Sunday, January 15, 1956 THE MICHIGAN DAILY Page Threw Te Rise of Richard Nixon "I started with ideas of black or white. But I fo nd that it's hard to find anywhere. where it's all black or all white .. . I found compromise is often what is right." Nixon's Transformation From "The Greenest Congressman in Town" To "One of the Great Leaders of Men" r * By PHIL BREEN "Are you available?" Perry ICHARD M. NIXON, the Vice asked Nixon President of the United States, "I am," Nixon quickly replied Is a remarkable man. Nine short "Are you a Repubican?' years ago he was a political non- "I guess so," Nixon answered. "I entity, quiet, shy, and embarras- voted for Dewey in '44." singly sincere. Today, he is a Nixon took a plane out to the superb hand-shaker, a magnifi- Coast and appeared before the cent back-slapper, and odds-on committee. They unanimously en- favorite to win the 1956 Republi- dorsed him. He was on his way. can presidential nomination, if At the age of 33, Richard Nixon, Ike doesn't run. the man of Quaker ideals, had Mr. Nixon is equipped with all taken the first step on the way to the personal qualities and abilities becoming Richard Nixon, the poli- important to a winning politician.jtician. He is personable. He is energetic. A grass-roots candidate. he He is ruthless. He cali shed a tear knew little about campaigning. at the click of a flash-gun and he He learned fast. He canvassed the can smile in the best toothpaste whole area, talking to business ad style. He is bright-eyed, fat- and community leaders in every checked, and cheerful-looking- town in the sprawling Twelfth the picture of "Republican peace District. Finally, he imveigled his and prosperity." His friends are Democratic opponent, Jerry Vor- many and influential, and lie hass his, into meeting him in a public organized a lesion of supporters ldebate. behinid inisAt the debate Nixon accused As the Nixon-foi Pesident Voorhis, who had served in the bandwagson rolls up steam and the House of Representative's for ten 19.6 cmpaign draws near there' years, of being a "New Deal Soc- will be much id and wilitte ialist" He produced documentary shouted and u ispered about Vii evidense showing that VoorhisIs PresidentNixon.The stblic will was endorsed by ai organization want to know more about this ri itsoice of whose members belonged ig young man from California, to the CIO Political Action Com- and it will have a hard time sift- niltee, a siis sit uas then ing the fact from the fable, separ- ciontrolled by Communists. Ham- ating the trui tfrom the half- mrig away at Voorhis' alleed truth and the half-truth from the radicalism, Nixont tent oii to winI outright lie. he election by a big majority. ICHARD Millious Nixon was At the outset of his political i born on Janury 9, 1913 at career he had used a winning Yoba Linda. California. ie is de- ascampain strategy which lie has scended froim Quaker stock andd employed ever since: attack. Blast he spent his formative years in away at every one of your oppon- Whittier, California, a town which ent's weak spots, and say little, was founded by pioneering Quak- if anything at all, about your own ers in the 1880's and in which te policies and plans. Sell your per- influence of Quaker virtue was sonality to the public, not your still very heavy during the time ideas. Be quick, forceful, and dar- Nixon was growing up. ins. "The gre.ter the risk, the. Nixon's family operated a small greater the opportunity," as he grocery, Nixon's Market, which his Ihas said. brother Donald now runs. The family business was a modest one, "Lost & Frustrated" but enough to provide the Nixons with a small'measure of prosperity AS A freshman Congressman he and to enable Hannah and Frank "felt lost - frustrated." A Nixon to educate three sons in the Washington newspaper even feat- ways of Quaker tolerance and ured an article about him entitled, generosity. "Greenest Congressman in Town" In 1934 the newly-founded Duke But again he learned fast. He wasr University Law School offered assigned to the Labor and Educa-t him a scholarship and he accept- tion Committee of the House and ed. He graduated from Duke in was instrumental in the passage of 1937 with honors and went back the Taft-Hartley Labor Relations home to Whittier to practice law. Act and other important meas- When World War II erupted ures. Nixon moved to Washington to 1948 saw him easily re-elected1 work for a government agency and he returned to Congress to - which badly needed lawyers. By take a post on the House Un-' law his Quaker religion exempted American Activities Committee. It' him from military service. He felt, is reported that he had serious however, that this was a war misgivings about joining the Com-c which "had to be fought." He ob- mittee, that he was afraid the tained a Navy commission in 1943 work of the Committee might and saw combat in the South damage the basic American free-' Pacific. Near the end of the war doms. he was transferred to an office in "We are deeply concerned," he Baltimore to work on Navy con- said, "that in our efforts to com-' tracts bat and break up subversivec "Amateur Candidate" moeet., we do not impair or destroy any of the rights and vsNE SUMMER day, in 1945, lberties which we hold so funda- while he was observed in the mental in America." routine of his desk job, he received Subsequently he publicly de- a telephone call from a long time clared for the rights of accused friend of the family, banker Her- individuals to refrain from giving man Perry. Perry told Nixon that self-incriminating evidence, and a 100 man committee of the Re- he urged some coded procedure1 publican leaders of California's governing the actions of all chair-' men of Congressional investigat-1 Twelfth District were looking for ing committees. a man to run for Congress, In It was, however, because of hisi 1940 the committee, in deaperate work on the Un-American Activi-f need of a candidate, had bought ties Committee that Nixon firsti space in the state newspapers ad- gained national fame. He became1 vertising themselves, to use the an expert Red-hunter, springing Saturday Evening Post's words, suddenly into the national spot- as "amateur politicians searching light when the Committee explod- for an amateur candidate," and ed the Alger Hiss-Whittakeri Perry was just helping them out. Chambers case. Nixon quickly be-f came the prime mover in the af- nary speeches in the annals of during his recent illness, Nixon fair, making headlines every day. political history. has taken over many of the ad- He became wonderfully adept at Pouring out the details of his