National Affairs: The Organization Nominee

Armed with the Kennedy smile and the Kennedy confidence, the hopeful nominee made his businesslike way to Los Angeles.

Surrounded by his vast company of experts and workers, and by Brothers Bobby and Ted, Jack Kennedy was ready to pluck the fruit of seeds he had nourished so well over the months. In his pocket, secured, checked and double-checked like an audit of the U.S. Treasury, was his packet of certain votes so persistently gathered around the nation. And yet, with all the smell of victory in the air, the Kennedys were allowing for mischance, miscalculation—the sudden outbreak of an emotional riot, perhaps, that might start delegates stampeding in the wrong direction.

Adlai Stevenson had come to town, too, and from the evident Southern California passion for Stevenson or from the scattered pockets of Northern resistance could come a derailment of Kennedy plans.

More dangerous still was the image of Texas’ come-lately Lyndon Baines Johnson, bolstered by his prestige as a consistent miracle worker in the Senate, confident of a solid block of Southern votes —a block second only to Jack’s,. Jack’s prize was not yet in the bag.

Time to Nap? Kennedy got moving like a honeybee in the spring. He patrolled the reaches of Los Angeles in a white Cadillac. Invading caucus after caucus, he made his plea for support, fitting each ad-lib speech to the mood of the moment or the region. Farmers need help, he told lowans; the West’s natural resources need development, he warned Coloradans. On and on he pushed, relentlessly, coolly, gathering applause, staving off trouble from the opposition. Between caucuses, he held court with a parade of politicos in his Biltmore suite (Apartment Q), or checked new lists and new threats. Going into a meeting with New Yorkers, he bumped into a jovial but tense Lyndon Johnson. “Why don’t you take a nap?” kidded Lyndon. “I’ve got that one all sewed up.” Kennedy showed impressive muscle in his first big key play with the Pennsylvania delegation (81 votes). For months Governor David Leo Lawrence, one of the nation’s strongest Democratic bosses, had been a holdout against Kennedy for fear that a Roman Catholic presidential nominee might hurt the party in militantly Protestant rural regions. Lawrence and his Pennsylvanians invited Kennedy and the opposition to a breakfast at Pasadena’s Huntington-Sheraton Hotel. Stu Symington, forceful and yet somehow dim as a waning flashlight, got a good hand for his promise to attack Richard Nixon on domestic policies and Eisenhower on foreign relations. Johnson promised responsible leadership and then, almost with a note of resignation, offered to back the winner whoever he might be.

Jack Kennedy pounced on the U.S.’s dwindling prestige, promised to campaign in Pennsylvania if nominated and “make this election the most significant in 25 years.” When they had finished, Dave Lawrence led the biggest question-mark delegation in the nation into caucus, told them that he was for Jack Kennedy.

Sixty-four delegates fell into orderly ranks behind him.

Just when it appeared that Kennedy had votes to burn, the first Stevenson fire started. The alarm came from the Minnesota delegation. Following a moving speech by Adlai Stevenson, Hubert Humphrey flipped from Kennedy to Adlai; Junior Senator Eugene McCarthy was more than ever madly for Adlai; and Governor Orville Freeman, fresh from a vice-presidential tour of Kennedy’s Apartment Q, had a raging Kennedy fever.

Shaky Knees. Next day, the Kennedys’ one big miscalculation handed Johnson the big chance. As a routine matter, the Kennedy company had sent off a batch of wires to delegations, requesting an audience for Jack. Johnson replied with a telegram suggesting a joint caucus of the Texas and Massachusetts delegations and a debate on major issues. Kennedy declined to mix the two and assumed that the debate was off, but Lyndon and his boys, as well as a regiment of newsmen and TV contingents, crowded into the Biltmore’s ballroom for what was now billed as something like the Lincoln-Douglas debates. While the crowd waited and Lyndon orated, Jack sat tight in his room. At last South Carolina’s Governor Fritz Hollings phoned. “You’re going down to that debate, aren’t you?” he asked. No, said Jack. “You’d better do it,” drawled Hollings. “I’m watching that man on TV and he’ll ruin you if you don’t.” Jack went.

As he rose to address the Texans, Kennedy’s trembling legs made his trousers flutter, and sweat beaded his upper lip. “I shall continue to vote for Senator Johnson as President, if he’s nominated, or as majority leader,” he said. Against Kennedy’s conciliatory remarks, Lyndon launched into a barrage of sarcasm, and without mentioning Jack’s name, bitterly attacked Kennedy’s voting record and his Senate absenteeism. Then: “I think, Jack, we Protestants proved in West Virginia that we’ll vote for a Catholic. What we want is some of the Catholic states to prove that they’ll vote for a Protestant.”

