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Some Notes on Party Membership in Congress, II*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Clarence A. Berdahl
Clarence A. Berdahl
Affiliation:
University of Illinois
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Extract

The progressive movement developed for the campaign of 1924 into La Follette's Progressive party operating as a third party, with many of the progressive Republicans giving it active support and thereby bolting the Republican nominee, President Coolidge; and immediately following the election, won easily by the Republican party, the Republican leaders began to suggest punishing the bolters by treating them, in respect to committee assignments, as members of a third party and no longer as Republicans, and thus depriving them of their seniority on committees, a privilege which had put many of them in good positions. Senator Watson (Indiana), who became chairman of the Republican Committee on Committees in the Senate, indicated that “Senator La Follette and all those who read themselves out of the party” would lose their present committee places in the new (69th) Congress and would be given places according to their new party strength; Senator Moses (New Hampshire), slated for president pro tem. of the Senate, said: “Senator La Follette has gone out of the Republican party and has gone voluntarily. He has headed the national ticket of a new party which he undoubtedly hopes to perpetuate.

Type
American Government and Politics
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 43 , Issue 3 , June 1949 , pp. 492 - 508
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1949

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References

39 Quoted in Chicago Tribune, Nov. 17, 1924, p. 14Google Scholar.

39a Norris (Neb.) also supported La Follette but did not actively campaign for him, and possibly for that reason was not threatened with party discipline. See his autobiography, Fighting Liberal, p. 286; and MacKay, , The Progressive Movement of 1924, pp. 195–196Google Scholar.

40 N. Y. Times, Nov. 29, 1924, p. 1, c. 8; p. 2, c. 1.

41 Ibid., p. 2, c. 1.

42 All except La Follette had expressed this desire, even after their expulsion on November 28. Brookhart wrote a letter to Senator Watson, chairman of the Republican Committee on Committees, in which he said: “It is my desire that I be assigned to committees as a Republican under the same rights and rules as all other Republicans. I desire that this question be submitted to the committee [on committees] and to the caucus, and if approved I shall abide by the action of the committee and caucus on all committee assignments.” Cong. Record, 69 Cong., Spec. Sess., Vol. 67, p. 15 (Mar. 7, 1925). Letters of Ladd, Frazier, and Brookhart, in N. Y. Times, Feb. 28, 1925, p. 2, c. 1.

43 Cong. Record, 69 Cong., Spec. Sess., Vol. 67, p. 16 (Mar. 7, 1925). Cf. view of New York Times: “In asking for a definition of Republican loyalty, Senator Borah runs off into metaphysics. Who can say what essential Republicanism is today? The dissenting Republicans of 1896, the come-outer Republicans of 1912, are today pillars of the party. Why draw the line at the more recent rebels? But there is a rough-and-ready line which they themselves drew. If you denounce a party's platform, if you attack its candidates, if you refuse to vote for it or work with it, then you are not an honorable member of it. It may change later, or you may change. But as the thing stands today, it is both incongruous and impudent to demand that the party organization should welcome to its arms men who did their best to destroy it and who remain impenitent.” Editorial, “Political Consequences,” N. Y. Times, Mar. 9, 1925.

44 Cong. Record, vol. 67, p. 16.

44a La Follette was demoted from the chairmanship of the Committee on Manufactures to the next to the last place on that committee, with Brookhart in the last place; Ladd was demoted from the chairmanship of the Committee on Public Lands and Surveys to the last place; Frazier was transferred from the Committee on Indian Affairs, where he held the last Republican place, to the last place on the Committee on Banking and Currency; all were assigned to these and other committees as third-party men, below both Republicans and Democrats. Ibid., p. 15; N. Y. Times, Mar. 8,1925, Sec. 1, p. 2, c. 2; Cong. Directory for respective sessions. In the Senate, where the matter was settled only after considerable discussion, the Democrats adopted the policy of considering it a Republican family affair and keeping hands off. See especially remarks of Senator Robinson (Ark.), Democratic floor leader. Cong. Record, vol. 67, p. 46 (Mar. 9, 1925)Google Scholar; N. Y. Times, Mar. 10, 1925, pp. 1, 4.

