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On June 10, 1953, Senator Robert Taft held a press conference to announce a severe hip ailment. He said doctors told him he could continue working in the Senate, but he would have to take a good deal of rest. Taft stepped down as the Senate Majority Leader and appointed Senator William Knowland to assume all of his duties[1]. Taft told reporters that he expected to recover and return to his duties in the next session.
However, Senator Taft didn’t continue to work that session. He went to a New York hospital in June and remained there until he died on July 31, 1953. When Taft told reporters and his co-workers that he had a hip ailment, he failed to tell them that the hip ailment was cancer[2].
The President, the Senate, and the Nation mourned the loss of Senator Robert Taft, Mr. Republican. President Eisenhower led a solemn tribute to Robert Taft in the Capitol rotunda. Thousands of people visited the Capitol that day to pay their respects to Senator Taft.
The Ohio Senator was given one of the highest honors in America as his body lay in state in the majestic rotunda of our Nation’s Capital. Before Taft’s passing, there had only been about a dozen other occasions America had given a political leader a national farewell like that[3].
Senator Taft’s passing caused President Eisenhower to rethink any changes to the Taft-Hartley law. The President cited the memory of Senator Taft as the reason he wouldn’t ask for changes to the law that year and would put it off until the next session[4].
Having passed no major legislation, by August, the Republican-controlled 83rd Congress was called the least productive Congress since World War II[5].
With the GOP in control and Truman out of the picture, the Democratic Party National Chairman, Stephen A. Mitchell, sought to heal the wounds between the Northern Democrats and Dixiecrats[6]. The party was ready to welcome back the Southerners who strayed and partnered with the Republicans in the Dixiecrat-Republican Coalition. By the end of the year, the Dixiecrats became angry at Republicans over three issues: segregation, GOP farm policy, and their perceived attack on Protestants.
Leading up to the second session, many predicted that the Dixiecrats wouldn’t partner with the Conservative GOP any longer[7]. However, the Dixiecrat-Republican Coalition was far from over.
As the second session began, Republicans had yet to meet any of their campaign promises. They promised a balanced budget and reduced taxes, yet the budget was worse off, and taxes had increased. America faced higher consumer prices, higher home prices, and higher rent. The GOP promised to reduce the national debt but tried to increase it, and Democrats blocked it. There had been no changes in foreign policy, farm policy, immigration laws, or civil rights[8].
The GOP had its priorities in the second session of the 83rd Congress, and it was anti-Red and anti-Communism[9].
President Eisenhower gave many in the Republican Party the impression that he was politically superior to his party, threatening his chance at a cooperative congress[10]. Eisenhower relied on his popularity, assuming his party would vote for everything he wanted because he was popular. Despite the priorities of the GOP in 1954, a rift was growing in the party.
Republicans had postponed all committee hearings on civil rights in the first session to January 1954. However, when Senator Howard Smith, a Republican from New Jersey, postponed the hearings again, Senator Irving Ives protested the move in committee and then later to the press[11].
Then, when Senator John Bricker (R-OH) introduced the Bricker Amendment, it exasperated the conflict between the Eisenhower administration, Liberal Republicans, and Conservative Republicans. The Bricker Amendment sought to limit Eisenhower’s power by declaring that no treaty that conflicted with the Constitution could be made. It also would have limited the president’s power to enter into executive agreements with foreign powers.
When the Bricker Amendment came up, Democrats slunk into the background to allow the Republicans to fight among themselves. The self-implosion of the Republican Party would only help Democrats in the future election[12]. One of the most notable things about the 1954 Bricker Amendment was that almost no one understood it. Legal experts around the country disagreed over it for weeks.
Senator Bricker believed that there was a loophole in the Constitution that permitted the Federal Government, using treaty-making power, to make internal laws it could not otherwise constitutionally enact. Bricker called it a clear danger to states’ rights and civil rights. Treaty power could undermine civil liberties, Bricker asserted. However, Eisenhower believed that treaty-making power was not dangerous to rights and freedoms and that unconstitutional laws couldn’t go on the books through the treaty routine.
Bricker said that he intended to ensure unwanted laws could not be forced on states or the Federal Government by a treaty[13].
