The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, June 28, 1920, Page 4

What a National Convention Is Like Is It a Great Deliberative Body? —*‘ Hardly,” Says Leader Staff ' Representative, Describing Typical Session WIS e 1 oy AN N L e R _ BY E. B. FUSSELL Representative of the Leader at the Republican National Convention at Chicago FEW weeks from now the best cam- paign orators of the Republican party and of the Democratic party will be out telling the dear people that the platforms and candidates of their re- spective parties are the result of the ~ choice of 1,000 delegates, after careful considera- tion and due deliberation. They will paint a picture of 1,000 sober, intelligent men and women, from all parts of the United States, in Republican or Demo- cratic national conventions assembled, conscien- tiously trying to decide what is best for the rest of the 100,000,000 people in the United States. This is a false picture. Whatever else a national convention may be, it is not a great deliberative body. To show what a session of a national conven- tion is like, I will describe in detail exactly what happened at one session of the Republican conven- tion at Chicago this year. It is 4 o’clock the afternoon of June 10. A thou- sand delegates, a thousand alternates and 13,000 spectators crowd the great Coliseum floor, balcony and gallery. The convention is due to be called to order to hear the reading of the platform, prepared by the resolutions committee. But the platform is late, so it is not until nearly 5 d’clock glass of water and waves it before the crowd and makes a little speech poking fun at prohibition. He says he will drink the health of the convention, drinks the water, making a wry face at it, God blesses all the delegates and retires. The delegates now start calling for former Sena- tor Beveridge. But Senator Lodge has remember- ed that the convention has forgotten to elect the national committeeman from Georgia. So the sec- retary of the convention calls the roll of the Georgia delegates. As each delegate gets up he names his choice, either Henry Lincoln Johnson or the candi- date that is running against him. In a spirit of horseplay the whole convention cheers each Georgia delegate as he announces his _vote, whether he is for the ‘“Georgia peach” or against him. Finally the roll is completed. The “Georgia peach” has 12 votes; his opponent has only three. Motion is made that the convention elect Johnson, the choice of the delegation. Just as before, about 100 of the 1,000 vote a weak “Yes.” The rest of the delegates and most of the audience, still in a spirit of horseplay, vote a thunderous l WAKE UP, UNCLE SAM! f ‘“What does he mean by mandatory?” asks the man sitting next to me. “Dunno, something about Armenia, I guess,” says the man on the other side. The crowd is yelling for Beveridge again. But apparently Senator Lodge doesn’t want Mr. Beve- ridge, who is something of a progressive, to speak. Instead of sending Beveridge out to the front of the platform, Senator Lodge sends out “Leather- Lung” Brown. Mr. Brown was a Y. M. C. A. secre- tary who led community singing among the soldiers during the war. He is hired to help entertain the convention in the same way. On the opening day he led them in singing “Star Spangled Banner.” He insisted on the delegates singing the second verse, which they didn’t know and they took a dislike to him. “HAIL, HAIL, THE GANG’S ALL HERE”—THE FAVORITE Now he wants them to sing “A Long, Long Trail.” The band starts up and Brown starts to sing. But the delegates don’t want to sing “A Long, Long Trail.” It has been a long, long trail from the political pie counter for them for a long, long time. The whole audience hoots and yells and whistles and completely drowns out not only “Leather Lung’'s” voice but also the big 50-piece band. Mr. Brown gives up in disgust. Then he has a that the convention is called to order. happy idea. “Let’s sing, ‘Hail, Hail, the Senator Henry Cabot Lodge raps his SVUGLAR Gang’s All Here,’” he announces. This is gavel and calls the convention to order. “':‘,”ch'?:ufi more to the delegates’ taste. They sing Mr. Lodge is a small, elderly man with a gray Van Dyke beard and a Harvard ac- 21bs To A Cusvomer for a while about “What the hell do we s svor=] care, what the hell do we care,” and then . it will b Py, 2 N = = this palls. They start yelling for fif:ltr bgfif: I;(filéncle:t;};:xtxlgsw;ead; angf)};fi: Pt /,/ i \\\\\\\\Y 3 D W m-g-‘ ?E‘z:evr:aridgse I:=1g21i1'1 witl}; a :fewy callg for of the delegatesphoot. In the meantime, = = //, \\\ VA %’}_‘%fi‘{fl%i “Teddy Junior.” ] says Senator Lodge, the convention will SY7 (7 \ 0 o Then, down in the middle of the delegate proceed to elect the national committee, which consists of one committeeman from each state. The roll of the states is called and each state delegation announces the name of the man they want as their mem- ber of the committee. There are just two or three incidents of this rollcall worth recalling. When Illinois is reached Senator Sherman is announced as the choice of the state. Sherman, de- fender of the Big Five packers, gets a big ovation. There must be a good many fol- lowers of the Big Five in the audience. When Pennsylvania is reached Senator Penrose is named c.d the whole convention breaks i.