45 Quoted in Chicago Tribune, Jan. 7, 1925; and Cong. Record, vol. 67, p. 16 (Mar. 7, 1925)Google Scholar.

46 The chairman of the Wisconsin Republican executive committee, W. J. Campbell, intimated in a formal statement that the label should be ignored, pointing out that in the senatorial campaign La Follette had reiterated his opposition to all the major policies in the Republican platform, and that, under the open primary in Wisconsin, Socialists and Democrats could vote in Republican primaries. He proposed that La Follette should be asked explicitly whether he now endorsed those Republican policies, and that his status be determined according to his “yes” or “no” answer. “The Republican party,” he said, “has the same right of self-preservation as any other institution. This right is inherent. The test of Republicanism is general adherence to the major policies and principles of the party as enunciated in its existing platform. Neither does this mean adherence to every dot and dash in that platform, but certainly if the Republican party is to live it must insist that those who repudiate its principles in their entirety must be subject to some test. It matters not whether those political principles are sound or unsound; it has the same right of self-determination as to its membership that any other institution has.” Statement quoted in Chicago Tribune, Dec. 14, 1925.

47 “If Mr. LaFollette wants to return to the Republican party and function with it, by all means let's give him a chance. I have only opposed the man who publicly repudiated the party and openly left it.” Senator Edge (N.J.), quoted in N. Y. Times, Dec. 3, 1925.

48 Chicago Tribune, Dec. 3, 6, 1925; N. Y. Times, Dec. 7, 1925, p. 1, c. 8. Young Bob was nevertheless assigned to committees as a Republican.

49 Nye was even shortly given the chairmanship of the Committee on Public Lands and Surveys, the post from which Ladd had been demoted.

50 Nye and Frazier both protested the appointment of Colonel C. F. Mudgett, one of their political opponents, as U. S. marshal for North Dakota, and clearly made it a condition of their support of the Republican party organization in Congress that this appointment be withdrawn; after a series of conferences with President Coolidge, it was attributed to a “clerical error” and withdrawn, and the senators were evidently assured of proper consideration in the future. On this incident, the N. Y. Times commented: “The old doctrine used to be, ‘first pure, then peaceable’; but when Republican peace must be had, the price of Republican purity is none too high to pay for it.” See editorials, “No Harmony Without Offices,” and “Republican Peace at Any Price,” Dec. 3, 4, 1926; also editorial, “Political Moralities in North Dakota,” in Chicago Tribune, Dec. 6, 1926Google Scholar; and good account by Henning, Arthur Sears in Chicago Tribune, Dec. 3, 1926, p. 1Google Scholar.

51 The seat was successfully contested by the Democratic nominee, Dan F. Steck, the legal issue being whether certain ballots voted for Steck, but with other distinguishing marks, should be counted; the Iowa election authorities awarded the seat to Brookhart but the Senate decided otherwise, with regular Republicans voting heavily for Steck.

52 The result was: Republicans, 48 (including Frazier, Nye, Brookhart, Norris, and other insurgents); Democrats, 47; Farmer-Labor, 1 (Shipstead of Minnesota). Shortly after the election, Senator Reed (Pa.), who had sponsored the expulsion of these senators in March, 1925, said: “If Senator Frazier asks to be classed hereafter as a Republican, I see no reason why his request should not be granted.” Frazier responded that any action was up to those who had acted before. N. Y. Times, Nov. 23, 1926.

53 In 1926, Brookhart beat the veteran Cummins for the Republican nomination by more than 70,000, and was elected by about 75,000 plurality.

54 Frazier was given the chairmanship of the Committee on Indian Affairs, which he particularly desired, as well as restored to his other committees as a Republican; Brookhart was similarly reassigned as a Republican to his previous committees or to better ones. See Senate committee assignments in Congressional Directory for the respective sessions of Congress.

