When Connecticut Democrats nominated Abraham Ribicoff as their candidate for governor last June, some Democratic Party leaders held their breath. In all of Yankee and Catholic New England, no Jew had ever been elected to a governorship. But no one sought to raise the religious issue against Ribicoff until the final week of the campaign. Then a 68-year-old Milford realtor named John F. McCoy, a Democrat, sent out some 200 letters (which he signed "Friend Bob'') attacking Ribicoff on the basis of his religion, and condemning New Haven's Democratic Mayor Richard C. Lee for having appointed the first Negro as that...
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