Walter Mondale Folder Citation: Collection: Records of the 1976 Campaign Committee to Elect Jimmy Carter; Series: Noel Sterrett Subject File; Folder: Walter Mondale; Container 89 To See Complete Finding Aid: http://www.jimmycarterlibrary.gov/library/findingaids/Carter-Mondale%20Campaign_1976.pdf J. r'I 1 '. / ' ,. I ~ j THREE ·,i ·~' / HUNGRY. .. J ,''1 DEMOCRATS : ! / ( The 1976 Democratic nomination for President is I. WALTER MONDALE up for grabs. The field is Has he ever been tested? getting crowded. This month by Albert Eisele The Atlantic profiles three early hopefuls-Senators About an hour after Senator Ed­ available, few Democrats would Mondale and Bentsen and ward Kennedy took himself out of focus on him in the search for new Congressman Udall. the race for the 1976 Democratic presidential timber. Now, with Ken­ presidential nomination on Septem­ nedy's withdrawal, Mondale has Examinations of other ber 23, a reporter asked Senator emerged as the leading candidate of aspiring tenants of 1600 Walter Mondale of Minnesota what the perpetually restless, and fickle, Pennsylvania Avenue will he thought Kennedy's action would liberal wing of the Democratic follow in subsequent issues. mean for himself and others 'who party. might ~eek the nomination. Minnesota's contribution to 1976 Mondale, sitting in his office presidential politics and the people around the corner from Kennedy's around him are realistic enough to on the fourth floor of the Russell understand that Kennedy's action . Senate Office Building and puffing merely removed the biggest of intently on a cigar, answered by re­ many big obstacles between Mon­ calling something the late Stewart dale and the Democratic nomi­ Alsop had written about Kennedy. nation. "Mondale's not going to in­ "He once wrote a column com­ herit anything from Kennedy paring Ted to a shade tree that is so automatically," Richard Moe, Mon­ big and effective that no other trees dale's administrative assistant, said could grow around it," said Mon­ after Kennedy's withdrawal. "He's dale, "Well, I think maybe we'II see going to have to show people h.::'s some of the sunlight coming got something before they'ii go for through now." · him." But Moe, a dedicated profes­ Whether enough of that sunlight sional politician of thirty-eight who will fall on the forty-six-year-old was attracted to politics by the ex­ Mondale's sharp-edged profile to ample of John F. Kennedy, notes transform his senatorial acorn into a with irrefutable logic that "the odds presidential oak, only time will tell. on us are no longer than they are But there is no mistaking the feel­ on anybody else now. Certainly, ing of relief that Mondale now dis­ they're good enough. to warrant plays after ten years of trying with- · making the effort." out much success to emerge from Some people think Mondale has Kennedy's large shadow. Since com­ been conte'mplating that effort al­ ing to the Senate in December, most fn;>m the day he arrived in the 1964, as Vice President-elect Hubert Senate as the latest export of Min­ Humphrey's handpicked successor, nesota's robust and progressive the former Minnesota attorney gen­ Democratic-Farmer-Labor, party. eral and son of a poor country Unlike his political mentor~ Hum~· preacher has le<}rned to accept the phrey, who arrived in the Senate fact that as long as a Kennedy was sixteen years earlier like a rowdy -i .. .,.. lumberjack barging in on an old next · to· Robert Byrd, the biggest mains unknown and ~nrecognized folks' picnic, .Mondale prudently self-promoter next to Bill Proxmire by 97 percent of the American elec­ avoided offending senior senators, and Jack Javits, and the toughest torate, according to the Gallup Poll, and concentrated on learning about s.o.b. next to Scoop Jackson." ·and with Kennedy out of the race, the levers of legislative power. Care­ Such a senator did not go unno­ GaUup still shows Mondale as the fully heeding Humphrey's advice ticed by that mysterious but influen­ preferred nominee of only 2 percent that in the Senate, it's often not as tial force that New York Times col­ of Democrats, trailing even his ex­ important what one says as how one umnist Russell Baker once dubbed colleague, former Senator Eugene .. says it, Mondale began an uninter­ "the Great Mentioner." Mondale McCarthy. Naturally, Mondale likes rupted climb to a certain kind of began to be mentioned with increas­ to quote another pollster, his friend national prominence. ing frequency as a presidential dark Lou Harris: "It's going to be an un­ He was one of a dozen young, horse. But the Mondale-for-Presi­ known in 1976 and it might as well liberal Democrats who came to the dent boom didn't begin in earnest be you." The fact remains that after Senate in the 1960s, one of a new until the night of November 7, a year of hard campaigning as an generation of senators who were 