55 These five were La Follette and Blaine, of Wisconsin; Frazier and Nye, of North Dakota; and Shipstead, the Farmer-Labor senator from Minnesota; they wrote a joint note to Senator Curtis, the Republican floor leader, embodying these demands and impliedly threatening to block Republican organization of the Senate unless the demands were granted. The result was formal assurance with respect to the legislative program, and immediate or gradual improvement in committee assignments, Nye, for example, being put on the party Committee on Committees and later (1935) becoming its chairman; and La Follette not only securing his father's chairmanship of the Committee on Manufactures (in 1929), but also (in 1930) being assigned to the powerful Committee on Finance, on which he continued to serve with full seniority privileges as a Republican, even while labelling himself a Progressive (1934–46), until his defeat in 1946. N. Y. Times, Dec. 2, 1927, pp. 1, 7; Chicago Tribune, Jan. 8, 9, 1930.

56 Following the election in November, 1926, Senator Shipstead said: “I have not made up my mind as to what my course will be as ‘balance of power’ Senator. … I guess I will have to hold a caucus” (N. Y. Times, Nov. 8, 1926); he later voted with the Republicans on matters of organization, associated more and more closely with the Republicans, and finally adopted the label in 1940.

56a The insurgent Republicans announced that while they would support the Republican party in organizing the Senate, they would not be bound on matters of policy.

57 These were 10 from Wisconsin (the entire Republican delegation, the 11th from that state being Victor Berger, Socialist), Keller of Minnesota, La Guardia of New York, and Sinclair of North Dakota.

58 N. Y. Times, Nov. 29, 1924, p. 2, c. 2.

59 Speech to Ohio Society in New York City, Jan. 10, 1925, N. Y. Times, Jan. 11, 1925.

60 These were the 10 from Wisconsin, Beck, Browne, Cooper, Frear, Lampert, Nelson, Peavey, Schaefer, Schneider, Voight; La Guardia (N. Y.), elected to the 69th Congress as a Socialist; Keller (Minn.); and Sinclair (N. D.).

61 Since Wood was not, strictly speaking, a caucus official at all, the challenge to his authority would seem to have considerable point; the chairman of the Republican House caucus, from whom such invitations would normally come, was at that time Sydney Anderson (Minn.), probably more sympathetic than Wood with the insurgents. The exchange was part of a vigorous debate in the House, Jan. 29, 1925, over the status of the insurgents; the debate showed that the regular Republicans were much more concerned about the opposition of these insurgents to other Republican candidates for Congress than about their failure to support the presidential ticket. Frear (Wis.) was particularly quizzed on this point. See Cong. Record, vol. 66, pp. 2642–2646, 2650–2652 (Jan. 29, 1925)Google Scholar; pp. 2712–2719 (Jan. 30, 1925). N. Y. Times, Jan. 30, 1925.

62 In House of Representatives, Jan. 30, 1925. Cong. Record, vol. 66, pp. 2712–2713 (Jan. 30, 1925)Google Scholar.

63 N. Y. Times, Mar. 11, 1925.

64 Editorial in The National Republican, Feb. 7, 1925. For other newspaper opinion, overwhelmingly in approval of the above view, see “Purging the Republican Ranks,” in Literary Digest, Mar. 21, 1925, pp. 7–8Google Scholar.

65 The resolution, offered by Snell (N. Y.), read as follows: “Resolved, That the caucus roll of the Republican members of the Sixty-ninth Congress shall contain only the names of those members who in the last election openly supported the Republican candidate for President and Vice President.”

66 Rep. House Caucus Journals, Feb. 27, 1925, pp. 119, 121Google Scholar. Lampert's contention was that he had not actually campaigned for La Follette.

67 The membership of the Committee on Committees is given in N. Y. Times, Mar. 4, 1925. Tilson (Conn.) was chairman, having also just been chosen to succeed Longworth as majority floor leader.

