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Some active primary races between Adlai Stevenson and Tennessee's Senator Estes Kefauver would suit the Harriman strategists just fine. There has been so much buzzing about this in Democratic Party circles that Oregon's Democratic State Chairman Howard Morgan exploded: "Harriman and Tammany money will be routed circuitously to Kefauver to finance bitter primary fights with Stevenson in the hope of hurting both. Harriman will remain aloof from these contests, and the Eastern bosses will try to sweep up the pieces and hand them to Harriman at the convention."
Both Averell Harriman and Carmine De Sapio issued outraged denials, but the fact is that Oregon's Morgan understood their strategy even if he was wrong about the money. While waiting for the swept-up pieces, Averell Harriman will be standing by—but not idly. He has already made one foray into the Middle West, for a speech last month in Des Moines. (Harriman gave this critique of his Des Moines performance: "What they think about out there is ham and corn, and I was both hammy and corny.") Next fortnight he will fly to the Northwest for appearances in Seattle, Eugene and Portland, Ore., and Lewiston, Idaho. Early in December he will speak at the national convention of Young Democrats in Oklahoma City.
New Dealer from Wall Street. Although Averell Harriman is a devoted and doctrinaire New Dealer, his forces believe he can pull strong conservative support in the West as well as in the East. They count, for example, on some spotty strength along the Harrimans' Union Pacific Railroad. They think Harriman has a two-way appeal. Says a partisan: "Because of his liberal record, he stands well with labor; because he's a businessman, the really big businessmen know that he's no crackpot."
Sounds coming from Democrats in the South, however, do not indicate that conservative sentiment for Harriman will run very deep. When the New York governor began to loom as a presidential prospect, Louisiana's Democratic Senator Allen J. Ellender cried: "Talk about giveaways; Harriman would go Eisenhower. Truman and Roosevelt one better. He would give away the Indian chief on top of the Capitol dome."
Harriman will have some nuisance trouble in his own New York delegation. His move into the center of the picture has brought real anguish to many a New York Democrat who is emotionally committed to Stevenson. For most, it would hardly be wise to speak out against their own governor, who will be in the Statehouse for two more years if he is not in the White House. Harriman and De Sapio will be able to control nearly all. of New York's go-vote delegation to the Democratic National Convention, but they face the possibility of a Stevenson minority clustered around U.S. Senator Herbert Lehman. Although Lehman has announced for Stevenson, De Sapio will have to let the senior U.S. Senator go to the convention. Said De Sapio last week with great gentleness: "Senator Lehman is entitled to every consideration—every consideration."