INTIMATE SKETCH

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22444, 13 June 1936, Page 13

INTIMATE SKETCH

CHOSEN CANDIDATE

AN AVERAGE AMERICAN MAN OF SIMPLE TASTES Searchers for the average American might well choose Mr. Alfred M. Landon, Bays a writer in the Literary Digest. He stands five feet nine, weighs 1701b., is married, has three children, smokes a pipe, likes the movies, plays bridge and poker, has never been abroad, takes a highball occasionally and belongs to the Elks, Odd Fellows and Masons. He is 48, has brown eyes, a likeable smile and silvering hair. Mr. Landon walks to his office at 8.30 every morning, lunches at home on soup and salad, and, in the evening may sit on the verandah swing and talk politics with his neighbours.

Another writer says of Mr. Landon that he is fonder of old clothes than of new, and wears the same shiny blue serge suit and battered felt hat in public that he wears in private; also that ho likes his acquaintances to call him "Alf." Opposer of New Deal Mr. Landon studied law at the University of Kansas and graduated LL.B. in 1908. Since 1912 he has been interested in oil, and has established a very successful business. During the Great War ho served as First Lieutenant in the Chemical Warfare Service. Before his election in 1932 as Governor of Kansas, Mr. Landon was unknown outside that Stale. His election was noteworthy, however, for the fact

that he was one of the few successful Republican supporters at a time when the Democrat Party was in the ascendant. Two years later he was reelected against strong Democrat opposition, and later he was able to announce that under his control the State of Kansas had balanced its Budget. Mr. Landon is a strong opposer of the new deal with its "aimless experimenta-, tion," its "unworkable" Social Security Act, and its "waste and extravagance." The Kansas was balanced by reducing the expenditure relentlessly, cutting salaries, merging departments and abandoning building programmes. Not a Polished Orator According to an independent Democrat paper, Mr. Landon reconciles the sharply conflicting interests within tho Republican Party. His proposals for helping the farmer are rather vague, but as he lives in a State which is predominately agricultural, his sympathies with agriculture are to be taken for granted. And his insistence on strict economy in public expenditure is enough to satisfy the business interests. On the other hand opposition newspapers charge him with balancing the Kansas Budget by shifting the burden of relief on to the Federal Government, and affirm that his capacities are too limited for the position of President. The Governor of Kansas is not a polished orator, but he has; been hailed as the "commonsense- candidate," and his constructive, clear-thinking speeches have made an undoubted impression. He has urged recovery before reform, and stated that unemployment must bo solved by business recovery based on confidence.