Nation: The Republican Assault on the Senate

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be unable to make a sufficiently marked —and sufficiently swift—ideological about-face. Democrats, too, will be expected to extend their current scramble for the center to a point somewhat farther to the right. A possible development: a repeat of the 1969 liberal v. conservative fight for the post of Democratic whip. Ted Kennedy, who defeated Russell Long, could easily be toppled by conservative Robert Byrd.

Additionally, Nixon will be strongly catapulted toward a successful re-election bid in 1972. He might then with reason set a new goal of a Republican House of Representatives.

If Republicans gain no ground or even lose some after such a mailed-fist assault on the Senate, Nixon may see in the results a suggestion that while America periodically drifts either right or left, it has rarely moved far or fast in either direction. And he will have to resign himself to at least two more years of coexistence with a liberal Senate, made all the more truculent by his efforts to transform it.