Eisenhower appealed to the GOP for unity, quoting Abraham Lincoln, saying, “The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present.” Conservative Republicans whispered about how certain phases of Eisenhower’s program were too much like the New Deal[14].
The Dixiecrat-Republican Coalition under the Truman administration had caused a split in both parties. When both parties elected President Eisenhower, America hoped that it would heal the rifts in each. While having the Republicans in control did create brief unity in the Democratic Party, their entire focus was the 1954 mid-term elections. The Republican split was between Liberal Republicans, who supported Eisenhower, and the party's Conservative wing.
Then there was Senator Joe McCarthy. In February, a dispute started over the promotion and honorable discharge of Major Irving Peress, an Army dentist who pleaded the Fifth Amendment when asked about communist activities.
McCarthy then attacked Peress’ commanding officer, a Brigadier General, for failure to explain why the Army had a possible communist in their ranks. McCarthy’s action was bullying, and it was the United States Army he was bullying. The Secretary of the Army, Robert T. Stevens, leaped to the general’s defense and told the Senator that no more Army men would go to the Hill for abuse[15].
Before Eisenhower was the president, he was the five-star General of the Army. McCarthy’s bullying of the Army was a heavy blow to Eisenhower’s prestige and something he took personally. The president called Secretary Stevens to give him his unqualified support. Then, Eisenhower held a conference with the Secretary of Defense, under whom Secretary Stevens served. McCarthy reached the limit of how much he could get away with under his Communist investigations[16].
The fight against Communism and subversion at home to which the Republican Party pledged itself during the election campaign turned into party strife. In March, the Republican National Committee Chairman Leonard W. Hall told reporters that he couldn’t go along with McCarthy and his treatment of the Army officials[17]. The next day, Eisenhower held a press conference where he denounced the disregard for the standards of fair play. The president defended the Army and the Secretary of Defense and claimed it was simply mudslinging[18].
On March 1, 1954, four Puerto Rican nationalists entered the Capitol building, armed with pistols and semi-automatic pistols, made their way to the balcony of the House of Representatives, and opened fire.
The Congressional Journal says the following: “At approximately 2 o’clock and 30 minutes p.m., a demonstration and the discharge of firearms from the southwest House Gallery (No. 11) interrupted the counting of the vote; the Speaker, pursuant to the inherent power lodged in the Presiding Officer in the case of a grave emergency, after ascertaining that certain Members had been wounded and to facilitate their care, at 2 o’clock and 32 minutes p.m. declared the House in recess, subject to the call of the chair.
“The Members wounded were Mr. Bentley of Michigan, Mr. Davis of Tennessee, Mr. Fallon of Maryland, Mr. Jensen of Iowa, and Mr. Roberts of Alabama[19].”
· Congressman Alvin Bentley was the most seriously wounded. A bullet struck him in the upper right chest, traveled through his lung, diaphragm, liver, and stomach, then exited his left side.
Congressman Kenneth Roberts was shot in the knee.
Congressman Ben Jensen was wounded in the left shoulder.
Congressman Clifford Davis was shot in the right leg.
Congressman George Fallon was hit in the hip.
The shooters were quickly tackled and apprehended[20]. The terrorists wanted freedom for Puerto Rico. They were all charged with intent to kill. Heavy guards protected the Capitol, and the FBI investigated for Communist ties to the violence. The Capitol Building banned tourists temporarily from the galleries[21]. All Congressmen recovered, and the session went on.
While the Republican Party remained fractured on the Bricker-Eisenhower fight and McCarthy-Eisenhower fight, Democrats touted unity. They used the GOP breaks as campaigning talking points, calling themselves the nation’s only party of reason[22].
The Democratic unity was superficial and all for the sake of winning the next election.
The Republican split was on issues, leadership, and personalities. The Eisenhower supporters tried to silence McCarthy, not only because he attacked the Army, but there appeared to be resentment towards him for hogging the stage, getting favorable and unfavorable attention, and capturing more radio and television time than any other Senator. In 1954, Senator Joe McCarthy was the face of the Republican Party[23], and the Senators who supported him were part of the Dixiecrat-Republican Coalition.
