Chapter X

How to Win an Election (conclusion)

The Final Sprint

Last Week Mail Coverage: Your candidate has called on more than 3,000

people, possibly as many as 5,000. (Fantastic? I once rang 8,000 doorbells under similar circumstances.) Your precinct workers and you yourself have worked on the rest of the 25,000 targets. (You did not have time, you yourself? My dear lady - or sir - you must have time. I suggest a firm date for Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, one to five. Accept no other engagements for those hours.)

The campaign has not been perfect, but 20,000 aimed shots have been fired, in addition to the shotgun spread of publicity and meetings. However many of these shots were fired weeks ago; you need to use last minute reminders.

I suggest the use of either penny postal cards or personal letters - nothing in between. The usual political advertising, sent third class in an unsealed envelope and addressed by stenciling, then stuffed till the envelope bulges with wordy printed matter, has a way of landing in waste baskets unread.

A post card will be read because it is short, and it stands a chance of being kept around for a few days as a reminder. A personal letter of any sort, sent first class, will be read and noticed.

Even for postal cards your postage alone will be $200, plus printing costs and the (volunteer) effort of addressing and signing-all cards should be signed by someone, even if with an "authorized" signature, not marked as such. The signing and addressing take many hours and the work will need to be done long before the mailing date.

The final mail coverage will be the largest single expense in your campaign and may be one-third of your total campaign expenses. You may 123

be forced to use postals, rather than letters, to save time and expense, but I suggest that you consider personal letters for the persons the candidate called on, as these are your prize prospects.

("Five thousand personal notes? It would take a crack typist four months to do such a job!" So it would-)

A man named Hooven invented a sort of player-piano typewriter which types any given copy over and over again, using a standard typewriter. The pseudo-player-piano roll can have signals cut in it which stops the typing and permits a human typist to insert a name, a date, a phrase, or any other variation in the copy, without disturbing the set-up. There is no way to tell a Hooven-typed letter from one typed entirely by hand.

Hooven-typing service is available in most large cities; you can do business by mail if your community does not have it. It is much more expensive than printing and much cheaper than equivalent service by a typist. (Some day, he said dreamily, I hope to awn one of these marvellous gadgets for the use of my own district organization.) I suggest some such copy as this - make it short, both for economy and effectiveness:

(Letterhead)

(date)

Dear Mrs. Boggles,

I hope you will recall my visit to your home last April 3rd and our discussion of the primary election. The election is next Tuesday. Naturally, I would like to have you vote for me for the Demican nomination for Congress.

I enclose a short memorandum of my qualifications and the issues I am committed to support

Whether you support me or not, I urge that you and your family turn out and vote next Tuesday. The privilege and the duty of voting are more important to the safety of our country than an individual's candidacy.

Faithfully yours,

Jonathan Upright

JU:htc

The name and the date of the visit are the only items which require the Hooven robot to stop for an insert If you use printed post cards you fall back on "Dear Fellow Demican" and "recent" Full coverage by post card of the persons called on is better than partial coverage by personal letter, but do not be tempted to cover the whole list of registered voters by mail-it won't pay its freight

It is worth while for Mr. Upright to thumb through his cards and dictate as many post-scripts as possible, which are to be hand-written by the person who signs his name. "ES. My regards to the chow puppy-JU" or "I'll be after Bobby's vote in 1960!" or "Will you write to me your opinions on that reclamation matter?" or "I hope your husband is completely well by now."

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Some of your precinct workers may be able to afford Hooven service for their own precincts, or they may be industrious enough to tackle the job of writing or typing personal notes - a big job but manageable for single precincts. Otherwise you will supply them with printed postals with the

"trademark" picture of Mr. Upright occupying a third of the space, and a short

"Dear-Neighbor" note on the rest, following the general idea of Mr. Upright's note. Leave space for the precinct worker to sign, and use the type face which simulates typewriter type style.

You may be forced to ask those who can afford it to pay the postage. It comes to a couple of dollars per worker; it amounts to a couple of hundred dollars at least to the campaign fund. One of the inspiring things about volunteers is the way they will give till it hurts right before an election, whereas a paid worker expects everything furnished to him as well as his fee.