1972, when he won re-election to a undeclared candidate in more than ideally situated to use that vener­ second full term by a healthy mar­ thirty states, including repeated vis­ able institution as a launching pad gin. His victory was greatly magni­ its to all the key ones; after taking for loftier ambitions. Under the fied by the fact that it flew in the all the ritual steps required of a se­ egalitarian leadership of Mike face of George McGovern's dis­ rious candidate, including formation Mansfield, who believed that fresh­ astrous defeat by Richard Nixon, of a volunteer campaign committee, men should be heard as well as and it was hailed as a polit­ beefing up his professional cam­ seen, Mondale and others-Edward ical watershed by Humphrey, an ex­ paign staff to six, traveling to Israel, and Robert Kennedy, Birch Bayh of pert at running for, if not winning, Bonn, Brussels, London, Paris, and Indiana, Daniel Inouye of Hawaii, the presidency. Moscow, and writing a forthcoming George McGovern of South Dakota, book on his view of the presidency, Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut, Mondale· has yet to strike many Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, Fred sparks. ·· - Harris of Oklahoma, Thomas Eagle­ One reason may be that Mondale ton of Missouri, Alan Cranston of just doesn't turn people on. A man California, and Harold Hughes of of average size, with prominent blue Iowa-not only swept away some of eyes, a slightly beaked nose, and the Senate's musty gentility, but carefully groomed, straight, dark also gained· the kind of visibility blond hair that he has let grow that has long made that body the slightly longer at the urging of his best breeding ground of presidential wife,. Mondale conveys an image of dark horses. earnest youthfulness and Boy Scout Starting with his maiden speech Walter Mondale sincerity. He is a good but not out­ in the Senate, which dealt with the standing speaker, and his voice world hunger problem, Mondale . Standing at Mondale's side in· the sometimes takes on 'a whining, ser- identified himself with the politics same Minneapolis hotel ballroom monizing quality. · of human need. In countless legisla­ where he gamely conceded to Nixon Mondale's shortcomings as an tive battles, he prodded his col­ four years earlier, Humphrey orator were demonstrated in Los leagues about the problems of "the anointed his political protege as the Angeles last June when he spoke poor, the powerless and those who latest in a long line of Minnesotans before about 2000 people at a con­ are without adequate representation who have aspired to the White vocation sponsored by the Center in our political system." House. ·~we are seeing the begin­ for the Study of Democratic Institu­ Characterizing himself as a "prob­ ning of a truly great national career tions. His speech, titled "The Crisis lem-oriented, pragmatic liberal," that can take Fritz Mondale to the in the Contemporary Presidency,': Mondale constructed a career out of office which. I long sought," Hum­ was a thoughtful argument that the the issues that were the touchstones phrey declared. Then, with Mondale presidency must be stripped of some of New Deal-New Frontier-Great looking more grim than grateful, of its regal trappings and made "life Society liberalism. He was, he told · Humphrey added, "Ifit isn't being too . size" and "open and accountable" the voters of Minnesota and the na­ sacrilegious, I don't mind being John to the people. tion in 1972, not a radical, but a re­ the Baptist for Walter Mondale." "It had all the earmarks of a · former. With that kind of an evangelical great ·speech," recalls a California At the same time, Mondale built send-off, Mondale would seem to be newspaper editor who was present a reputation as an expert legislator. a shoo-in for the nomination. But and wanted to see if Mondale was As one of his coUeagues remarked obviously, he is not. As he ap­ as good as advertised. "He''delivered earlier this year, "Fritz Mondale is proaches the point of no return for it well, but he just sort of swallowed the best politician in. the Senate an all-out campaign, Mondale re~ the ending. He dribbled it out and 83 . \ / } what he said was almost lost in the attractive. The only question about The Making of the President series, way he said .it. I thought to myself, him is whether he really wants to be David Halberstam's The Best and 'Boy, if you're going to run for President." the Brightest, and Tim Crouse's The President, you've got to do this kind The most compelling evidence Boys on the Bus, and lately has of thing better.' He's been on the that he doesn't was provided by been reading a great deal about do­ scene for a long time now and he Mondale himself after he helped mestic and international economics should be doing something about Humphrey win the 1968 Democratic and trade.