Hubert Humphrey's Problems

...But now that Humphrey has also added O'Brien to his campaign operation, things may quickly begin to brighten...

...The coffers of the National Committee are thought to be bulging with President's Club funds, but there is some question about whether Humphrey, as prospective party nominee, is entitled to use these resources...

...Humphrey plainly wants an overwhelming convention victory to boost his stock, but he also wants to avoid any talk of a lock on the convention or a rigged, pro forma proceeding that will stifle the views of the dissenters...

...Yet, the let's-get-it-out-of-our-systems approach in Chicago will hardly begin to assuage the deep bitterness felt by vocal elements among the Kennedy and McCarthy forces, or help to reestablish Humphrey's old Senate image as a fighting, iconoclastic liberal who socked it to 'em on the right issues well ahead of his colleagues...

...But at this point it is difficult to say just who at Humphrey's headquarters is doing what and for whom...

...Locking in the delegates, yet keeping open platform and credentials discussions and debate from the floor, is a very tricky business indeed...

...But with Kennedy's death, growing threats of violence, and the trauma of being soundly booed at the Solidarity Day ceremonies at Lincoln Memorial, Humphrey is now prepared to take a more somber line and demonstrate his abilities as an innovative leader who can tell it like it is...

...Nevertheless, Humphrey is grimly determined to bear his burden without seriously departing from Administration scripture...

...He reportedly dropped by to wish Humphrey well before returning to his post as Ambassador to Poland and was confronted with a plea from the Vice President to lend a hand...

...The brief moratorium following the Kennedy assassination provided a valuable opportunity for the Humphrey camp to attempt to straighten out its dreadfully disorganized campaign apparatus...

...The worst thing that could happen to Humphrey, wriggling to escape the image of The Establishment Candidate, is to have a clean, quiet, well organized convention...

...Gronouski, who resigned his Warsaw post within 48 hours, can claim the political sagacity of being among the first in Wisconsin to support Jack Kennedy in 1960...

...The campaign effort has been split between Citizens for Humphrey, which seeks the support of independents and Republicans, and United Democrats for Humphrey, whose title apparently tells all...

...As one of Humphrey's Capitol Hill friends explained: "Not many people realize that nearly half of Hubert's delegate pledges come from party members who are loyal, first and foremost, to the President...

...but rather, is the nomination of Hubert Humphrey worth having in 1968...

...His speech schedule prior to the convention is extremely heavy, for he is determined to stake out his positions well in advance of the platform hearings—a gambit designed to prove to the liberal wing that he is still one of them...

...and some nervous whites wonder if he is capable of the get-tough policies they want enacted...

...Senators Fred Harris of Oklahoma (mentioned as a possible Vice Presidential running mate) and Walter Mon-dale of Minnesota are nominally in charge of the campaign, with former Postmaster General John A. Gronouski on board as principal internal organizer...

...Southerners, ruralists and large segments of the business community backed Humphrey as long as he stood between Kennedy and the nomination...

...Humphrey's frustration with the organizational aspects of his campaign is demonstrated by the way Gronouski was hired...

...In fact, the Humphrey staff was furious at Moyers and regarded his public advice to the Vice President as a self-serving attempt to reestablish himself as a high level political confidant...

...At a time when most Americans seem to want movement either to the Left or to the Right, Humphrey must ponder how and where he will move, in his words, to "establish my own identity...

...So, if either of them want to be heard, they'd better talk fast...

...Shortly after the assassination, nearly 40 per cent of the campaign staff was fired, reflecting both dissatisfaction and a shortage of funds...

...During the coming weeks, Humphrey hopes to concentrate on his future role as "captain of the team...

...With Kennedy's assassination, Humphrey seems much less a white knight to many Democrats and much more a faded politician who has not won an election on his own in nearly a decade...

...Knowing he must write off the South and sections of the West and Middle West, Humphrey is frankly worried that many liberals will leave Chicago angry, and together with a sizeable portion of the Negro population, decide to stay in bed on election day and cost him urban industrial states as well...

...Negroes, especially the militants, regard him as Establishment...

