There’s no question about the lact that he
understood Congressional politics, being a
product of it tor a quarter oi a century and
was much more able to get things through
the Congress than Kennedy was, But don’t
ignore the iact that even when the same
party controls both the Congress and the
Presidency, you have dilterent constituen-
cies. There’s builtrin resistance. Even
under the most ideal political circumstan»
ces, with a strong President and with his
party controlling the Congress the Presir
dent still has ditiiculty in getting his legislar
tive program through

SKLB: We’ve touched at least on some of the
policy ditterences. One other tacticalqnes—
tion that we might ask is simply this: Nixon
has the advantage oi being able to take the
initiative and control a lot of What happens,
especially in loreign policy and even to some
extent in economic policy. How do you think
the Democrats are going to be able to counr
ter this?

Gilmour: What you have is a two»edged
sword, because the iact is that he’s not in
complete control oi the loreign situation
and it may very well be that the North
Vietnamese figure‘the'y‘ll get a better shake
irom a Democratic Presidentand get a
quicker withdrawal. They may very well
have another Tet otiensive at a very
crucial time in the election campaign.

Orr: But that can be a two—edged sword too.
It can drive the American people behind the
incumbent,

Hottois: Nixon does have the advantage of
the initiative; he can easily take initiatives,
it's not clear whether that's always helpful.
Some argue for example that an incumbent
is then put into a defensive position. I think
the important two things he has going tor
him are i) the fact that he is in the White
House *— and that just gives him all sorts
of little goodies that the other candidates
just don’t have. He can use the services that
are paid (or {or a President in his campaign.
The second thing is that the Republicans have
gotten themselves organized, the Democrats
are still in the position oi lighting among
themselves.

Orr; But the whole thing it seems to me —-
the most important thing is going to be the
unemployment picture.

Moore: One terrible thing that crossed my
mind, you know Willy Brandt got the Nobel
Peace Prize ior going to East Germany,
what it Nixon were to win the Nobel Peace
Prize tor going to China?

see: i think the timing would save him {or
the election there. ,

Moore: They awarded it in August lastyear.

Hottois: My sense is that the Nobel come
mittee would know better than to give it then.
That is going to hurt him with a lot of his
normal constituents.

65

Gilmour: You saw the latest uallup analyr
sis in which they measured the Democratic
candidates against Nixon on the three factors
oi personal appeal -- what they call charis-
ma -- party support, and which party in the

. minds of the people could best meet the
central problems of the day. Ontwo oithese,
the Democratic party and its candidates
would have the advantage _. but interesting
1y enough, on personal appeal, President
Nixon was far ahead. I would Just remind
all or us W i think l am right, am i not,
Jim, that in this century, there has only
been one President who has been seeking
reelection who didn’t get it. and that was
Herbert Hoover. And he, I think its {air
to say, was beaten because oi the
Depression.

Hottois: You iorgot to include Lyndon John-
son,

Gilmour: He didn’t choose to run. 1 said a
President who chose to run. The only Presi-
dent who has everlost in seeking reelection.

Orr: But the economic condition...

Gilmour: , p
raise. Bad as the situation is, certainly
its not comparable to the 1932 situation.

Orr: i think it was heading that way until
the Wage-Price Freeze.

Gilmour: The Kennedyorganizationpro‘oahr
ly has as good political intelligence as any
in the country, and it Ted Kennedy isn’t
interested, l think its because they’re say-
ing its not winnabie.

Moore: 1 still think Nixon is neatable I
think back again to 1968 alter the conven-
tion, They were arguing not whether Nixon
was going to win but whether it was going to
be by three million votes or iive million
votes,

SKtB: Eugene McCarthy will prohablv run
on a iourth party. Certainly he will iti-lumphr

This terrible thought just
crossed my mind . . .

Well, this. is the point I would,

rcy or Jackson is nominated, possibly hewill
it Muskie is nominated. Do we needa tourth
party?

Gilmour: rm in iavor oia multirparty sy5r
tem, lor the iirst time in my liie iagree
with Richard Scammon that it probably would
have been better for the political system in
terms of policy outcomes ii' there had been
a third party W ii there had been a peace
party. it may not have changed the actual
results in terms of who won and who lost,
but it would have given a vent to and a sense
or meaninglui participation to guys like Ed
Moore here, who chose not to vote at all and
was enormously frustrated ‘ Quite apart
from this, I think the umbrella approach to
the two party system, which i, and most
political scientists used to think was one of
the great strengths oi the American system
...what Walter Lippman calls the genius or
American politics, because it drives every
thing to the center. I think when you talk
about the tworparty system, that its virtue
is being that oi stability and continuity,
that’s line in times of rather social peace.
But in times of rapid social change like
now stability becomes a vice. not a Virtual
And what I think we need is really an up-
setting” of the Whole political system, hold:
ing it up, ventilating it, getting new ideas,
new leaders, new parties.

Hottois: I would agree with you to the extent
that I don’t see why political scientists have
traditionally rectilied the two—party system,
and necessarily applauded its greatness.
The literature is simply full or holes ior a
number of reasons. i would disagree with
you, however, on one point, it seems to me
that your radical populism is leaving some
thing out. That is, you’re looking at this
party as a party which will ultimately gain
control. My response is that the party which
is ultimately likely to gain control is probab—
ly not that one but probably the one of some
body like George Wallace. in addition. I
would point out that both of these things that
we’re talking about, the third and the fourth
party, are individualistic parties. It maybe
th 't is unrealistic to think about the pos-
s' ty or more than two parties in the sys
tem; that is, there may be something built
into the American political system, the
structure of American government, which
almost necessitates, as a causal {actor
leading to two parties. That doesn't mean
that it's necessarily good, and it doesn’t
mean that it's necessarily good that those
two parties come together in the center,
but i think that you’ve got to keep in mind
the tact that splinter parties can go any way.

Gilmour: . . . What the two party system
has done most effectively is just kept the
great mass or the needy, oi the blacks, and
oi poor people, even women and young
people, on the outside. . . (We need) to
build this kind of a coalition and use it as
a pressure group on the lelt, to force the
Democratic party and the whole political
system to move to the lelt.

 