Special attention must be given to the unregistered potential voters turned up during the campaign by Mr. Upright and the precinct workers. You have been obtaining regular reports on these people, daily from Type right and weekly from your area supervisors, and you have been turning the names over to deputy registrars with whom you have friendly liaison. These votes are free for the asking and they may amount to a couple of thousand, enough to turn a bad defeat into a narrow victory. (These are the votes Mr. Dewey needed but didn't get in 1944-the "sleepers.") Special attention by mail and special attention on election day is indicated. You can vary your printing or your Hooven set up.

Your mail coverage should be delivered to the post office, tied in bundles by districts, on Friday afternoon before the election.

Election Day: The campaign is over, all but the final sprint That sprint needs careful preparation.

An ideal election day organization has block workers on every street, a precinct captain and lieutenants, a squad of automobiles directed from each precinct headquarters, a trained telephone organization, workers at the polls, a flying squad to take care of physical opposition, and another squad of legal eagles to take care of more esoteric matters. The whole thing is organized like a war ship going into battle.

You won't have any such organization; you won't find it anywhere save in some large cities east of the Mississippi, and it won't be complete even in those cities.

Your ideal organization - which you won't achieve; 80% is a fine score -

will consist of three workers in every precinct, one at the polls, one at the telephone, and one with an automobile, plus roving area leaders with a telephone contact for each, a telephone and a couple of helpers for you, and two lawyers on tap who will drive to any trouble spot in a hurry. You dispense with muscles in your flying squad and depend on the fact that no one, not even a bad cop, will break the peace in the presence of a lawyer who announces himself as such.

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Mr. Upright spends the day circulating around among the workers, giving them that "appreciated" feeling.

Tb achieve such an organization you need several times as many workers as there are in your Doorbell Club. It is not really hard to manage-for one day-if your area supervisors are active and alert. Some of them won't be.

Since your efforts must be incomplete work according to the following priorities:

(a) Cover every contact in the precincts canvassed by Mr. Upright even if it means persuading your best workers to leave their own precincts completely vacant

(b) Try to cover every precinct which has been worked by anyone.

(c) Do not put workers in any precinct which has not previously been canvassed unless you are blessed with more workers than you know what to do with, in which case completely untrained workers may hand out literature at the polls in those precincts. Tell them about any local regulation which limits how dose to the polls they may work and caution them not to argue with anyone.

(d) If a precinct has but one worker he or she may accomplish almost as much as three people by working in this routine: Telephone as many as possible the night before and between eight and ten the next morning. Make dates to take people to the polls, where needed, between ten and noon - a full car-load at a time. After lunch go to the polls and remove from the files all who have voted, then get to work on the telephone with the remainder, making more transportation dates for four to six o'clock. At six o'clock weed out the files further and make frenzied attempts to get a few more to the polls during the evening, giving quite as much attention to the inactive list as to the live contacts. As soon as the polls have dosed, grab a hasty supper and return to the polls for the count. Remain there, watching the count (inform the senior polling official of the intention). When the count for congress has been completed, telephone the result to head quarters, and then leave for the election night party. It is a long day's work but it is a perfect picnic for any healthy, intelligent person.

(e) If two persons are available, the same work is split up, except that the polls are not left unguarded even for a moment from the time they are closed until the count is completed.

(f) If three persons are available one of them may try to glean a few votes just outside the polls at the required distance for campaigning. He is permitted, under most state laws, to double as a poll watcher, thus keeping a running record of who has voted for the automobile workers, provided he does no electioneering while inside the balk line. He sets up a

"headquarters" - a parked car, a card table, or a packing case - and covers it with signs for your candidate, and then attempts to hand some small, simple printed reminder that Jonathan Upright is running to each person who approaches the polls. If the local administration is unfriendly and 126

unscrupulous he may have trouble with cops. If this is anticipated, have your best lawyer have a talk with the chief of police ahead of time, explaining your intentions, going over the law, and reaching a full understanding as to just what will be allowed. If your police chief is recalcitrant, let him know that you intend to fall back on the federal authorities - there are pertinent Supreme Court rulings which can scare the boots off a local official if he knows that you know your rights.

A second poll worker is desirable, as there are usually two approaches in view of the no-electioneering balk line. Anyone who is old enough to walk can be an assistant, the younger the better.

