University of Virginia Library

Of Fish And Fowl

"For here we are not afraid to follow the
truth..."

Pity it's not so in Washington.

The refusal of the Senate to allow the
Nixon-Humphrey-Wallace debate can only be
interpreted as someone's fear of "the truth."
In that refusal is attributable to the
Republicans, or the Nixon camp, we can only
assume that they are the ones who are afraid.
And what is the truth of which they are
afraid? For the answer to that one need only
recall the Nixon-Kennedy debate of 1960.

But, we ask, is Nixon's failure in a similar
situation eight years ago a legitimate reason
for suspecting that he would fail in such a
debate now? We doubt it; with a new make-up
man he might come off even better than the
other candidates, for all we know.

The point is this: the Republicans' selfish
fear lest their candidate's chances be harmed
by the debate has deprived the country of
what might have been a very helpful and
informative source of insight into all three
candidates as men and potentially as
Presidents. In depriving the country of that,
the Republicans have done it a great
disservice.

Venerable old Everett Dirksen said of the
matter, referring to the fact that the
Democrats squelched the Goldwater-Johnson
debate in 1964, "If it was fish then, it ought
to be fish now. If it was fowl then, it ought to
be fowl now." With all respect to Mr. Dirksen,
our opinion is that it was foul on both
occasions.