°2> cheers. Regardless of the choice of the convention as their presiden- tial candidate, Penrose is the big hero of the politicians gathered here. He is the man they would name for president if they dared. When Georgia is reached in the rollcall one of the delegates nominates Henry Lincoln Johnson, an Atlanta negro mick- named the “Georgia peach.” Johnson was given $9,000 by Lowden forces to line up the delegates for the Illinois governor, the senate investigation showed. One of the other delegates gets up to say that Johnson is not the choice of the delegation. So Senator Lodge an- nounces that Georgia will be passed for the time being. “JOE” CANNON TOASTS THE DELEGATES—WITH WATER ‘When the rolleall is completed a motion is made that the delegates nominated by the states be elect- ed by acclamation. A hundred or so out of the 1,000 delegates vote for the resolution and nobody votes against it, so it is carried. All this has taken only a few minutes and there is still nearly an hour to wait for the platform. The crowd starts yelling “Cannon,” “Joe Cannon.” They want to hear from the old boss of the house of rep- resentatives, thrown out of his leadership 10 years ago, but still the big hero of the standpatters, next to Senator Penrose, who is sick and can not be at the convention. Mr. Cannon can not be found for a time. Finally he is located and comes forward. He picks up a high prices. £ The Republican platform failed to promise the people any relief from It said, in virtually so many words, that little could be done to help the present situation. But other countries are doing something. “NO.” It is plain that the motion to elect Johnson has been lost, about 20 to 1. “The motion is carried,” Senator Lodge an- nounces. : “No, no, rollcall,” the delegates and visitors shout. They know it is nearly an hour yet before the platform will be ready and they want a little more fun while they are waiting. Senator Lodge gets peevish. He pounds the table with his gavel until the gavel breaks. “You ean’t have a rollcall,” he announces. “There is no provision for a rollcall on election of the na- tional committee.” The tumult keeps up. If Senator Lodge had treated the whole matter as a joke, as it is, it would have been all over before now. Somebody comes up from behind and tells him something. He raps for order again. “The convention has no choice but to elect the candidate selected by the Georgia delegation,” he says. “The choice of the delegation is mandatory on the convention.” PAGE FOUR . section someone starts up “How Dry I Am.” This is what the delegates want to sing. In a minute everybody in the convention is telling the world how dry they are, that “the Lord only knows how dry they are and that nobody gives a d—— Mr. Brown gets up in front in time to lead the last bar of the chorus. Then the uproar resumes. Finally it is announced that the platform is all ready for the delegates to hear. Senator Watson reads it for mnearly an hour. By the time he is through it is nearly 7 o’clock and the delegates and visi- tors are tired and hungry. It is announced that there is a minority report. A slender young man from Wisconsin gets up to read the minority report. It consists of the “La Follette platform,” on which La Fol- lette delegates ran in Wisconsin and were elected by a two-to-one vote. It declares for a bonus for the returned soldiers, against compulsory military training and for freedom for Ireland—all of which points were “dodged” in the platform sub- mitted by the majority of the resolutions committee and read by Senator Watson. The Wisconsin man gets a little mild ap- plause, but it is too late and the delegates don’t want to take the time to consider his planks. When he reaches the one for “free speech” there is hissing and when he comes to government owner- ship of railroads and control of packers there are hoots, jeers and cries of “Throw him out.” The Wisconsin man reminds the audience that even Senator Watson’s platform called for “free speech” and he wants some. The crowd only laughs and jeers. Senator Lodge hammers with his gavel and gets some kind of order and the reading is finished. Motion is made to adopt the Wisconsin platform in place of the Watson platform but it is drowned under a chorus of “noes.” The crowd wants to get home. A majority might favor Irish freedom or other planks, but they are late for din- ner now. That is the important thing. This is a fair sample of a national convention, Republican or Democratic. Are they “great delib- erative bodies,” as the platform orators assure us? There is more real deliberation in five minutes of a state convention of League farmers than in the Republican and Democratic national conventions put together. -