A Letter From the Publisher: May 2, 1988

When he took the lead in the 1928 Republican presidential race by winning the New Hampshire primary, Herbert Hoover suddenly found his picture on the cover + of TIME. Historians may debate the impact of that distinction, but Hoover went on to occupy the White House. Since then, dozens of presidential hopefuls have appeared on the magazine's cover, with similarly unknowable results. "When TIME puts a candidate on the cover, we unavoidably become part of the political process," says Nation Editor Walter Isaacson, who edited this week's articles on Michael Dukakis and his New York Democratic-primary victory. "But our cover decisions...

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