Democrats Control House And Senate

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31830, 7 November 1968, Page 11

Democrats Control House And Senate

(N Z.P.A -Reuter —Copyright) WASHINGTON, November 6. The Democrats clinched control of the ninety-first Congress, capturing a majority of the House and Senate seats, the Associated Press reported. It will be the eighth consecutive Congress in which the Democrats have been in charge.

Compilation of election returns was greatly delayed when the News Election Service (N.E.S.) had to suspend its counting because of “flaws” in its computer tabulation.

Because of recurring discrepancies in some of the figures, N.E.S. finally stopped counting about 1 a.m. to try to solve the problem- This followed an earlier failure. The N.E.S. was set up by the two major United States news agencies and the three-nation-wide broadcast networks to gather election results for them.

Victory by both "hawks" and “doves” blurred the overall impact of the Vietnam war in key Senate races, the Associated Press reported. Senator J. W. Fulbright, of Arkansas, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and one of the most outspoken “doves" won re-election, while Senator Joseph S. Clark, Pennsylvania, another “dove,” was defeated.

Senator Wayne Morse, of Oregon, another Foreign Relations Committee member who sharply attacked Vietnam policy, was trailing in his bid for re-election. Mr Barry Goldwater, of Arizona, and Mr Edward Gurney, of Florida, were the most prominent "hawks” to win Senate seats.

Mr Gurney, a Republican member of the House, captured the Senate seat vacated by the retiring Democrat, Mr George A. SmathersMr Gurney, who advocated carrying the war to North Vietnam and blockading the port of Haiphong, defeated

his Democratic opponent, former Governer Leroy Collins by a substantial margin. Mr Collins had called for pushing the Paris peace talks and for gradual de-Americani-sation of the war. Mr Goldwater, the G.O.P. Presidential candidate four years ago, won back a Senate seat after a campaign in which he said new leadership was needed to win the war.

Mr Goldwater replaced a retiring Democrat, Mr Carl Hayden.

A calculation by a major broadcasting network indicated the Democrats would hold a 235 to 200 margin in the

House of Representatives compared with the pre-elec-tion line-up of 245 Democratic seats and 187 for the Republicans, with three vacancies. In the Senate, where 34 of the 100 seats were up for election this year, the Democrats appeared likely to lose only a few seats. Before the election, the party standings in the Senate were: Democrats 63, Republi-

cans 37. In the Governors’ contests that have little over-all na-

tional impact but offer the winning party grass roots power, Republicans increased their present majority of 26.