68 Adopted Mar. 5, 1925. N. Y. Times, Mar. 6, 1925, p. 4.

69 Frear and Nelson, of Wisconsin, considered as the ring-leaders of the insurgent revolt, were removed from the Committee on Ways and Means and on Rules, respectively, before the new Congress met. Henning, Arthur Sears, in Chicago Tribune, Mar. 6, 1925, p. 1, c. 1Google Scholar; Nov. 27, 1925, p. 1, c. 8. Nelson was La Follette's campaign manager in the presidential campaign of 1924, and Frear acted as chairman and leader of the Wisconsin delegation. The committee assignments of all the insurgents, in every case but that of Cooper (Wis.) to minor committees only, were announced Dec. 15, 1925. See list in Chicago Tribune Dec. 16, 1925, p. 6, c. 1.

70 N. Y. Times, Dec. 4, 1925; Henning, Arthur Sears, in Chicago Tribune, Dec. 7, 1925, p. 1Google Scholar, c. 8. For some time the House rule had required a full majority of the House membership (218) to bring before the House the question of discharging a committee from consideration of a bill; in the previous Congress the insurgent Republicans had joined forces with the Democrats to secure (on Jan. 18, 1924, after a vigorous debate for six days) a new discharge rule permitting 150 members to invoke such discharge proceedings. It may be noted that in the end both Longworth, then the majority floor leader, and Snell, the chairman of the Rules Committee, as well as many other regular Republicans, voted for the modified rule, whose abrogation they now sought to force by the application of party discipline; they were duly twitted for this by the minority leader, Garrett (Tenn.). Cong. Record, vol. 65, esp. pp. 14, 19, 943–944, 1116–1117, 1143 (68 Cong., 1 Sess.)Google Scholar.

71 Actually, only 10 Republicans voted for Cooper, nine from Wisconsin (Cooper himself voting “present”), and Sinclair of North Dakota; La Guardia of New York (previously a Republican but elected to this House as a Socialist) and the two Farmer-Labor members from Minnesota (Kvale and Wefald) also voted for Cooper; Keller of Minnesota, generally associated with the insurgents, voted for Longworth. Cong. Record, vol. 65, pp. 8–15 (68 Cong., 1 Sess., Dec. 3, 4, 5, 1923)Google Scholar. For comparison with situation in the previous Congress, see supra, n. 37a.

72 These were Barbour (Calif.), Burtness (N. D.), Cooper (Wis.), James (Mich.), Keller (Minn.), Kelley (Pa.), Kendall (Pa.), Rathbone (Ill.), Simmons (Neb.), Sproul (Kan.), Swing (Calif.), Woodruff (Mich.). See list of Republicans voting on both speakership and discharge rule in Chicago Tribune, Dec. 8, 1925, p. 1; and roll calls in Cong. Record, vol. 67, pp. 381, 390–391 (69 Cong., 1 Sess., Dec. 7, 1925)Google Scholar.

73 Statements issued Dec. 6, 1925, and repeated next day in the House during nominations for speaker; the original supplementary statement included Illinois among the states represented in the progressive group, but that seems improbable, and the House statement omitted Illinois. N. Y. Times, Dec. 7, 1925, p. 2, c. 1; Chicago Tribune, Dec. 7, 1925, p. 2, cc. 1–2; Cong. Record, vol. 67, pp. 380–381 (69 Cong., 1 Sess., Dec. 7, 1925)Google Scholar.

74 Supra, n. 60.

75 See lists of demotions and new committee assignments in Chicago Tribune, Dec. 11, 16, 1925; and Cong. Directory; Cooper (Wis.) was, as the only exception and probably because of his long service in the House, allowed to remain on the Committee on Foreign Affairs, a major committee, although shifted from 7th place to the bottom [13th.]

