Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1946-06-12
Wisconsin Democrats
Hope for La Toilette
Defeat in Primary
Continued From First Page.)

State went for President Roosevelt
in the elections of,1936 and 1910.
The Democrats invited Senator
La Toilette into their party. He
could, they say, have had the Demo-
cratic nomination for Senator this
year. Senator La Toilette, however
would have none of it, preferring to
lead the Progressive party back into
the Republican fold-and to run as
Republican himself.
As a matter of fact, Senator La
Toilette probably figured that since
the State has for years been over
Whelming Republican, basically, and
since many of the Progressives had
already returned to the Republican
party which they left when they
followed him into the now defunct
Progressive party in 1884. it would
be simpler to get reelected as a Re-
publican, with a promise to make
the Republican party of Wisconsin
again Progressive. AT any rate that
Is the course he is attempting to
/ follow.
Prefer COP "StalWart."
/ Under the circumstances. there
fore, the Democrats prefer to see
Judge Mccarthy, the "stalWart' Re-
publican candidate, nominated for
the Senate over Senator La Toilette.
They hope that Democrats can help
to bring this about by keeping the
Democratic labor vote as much as
possible in the Democratic primary
and by having Democrats who do go
into the Republican primary vote
for Mr.. Mccarthy on the issue of
international collaboration.
The Democratic nominees for the
Senate and for Governor respec-
lively will be former Representative
McMurray and former Mayor Daniel
w. Hoan of Milwaukee. They were
the partys nominees for these offices
in 1914, and in that election the
Democrats rolled up half a million
votes for their senatorial candidate
against Senator Wiley-and lost by
something over 100000 votes. This.
they figure was a good showing.
To bolster the plan for making
the Democratic party the progress
sive. liberal party of the State. the
leaders here have persuaded Secre-
tary of Commerce Wallace to come
into Wisconsin the last of June or
| first of July to speak along these
lines.
Point to Taft Letter.
In an effort to tear down Sena-
tor La Toilette as true progressive
and liberal the Democrats are
charging that the Senator is playing
ball with conservative Republicans
in Wisconsin and in Washington.
They point to the now famous let
ter written by Senator Taft of Ohio
to Lester j. Bradshaw of Milwau-
kee last April II, and which was
unearthed and published by Lau-
renee c. Eklund, political writer of
the Milwaukee Journal, at the time
OF the Republican convention, which
Endorsed Mr. Mccarthy for Senator
and Delbert j. Kenny for Governor.
In that letter. which Senator Taft
later said was ''garbled," the Ohio
Senator said: ~--.--r
with regard to Wisconsin I hope
La Toilette is successful. I get on
with him very we'll and would have
no difficulty in agreeing with him
on social welfare measures. In the
long run he will be closer to me
than he will be to Morse (Senator
Morse, liberal Republican, of Ore
gon). Furthermore, Tom Coleman
chairman of the Wisconsin Repub-
lican Committee) appears to be tied
up with Stassen. I don't think that
La Toilette will ever get in that
campaign because he disapproves
so strongly of Stassen's foreign pol
icy" The Journal later published
a photostat of the letter.
Irish Catholic Issue.
While Senator La Toilette and
his supporters are not making the
issue, the fact that the regular Re-,
publican ticket in the primary is
headed by two Irish Catholics may
play an important part in the pri-
mary election. Judge Mccarthy
and Mr.. Kenny are both Irish and
Catholic-and so is Chairman Cole
man of the Republican Committee.
In State which is predominantlv
Protestant. this lineup may prove
disastrous to the "Stalwart" ticket.
No Catholic has ever been elected
Governor of the State and Judge
/ Duffy, Catholic, who was elected
Senator in 1882. had the benefit of
Progressive support which declined
to go for Chapple. the Stalwart Re-
publican nominee for Senator who
defeated Senator Blaine. Progress
/ sive, for the Republican nominal ton
that year There are large racial
blocs of voters in the State-Ger-
man, Scandinavian and others
who are strongly Protestant.
This religious issue has come into
the open through newspaper publ
cation and particularly through the
Word-of-mouth process. 1t is
brought further into focus because
of proposed constitutional amend
ment which would permit the ex-
penditure of public funds for buses
for the use of students attending
parochial schools-resisted strongly
by many Protestants. The amend
ment, however. will not be voted on
until the November election.
/ Another issue which promises to
raise its head more and more is
that of international collaboration
with Judge Mccarthy taking a
stand in support of such a foreign
policy, and the La Toilette sup
porters looking askance. Wisconsin
in the past has been isolationist in
sentiment. This was one of the
issues which helped to defeat the
late Wendell L. Willkie so devastat-
ingly in his Wisconsin campaign for
instructed delegates to the Repup-
lican National Convention in 1914
! LOST.