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Show I fighting WdtWeMPm ' ? ' P i' I E . L X& - ' ; x ' - vu 1 ,v' V "i 4 i ' -i ' .N ftL A i J ' A - 'l -I ' PRESIDENT HARRY S. TRUMAN by trie California, Wisconsin and Minnesota delegations spearheaded by Mayor Hubert J. Humphrey, of Minneapolis. This plank paid high tribute to President Truman for his civil rights stand and called upon the congress to support the President In (1) the right to full and equal political participation; (2) right to equal opportunity of employment; (3) the right of security of person and (4) the right of equal treatment treat-ment in the service and defense of our nation. The resolution was adopted by a vote of 65 Ui to 582 12. The vote does not indicate relative strength of the opposing forces since many states voted against the resolution merely to uphold the resolutions committee which had adopted a compromise plank on civil rights. The platform differs from the Republican platform In some essentials es-sentials it demands repeal of the Republican Taft-Hartley labor act and declares it has proven a failure; fail-ure; it demands repeal of the discriminatory taxes on oleomargarine; oleomar-garine; it pledges to oppose any revision re-vision of federal laws "designed to curtail the most effective functioning function-ing of farm cooperatives." This is interpreted to mean the party goes on record against change of the tax-exempt status of farm cooperatives. coop-eratives. As a matter of fact the platform supports all forms of cooperatives co-operatives and "other democratic associations for the purpose of carrying out any proper business operations free from any arbitrary and discriminatory restrictions." The foreign policy plank pledged continued support of the Truman doctrine, the Marshall plan, the United Nations, the Good Neighbor Neigh-bor Policy with respect to South America; and, taking a slap at the Republicans, pledged sufficient appropriations ap-propriations to carry out the will of the congress on Its foreign commitments. com-mitments. Truman s Opposition , Lacked Leadership In the hectic days prior to the roll call of states, the re"olt against the nomination of President Truman, followed much the same pattern that was evident in the Republican convention held In the same hall only a few short weeks before . . . the opponents of the President could settle on no single leader to make the race. So it was in the GOP convention . . . opponents of Governor Dewey could settle on no concentrated opposition. op-position. So the President ran away with the nomination on the first ballot as Dewey did on the third. While many of the faces of bygone by-gone glory were at Philadelphia and the ghost of Franklin D. Roosevelt still hovered over the conglomeration of factions which always has made up the Democratic Demo-cratic . party, there was no single leader able to cement these factions fac-tions Into unity as Roosevelt and his braln-trusters did through four national conventions, one of them here at Philadelphia In 1936. While some sources sought to Interpret In-terpret this factionalism in the convention as a "wake" or a "breaking up" of the party, the political po-litical history Indicates there has always been such factionalism in Democratic conventions. This fac tionalism or sectionalism has been brought about by geographical and political philosophy factors ... the south ... the liberal element, labor, even religion and race. As a matter of fact in only three conventions since the civil war has this factionalism been brought together to-gether with any degree of national unity ... the 1884 Chicago convention conven-tion which first nominated Cleveland; Cleve-land; the 1912 convention at Baltimore Balti-more which nominated Wilson and the 1932 Chicago convention which first nominated Roosevelt. In all three the cement of unity was a national crisis. A great many of the delegates believed be-lieved the nation again faces a major crisis . . . that any day some Incident may touch oft World War in. Hence they sought Gen. Elsenhower Elsen-hower as a national leader who could weld the party into unity. Eisenhower refused. Then they turned to the liberal and New Dealer, Justice William O. Douglas. He refused. Then in attempting to center on someone else revolters could find no one. Sen. Claude Pepper, of Florida, one of the better known liberals, put himself forward. But the big states . . . California, New York, Illinois refused to take him and swung back into the Truman column col-umn after James Roosevelt, son of the late President, had been severely chastised by his own California delegation. The south wouldn't accept Pepper's Pep-per's liberalism. So, Gov. Ben T. Laney, of Arkansas, was tossed into the ring by conservative and reactionary reac-tionary southerners who put states rights above civil rights. Party caucuses cau-cuses were bitter. Barkley's Keynote Sparked Enthusiasm The delegates were whipped into something like old-fashioned "democracy" "de-mocracy" when Barkley delivered his blistering, fighting keynote speech. The veteran Kentuckian was given a 28-mlnute demonstration. demonstra-tion. These delegates were Just waiting for something to cheer over, to lift the morale from the bitter depths of factionalism and Barkley gave it to them. He speeded up the tempo of the convention con-vention so that by the third day there was some evidence of the will to win and to fight for the nominee of the convention. Due to the absence of competing downtown headquarters at the various hotels, such as was the case In the Republican convention, there was not quite the activity and enthusiasm en-thusiasm engendered among delegates dele-gates at this convention. Aside from this fact however, the convention nail pageantry was Just as hectic and in all probability these Democratic Demo-cratic delegates wanting desperately desper-ately something to cheer about, cheered all the louder for their speakers and the demonstrations were Just as vigorous and noise-some noise-some as the Republican convention held here such a short time previous. Comparatively, the convention set-up was identical. Some of the state delegations had been changed around to give the more favored ' Democratic states better positions with regard to the speaker's podium. |