76 N. Y. Times, Jan. 31, 1925, p. 3, cc. 2–3.

77 The Republicans had a majority of 10, including the insurgents, which meant that the Wisconsin delegation held the balance of power.

78 Text of letter in N. Y. Times, Nov. 27, 1926. LaFollette was apparently the only one of the insurgent senators to give any heed to Frear's suggestion. See editorial in La Follette's Magazine, quoted in Chicago Tribune, Dec. 19, 1926.

79 N. Y. Times, Nov. 30, 1926.

80 Ibid., Dec. 17, 1926.

81 Ibid., Feb. 22, 1927; Chicago Tribune, Feb. 5, 21, 22, 1927.

82 Chicago Tribune, Feb. 10, 1927.

83 Chicago Tribune, Mar. 14, 1933, p. 17, c. 5.

84 Lemke replied to this demotion: “I'm not begging anything from the damned reactionary Republicans.” Chicago Tribune, Jan. 15, 1937, p. 9, c. 3. He continued, however, to wear the Republican label and to associate generally with the Republicans.

85 Cong. Record, vol. 81, pp. 211, 245 (75 Cong., 1 Sess., Jan. 13, 14, 1937)Google Scholar. For comparison of this harsh discipline by House Republicans with the liberal treatment of La Follette and Norris by Senate Republicans, see O. R. Altman, in this Review, Vol. 31, p. 1075 (Dec., 1937).

86 Cong. Record, vol. 81, pp. 1314–1315 (75 Cong., 1 Sess., Feb. 17, 1937)Google Scholar.

87 The more vociferous progressives, Brookhart (la.), Howell (Neb.), Frazier (N. D.), and Nye (N. D.) supported Hoover; Borah, one of their number in the Senate, was always regular during the campaign months.

88 Letter from Fess to Marshall Sheppey, of Toledo, May 9, 1929. Fess named Borah, Brookhart, and Nye, but clearly referred to the 13 Republicans who supported the debenture plan for agricultural relief. Chicago Tribune, May 10, 1929.

89 Address by Senator Moses at Washington dinner of New England manufacturers, Nov. 8, 1929, with reference to the position of these insurgents on the tariff bill then pending. Following this jibe, Senator Norris, in the Senate, took a handful of straw from the tariff exhibit of German pottery, shook it over his head, and said: “This packing probably is fodder for us wild jackasses, and that's the kind of food they want to give to the consumers.” N. Y. Times, Nov. 9, 1929, p. 1, c. 3: Literary Digest. Nov. 23, 1929, p 10Google Scholar. As a result, 14 Republicans refused to support Moses for reëlection as president pro tem. in December, 1931, and forced a deadlock on 23 ballots; the result was, however, to continue Moses in that office during the 72nd Congress, since under Senate rules a president pro tem. holds office until displaced. Cong. Record, vol. 75, pp. 226–227, 458–460, 921–922, 1197–1198, 1368–1372Google Scholar.

90 Address in Boston, May 27, 1929, quoted in Cong. Record, vol. 71, p. 2063 (71 Cong., 1 Sess., May 28, 1929)Google Scholar.

91 Chicago Tribune, Nov. 9, 1928; Feb. 5, 1929. There was apparently some use made of original committee assignments for disciplinary purposes; for case of Senator McMaster (S. D.), see Cong. Record, vol. 72, pp. 1421–1423 (71 cong., 2 Sess., Jan. 11, 1930)Google Scholar.

92 Chicago Tribune, Feb. 6, 1933, p. 4, cc. 4–6; Feb. 25, 1933, p. 2, c. 7; N. Y. Times, Mar. 6, 1933, p. 30, c. 3; and editorial, “Calling the Stray Sheep,” in N. Y. Times, Dec. 29, 1933Google Scholar.

93 La Follette was a Progressive from 1934 to 1946, when he again took the Republican label and was defeated for renomination in the Republican primary.

93a Ball was, however, denied a post on the Committee on Foreign Relations, which he presumably desired.

