Evening star., 1948-11-27
Republican Liberals
Seen as Likely 'Saps'
For New Dealers
What They Get Out Of 1t
Won't Help Them Much,
CoIumnist Contends
By Frank X. Kent

bIlC wluV4y diuCu
liberal Republican senators. SO
handsomely extolled by the lib
eral' columnists and commentators
(all of whom are New Deal Demo-
crats>, have not quite thought their
situation through. Perhaps If some
of the brighter among them get
around to doing so they may con-
clude they are being played for
saps and that what they get out
Of it is not worth very much.
Reference is to such Senators as
Aiken and Flanders of Vermont
Baldwin, of Connecticut; Tobey, of
New Hampshire; Morse of Oregon;
Lodge, of Massachusetts. and one
or two others. The claim of these
statesmen to be liberals" seems
based on several not entirely sound
assumptions. One is that it is the
mark of liberal publicly to echo
the labor-union propaganda-par-
ticularly that of the CIO. Another
is that it is the mark of a liberal
to resist every effort toward gov
ernmental retrenchment and sup
port every proposal classified as
social legislation" regardless OF
cost or direction. A third is that
il is the mark of a liberal" fire.
quently to denounce the "Old
Guard" and insist that the Republi-
can Party must be "liberalized" il
it is to live.
Eo,,rtb fbot u ;e {ba ,,,,rl, - q
"liberar' frequently to assail cor
porate greed" and assert that the
ower-income groups already pay
more than their share of taxes
And, finally. it is the mark of a
liberal" to feel no concern-and
certainly take no public notice-of
the height of the national debt. OF
the depth of the annual deficits
Easy To Qualify.
Now, it is extremely easy for the
aforementioned Republican lib
erals and their counterparts in the
House to qualify along these lines
without doing anything more than
beat their breasts and exercise
their tonsils. Along these lines they
can become liberal" be
lauded by the New Deal propa-
ganda groups-without ever taking
specific stand, making a construc-
tive suggestion or concrete charge
1t is not necessary to have SC
much as a single cohesive idea or q
single sincere emotion. Actually
you can get to be a recognized lib
eral" by the simple expedient oi
proclaiming that the Republican
Party needs liberal leadership.
That is the one essential thing tt
do and actually that is all some
of them have done. Immediately
they reap an astonishingly favor
able publicity from New Deal lit.
erary and radio characters in al
parts of the country. They are
lauded as "forward-looking men.
Adjectives such as fortnight,
''modern- minded hard hitting,
"able and alert ETC., ETC., are reg
ulariy attached to their names
They find themselves singled out
for contrast with those reaction
ary Republicans" who want to &c
back to the days of William Nc
Kinley" That Is the line these
journalistic and radio bleeding
hearts" use on these newly devel-
oped Republican "liberals"-and
the Republican liberals" love it.
Strangely enough, what they do
not appear to see, is that there is
little political nourishment for them
in the cause which they thus es-
pouse-and certainly none at all
for their party. The more they sue
ceed in pushing themselves and
their party into the New Deal kind
of liberalism" the more liberal"
and leftish the New Dealers glee-
fully 60 It has been proved in three
campaigns that when the Republi-
can candidates try to compete with
the New Deal they fail more lam
entably than in any other way
They do not succeed in making
inroads on those special groups
TO which the spending policies OF
the New Deal particularly appeal
to wit, organized labor, the North
ern Negroes and the big-city ma
chimes, which have become incur
ably Democratic. And, certainly
they fail to attract the conservative
Democrats who, much as they dis
like both the Roosevelt and the Tru-
man New Deal, feel no urge to
leave their own party when the
other offers nothing but cheap
imitation.
Cannot Win Race.
One would suppose that these
Republican liberals" who demand
that their party engage in a race
with the New Deal-a race which
obviously it cannot win-would
realize that all they possibly can
achieve is to force mounting Gov
ernment bounties and mounting
Government controls. And that,
says Rogers c. Dunn. of the Dunn
Survey. ultimately will close the
steel trap of statism" Unless an
exception is made of Senator Lodge
because of his proposed reform OF
Cne elecLQTal system, not one OF
these highly publicized Republican
liberals" has anything in his record
to sustain his claims-save bleats
about the "Old Guard"
1t might be good thing If these
Republican liberals" were required
clearly to state their principles and
program and then required to show
= that these can be achieved without
further enlarging the cost, size and
power of the Federal Government
to the point where it becomes the
complete master Of all the people
From the start that has been the
New Deal direction. All the Repub-
lican liberals" are doing is to hasten
us toward that goal where we will
be Nation of sheep with the Fed.
eral Government the shepherd of us
all. This is exactly the dire END
forecast for our great democratic
experiment by that far-sightec
Frenchman - De Toqueville-nearly
$50 years ago. Two facts are here
commended to the Republican lib.
erals:
l. The rather reckless pledge.