DEMOCRATS: The Wrecker

DEMOCRATS The Wrecker

On July 6, 1952, Oregon’s’ quick-minded, erratic Republican Senator Wayne Morseboarded the Chesapeake & Ohio’s Capitol Limited, rode to Chicago to take his place among Republican dignitaries at the national nominating convention. Six days later, his feelings hurt because nobody at the convention had paid himmuch attention, he rode back to Washingtonton the same train, no longer a Republican. In October he made it official, declared himself an “Independent.” Two years later, the Independent Party having picked up no followers, Morse declared himself a Democrat, was re-elected to the Senate in 1956 on the Democratic ticket. He left behind him an Oregon Republican Party shattered by factionalism for which he was largely responsible. Last week he seemed ready to do the same to the Democrats.

Morse’s Democratic affiliation once seemed the beginning of a fine friendship. In 1954 Morse effectively stumped Oregon for Fellow Liberal Democrat Richard

Neuberger, who was elected Senator by about the length of Wayne Morse’s cropped mustache. The two were old friends: in 1933 Morse, then dean of the School of Law at the University of Oregon, was Neuberger’s only defender when Student Neuberger was accused of violating the honor system during an examination. In 1954 Morse delivered more than 300 campaign speeches on behalf of his old pupil. In 1956 Neuberger returned the favor, stumped the state in support of Morse. That year, led by Morse and Neuberger, Oregon Democrats elected their first Governor since 1934, took over the state house of representatives for the first time since 1939.

“Cowardly Attempt.” But anyone who knew anything about Wayne Morse’s record for political consistency could have made an odds-on bet that his Democratic honeymoon would not last forever. Sure enough, he soon began feuding with Richard Neuberger. In 1957 Neuberger voted for a civil rights bill that Morse had dismissed as meaningless. Later, Neuberger committed the sin of sponsoring a trivial bill to turn over some public lands to the town of Roseburg, Ore.—without consulting Wayne Morse. That did it. Morse killed the bill, which required unanimous Senate consent. There followed a truly remarkable exchange of letters, begun by Neuberger in an attempt at reconciliation and answered by Morse in these words: “You have a lot of guts to write me … The cowardly attempt in your letter to pass the buck to me for your failure . . . to consult with me about your bill is but further evidence of your complete untrustworthiness as a colleague.” For months Dick Neuberger doggedly kept up the correspondence, but Morse finally ended it without love and kisses: “I wish to notify you that this is the last personal letter you will receive from me.”

Last February Neuberger returned to the Senate after a gallant, five-month struggle with cancer (TIME, Feb. 16). True to the unpredictable Morse code, Neuberger’s friend-turned-enemy offered “a very warm welcome and assurance of our sincere pleasure over the fact that my colleague has returned.”

“Maybe He’s Jealous.” For a few fleeting weeks it seemed that all was serene again. But last week Wayne Morse proved that he had lost none of his awesome capriciousness. Announced he, out of a clear blue sky: “I shall take to the people of Oregon in the 1960 campaign my differences with Mr. Neuberger. I shall not support him for re-election.” Wearily, Dick Neuberger searched his mind for possible reasons for the new split. “Maybe he’s jealous,” he speculated, “of an article I had published in the Reader’s Digest”

And back in Oregon, Democratic leaders blanched in dismay. Wayne Morse had left the G.O.P. in wreckage. Now, as a Democrat, he was proposing to blow his latest party wide open. Said a top Oregon Democrat distractedly: “This is harmful to the party. There’s a hard core for Neuberger and a very hard core for Morse. But what the hell about the middle? It gets down to this: What good can come out of this for the party?”