The Republican Party was further split open in May when the Taft-Hartley law appeared in the Senate. President Eisenhower had asked for minor changes to the law to reinforce its primary objectives.
Freshman Arizona Junior Senator Barry Goldwater introduced a “States’ Rights” Amendment to Taft-Harley. Goldwater’s amendment would have allowed states to enforce any labor relations law in interstate commerce disputes. So long as the law did not permit employers to interfere with, restrain or coerce employees to exercise the rights guaranteed to employees in the Taft-Hartley law[24].
Eisenhower asked for a minor change, and Goldwater proposed a far-reaching change.
Neither Eisenhower nor the Secretary of Labor supported the Goldwater amendment. The amendment would have made wages, hours, and fair labor standards, which the New Deal wrote into Federal law, vulnerable in every state in the Union[25]. Although unsurprising, Conservatives supported it; the Dixiegops endorsed the amendment[26].
As the Conservative and Liberal wings of the Republican Party were at each other’s throats, once again, no civil rights measures made it through Congress. Then, on May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court handed down a decision that would change America and further pit both parties' left and right sides against each other.
[1] J. A. O’Leary, “Taft Steps Out as Floor Leader of Senate for Rest of Session; Hip Trouble Called Serious,” Evening Star, (June 10, 1953)
[2] Barbara Bundschu, “Senator Taft is Dead,” The Daily Record, (July 31, 1953)
[3] Herbert Foster, “Nation Pays Tribute to Taft,” The Daily Record, (August 3, 1953)
[4] Evening Star, “President to Defer Note on Taft-Hartley,” (August 3, 1953)
[5] Richard Fryklund, “83rd Congress Made Modest Beginnings,” Evening Star, (August 9, 1953)
[6] Gould Lincoln, “Democrats Seek to Heal Dixie Breach Before ’54,” Evening Star, (May 5, 1953)
[7] The Daily Record, “The Old Southern-Republican Coalition,” (December 31, 1953)
[8] The People’s Voice, “A Checklist of the First Session of the 83rd Congress,” (January 8, 1954)
[9] Evening Star, “Anti-Red Plan Tops State of the Union,” (January 10, 1954)
[10] David Lawrence, “Risk Seen in GOP Snobbery,” Evening Star, (February 8, 1954)
[11] Evening Star, “Republican Split Over Hearing Delay on Civil Rights Bill,” (January 8, 1954)
[12] Jack Bell, “Ike May Face Critical Test in Congress,” The Key West Citizen, (January 14, 1954)
[13] Evening Star, “Big Four Make Haste to Disagree,” (January 31, 1954)
[14] Associated Press, “Eisenhower Appeals for GOP Unity in Lincoln Day Message,” Evening Star, (January 29, 1954)
[15] Evening Star, “Review of the Year,” (December 26, 1954)
[16] Thomas L. Stokes, “Eisenhower Takes a Hand,” Evening Star, (February 24, 1954)
[17] Garnett D. Horner, “Hall Critical of McCarthy After Talk with Eisenhower,” Evening Star, (March 2, 1954)
[18] Cecil Holland, “Army Defended, Zwicker Praised by President,” Evening Star, (March 3, 1954)
[19] Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 83rd Congress Second Session
[20] William F. Arbogast, “Puerto Ricans Show No Regret Over Shooting,” The Key West Citizen, (March 2, 1954)
[21] Rex Chaney and Vincent J. Burke, “Heavy Guard Put Around Capitol,” The Daily Record, (March 2, 1954)
[22] Associated Press, “Unity Emphasized as Democrats Gather for Florida Parley,” Evening Star, (March 5, 1954)
[23] The Daily Record, “These Days by Sokolsky,” (March 17, 1954)
[24] Rowland Evans JR, “Taft-Hartley Law Revision is up for Senate Go-Round,” The Key West Citizen, (May 3, 1954)
[25] Doris Fleeson, “Republican Split on Labor,” Evening Star, (May 5, 1954)
[26] James Y. Newton, “Plan to Expand Rights of States in Labor Field Appears Lost,” Evening Star, (Mar 5, 1954)