94 There were only 17 Republicans in the Senate following the 1936 elections, including those who had bolted Landon.

95 N. Y. Times, Dec. 8, 1936, p. 12, c. 2; Dec. 23, 1936, p. 15, cc. 6–7. Lundeen, however, requested and was granted classification as a Democrat for purposes of committee assignment.

96 Editorial, “Hospitable Republicans,” in N. Y. Times, Dec. 9, 1936.

97 This curious relationship between the Republican party and its own presidential nominees, particularly Mr. Willkie, requires further analysis, but not in this paper. The newspapers of the period 1940–46 reflect this profound dissatisfaction of the congressional leaders, in particular, with these nominees, and make the renomination of Dewey in 1948 all the more remarkable.

97a Morse was, however, referred to by other Republicans, such as Representative Shafer (Mich.), as “the so-called Republican from Oregon,” “another New Dealer of the Wallace stripe,” and “the New Deal secret weapon among the Republicans”—language which no doubt reflected the feelings of a considerable number of conservative Republicans. See statement by Representative Shafer (inserted by Senator Morse himself), in Cong. Record, 80 Cong., 1 Sess. (Mar. 7, 1947), pp. 1831–1832Google Scholar. “The things that Morse's Republican colleagues say about him in private could never be printed in the Congressional Record.” Childs, Marquis, in Washington Post, July 19, 1947, p. 5, c. 2Google Scholar.

98 Cong. Record, vol. 93, pp. 10301–10302, (80 Cong., 1 Sess., July 26, 1947)Google Scholar.

98a Smith, Beverly, “The New Sons of the Wild Jackass,” Sat. Eve. Post, June 7, 1947Google Scholar. Senator Tobey said on one occasion: “I've been a Republican for nearly 45 years. I'm no bolter. But I'm jealous of my party. I want it to be as clean as a whistle. I want it to deserve the commendation of the country for its uprightness”; and Senator Morse, replying to remarks by Congressman Clare E. Hoffman (Mich.), said that Hoffman “paid his disrespects to me and questioned my Republicanism. He judged my Republicanism, of course, on the basis of his conceptions of Republicanism. I surmise there is some difference between his and mine.”

98b Editorial, “The House Stands Firm,” in Chicago Tribune, Mar. 6, 1947Google Scholar; other vigorous editorials to this effect in the same paper are “The House Keeps Faith,” Feb. 21, 1947; “Republicans on Trial,” Feb. 26, 1947; “Renegade Republican Senators,” Mar. 3, 1947; “Congress in Review,” July 29, 1947. The Senators most regularly indicted for lack of true Republicanism were Morse, Langer, Aiken, Tobey, Cooper, with Vandenberg as “the most prominent offender” and “the most damaging of the lot,” but frequently many others in both houses. A news story with a survey of the voting records listed 16 senators and 43 representatives “who bear the Republican label as the 1948 campaign gets under way, but helped destroy G.O.P. unity in the 80th congress.” Ibid., Sept. 5, 1948, Pt. 1, p. 5, cc. 6–7.

98c Editorial, “Party Responsibility,” in Republican News, Mar., 1947Google Scholar, summarized in N. Y. Times, Mar. 3, 1947, p. 1, cc. 2–3, p. 19, c. 2. Senator Morse retorted: “Mr. Reece and the Republican machine for which he speaks want a return to the depression-causing economic policies of the Republican party of 1928”; and it was this retort that brought upon Morse the characterization from Shafer and others referred to above. “It is obvious from their record that no amount of pleas for regularity would ever move Senators Morse, Tobey, and Aiken. For them the issue is a fundamental one of clashing political ideologies, a conflict between what they call middle-of-the-road liberalism and Old Guard conservatism.” Morris, John D., in N. Y. Times, Mar. 9, 1947, Sec. 4, p. E 7, cc. 6–7Google Scholar.

98d Editorial, “Eightieth Congress: To Date,” N. Y. Times, June 20, 1948.

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