THE PRESIDENCY: Tar-Baby

“How duz yo’ sym’tums seem ter segashuate?” sez Brer Rabbit, sezee . . . en de

Tar-Baby, she ain’t sayin’ nothin’. “How you come on, den? Is you deaf?”

Brer Rabbit, sezee. “Kaze if you is, I kin holler louder,” sezee. Tar-Baby stay still, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

President Harry Truman just sat there, like the Tar-Baby. The most untroubled man in the U.S. last week seemed to be its President.

At his press conference the President still had nothing to say, no announcements to make. Questions poured in from newsmen. The skidding stockmarket? The President was interested, of course. But he had no comment. The maritime strike? Still in the hands of the Department of Labor. A special session of Congress? The President didn’t think there was any emergency that would require it; Congressmen were entitled to an uninterrupted spell of politicking.

What about his own fall campaign plans? Here was something the President would know about and would be interested in. But still he said nothing. The only official hint came from Press Secretary Charlie Ross: a couple of speeches, but no barnstorming tour.

But Capitol newsmen were betting that the President would find it hard to resist the urge for on-the-spot electioneering in such critical hotspots as California, Pennsylvania and his home state of Missouri.

The correspondents figured he would obey the impulse to salvage something in November, and that when the time came, he’d be off like Brer Rabbit lippity-clippity, clippity-lippity—just a sailin’ down de big road.