December 7, 1971
Page 45105
BRADEN INSULTS NEW HAMPSHIRE
(Mr. WYMAN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 minute, to revise and extend his remarks and include extraneous matter.)
Mr. WYMAN. Mr. Speaker, New Hampshire – the beautiful State is also New Hampshire the Granite State. It is a citadel of rugged independence. Nowhere in the entire United States of America is there to be found a more self-reliant, courageous, humble, reverent, and independent citizenry than in New Hampshire the Granite State whose State motto is "Live Free or Die."
It is too bad that encountering such discerning thoughtful and conscientious voters disturbs certain columnists. It also discourages left-leaning candidates for President in either party. But frustrated columnists should refrain from resorting to anti-New Hampshire distortion and misrepresentation in what they put out across the Nation, if for no other reason than its reflection against their favored candidates.
In his today's syndicated column in the Washington Post entitled "MUSKIE Finds Granite State Quiet," Tom Braden describes New Hampshire as about the least most logical folkway in America for a test of presidential candidates. He writes that:
New Hampshire is so small that anybody who can claim to influence the votes of ten people is a power-broker. It does not have a major city.
Mr. Braden owes the people of New Hampshire an apology, for almost nowhere else in the Nation can there be found a more representative cross section of concerned Americans of varying ethnic backgrounds and political persuasion. Most New Hampshire voters are not extremists of either stripe and they are demonstratedly quite capable of thoughtfully discerning what is needed in America in terms of policies and candidates.
Put another way – New Hampshire folk know a man when they see one and they can also spot a phony, a mile away.
Mr. Braden's statement that New Hampshire "does not have a major city" should deeply offend every resident of Manchester, the Queen City of New Hampshire, that by almost any standard is a major city of nearly 100,000 residents. Braden owes the residents of our largest city a retraction.
New Hampshire voters are not likely to forget Mr. Braden's nationally distributed insults. After such slander of New Hampshire his support of a particular candidate will almost certainly prove to be a liability.
The balanced judgment of a majority of New Hampshire voters will support President Nixon's struggle to achieve a generation of peace and a stable economy. This is certain to distress the Bradens of the media who apparently favor tossing the Nation to the hyenas of the urban jungle, but it does not justify maligning New Hampshire by poison pen.
Would to God this Nation had 50 States a majority of whose residents possessed the balanced judgment of New Hampshire people. The United States of America would be the gainer.
So the extent of Mr. Braden's disaffection may be seen in context I include his column at this point in the RECORD:
MUSKIE FINDS GRANITE STATE QUIET
(By Tom Braden)
DOVER, N.H.– There are a great many more spruce trees than there are people in New Hampshire, but both stand silent before Edmund Muskie. The front-runner tramps through the snow from one small meeting to another and is greeted with a politeness so granite-faced that it is impossible to mistake it for enthusiasm.
Maybe this is the way New Hampshire is. Having one of everything already, as Robert Frost pointed out in his famous poem: One mountain worth the name, one college, one statesman to be proud of, one president, "pronounce him Purse and make the most of it for better or worse," New Hampshire isn't about to cross the street to shake hands with something there's more than one of – like a presidential candidate.
Maybe it's that neighbor Muskie understands the sufficiency of New Hampshire. At any rate, he does not offend its people by crossing the street to shake hands with them.
Or maybe it's that Muskie's campaign is only now getting under way, and we are witnessing the silence, which, it is said, invariably precedes the storm. A headquarters in Manchester, this state's largest city, is just opening; an in-state staff is only now being assembled. Muskie's organization seems to have taken New Hampshire almost as much for granted as New Hampshire seems to take Muskie.
"It's restful just to think about New Hampshire," Frost wrote, and Muskie seems to have caught the mood. If he is right, his neighbors, three months from now, will give him the vote to which a neighbor may feel entitled, and all will be well.
But even at this early date, it is impossible to down the suspicion that he may be wrong. Is it a warning of trouble ahead to watch Muskie walking through a crowded college cafeteria on his way to a meeting while the diners hardly bother to look up from their coffee?
Is it a warning of trouble that he can speak for 20 minutes without worrying about being interrupted by applause?
Or that a man waiting for a haircut in a barber shop, asked if he would like the candidate to autograph a picture, murmurs a polite "No thanks"?
Would these things happen to a Lindsay? A Kennedy? One feels an almost irresistible impulse to speak crossly to New Hampshire: "Look, this man you're not even bothering to look at is one of the best and most intelligent leaders of your country. He's worked hard for you; he cares about you. Can't you do something to show you care about him?"
Of all the illogical folkways which govern American politics, the least logical is the folkway which makes New Hampshire a major test for the presidency. The state is so small that anybody who can claim to influence the votes of 10 people is a power broker. It is unrepresentative. It does not have a major city. It has only one newspaper of any size and that one can be counted to deliver 15 to 20 per cent of the vote to an odd-ball named Sam Yorty who is not seeking an office, but maintaining a career.
But the folkway exists and Muskie has to exist with it, though it may destroy him and the chances for victory of a Democratic Party which has made him its favorite son.
If Muskie is offended by the lack of attention here, he doesn't show it. But he ought to know New Hampshire, and if he does, he must know that the Muskie name and the easy Muskie style are creating about as much excitement here as though somebody came in from the woodpile to remark that it's snowing again.