Thomas F. Eagleton served as U.S. Senator from Missouri from 1968-1987. He is now University Professor of Public Affairs at Washington University in St. Louis. Now and henceforth, money will be the factor in American politics. Everything else will be secondary.
Money is the exclusive, pre-eminent determinant of the outcome of federal elections.
William McKinley had Mark Hanna as his money bag man. The price of politics nudged up. Money flowed rather freely in the terms of Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover. Raising campaign funds posed a serious problem for Harry Truman. Even life-long Democrats were reluctant to give to Truman since he was certain to lose to Thomas Dewey.