MR TRUMAN CHOSEN

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25548, 16 July 1948, Page 7

MR TRUMAN CHOSEN

Democrat Party’s Candidate SOUTHERN STATES NOT RECONCILED (N.Z, Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 9 p.m.) NEW YORK, July 14. Mr Harry S. Truman was tonight nominated as the Democratic Party’s candidate for the United States Presidency. The voting by the party’s national convention at Philadelphia was:—Mr Truman, 9471 votes; Senator Richard Russell, 263. While his nomination was being acclaimed, Mr Truman arrived at the convention hall and waited in an office to make his acceptance speech. When news of his arrival reached the floor of the hall the convention really cut loose in the old Democratic tradition. A yelling, jostling, cheering crowd marched up and down the aisles singing to the mucic of the band. However, while the spirits of the demonstrators seemed to be rising as high as the temperature in the stifling hall, one section of the convention sat grimly silent. The Southern States were visible proof of the split in the party which went from triumph to triumph, united under Franklin D. Roosevelt. Eventually the Kentucky delegation relented and its standards moved into the surging throng. The demonstration lasted

half an hour. The party split was further emphasised to-night, when Mr Fielding Wright, Governor of Mississippi, formally called for a meeting of Southern Democrats at Birmingham, Alabama, on Saturday, to nominate a “States rights” candidate for the Presidency in opposition to Mr Truman. He issued his call shortly after the Mississippi delegation and half the Alabama delegates had walked out of the convention. “The Mississippi delegation is on its way to Birmingham, and a good many other States will be represented,” he told a reporter.

Compromise With South Rejected Amia an uproar of shouts and doos from angry Southern delegates, the convention to-day adopted the full civil rights plank in the party’s election platform and opened «the possibility that some of the Southern delegates might walk out of the convention. 'rhe first blow to the Southern States came when the convention defeated by 925 votes to 309 the Southern demand for a provision in the platform that States should be granted their own rights in settling racial questions and not be subject to Federal interference. Then, in a surprise move that staggered the Southerners, the convention overrode the platform committee’s compromise platform and inserted a flat declaration against racial discrimination, endorsing the very features of President Truman’s civil rights programme that started the intense anti-Truman drive throughout the South. The platform has finally approved calls in unmistakeable terms for Federal legislation outlawing the poll-tax, lynching, and all other forms of racial discrimination. It pledges the Democratic Party to fight for repeal of the Taft-Hartley Labour Act—which the Democrats themselves helped to push through Congress in spite of Mr Truman’s veto. The platform also recommends the removal of the Palestine arms embargo and action to “curb Republican inflation.” It pledges the party to a nationwide minimum wage of 75 cents an hour, a strong foreign policy, and farm opposition to Communism. Two Delegations Walk Out The first reaction to the North’s victory in the civil rights fight was se.en in the evening session which was to nominate Mr Truman, when the Alabama and Mississippi delegations walked out of the convention hall amid loud booing.

Earlier, Mr Ben Laney, Governor of Arkansas, withdrew as a candidate for the Presidency because he could not run on what he said was in effect a Socialist platform. He had estimated that he would get 150 to 200 votes. Mr Laney said: “I could not accept nomination, in view of the civil rights plank now in the platform, if I were expected to carry through this platform’s provisions.” After two hours of minor oratory and the nomination by Georgia ot Senator Richard Russell, Mr Phil Donnelly, Governor of Missouri, nominated his fellow Missourian, Mr Truman, for the Presidency. U.S. MINERS SENT BACK TO WORK (N.Z.P.A.—Reuter— Copyright) WASHINGTON, July 14. The president of the United Mineworkers of America (Mr John L. Lewis) has called off \ the week-old strike in coal mines owned by the steel companies and ordered 40.000, miners back to work. Mr Lewis said that the steel companies had signed the contract already agreed to by other mine owners. RUSSIAN WHEAT FOR INDIA (Rec. 7 p.m.) NEW DELHI, July 14. It is announced that Russia will supply India with 50,000 tons of wheat in exchange for tea under an agreement signed by the two countries. The wheat will be carried in Russian ships. R.A.F. Jet Planes Cross the Atlantic. —Six Royal Air Force jet planes landed at Goose Bay, Labrador, to-night, completing the first Atlantic crossing by jet-propelled aeroplanes. The aeroplanes, which took off from Stornoway, Scotland, made halts in Iceland and Greenland. —New York, July 14.