Friends—In Private

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30586, 31 October 1964, Page 15

Friends—In Private

(N.Z.P.A.-Reut er —Copy rip hi)

NEW YORK, October 30.

Senator Barry Goldwater will carry his campaigning into his home State of Arizona today after saying that, in spite of all the bitter charges exchanged between him and President Johnson, they could “still call each other friends.”

The Republican Presidential candidate’s remarks about his friendship with Mr Johnson came in a speech last night in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, after a busy day of campaigning in which he accused the President of using “smear” tactics and said his Administration condoned a “shabby code of conduct” at high levels.

Both Senator Goldwater and his Vice-Presidential run-ning-mate, Mr William Miller, predicted yesterday that the voters in Tuesday’s election would give them a stunning upset victory. But President Johnson, speaking in Philadelphia last night, said he knew he would receive a mandate from the people to continue on "the course of peace, of patience and perseverance, of prudence and preparedness,” set during the last four years of Democratic rule. The President, determined to keep campaigning right down to the wire, today moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for a rally there. Later he was to tour Illinois.

Senator Goldwater also had some nice things to say about Senator Hubert Humphrey, the Democratic Vice-Presi-dential candidate, in his Greensburg speech. "I have had some of the most hair-pulling debate I

ever wanted to have with Hubert Humphrey,” he said, “but I don’t think two people in this country re closer together as friends.” During the campaign, the Republican candidate often has said that just the thought of Senator Humphrey being “a heartbeat away” from the White House gave him shudders.

Turning to his relations with President Johnson, Senator Goldwater said: “With Lyndon Johnson I have argued, fought, and debated on the floor, in his office and my office, but we can still call each other friends.” The role of clergymen in

politics cropped up yesterday as a campaign issue. Departing from his prepared text before a packed audience of 18,000 at the Philadelphia Convention Hall, President Johnson said that he hoped the time would never come when religion would be denied a role in U.S. political campaigns. The day before, in Cedar Rapids, lowa, Senator Goldwater had said he failed to see how churches could be “concentrating on morality when we find clerical spokesmen who have become loud advocates of Lyndon Johnson.”

President Johnson commented last night: “Religion has always, and religion must always, play a part in all that we do and all that we hope to do.

"I hope that the day will never come when any man and any cause will try to keep religion out of our national decisions on who shall lead us or the directions we shall g°” Meanwhile, a group of clerygymen, including members of the Protestant, Roman Catholic and Jewish faiths, issued a statement in New Yord deploring the introduction of the “morality” issue into the campaign. “The very idea of morality is being distorted,” the statement said. “A few episodes involving personal morality are allowed to obscure fateful moral issues related to public

life—moral issues such as the full civil rights of all citizens, the shameful squalor and poverty in our cities and the danger of nuclear war.” The clergymen specifically mentioned the case of Walter Jenkins. President Johnson's aide, who resigned two weeks ago after the disclosure he had twice been arrested on morals charges, "We see the Jenkins episode as a case of human weakness that should not annul the many testimonies of respect for the basic character of this man and they should not he used as political weapons against his associates.” the statement said. The Republicans have been citing the Jenkins case as an example of what they call a general laxity in security and lack of morality in the Johnson Administration.

Wilson Escape ' Still Mystery

(N.Z. Presit Assn.—Copt/riflht'

LONDON, October 30.

The escape of the train robber, Charles Wilson, from prison 10 weeks ago remains a mystery today in spite of a 50.000-word police report. Wilson, gaoled for his part in Britain’s great train robbery last year, escaped from Winson Green prison, Birmingham, in August.