ministrative duties of the Presi- appearing before cameras and family's penury, he claimed that dent. He has presided at meet- microphones, giving speeches and the fund was necessary to defray ings of the Cabinet, of the Na- holding press conferences. the many expenses of Senatorial tional Security Council, and of Nixon the Quaker was fast be- life that a Senator's salary ordi- groups of legislators. He has coming Nixon the actor, Nixon the narily couldn't afford, and that handled these and other adminis- orator, and above all, Nixon the the contributors of the fund did trative tasks with much success. politician, not expect and did not receive any A few months ago when Nixon special favors. . returned from a trip to the Cari- BY 1950 the transformation was Choked with emotion, he bbean, the President is reported complete. He had become, as made references to his wife and to have aid the following: "tt is good to have Vice-President Nixon back. You know, polities is some- thing like a bale. and the coin- manding officer usight fall in that battle. Ii is reassuring to have a man who is capable of steppim into his place u &Many look upon this and simi- l'r statemen s by the Presiient sniate ssttafIke 'sill not ruin in and silltisis official bi ssitto u a aoist1956. Yhey sfuel taeatsis)1 ixnnerds t is iii TE 1there es1on" e erl le in the GC who sill dio e-ery- h ng in thei r u' c i block N on's nomination. Thy feel as a candidate for President too paltiraly immature. T tase these feeliugs mainly hr evidence that Richard f., no riefined policy a "hate Nixon" cam- pt as the ca h 'd Persapst ' P at po)i ehic < a t ci ass "s whicl incites t , Jt n or, il; part of so many peospe. As Richard H. Rovere points out RICHARD M. NIXON ... "The greatest error you can make in Harper's: "It is astonishing .O T g s ethat when one 'thinks of Nixon in politics is to get mad, in relation to the history of the past three years there is no single Robert Coughlan has put it, "a children, and even to the family item of substantive policy that completely political man," mach- dog Checkers which an admirer one can identify him with ine-like in his "ability to digest from Texas had sent him, ("You Nixon appears to be a politician political factors and come up Oith know, the kids love that dog, with an advertising man's ap- the predictions." As candidate for and I want to tell you right now,' proach to his work. Policies are the Senate from the State of Cal. that regardless of what they say products to be sold to the public- ifornia, he was a natural. about it, we're going to keep this one today, that one tomorrow, He based his campaign on the it.") depending .. .on the state of the "failure of the Administration's As a result of the speech Nixon market." Far Eastern policy which had received some two million, favor- Nixon is all things to all men- made the Korean War inevitable, able letters and telegrams and the or rather, as the Reporter put it, made the Korean War inevitable," unanimous re-endorsement of the "all things to all Republicans." and he linked disloyalty in the GOP. Yet perhaps it is not altogether Government, as evidenced by the Afterwards, speaking about his fair to say that he has no policy. Hiss case, with this policy. performance, he gushed: "I told His is perhaps a more unique kind Nixon accused his Democratic my wife I didn't think I could do of policy than has ever before, or adversary, Helen Gahagan Doug- it. But it was like before starting at least recently, been exhibited las of being subversively inclined in a football game. You're all in the national political arena. and pointed out that in the House keyed up, you're praying, your It is not the kind that can be of Representatives she had voted knees are full of water. But then broadly categorized into foreign 354 times for the same bills Com- they blow the whistle and you get and domestic. Rather, it is of a munist Congressman Vito Mar- in there and hit that line. I more personal nature, bordering cantonio had voted for. probably had been preparing to do almost on a general philosophy of 2T;ass nciive victor Auue1n i'eis-assroy.14#- t se His decisive victory added to the it all my life." Republican landslide of 1950. Nix- on had now won three in a row, NIXON had been spared the' and he was ready for the next political axe, but his influence one. The prospect of California's and prestige among fellow Re- 32 electoral,.votes and Eisenhow- publicans was seriously damaged. er's personal liking for the man His performance as vice-president boomed him into the Republican has been a real political comeback. vice-presidential nomination in No one stand higher in the 1952. eyes of President HEsenhower than' Nixon. Ike has described the Vice- "Nickels for Nixon" President as "one of the great . leaders of men" and as "the most HE WAS vigorousl campaign- valuable member of my team." ing for the GOP cause when In the Eisenhower Administra- the story of a secret fund (which tion Nixon has achieved the repu- Democrats facetiously 1 a b e 1 e d tation of "Mr. Fix-it"-the man "Nickels for Nixon") which had who is most responsible for any been raised for him while he was semblance of harmony in the Re- a Senator was brought before the publican Party. He has become public. Party leaders were shocked, the liason man between the White feared the outcome of the election House and stubborn Congressional was in serious jeopardy, and asked leaders, the mediator between the Nixon to resign from the race. left and right wing of the GOP. Nixon demanded a chance to vindicate himself, and on October PRESIDENT Eisenhower has al- 1952, before a radio and television lowed Vice-President Nixon to audience estimated at 50 million, become a kind of "assistant pres- gave one of the most extraordi- ident." During Ike's absences, and life. He has explained it best in the following words: "I started with ideas of black or white. But I found that it's hard to find anywhere where it's all black or all white . . . I find compromise is often what is right." In the coming fight for the Republican presidential nomina- tion Nixon will find much deter- mined opposition. Some of it will come from men in his own home state like Governor Goodwin Knight and Senator William Knowland. The rest will be lodged with men like Harold Stassen and Milton Eisenhower, the President's brother. Whether he wins the nomina- tion or not, Richard Nixon will still be very much with us. He figures to be around for a long time to come. Although he may no longer have the virtues of the Quakers, he still has their deter- mination.