(g) Telephone workers may be found among supporters or wives of workers who are tied down by small children or ill health but can use a telephone. They must be provided with lists, by the precinct worker, and mimeographed instructions, from you. Here is an adequate formula: "How do you do? Mrs. Duplex? Mrs. Duplex, this is the Jonathan Upright-for-Congress Citizen's Committee. Have you voted yet today? Would you like to have one of us call to take you to the polls by automobile? Oh, that's quite all right - you can take the baby with you; we will take care of him during the few minutes it takes you to vote. Is there any other member of your family who needs transportation? Very well then, suppose we pick you up sometime between ten a.m. and noon? No?

"How about between four and six? Three o'clock is better? Very well, then, we will make a special trip for you at three o'clock; I'll make a note of it. Not at all, we're glad to do it."

No direct attempt to campaign would be made in these phone calls; limit them to offering service and reminding the voter of the election, while mentioning the name of the candidate as often as possible by referring to the committee by its full name. The person who makes the pick-up limits his campaigning to signs on the car and to handing to each passenger as he gets in a copy of the same small printed item used at the polls.

Election day work is simply to turn your potential votes into real votes by seeing to it that all your supporters get to the polls. Many times your interest lies in a minor candidate or in a proposition on the ballot. Votes for these can frequently be obtained by the courtesy of supplying a ride to the polls. Many people vote only for candidates for president, governor, and senator. The votes of these people can be sewed up for Mr. Upright if one of Mr. Upright's friends supplies the transportation.

Watching the Count: These votes gained on election day can be lost on election night, in the count. One of the commonest pieces of chicanery in the counting is to take advantage of the feet that many people neglect to vote for any but the head of the ticket If the ballot is of the style in which the candidates are grouped by offices it is very easy to mark incomplete ballots after the polls are closed. Thus with 300 ballots cast for governor of which only 250 have been marked for a congressional choice, split 110 for 127

Doubletalk and 140 for True-blue, five minutes work behind closed doors can change the result to 160 for Doubletalk and 140 for True-blue without leaving any provable evidence of fraud.

Ballots arranged by tickets rather than by offices are more usually faked by throwing out as improperly marked any split ticket ballot which does not suit the dishonest polling judge and by accepting such ballots when the split does suit him, no matter how many technical mistakes the voter may have made.

Actual stuffing of the ballot box is very rare and the cash-in-hand purchase of votes is still more rare, whereas the election which is actually changed in outcome by these methods is so seldom found that it may be regarded as a museum piece.

These crude methods of blatant dishonesty are not used by the more successful city machines, even when the Machine is corrupt to the core, because they are not

as efficient nor as reliable as machine methods which are technically honest. If a Machine resorts to use them it is a symptom that it is on the skids. (Cf. Kansas City vote fraud trials.)

Your watcher will not be able to do much actually to check the count, because there is so much going on. But the presence of the watcher, announced as such to the official in charge, will be an almost airtight deterrent against fraud. In addition to purportedly watching the count the watcher keeps careful track of how many ballots are discarded as spoiled and for what reasons; this can strongly affect the outcome of a contested election.

Voting machines make the above routine unnecessary. It may be possible to inject fraud into an election conducted with a voting machine other than by the crude methods of coercion or bribery, since anything that one mechanical engineer can design another can modify to produce a different result, but there is nothing for you to do at this point. The detection of skullduggery with the innards of a voting machine would call for a type of investigation, probably by the FBI, beyond the scope of practical field politics.

The watcher telephones the outcome to headquarters, where you and Upright are keeping your own tally while chewing your nails down to the elbows. Then she, or he, goes to the election party.

The Election Night Party: When the polls closed you moved from the office headquarters to the space in which die Doorbell Club meets. You expect three times the membership of the Club but that's all right - let 'em crowd in; it makes them happier.

You did not stop for dinner; your stomach isn't behaving quite as it should.

A sandwich picked up "to go" is all you want. Upright shows up from the field about the time you get there and the two of you, alone for once, or with the office girl and one or two others, get ready for the party. You place someone at the telephone and arm her with a tally sheet. You turn on the radio to the 128

best station for returns-the snap tallies on the major offices are already beginning to come in - and set up the big black board to post returns on the whole ballot You place an excited, high school-age adherent in charge of this, and turn your attention to the refreshments.

Three times the membership of your organization gives a figure of 300 -

three hundred quarts of beer. That's a lot of beer; you have purchased it in kegs, if you could not get it donated, and made an arrangement to return untapped kegs for credit, so you display only one keg at a time and keep the rest under lock and key. You have five hundred paper cups, not of the largest size.

