THE VICE PRESIDENCY: The Veep Yields

The newsmen were waiting when the happy couple entered the living room. Said Vice President Alben Barkley: “The President of the Senate yields to the Senator, shall we say, from Missouri.” Said Mrs. Jane Hadley, smiling: “I think it is no surprise . . .”

It wasn’t. Everybody knew about “the Veep and the Widow.” Introducing Barkley at a Washington dinner last summer, Attorney General McGrath called him “the Squire of Paducah and the New Spirit of St. Louis.” In September, asked by newsmen about marriage rumors, Barkley replied: “In any such eventuality, I will be chasing you to tell you.” Two days later, he added: “I have no way of knowing whether I’ll make the grade.” The newsmen gathered in Mrs. Hadley’s apartment in St. Louis’ West End knew that he had. Said Barkley: “Our courtship has undergone a process of culmination.” The wedding would be Nov. 18.

Alben Barkley, 71, has been a widower since 1947, when his wife died after 44 years of marriage and several years of illness. Mrs. Hadley, a trim brunette who looks younger than her 38 years, toured Europe as a child with her mother, a professional pianist. Her lawyer husband, Carleton Hadley, left her a widow at 33 with two daughters. She worked for Willkie in 1940 (once she left a note for her Roosevelt-supporting milkman: “No Willkie, no milkie”) but she insists that she is really “a Democrat from way back.” Her grandfather was a Democratic Congressman from Missouri.

The engagement announced, neighbors began to peer in the windows and crowd into the apartment. The Veep exuberantly kissed a matron or two, shook hands all around. Mrs. Hadley’s younger daughter Jane came in shyly, and the Veep looped an arm around her waist happily. But he refused to pose with his arm around his lady. “No histrionics,” said Barkley. “This is going to be strictly dignified.”