Evening star., 1938-05-08

An action picture of Coz. Philip
La Toilette OF Wisconsin as he
addressed the ne1U political party,
the National ProgressiUes of Amer
ica. at the University OF Wisconsin.
A closeup OF the emblem is shoUn
belo1D. 1t 1UGS displayed conspicu-
OuSly, a red circle on ,Dhite back
ground, 1Dith square blue cross in
the center. The cross, Gou. La
Toilette explained, is the cross of
the ballot boL and the circle SYM
boliseS the uniting of the Ameri-
can people. Wide World Photo.
doomed to failure. Coolidge had 54 per
cent of the popular vote and 3s2 electoral
votes; Davis polled 20 per cent and received
1876 electoral votes. But La Toilette had
only Is per cent of the popular vote and
only l3 electoral votes-those of his own
State of Wisconsin. And yet in that year
La Toilette polled nearly 100000 votes
the country over.
The senior La Toilette died the following
year. in 1925. The forces that had followed
him disintegrated. His elder son, Robert
M La Toilette. jr, was nominated in the
Republican primary that year to succeed
him and was elected. And later his younger
son. Philip, was elected Governor Just 10
years after their father had sought to form
a national Progressive party, and as its
leader, to be elected President, the La Fol-
lette brothers launched the Progressive
party in Wisconsin, breaking definitely
away from the c. o. p They had sup
ported Franklin D. Roosevelt for President
in 1882.
Four years after the formation of the
Wisconsin Progressive party, the La Fol-
lettes have moved within the past 10 days
for the formation Of a national Progressive
party. They deny emphatically that in
either case were they moved by political
expediency. The time, they insist, had
come for political realignment in Wiscon-
sin in 1894 It has come. they add, for
national political realignment in 1885,
Expect No Sudden Success.
Neither of the La Toilette brothers ex-
poets the new party to blossom overnight.
They feel that they have pointed the way,
however, and they insist they have enlisted
for the duration of the war" Already
they have filed, or are in the process of
filing, the cross which is the political insig-
MIA of their new party in % States They
hope that organizations of the new Pro-
gressive party will develop in all of these
States-and in the other Is.
Their plans for the congressional cam
paign this year are still nebulous In Wis
consin, of course, the new Progressive party
will have candidates for the House in every
congressional district. 1t will have, too,
candidates for Governor and for Senator
in the field. Gov. Philip La Toilette, who
has been designated president" Of the new
political association, will be q candidate
either to succeed himself or for the sena-
torial seat now occupied by Democratic
Senator Ryan Duffy.
The La Follettes are not ready yet to say
in what other States candidates for Con-
gress will run on the new Progressive
party ticket. They are looking hopefully,
however, to the other States OF the North
west, particularly to Minnesota, where the
Farmer-Labor party has been in the saddle
for number Of years. So far the Mime
sofa third party" has not signif1ed an in
tention Of joining in the national move
ment advanced by the La Follettes. The
brothers are keeping their eyes trained also
on New York, with its American Labor
party, whose most prominent member today
is Mayor F. H. La Guardia of New York
City, and Pennsylvania, where John L.
Lewis and his Committee for Industrial
Organization are seeking political prefer
ment through their candidate for governor,
Thomas Kennedy, secretary-treasurer Of
the United Mine Workers Of America.
There Is North Dakota. too, where the Nom