Lessons of the Election

November 22, 1954

The real danger of the Republican defeat on Nov. 2 lies not in the narrow Democratic majorities themselves, but in the dominant interpretation that may be put upon the election results. The danger is that not merely the New Deal Democrats, but the Administration Republicans themselves, may interpret the result as a repudiation of President Eisenhower’s more conservative policies and a public demand for return to New Dealism—to big government, big spending, inflation, and subservience to labor-union bosses.

Sober analysis, however, gives no support to this interpretation. Outstanding left-wingers, both Republican and Democratic, were certainly elected to the new Congress; but so were outstanding conservatives. And the Administration’s most successful holding operations, and even gains, were made in the farm belt. It is instructive to recall that in the early part of Mr. Eisenhower’s Administration it was the opposition of his Secretary of Agriculture, Ezra Taft Benson, to the continuation of high, rigid farm-price supports that was the principal target of the Democrats in Congress and the principal fear of the Republicans from the farm districts. It seemed politically impossible that the Republicans could come out for lower subsidies than the Democrats and still keep farm support. But Secretary Benson stuck to his guns; he explained and defended his program; and he received the outspoken support of the President. The result was that the Republicans’ principal electoral successes were achieved precisely where it was feared until a few months ago that they might fare worse.

An outstanding illustration is Iowa, heart of the farm belt, which elected a solid delegation of eight Republicans and no Democrats to the House, and which retired the Democratic Sen. Guy Gillette, a vigorous opponent of the Benson program, and elected a Republican, Thomas E. Martin, who defended the program. Many other remarkable Republican successes were achieved through the farm belt.

The unequivocal and courageous stand on farm policy, unfortunately, was an exception in the Eisenhower Administration. An example of quite another kind was set when Attorney General Brownell exposed the shocking record of the Truman Administration in the Harry Dexter White case, only to find his exposure virtually disowned by the President within a few days. The Administration has since blown hot and cold on the tremendous issue of Communist infiltration in the government. It has almost apologized at times for its record in removing subversives.

The Administration has been equally irresolute on the question of spending. True, it has made some substantial cuts. But it still runs huge deficits and continues indefensible spending of billions—for example, in continuing the New Deal foreign giveaway program.

Much the same may be said about labor policy. True, the Eisenhower Administration has not been shamelessly subservient to the union bosses, as was its predecessor. But though it has thereby earned the implacable opposition of the union bosses, it has failed to gain the compensating friends it needs because it has continued timorously to appease and curry favor with the union bosses rather than begin firmly to curb some of their abuses of power. Mr. Eisenhower does not yet seem to have clearly distinguished between the interest of the small-but-vocal clique of labor-union leaders, on the one hand, and the interest of the whole body of workers (which involves, of course, the freedom of the individual worker), on the other. Not until the Republican Party grasps this distinction clearly can it hope to regain the majority of the so-called “labor vote.”

The turnover in the control of Congress was accomplished by a net shift of only twenty out of a total of 435 seats in the House, and a net shift of only one seat in the Senate as compared with the situation in 1952. Surely this is no reason for any loss of nerve on the part of the Administration, or for the belief that it can gain anything by moving farther in the direction of New Dealism.