot forgive his "premature" anti-Communism at a time when fellow-traveling was almost de rigueur here...
...Graves's campaign has been sluggish, but he has dug up some liquor scandals to throw at the Governor, and they have hurt...
...One Democratic seat in doubt is currently held by Robert Condon, under fire on "security risk" charges first leveled by the Atomic Energy Commission...
...A former State Controller, his Senate record since his appointment to succeed Nixon is undistinguished...
...They are all wrong...
...The reasons are complex...
...They may lose one...
...The race may actually depend on the number of right-wing Republicans who decide to go fishing on Election Day...
...But this should be no cause for liberal rejoicing...
...Bible was defeated in the Senatorial primary two years ago by young Tom Mechling precisely on the issue of McCarranism...
...Barring a major setback between now and the election, this means Yorty will win...
...A few weeks ago, Condon's defeat seemed probable...
...right now, it must be called a toss-up...
...Republicans in danger are Oakley Hunter of Fresno, where farm votes are causing trouble...
...John J. Allen of Berkeley, a silent man who seems to have made no enemies and no friends during his tenure in office, and who is opposed by Stanley Crook, a vigorous economist...
...In promising to veto any "right-to-work" bill, Knight lost the enthusiastic support of the Los Angeles Times and the strong open-shop group of industrialists which follows the Times's lead...
...Yorty, a former state legislator, ran for the Senate in 1940, returned to the Legislature after the war, and has since served two terms in Congress...
...Proof of Kuchel's weakness is the frantic GOP effort to smear Yorty as a "left-winger" and pro-Communist...
...California's other controversial Democrat, James Roosevelt, is conceded by all hands to be an easy winner in his Los Angeles district...
...and Robert Wilson of San Diego, who is faced with the same problem and running against Admiral Ross T. McIntyre, formerly FDR's personal physician...
...Knight may well be hoist by his own petard on the AFL deal, since his labor support seems little more than official...
...A fortnight ago, the California Poll indicated that Graves was only 150,000 votes behind and gaining...
...After a primary campaign whose expenditures have been conservatively estimated at $1.5 million, the Governor now seems almost destitute...
...There is no Senate race this year...
...CALIFORNIA Not as Republican as it looks By Frank Mankietvicz SAN FRANCISCO VIRTUALLY EVERY political analyst seeking trends in this election (including, to my chagrin, John P. Roche in The New Leader of October 11) has written off California as a safe Republican state...
...This is partly a result of the recent Knight-Knowland-Nixon feuding, which apparently resulted in the most Pyrrhic of victories for the Governor...
...Condon's opponent is soft-pedaling the Communist issue, probably in fear of a boomerang in this heavy labor district, but the Republicans nationally are sending their biggest guns, topped by the Vice President, into the district...
...Both of the state's Congressmen, one Republican and one Democrat, seem assured of re-election...
...Arizona: No change is expected...
...Edgar Hiestand of a Los Angeles district harboring some industrial unemployment...
...The GOP is neither raising money nor manning the precincts...
...If elected, he will probably be a McCarran without seniority, which is probably some blessing...
...Former Attorney General Alan Bible, once McCarran's law partner, will probably defeat interim Republican Senator Brown...
...Although Kuchel's combined vote in the primary exceeded Yorty's by more than 500,000, they are now neck-and-neck, with Yorty gaining in even the most conservative polls...
Vol. 37 • October 1954 • No. 43
