You must avoid hurting their feelings. They may not be much use to you but they have the power to do you a great deal of harm.

Remember the old story about the new lodge member who was elected "Lord High Exalted Ruler of the Universe"? He was not the lodge master; his was the very lowest position in that lodge. There is your technique.

Flatter them. Defer to them. Ask their advice... in such terms that you get the advice you want! Never ignore them. Have them speak to new dubs. Put them on "dignity" committees (people who greet visiting notables, sit on platforms during programs, and have their names printed on political stationery). Never displace them from club or organization office unless they wish to retire. You can always create new offices- "executive" this and "executive" that - without disturbing them. If some old fuddy-duddy is now chairman and can't conduct a meeting properly you can always carry out basic business in a committee-of-the-whole, with your own choice as chairman of the committee-of-the-whole - or you can through an executive committee - or provide the office of parliamentarian-or even teach him some parliamentary law if you are subtle about it. You yourself will work as floor leader, in his good graces. Be sure never to surprise him with what you bring up on the floor. Tell him about it before-hand.

But don't replace him until he wants to retire, then create some equivalent of Lord High Exalted Ruler of the Universe for him - "critic," "senior adviser," "chairman of the reception committee."

I was present once when an elderly man, just the sort I have referred to, addressed a mass meeting for twenty minutes on how he had been ignored by the johnny-come-latelies in the campaign just completed. That was his whole plaint; the campaign had been successful - he could not deny that. It had turned out a bunch of vultures and had taken over an entire state organization. But he had not been consulted; he was the dean of the reformers in the party; his nose was out ofjoint.

His point was ridiculous, as a reformer he had been a consistent failure. But he was a powerful, persuasive orator; he managed to convince the crowd that he had been wronged. It started a crack in the organization which widened and destroyed it.

He is nationally known but I shall not name him - he is rich in years and honors and fought many a gallant fight in his youth. I cite him only as a warning.

Some few of the old-timers will turn out to be good workers; if you are considerate of all you can salvage the useful ones as well as avoiding the dangerous pique of the dead wood.

Let us now suppose that you have won your first primary (see Chapter X) and thereby control the official party machinery. You are the Party, you and your friends, in the legal sense; this obligates the state and national committees to deal with you.

You have still to cope with the persons you have displaced. This will be a headache!

Here we are assuming that these persons are not sincerely members of your party at all; they are stooges of the Machine who wear your party label for the purpose of selling out your party. These jackals lack even the limited honesty of the ordinary successful machine politician; they are professional traitors. You cannot trust them under any circumstances.

(This case is very different from the normal post-primary situation described in Chapter X where your object would be to heal the wounds between factions all loyal to your party.)

You are likely to find it very difficult to throw these crooks out of the party. You can't keep them out of public meetings; in any case some of them will have been elected to your county committee. There is probably no method of unseating them, but this is not the time to compromise. Don't let them hold any office if you can possibly prevent it. If you let one have so much as an honorary vice-chairmanship in a subcommittee, he will go out, print up stationery with his title on it, and write letters of endorsement for the Machine which will appear to be, through judicious use of large and small type, official endorsements from your organization.

Another favorite trick, and one almost impossible to stop, is for them to incorporate a dummy political "club" under an official-sounding title, such as: The 12th District Official Republican Club or The Democratic Assembly of Gedunkus County. Sometimes you can stop this sort of thing with an injunction, but not often.

There is no sure cure here. All I can recommend is to keep them at arm's length, don't trust them, and don't give them anything. Some of this phony organization may be poor lost souls, honestly devoted to the party and happy at the change. Very well, let them prove it by a long, long, term of volunteer work at a low level. Keep them on parole until you are sure of them.

I have elaborated this point because, once you build an organization, these termites will try to dominate it, under the pretext that they are the "real" (Democrats) (Republicans), and you will be tempted to meet them half-way, particularly because pressure will almost certainly be brought to bear on you from the state capital or from Washington by senior party members who are interested in party harmony and may not understand the local situation. Don't do it. If you know, of your own knowledge, that the official party organization you replaced had unclean relationships with the Machine you are opposing, then this is one of the times not to compromise, even though the national chairman of your party gets you on long distance to plead with you!

You have built an organization; you have captured party machinery - now to win an election!

CHAPTER VII

How to Win an Election

The By-Election at Eatanswill

"There are twenty washed men at the street for you to shake hands with and six children in arms that you are to pat on the head and inquire the ages of. Be particular about the children, my dear sir; it always has a great effect, that sort of thing."

"I'll take care," said the Honorable Samuel Slumkey.

"And perhaps, my dear sir," said the cautious little man, "perhaps if you could-I don't mean to say it's indispensable - but if you could manage to kiss one of them, it would producea great impression on the crowd."

"Wouldn't it have as good an effect if the proposer or seconder did that?" said the Honorable Samuel Slumkey.

"Why, I am afraid it wouldn't," replied the agent. "If it were done by yourself, my dear sir, I think it would make you very popular."

"Very well," said the Honorable Samuel Slumkey with a resigned air, "then it must be done - that's all."

"Arrange the Procession!" cried the twenty committeemen.

- From The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club,

Charles Dickens, 1837

"The place to learn to wash dishes is at the sink." The stuff in this book is pre-digested; to cut your teeth you must get out there in the field and try.

You are likely to lose your first election - let's discuss that first. With the aid of a few simple rules you can be absolutely certain of losing.

How to Lose an Election: The first thing to do to lose an election is to put out of your mind the basic rule of politics that elections are won with individual votes, each held by a separate human being who must first be convinced, then persuaded to go to the polls on election day to record his conviction so that it may be counted.

If you will neglect that rule you can lose extemporaneously. However, there are some other positive steps you may take to insure a good, rousing, landslide defeat.

Put the major portion of your time, energy and money into the indirect, superficial aspects of campaigning, and slight the direct, vote-by-vote methods, such as doorbell pushing. Accept all the speaking engagements you can manage to get, even if they take you miles out of your district and are before groups who will not permit an outright campaign speech. It gets your name in the paper, doesn't it? A candidate has to have publicity, doesn't he?