Coffee and soft drinks are available for those who do not drink. A very small amount of food, doughnuts, cheese and crackers, has been obtained, but you hide it away and will not display it until about one o'clock in the morning.

Don't try to serve hard liquor; it will bankrupt you. Some will bring their own and some will get tipsy. It’s a free country.

A few people are beginning to show up and it breaks up the depression that you and Upright have been suffering from since the polls closed. They crowd around him, shaking his hand and slapping him on the back, and urging him to have a drink "right out of the bottle." Some of them also speak to you.

After that they pour in a steady stream; the place gets crowded and stays crowded. Most of them are your friends; some of them are the perennials who go to all the election parties every election night. You wedge yourself in back of a table to get away from the press and bend one ear to the telephone while trying to watch the telephone tally and eat your sandwich and drink some coffee. Judge Yardwide, according to the radio, has a safe lead over the field for the gubernatorial nomination. You nod knowingly and with pleasure - with Yardwide at the head of the ticket the final election should be easier to win.

The first telephone reports come in; they are simply awful Your sandwich shows a tendency to want to come up again. Upright squeezes his way through the crowd, nodding and smiling and speaking to people, then bends over and glances at the figures.

His face is suddenly grave, but he pats your arm. "Never mind," he says.

"It's all been worth it, even if we lose. If I ever run again I want you to manage me."

You feel like bursting into tears, but there are too many people present After a while it begins to swing. Upright is creeping up on Hopeful....

Upright-982; Hopeful-1,005. Upright-2,107; Hopeful - 2,043. You're ahead!

Upright - 5,480; Hopeful - 5,106. You begin to breathe more easily.

Upright-9,817; Hopeful -8,166

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Upright - 12,042; Hopeful-Wait a minute-you hear your district number mentioned on the radio, and the telephone is ringing at the same time.

"Quiet! Keep quiet-please!"

You get some modicum of surcease, at least around the radio: " - minor contest seems to be settled," the announcer is saying cheerfully. "Jack Hopeful, through his manager, has just conceded the nomination in the Umpteenth District to the Honorable Jonathan Upright. The statement urges all voters to support the Demican ticket this fall. Mr. Hopeful could not be reached for a personal interview but it is understood that- "

You don't hear the rest. You've won.

The rest of the evening is pretty light-hearted. You break away from the radio and circulate around a bit even though your feet are killing you. You try a glass of beer but you let it go flat while you duck back to the radio. The attorney general fight has taken a very interesting twist; it's likely to cause some complications. About three a.m. you and the nominee and two other faithfuls squeeze into a booth in an all night restaurant and you eat the biggest meal you have eaten in over two weeks. You've got die first edition with the preliminary returns and you eat while one of you reads the figures aloud.

At four a.m. you fall into bed and die. Post-Mortem Upright- 16,107

Hopeful-11,373

Figures from earlier contests, corrected for population and registration changes, show that a candidate in a two-man race will receive 10,000 votes in your district if he files and makes a superficial campaign. Comparison with other districts and previous years on a percentage basis shows that your district had 2,000 votes more than normal.

Therefore your campaign methods stirred out about 6,000 votes, of which some 2,000 were new votes not normally to be expected in a primary. This is the final proof of the correctness of your technique, since winning could have resulted from the deficiencies of Hopeful's campaign rather than the excellence of yours.

Detailed examination of the results by individual precincts shows that the candidate stirred out between a third and a quarter of the majority and that the precinct workers did the rest. The decision to have Upright go directly to the homes of the voters has been justified.

The cupboard is bare but the bills are paid - all but the beer; you pledged your own credit on that. You must remember to return the two kegs left over -

that will help, and perhaps you can get one or two others to divvy up while they are still feeling good over the victory. Upright intends to reimburse you but you don't want to stick him for it - his personal expenses have been a little heavier than he had anticipated.

We Was Robbed! Or perhaps you did not win. Maybe there was a bad break at the last moment, or a schism in the Club, or something. Suppose the outcome was: Hopeful-12,785; Upright-12,009.

