Evening star., 1936-09-04
LAND0N LEADING
IN DIGEST POLL
BaIloting Gives Him 1906
to 1854 in Four
States.
BY G. GOULD LINCOLN.

Like It or not, the first fragment
of the presidential poll taken by the
Literary Digest indicates that Landon.
the Republican nominee, has chance
to defeat President Roosevelt.
Indeed, the ardent Landon and
anti-Roosevelt enthusiasts would put
It far beyond that mild statement.
For the poll, taken in Maine, New
York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania
shows Landon with a 2-to-1 vote
against Roosevelt The total vote
received and tabulated was 16,056
for the Republican candidate to 1854
for the President. However. the vote
cast did not include any part of New
York City, Philadelphia or Pittsburgh.
1t is in such centers that Roosevelt is
believed to be particularly strong.
There is nothing sure about that,
though.
Maine for Landon.
Landons greatest strength, accord
ing to this poll, was found in Maine,
where he got 1881 votes to 522 for
Roosevelt. This is not particularly
surprising. Roosevelt and the New
Deal do not stand we'll in the Pine
Tree State, which is set to give him
a drubbing next November, no matter
what it may do in the State election
September IA of Governor and
members of the Congress. The
strong Republican swing in the State
however, rather indicates that the
State election will be none too rosy for
the Democratic candidates.
In New jersey the voters appear to
like Landon quite bit better than
they do Roosevelt. for the count stood
1850 for Landon to 1921 for the
President. New York, the President S
own home State, was not much better
for the New Deal President in this
r1eager poll. Landon had 5,931 votes
to 2,724 for Roosevelt. To be sure,
no part of Greater New York was
included in the balloting, and 1t is
in the metropolis that the President
and Chairman James A. Farley are
counting on rolling up several hun
dred thousand majority to Offset the
Landon lead upstate. However, q
more than 2-to-1 vote in New York
State does not look any too good for
the Democrats.
Trail in Pennsylvania.
The Democrats have been chirping
a lot about what they intend to do in
Pennsylvania, where Senator Joe
Guffey is the Democratic boss and
Gov. Earle has his mind about made
up to run for President on the Demo-
cratic ticket in 1910. However, the
Roosevelt showing in the Pennsyl-
vania vote so far tabulated is not
particularly encouraging, for Landon
received 5,634 votes to 2,778 for Roose-
welt.
The Digest warns the public not to
make final predictions from these first
few returns about the coming elec-
tion. The ballots go to 10000 voters
all over the country in an effort to
test the sentiment of the country.
Furthermore. election day is two
months in future, and a lot of things
can happen in that time.
One thing, however. may be said
about the first returns from political
polls growing out of the experience
of many years in taking polls. The
complexion of the final poll figures
is more than likely to show the same
trend as the early poll. And the
present poll covers, in part, three great
Eastern States, with many electoral
votes, and one of the group Of New
England States.
Small Vote for Lemke.
Lemke, the new third party presi-
Dental candidate. had only a small
vote, but it ran to about 3 per cent
of the total. The interesting thing
about the Lemke vote, however, was
that Lemke took four votes from
Roosevelt for every one he took
from Landon, considering that Lam
don is receiving the Hoover vote of
four years ago. That is something
for the New Deal high command to
think about seriously. Especially since
Lemke and his Union party ticket are
gong on LIlS DdllOIS III lOL Ol tIlS
important States, among them Penn
sylvania. There the Democrats tried
to beat Lemke and Father Coughlin
to it. They "pre-empted" in many of
the counties the name Union party"
by the simple method of having lot
of Roosevelt followers sign up for it.
The Lemke people, however, are Al
ing in Pennsylvania as the Royal Oak
party.
Another interesting thing about
this first poll of the Literary Digest
Is that it shows Landon getting a
large proportion of the new voters.
In Maine, for example, Landon had
81 new voters to 81 for Roosevelt; in
New Jersey he had 129 to "a for
Roosevelt; in New York, 211 to 1913,
and in Pennsylvania. 223 to 130
The Digest is making an effort to
learn how the old voters voted in 1882
and the swing from one party to the
other.