"Food won the war; but it means getting loyalty and co-operation from every kitchen. . . .
"Do you remember meatless days? So, too, we can have cocktail-less parties. You may say that was war-time sacrifice, and the average citizen won't sacrifice his desires in peace times. Of course, peace patriotism is harder, but it is not impossible.
"Herbert Hoover carries no timidity of defeat in his heart. He has the amazing spiritual leadership to make each law-abiding household want to do its bit. Governor Smith says it can't be done. With Herbert Hoover we know it CAN be done!"
Thus, a third time, did Mrs. Mabel Walker Willebrandt, Assistant Attorney-General of the U. S., do-her-bit for Hooverism before an audience of Ohio Protestants. The evening after delivering her message to the Methodists at Lorain (TIME, Oct. 1), she visited a Presbyterian men's club at Warren. A long quotation about Tammany Hall corruption a generation ago was part of the speech. She had looked it up in the Encyclopaedia Britannica. She cried:
"Of course, Tammany's Governor may be equal to the task of reforming Tammany, but I want to say far above a whisper that I doubt it!"
It was very effective speech-making and most of the Presbyterian gentlemen of Warren, Ohio, went home shaking their heads about cocktails and parties and Tammany and all the rest.
But there were frowns and scowls and even growls among the "practical" element of the G. O. P. Senator Moses, himself no scorner of cocktails, said he had received "plenty" of letters protesting about Worker Willebrandt. The arch-Democratic New York World turned, of course, from anger to glee and redoubled its editorial sniping at "Mabel" and "sectarianism." More serious was a cartoon published broadcast by the pro-Hoover Scripps-Howard newspaper chain, showing a church daubed with "Politix" and the G. O. P. spanking a naughty child. The caption was "Give this little girl a great big hand!"
In wet Cleveland, National Committeeman Maurice Maschke said she was "misguided." In wet New Jersey, Senator Walter Evans Edge assured the public that Mrs. Willebrandt would make no visit there. From wet Wisconsin to wet headquarters in wet Chicago went a letter from Benjamin Fuelleman, a State committeeman. "Unless Mrs. Willebrandt is muzzled," wrote Mr. Fuelleman, "Mr. Hoover is sure to go down to defeat. ... If she fails to do this [return to Washington, be silent], President Coolidge should call for her resignation. . . . We cannot do it if we have to carry around 'an old man of the sea' such as Mrs. Willebrandt has proven herself."
Walter Jodok Kohler, the G. O. P.'s gubernatorial nominee in Wisconsin, sped to Washington to see Nominee Hoover. What he said about Mrs. Willebrandt was not revealed. Newsgatherers plagued Dr. Hubert Work, the G. 0. P.'s chief spokesman. This colloquy ensued.
Q. What is Mrs. Willebrandt's status?...
Dr. Work (raising his hands): I don't know. She is a sort of free lance. . . .
Q. Do you approve of the speeches she has made?
Dr. W. . . . I have not read them all and so I cannot answer.
Q. You will find them very interesting.