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It is easy to cry fraud, easy to charge it up to a machine, to dirty campaigning, to stuffed ballot boxes. But you won't be right, not one time in a thousand. No, citizen, depend on it - if you lose it is almost certain that it was because not enough people wanted your man to win and most especially that not enough supporters worked hard enough or intelligently enough.

At the very least in every election there is a high percentage who just don't vote - in a primary more than 50%. You cannot blame those lost votes on chicanery. Perhaps you did the best you could and the outcome was indeed affected by some dirty tricks, at the polls or elsewhere, but the result still represents die will of the American people, at least by passive consent.

Accept it

Closing Ranks: You won't get anything out of your workers and you won't try to - you will wait till the next regular meeting of the Doorbell Club. In the meantime you are very busy.

There is the matter of gathering up records of the primary in order not to have to depend on the county clerk's records next time. Some of the precinct area supervisors may be disciplined enough to help you do this, but the let-down may continue until the posted voting record and results have been taken down. A 35-mm. camera furnishes a convenient way to get these records without stopping to copy the data, but it's too big a job to cover die entire district single-handed even with a camera to help you. Do the best you can and pick up die rest from die official records next winter.

Your memo pad has a score of such jobs, loose ends to be picked up.

You want to get them out of the way promptly so that both you and the nominee can get at least a week's rest, out of town, after the state convention and before starting the final campaign. A shorter holiday is needed before then, too, if you can manage it. But you have got to consolidate your victory by getting the party factions inside the district together before you dare leave town or make any campaign plans.

The entire slate of county committee candidates from the Doorbell Club have been elected, yourself among them-you now control the district delegation. The nominee is an ex-officio member of the state committee and is a delegate to the state convention. On your advice he has appointed state committeemen, yourself among them. You must plan to attend the state committee meeting at the capital but you may not have time to stay over to observe the convention - there is so much to be done.

(Your own state may provide for party organization somewhat different from that implied here, although this is typical. You must be familiar with it, whatever it is. Don't be caught with less representation on either the county committee or the state committee than your pro-rate necessary to control your district.) But your first job is to see Jack Hopeful. We have assumed that Mr. Hopeful is a regular member of your party and not a stooge of the other party. You want and need his support in the final election. Get hold of him or 131

his manager and invite them both to your house for dinner. Mr. Upright will be there also. After dinner you will talk over the coming campaign.

Don't offer him anything. Don't assume that he wants anything. Treat it as a matter of course that he and his manager will support the straight party ticket, including Mr. Upright. Mi-. Upright will ask him to serve as chairman of the district campaign committee

for the ticket, while explaining to him that the work need not be any more strenuous than he wants to make it. The office will in fact be titular, since you will dominate the executive committee and the committee as a whole. You will remain personal manager for Mr. Upright, and, as chairman of your district's delegation of committeemen, you will be in authority on any official party matters.

You don't speak of these aspects to Hopeful; you offer him the top stuffed-shirt position in exchange for his nominal support. His manager is offered a vice-chairmanship and a place on the executive committee.

They may accept, pitch in, and be most valuable. Or they may hem and haw and leave, after asking for time to "think it over." Or they come right out and ask for money or appointments or both. They may have campaign debts to meet, or they may demand outrageous salaries to campaign. Hopeful may want help in landing a major piece of patronage for himself, or he may expect you to pay off his obligation to his manager by letting him have one of the congressional secretaryships if Upright wins. For some curious reason many unsuccessful candidates seem to feel that their successful rivals owe it to the defeated to pay off their campaign debts and commitments.

It's a form of blackmail; don't give in to it.

Upright should explain that he can't promise appointments to anyone since he has consistently refused to promise them inside his own committee.

Appointments will be settled if and when - after the final election. As for money - there isn't any.

They may give in with bad grace, if they have no place to go and wish to stay in good standing in the party, or they may leave. If they do, they will be self-righteous as can be about the whole matter. For some reason your refusal to pay the bills they ran up trying to defeat you will seem like a clear case of moral turpitude to them.

Bring up your heavy artillery. Get some Big Names, preferably from the camp of the party's nominee for governor, to call on Hopeful and explain to him, sweetly but firmly, that if he ever intends to get anywhere inside the party he had better stay regular, lend his name, invite in his supporters, and, as a minimum, preside at one or two public meetings for Upright and die ticket

The chances are you will get him. But don't buy his "support"; it isn't worth it.

