Evening star., 1944-10-13

ultimate inten-
tion to favor the 'ss''
candidate of Frank R. Kent
their choice.
This is taking a pretty mean ad-
vantage Of a dead man who has no
way of correcting misrepresenta-
ton. Certainly, it is one Of the low
est forms of vote solicitation known
to politicians.
so outraged have the closest
friends and relatives of Mr.. Willkie
been over this unpleasant compete
tion that serious consideration has
been given to the issuance of a
statement which would say that
Mr.. Willkie had not, directly or in
directly. confided his intentions to
any one; that no one had the slight
est right to make any deduction
from anything he had said or writ
ten; that he himself had not finally
made up his mind as to his position.
This statement may have been
issued before this is printed, or 1t
may never be issued at all. But,
whether 1t is or not, the fact re-
mains that the family of Mr.. Will
kie Is properly indignant over the
sort Of distortion to which his con-
fidential correspondence and con-
versation have been subjected
Apparently Mr.. Willkie died with
out giving any one-including men,
bers of his family-the slightest
inkling as to what he intended to do.
Now that he is dead he ought to be
protected from having his purpose,
which no one actually knew, pro-
claimed by men whom he would not
have taken into his confidence and
who merely guess that his final de-
cision would have been satisfactory
to them.
The truth is that Mr.. Willkie
talked with great freedom to large
number of newspapermen-always
with the understanding that he was
talking personally and could not be
quoted, None of these violated his
confidence while he lived. Most of
them would not have thought of
doing so anyhow and those who
might have been tempted were de-
tered by the knowledge that Mr.
Willkie was in position to repudiate
and to make the reputation stick.
His death would not appear to re-
lease the obligation to keep conf
dence-particularly as he never
really gave any one his confidence.
Besides talking confidentially to
many newspapermen, Mr.. Willkie
wrote lots of letters to them. Prob
ably there were 80 or 40 with whom
he kept up correspondence II
newspaperman wrote a piece praising
or criticizing Mr.. Willkie he was sure
to get either telephone call or
letter.
And If the piece was critical he
found himself in an acrimonious
literary debate, which generally
reached stage of considerable vio-
lence. Then would come period of
silence, finally broken by the receipt
of another-and good tempered
letter from Mr.. Willkie, which re-
stored cordial relations.
MIR. Willkie liked newspapermen
and their company And they liked
him better than they liked either
President Roosevelt or Gov. Dewey
But that did not mean that all
those who liked him thought he
would make a good President or
that he was a great man. He did
have admirable qualities and his
fight against isolationism in his
party was fine thing, of great
benefit not only to the Republican
party but to the country and the
world. He deserves the fullest credit
for that and he certainly was a
man of more than average charac-
ter and courage.
Also, he had a national popular
ity somewhat reminiscent of the
late William Jennings Bryan, whom
in many ways he resembled. No
one would wish now to disparage
Mr.. Willkie or to detract from any
credit that has been given him. But
certainly a good deal of foolishnes
has been written about him since
his death.
His complete disinterestedness
for example, has been overstressed;
]lis following has been exaggerated.
1t does not detract from Mr.. Will
kie's sincerity to say that he was
not wholly unmindful of the effect
upon his own political future of the
course he intended to pursue in this
campaign. And, the notion that he
did not think of himself as having
a political future is absurd.
He was colorful figure and a
fine citizen, but he was no political
superman and the idea expressed
by an eminent lady journalist that
he was the conscience of the Re-
publican party" which now has no
conscience, is not very reasonable.
He was the best advertised and
the best known, but he was not the
only conscientious and principled
man in the Republican party-not
by long shot. That covers too
much territory.
And, if he was the Republican
partys conscience, it is timely to
ask who is the Democratic party's
conscience? Mr.. Roosevelt? Mr..
Ickes? Claude P. Pepper? Mr..
Hopkins? Mr.. Hague? Mr.. Wal
lace? Few persons would pick one
of these.
The nearest thing to a conscience