Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1950-01-28
The Political Mill
Liberal Aims in South
Stressed in Raleigh ToIks
Trumancrats' Seek to Show Area
Gains from Fair Deal Program
D.. H,.JI

RALEIGH, N. c., Jan. 28.-One Of the
strangest political paradoxes is found in the
fact that many of the highest Offices, legis-
lative as we'll as executive, in the Truman
Fair Deal government in Washington are
held by Southerners and at the same time
the South is today major trouble spot for
President Truman. Not only did he fail to
carry the solid South" as every Democra-
tic candidate for president-with the ex-
ception of the late Alfred E. Smith of New
York-has done since the days of recon-
struction, but it is the stubborn opposition
of the South Democrats in Congress which
is hamstringing the most important items
in his Fair Deal program.
The Truman administration therefore, Is
at present engaged in a desperate struggle
to change all this. The southern regional
conference staged in Raleigh is the result of
a -thought-out campaign, which will
increase in tempo as the months go by. 1t
is campaign of education to show the
people of the South what they have to gain
from the Fair Deal programme welfare
state-and how stupid they are to permit
their representatives in Congress to help
block that program.
Trumancrats Confident
The Trumancrats of the South, who insist
they are the true DemocratS-just as the
DixiecratS contend that they alone have that
virtue-do not minimize the fact they have
a fight on their hands. They are confident
of winning, however.
The announced candidacy of former Sec
rotary of State James F. Byrnes for Cover
nor of South Carolina was a setback for
the Trumancrats. Knowing that Mr..
Byrnes, because of his wide prestige, will
probably win easily, they are pouring out
their walls of wrath. They say he is fouling
No he Lo1y@ n,,;II sl,,,4~ III
present political stand to hatred for the
late President Roosevelt and to dislike for
President Truman. Also they seek to build
up the idea that MIR. ByrneS is looking to
1852 and vice presidential nomination on
an Eisenhower ticket backed by Republic
cans and Dixiecrats. All of which burns I'D
Mr.. ByrneS.
Jonathan Daniels, Democratic National
Committeeman, former assistant to the late
Franklin D. Roosevelt and largely reSponS-
ible for the Southern conference, is the spark
plug of the drive to bring the South back
into the Truman fold. He is the able and
active editor and publisher of the Raleigh
News and Observer, following in the foot
steps of his father. the late Josephus Daniels,
Secretary OF the Navy and Ambassador to
Mexico.
Contention of Daniels.
1t is Mr. Daniels contention that the
South has always been liberal and that it
is only question of methods which is caus-
ing trouble today. The South voted again
and again for William Jennings Bryan, great
liberal OF his day, for President. 1t insisted
on the nomination of Woodrow Wilson for
President against the opposition of New
York, and it supported and brought about
the nomination of Franklin D. Roosevelt in
1882, also against the opposition of New
York and other Northern Democrats.
Without the civil rights issue as funda-
mental cause of disturbance the liberal SEN
timent in the South would force support of
the Truman Fair Deal program, according
to Mr.. Daniels. And the reputation the
South has for conservatism springs from the
attitude of men who are really Republicans
but who insist on calling themselves Demo-
Gratis, many of them men of means And
he holds, finally, that the South above any
other section of the county needs the Tru-
man welfare state and that it will have it,
But Notwithstanding the liberal sentiment
in the South, and Notwithstanding the
advances which have been made in connec-
ton with the racial issue, the South is not
prepared to accept the compulsory Fair EN-
ployment Practices law which President
Truman continues to demand of Congress.
A voluntary and educational system, de.
signed to increase the Negroes field in in
duStry and better the grade of work for him
may be the solution