In the mean time you will have seen to it that personal notes of thanks are prepared (Hooven-typed, perhaps) for every worker, endorser, and 132

contributor in Upright's campaign. Make the ones to precinct workers different from and more emphatic than the others and let all of diem be a call to arms for the final ticket in die final campaign. In addition, make the first meeting of die Doorbell Club a jubilation in which each worker is thanked individually and his majority is announced.

You will want to get everyone possible out to die first meeting of the party-wide breakfast group; here is where your spade work for party harmony will pay off. In addition to gathering in Hopeful there are at least twenty party factions in the district, one for each candidate for each office on the ballot.

You will need all of diem and will make personal appeals by telephone to die leaders in die campaigns that lost, in addition to die usual postal card notice.

You have many different fights to straighten out here, dozens of sets of feathers to smooth, but your job is easier than it was with Hopeful, as you appear in the capacity of broker for everybody's interests.

Out of it all you try to whip together a campaign committee for die whole ticket, as that is die best way to elect your own man. You turn your thoughts to "face," everybody's face and you help to preserve it by offering them all a chance to do the noble thing in public by

declaring for the whole ticket. Titular offices in the campaign are passed out to anybody who seems to want one, with great fanfare (the possibilities of the words "vice-chairman," "director," "secretary," "coordinator," and

"committee" have never been exhausted).

From these other groups you get new members of the Doorbell Club, at least on a temporary basis. You may re-title it, if expedient, for the duration.

You now need a membership about four times the best you could do in die primary.

There is money to be considered, all over again. It is easier to raise now, but you need more of it. Better put money raising in the hands of the gubernatorial nominee's local manager, for die campaign as a whole, and handle your own resources as a separate account for the congressional campaign. Don't forget to insist that die national committee kick in for die congressional district and be darn sure some bright boy down town doesn't beat you to it and get his hands on it through a more direct pipeline to die national committee.

Some county and state committees seem to be under the delusion that the way to raise money is to assess die candidates. This is all wrong; the committee should raise money and support the candidates. If assessed, don't pay it; their help isn't worth much if that is how they work.

From a proper state or county committee you may expect some money, a lot of active help, and much free or partly free printing. Your printing bills should be small in the second campaign as the stuff you will use will be for the whole ticket.

You may want a few items in which Upright's name is emphasized over that of the rest of the ticket, by lay out and type face.

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We won't run through the final campaign in any detail. In general it is just like the primary campaign, except that everything is more complicated, the numbers are larger, the emotions are stronger, the amounts of money are larger, and you have the disadvantage, as it is usually figured, of running against an incumbent The Honorable Mr. Swivelchair has more friends and more acquaintances, but he has also accumulated a back log of enemies and mistakes. Still, incumbency is usually figured as an asset and that is the safe way for you to figure. If Swivelchair is the stooge of a tight and well-established machine, you will not only have to work harder but will have to count on some trouble of the dirty sort. The election night count in particular will have to be closer. Figure your trouble spots and make your watchers there your smallest women; they will be safe. Men might have their arms broken.

There will be more Big Operators in your hair, more blokes with votes-in-their-pockets, more people with their hands out, more hopeful patronage hounds, more of everything which makes politics complicated without adding to the vote.

There is just one thing to be remembered in the midst of all this hurly-burly and confusion: Keep your eye on the ball!

The votes are still in the precincts. Punching doorbells still remains the only way to get out the vote you need, despite anything you may hear from the Important Politicians from down town.

Maintain your own practice of spending two afternoons each week punching doorbells.

Schedule Mr. Upright for another 500 hours of canvassing and see to it that he keeps to his schedule.

Keep your campaign centered around the Doorbell Club and don't use them for anything but canvassing until election day.

Ignore the opposition as before.

The only real differences are these:

(a) You all campaign for the whole ticket and emphasize Mr. Upright only by getting in his name more frequently, principally through quoting him by name in support of the platform and the ticket.

(b) You canvass from a selected list as before, but this time you ignore, in your canvassing, all the members of your party who voted in the primary.

With the exceptions of the ones who had to be carried co the polls (and will have Co be again) these people can all be depended on to get to the polls and to vote the straight party ticket. Instead you canvass all members of your party who failed to vote in the primary ... and all members of minor parties and all unaffiliated voters. The known members of the other party you ignore.

