New York: The Curious Candidates

Although all he really had to do was send get-well cards to his virus-stricken opponent, New York’s Republican Governor Nelson Rockefeller was running hard, fulfilling a promise to visit each of New York’s 62 counties during this year’s campaign. Running as hard or harder was Republican Senator Jacob Javits, who just never seems to sleep. But, barring the biggest sympathy vote in U.S. political history, Rockefeller and Javits might better spend their time preparing their victory speeches. For they are up against a couple of the most curious candidates ever nominated by a major party in a major state.

Fractured Face. Everyone who knows him says that Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate Robert Morgenthau is a chap of ability and good will. But he has what Madison Avenue discreetly calls “a projection problem.” Every time he smiles it appears that he has fractured his face. His voice has all the emotion of a stenotypist reading back a transcript. His campaign is chaotic. Things recently got so confused that Vice President Lyndon Johnson disgustedly canceled a Harlem campaign tour with Morgenthau. When Jack Kennedy came to town, Morgenthau got his picture taken with the President—who spent most of his time chatting with Nelson Rockefeller. Morgenthau’s big campaign theme is that Rocky, if reelected, will hike state taxes next year; whereupon Morgenthau’s ticket mate, Democratic State Comptroller Arthur Levitt, blandly remarked that he saw no evidence of any such Rockefeller intention. Last week, to top it all off, poor Bob Morgenthau came down with the flu. This left his campaign schedule in total tatters—as if that made any difference by now.

l-Don’t-Know Looks. Javits’ opponent is even odder. Democratic Senatorial Candidate James Donovan has been acting as the Kennedy Administration’s man in Havana, negotiating for the release of the Bay of Pigs prisoners. His campaign literature frankly states: “Obviously, Mr. Donovan cannot be in Cuba negotiating for the release of prisoners and campaigning in New York State at the same time.” When he has found time to campaign in New York, Donovan has set a modern record for no-shows, schedule revamoings, shoulder shrugs and I-don’t-know looks.

And when he starts talking about issues and qualifications, national Democratic leaders swoon in their rocking chairs. Last week, asked about medicare. Donovan replied briskly: “Well, we need a whole new approach.” What about Kennedy’s approach, a program to be financed under Social Security? “Well, the modern liberal should believe in a sound free enterprise system so it can pay for social progress. I think we should explore every avenue by which private organizations can provide medicare before we put it under the Social Security system.” Did he believe at all in the Social Security principle? “Well, if we have to have it that way, then I would support it.” As to his credentials for the Senate, Donovan avers that they are far better than those of Javits. “My background qualifies me for the Senate. I know foreign affairs. When I was in London during the war, I lived next door to Peter of Yugoslavia and Michael of Rumania. I spent months and months in London.

“I was general counsel to two Government agencies long before Javits ever got into public life. I worked for the Office of Scientific Research and Development under Vanny Bush, and I worked for the OSS. You see those films used in Judgment at Nuremberg? Those were my films. I made them at the time of the trials.

“I’m a poor man’s Wendell Willkie.”