While U.S. voters this week looked to the northeast (New Hampshire) for the national political portent, the signs in Germany last week were in the southwest. Germany's Socialists, led by vituperative Kurt Schumacher, have long insisted that the bulk of Germany's people are dead set against Chancellor Konrad Adenauer's plans to tie Germany into the Western European defense. A local election for assembly members in the southwestern state newly formed from the merger of Württemberg-Baden, Baden and Württemberg-Hohenzollern gave them, they thought, an ideal chance to prove their case.
Schumacher dragged himself from a sickbed to harangue the southwest voters...