You have nearly 40,000 people to reach; you haven't time enough nor people enough to do more. Your effort will be to turn out the largest possible vote of your own party... especially the voce of the "sleepers."

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(c) Therefore you will put more effort than ever into organizing your election day forces. If additional help for election day can be obtained from the county or state committee you will want it, since it does not require local information, other than a prepared list, Co do election day work, and it does not even take that Co be a poll worker or a count watcher.

And that's all

Along toward the last of the campaign very heavy pressures will be brought against you co change the campaign, but one will come from an unexpected source. A senior member of the party, resident in your district, a nominal member from the beginning of the Upright committee and a fairly heavy contributor Co it, is likely to call on you. He won't put it quite bluntly but the idea is that you should lie down and let Swivelchair win.

He will say you have made a good fight but that Upright does not have a chance. Upright isn't quite ready yet; maybe in two years, or four years, but not this year. On the other hand he happens to know that Swivelchair plans to go for Senator next time; on that occasion he could throw a lot of support to Upright if Upright did not cause Swivelchair too much expense this time.

Why not be practical, take a long view, and get along?

You wouldn't even have to drop the rest of the ticket, naturally; just persuade Upright that there was no sense in throwing good money after bad-and get sick for a while.

As for you - well, what appointment would you like? Maybe it could be arranged.

There is no particular reason why you should not indulge in the rare luxury of losing your temper, although it won't help any. Send him about his business. Don't make it an issue - now. But don't let him sit in on any party conclave during the campaign, nor ever again, if you can keep him out. He's a Trojan horse.

Don't let it shake your faith in human nature. Instead, it should build up your faith. They would not try to buy you off if they were not frightened! It is a shining justification of your faith in the nature of the average citizen. Your methods and your beliefs are being vindicated in the most practical way possible - and die opposition knows it.

Some time later you will again find yourself seated behind a table with an election night party going on all around you. The radio will be blasting, the phone will be ringing, you will be trying to eat a sandwich and listen to the radio while thinking with half your mind about how to scrape up the postage for the eight or nine hundred-odd letters of thanks that Upright will have to send out in the next two weeks.

The early returns aren't going too badly; Upright is even running a little ahead of the ticket in some spots -but it's still touch-and-go. Swivelchair's organization is experienced and well trained; it can't be discounted. You decide to put off worrying about the postage, and so forth, until about Thursday. You'll find the money; you always have. There haven't been any 135

returns on congressional districts for about an hour. You are getting jittery.

The announcer is introducing candidates and notables - why don't those stuffed shirts get off the air?

Here come some figures-9th district, 10th district, 11 th district, 12th district - the announcer stops. What's got into him?

'Just a minute, folks, some new figures just in... any moment now. Here's one item of news anyway. The new figures clearly show that in the Umpteenth District, in a surprise upset, Jonathan Upright has unseated old-timer Congressman Swivelchair. The incomplete returns show a lead of-

" You have elected a congressman. You can't leave on that vacation the next day. In fact you can't leave for a couple of weeks. Besides the thank-you notes there are the post-election meetings of the Doorbell Club, the breakfast dub, and the state and county committees. Upright wants to discuss appointments with you, too, of his secretaries. You don't want to go to Washington with him; you don't even want to be on the payroll as his field secretary and stay in the district, as you don't want to be his employee - your position depends on your being your own boss. This attitude gives you at least a veto in the appointments he does make-and on his later appointments.

Your own plans have more to do with tying in the Doorbell Club to Washington through a weekly newsletter from Upright and a regular procedure whereby the Club will be kept informed as to what is going on, what it means, and votes their approval or disapproval for the information of Upright and the two senators.

It is nearly a year and a half later that you are sitting in your living room, thumbing through the current Congressional Record - the only tangible thing you got out of either campaign - when you notice a roll call vote on a measure you have been following. It's a good measure in your opinion, and important to the whole country. This is the last vote, the one that sends it to the President for signature. You note with approval that Upright voted for it-as you knew he would; you have corresponded about it.

It just squeaked through, by one vote. You suddenly realize die significance. One vote - Upright's vote, for Swivelchair had a definite record against this sort of measure.

One vote. Your vote!

Your own efforts have put a constructive measure into effect for the whole 140,000,000 Americans -you did it, with your bare hands and the unpaid help of people who believed you.

It's a good feeling!