...Everyone knows it's going to be Nixon and Humphrey, and they are not very excited about it...

...Of course, many forget that on March 30 Humphrey was still working hard to insure a renewed option as Johnson's running mate in 1968...

...The difficulty may be, as one veteran Democrat has observed, that "the people are going to stop listening early this year...

...The Vice President is known to attribute the South Dakota embarrassment (it is his native state and he campaigned there a few days before the voting) to a combination of Kennedy charisma and Johnson repudiation...

...While the Vice President has admitted that Vietnam can seriously hurt his chances, especially if the Paris talks fail before the election, his greatest problems appear to be on the less exotic level of domestic politics, where he is faced with a variety of quandaries...

...This typical piece of Kennedy irony is not lost on the Vice President, who fondly recalls the broad anti-Kennedy support he enjoyed and the anticipation of a smashing convention victory that would have catapulted him into the race against Richard Nixon...

...And don't forget, the President remains the most powerful figure in the party, the best pressure point for fund-raising and favor-seeking...

...In any event, major fundraising efforts are a desperate necessity for the Humphrey operation at this point...

...he chalks up his defeats in California and New York to poor organization and opposition to Vietnam...

...The big question," said a Humphrey aide, "is not the nomination...

...Ironically, the disclosure that Humphrey occasionally employed Moyers as "a sounding board" is a demonstration of independence of sorts, since Moyers has long been persona non grata at the White House...

...The well is running rather dry since the Kennedy assassination," one aide admitted, "although, to be honest, it never was very full...

...It is all there on the record, neatly zippering into Lyndon Johnson's breast pocket a newborn Presidential candidate struggling to "be my own man...

...For many independents, the Vice President continues to represent a very unpopular Administration and therefore encourages a feeling that perhaps the Democrats have been in power too long...

...His initial assessment of the public mood resulted in a reassuring slogan, "the politics of happiness," and he gladly projected himself to fellow Democrats as the unity candidate...

...A few years later, Wisconsin party leaders pushed him for Postmaster General and, after overcoming sharp resistance by the then Attorney General, he finally succeeded in landing the first Polish-American Cabinet appointment in American history...

...The McCarthy and Kennedy forces whom Humphrey wants to win over eventually are already roasting over the heavy-handed man-ueverings of National Democratic Chairman John M. Bailey, who has appointed only Humphrey loyalists as major convention officers...

...Most important of all, the last thing Humphrey wants or needs is to have the President coming at him on his right flank, while McCarthy gnaws at him on his left...

...Since Senator McCarthy is not regarded as a serious threat to the nomination and is intensely disliked by party professionals, Humphrey is keeping pressure on the National Committee to loosen the noose around Chicago's Convention Hall and give some semblance of an open convention, openly arrived at...

...For the fact is, he needs Lyndon Johnson solidly in his corner until the nomination...

...The Left, both new and old, regards Humphrey as a Lyndon Johnson rerun who will deliver more of the same...

...Several idea task forces, under the direction of New Deal economist Robert Nathan, are hard at work preparing position papers for the Vice President...

...Perhaps the biggest worry is the lack of financial resources...

...Now, a good number of them like Nixon better...

...Meanwhile, the dismal showing of Humphrey slates in the South Dakota, California and New York primaries indicates substantial political weaknesses...

...Clearly, Humphrey would like nothing more than to take positions on Vietnam and on domestic issues that would win him the broad support of the liberals, but it seems doubtful he can do so without repudiating the Johnson record or seriously damaging his own credibility with the electorate...

...Unfortunately for the garrulous Humphrey, most of his time as Vice President was spent boosting the Johnson Administration's accomplishments, from aerospace to zoology...

...Humphrey's angry rejoinder about not being a hypocrite left little doubt that Moyers' trial balloon was lofted without the approval of the Vice President...

...Bill D. Moyers, President Johnson's former press secretary, tried to encourage a Humphrey show of independence by suggesting in a recent radio interview that the Vice President had serious private doubts about Vietnam policies and should make these doubts public...

...As one Humphrey aide put it, "Gronouski and Larry O'Brien have in common only the Post Office department...