Armed with the Kennedy smile and the Kennedy confidence, the hopeful nominee made his businesslike way to Los Angeles.
Surrounded by his vast company of experts and workers, and by Brothers Bobby and Ted, Jack Kennedy was ready to pluck the fruit of seeds he had nourished so well over the months. In his pocket, secured, checked and double-checked like an audit of the U.S. Treasury, was his packet of certain votes so persistently gathered around the nation. And yet, with all the smell of victory in the air, the Kennedys were allowing for mischance, miscalculation—the sudden outbreak of an emotional riot, perhaps, that might start delegates stampeding in the wrong direction.
Adlai Stevenson had come to town, too, and from the evident Southern California passion for Stevenson or from the scattered pockets of Northern resistance could come a derailment of Kennedy plans.
More dangerous still was the image of Texas' come-lately Lyndon Baines Johnson, bolstered by his prestige as a consistent miracle worker in the Senate, confident of a solid block of Southern votes —a block second only to Jack's,. Jack's prize was not yet in the bag.
Time to Nap? Kennedy got moving like a honeybee in the spring. He patrolled the reaches of Los Angeles in a white Cadillac. Invading caucus after caucus, he made his plea for support, fitting each ad-lib speech to the mood of the moment or the region. Farmers need help, he told lowans; the West's natural resources need development, he warned Coloradans. On and on he pushed, relentlessly, coolly, gathering applause, staving off trouble from the opposition. Between caucuses, he held court with a parade of politicos in his Biltmore suite (Apartment Q), or checked new lists and new threats. Going into a meeting with New Yorkers, he bumped into a jovial but tense Lyndon Johnson. "Why don't you take a nap?" kidded Lyndon. "I've got that one all sewed up." Kennedy showed impressive muscle in his first big key play with the Pennsylvania delegation (81 votes). For months Governor David Leo Lawrence, one of the nation's strongest Democratic bosses, had been a holdout against Kennedy for fear that a Roman Catholic presidential nominee might hurt the party in militantly Protestant rural regions. Lawrence and his Pennsylvanians invited Kennedy and the opposition to a breakfast at Pasadena's Huntington-Sheraton Hotel. Stu Symington, forceful and yet somehow dim as a waning flashlight, got a good hand for his promise to attack Richard Nixon on domestic policies and Eisenhower on foreign relations. Johnson promised responsible leadership and then, almost with a note of resignation, offered to back the winner whoever he might be.
Jack Kennedy pounced on the U.S.'s dwindling prestige, promised to campaign in Pennsylvania if nominated and "make this election the most significant in 25 years." When they had finished, Dave Lawrence led the biggest question-mark delegation in the nation into caucus, told them that he was for Jack Kennedy.
Sixty-four delegates fell into orderly ranks behind him.