The Johnson-loaded room hooted and cheered with each sharp shaft, while Kennedy sat expressionless on the dais. When Johnson concluded, Jack popped up with a light back-pat from Brother Bobby. He somewhat neutralized the attack with a few sophisticated snap sentences. “We survived,” he said, laughing apprehensively. Johnson had scored some points, but Kennedy had the votes.

Confidence & Souffles. Survival still required action, and by day Jack Kennedy kept moving in on sector after sector, taking hill after hill. Wherever he went, he shook every outstretched hand, autographed every paper in sight, all the while pursued by a straggle of perspiring, panting reporters and photographers who, on one occasion, even swarmed behind him into the men’s room. In the evenings, while the convention droned on at the Sports Arena, Jack dodged his chaperons of the press and drove secretly to the Beverly Hills home of former Film Queen Marion Davies to dine and confer with his father, Joe Kennedy, an unseen but eagerly interested witness at the convention. To avoid the mobs. Jack shifted from the Biltmore to a not-so-secret hideaway in the penthouse of a rose-colored apartment building (which is shaped like a ship and named “The Mauritania”). To make his secret nightly journeys to see his father, Jack had to scramble down a fire escape, leap over a wall behind the building. “I’m so tired,” he said to his brother-in-law Steve Smith. “I wonder if I’m exuding the basic confidence.”

He was. As Wednesday rolled around and the delegates poured into the arena for the nominations and the balloting, the Kennedy steamroller had flattened the last visible rise of significant opposition: Johnson’s drive was stalled, Stevenson’s exquisite moment in Minnesota expired like a tired souffle. Even Adlai’s surprise appearance in the hall on the night before, exploiting the passions of the loving crowds in the galleries, had excited no rush to the Adlaian altar.

“We’re In.” Yet the Stevenson challenge was not altogether dead. To the rostrum came Minnesota’s Gene McCarthy to make the most impassioned speech of the whole convention—in Stevenson’s behalf. “Do not turn away from this man,” he pleaded. “He spoke to the people.

He moved their minds and stirred their hearts … Do not leave this prophet without honor in his own party. Do not reject this man.” With that, the hall exploded into the fiercest demonstration of the week. From his command post, Bobby Kennedy set out to snuff out Stevenson flickers in wavering delegations. But it did not take long to discover that the delegates themselves were largely unmoved, and that the Stevenson revival was largely a mirage. Bobby phoned Jack. “It’s O.K.,” he said. “We’re in.” The roll call told the story. As each delegation registered its declaration, Bobby Kennedy examined his lists. When Vermont was casting its vote, Bobby had already concluded that Wyoming’s vote could put Jack over the top on the first ballot—without switches. Ted Kennedy edged down the crowded aisles and joined the Wyoming delegation. There, Delegate Dale Richardson penciled the tally, looked up and grinned. Rising, he shuffled excitedly down the rows of his group, shouting “Let’s go! Let’s go!” Though the delegation had decided to split their vote among Kennedy, Johnson and Symington, one after another yelled, “O.K.!” and waved their arms in assent. Moments later the clerk called “WYOMING!” and Delegation Chairman Tracy McCracken, his white hair glistening in the spotlight, cried: “Wyoming’s vote will make a majority for Senator Kennedy!” And through the thunderous tumult came Missouri’s move to declare the nomination by acclamation (final roll-call tally: Kennedy, 806; Johnson, 409; Symington, 86; Stevenson, 79?).

Hospitality & Restraint. By the time it was all over, Lyndon Johnson, who had been watching his TV set with glum resignation, was dressed in gaudy Paisley pajamas and ready for bed. Jack Kennedy was calmly accepting congratulations in his hideout and putting through a phone call to his wife on Cape Cod. At first, he planned to stay away from the wild mobs at the arena, but Bobby advised him to make the trip, and Jack sped off at 60 m.p.h.

In the Kennedy “hospitality house,” outside the arena, the brothers met with restrained congratulations. The only sign of emotion came from Bobby, who pounded his right fist triumphantly into the palm of his left hand. A few minutes later the weary candidate walked into the roaring arena, flanked by his beaming mother and sister Pat Lawford. And back at Marion Davies’ Beverly Hills home, old Joe Kennedy picked up the phone. It was Bobby.

Cried the head of the Kennedy clan to his second son: “It’s the best organization job I’ve ever seen in politics.”