Unidentified Man: We are at the 5th Human Events Political Action Conference. Representative Bob Dole, Republican of Kansas, and Representative Edward Gurney, Republican of Florida, discuss how we won, how you can help now. The moderator is Mrs. Eleanor Smith of Wisconsin.

Eleanor Smith: And without any further remarks, I’m going to call upon Congressman Dole of Kansas as our first speaker, and he will tell you his story at this time. Mr. Dole. (applause)

Bob Dole: As I understand, we should visit first of all about how we won and what you may do now to help. I think, first of all, since you may know a little about the speaker, of course everybody who wins feels he had the hardest race in the country. We understand this, and we all understand it when we tell each other, our colleagues, just how tough it was. But I think you might be interested in knowing a little about what our problem was, because what may apply in our district might not apply in yours.

Now first of all, Kansas, we’ve gained population, believe me, but we haven't kept pace with some of the other areas. So it's necessary — that when the — under redistricting that we lost one seat. We dropped from six to five, and this happened that I was placed in with the liberal Democrat by the name of Mr. Breeding — Jay Floyd Breeding — who was Chairman of the Wheat Subcommittee on the Committee of Agriculture, which I am a member of also. And in our big district now — we have 105 counties in Kansas, we have 58 in our district — so it's a rather large area. It comprises 60% of the state of Kansas, and we have 550,000 residents, so we are kept busy, of course, trying to find out what the people really want in our district. Following the campaign, in an effort to do this, we made a tour of our district, and it takes 14 days just to go around and visit each county seat for about three hours. So, it's a tremendous job, and I think one that may not apply to some who live in urban areas, but in rural areas we believe that we do have some things that might be of interest.

Anybody here from Minnesota? Well, I'm glad somebody here knows Mr. [Orville] Freeman other than myself (laughter). He’s a very fine gentleman, and I understand people in Minnesota are happy that he's in Washington (laughter), but despite this, he is the Secretary of Agriculture, and he does have some plans in mind that might be of general interest, because many, many of you aren't interested in farm legislation. But as a freshman, and from talking with older members of our committee, I can tell you that Mr. Freeman has some things in mind that have never occurred to any other secretary. We use one little example in our campaign because my opponent was, of course, all out for Orville, and Orville was all out for my opponent, and we were pleased this was the way it worked out.

But despite this, Mr. Freeman sent a bill to Congress last year, which for the first time in history, contained a section which provided fines and jail sentences for farmers — not for violating some criminal law, which of course, we all should be punished for, but simply for not keeping proper books and records. And to those of us on the committee who hesitated to accept this provision, we were told that it wasn't there, that we were trying to read something that wasn't there. But I come from a wheat-producing area, in fact, Kansas is the largest wheat-producing state in the nation, and our district is by far the largest wheat-producing district. But it provided that if you didn't keep proper books and records as prescribed by the secretary, you could be subjected to fines up to $5,000 — this is for wheat producers — and if you were a dairy farmer, you could also be subjected to fines up to $2,000, and you could spend up to one year in jail. Now, this tipped off many of us as to the real intent behind Mr. Freeman's motives, and what drove Mr. [Willard] Cochran [economist at the Department of Agriculture] and Mr. Freeman to introduce this type of legislation: if you can’t control the farmer, you can always lock him up. And I think this is a theory they had, and this is a theory that many of us on our committee will continue to resent.

I think one thing that bothers conservatives in Congress and as we go out and campaign is sometimes the lack of interest and apathy — and downright negative attitude of businessmen and farmers and others who should be interested. I think sometimes it's ‘C of C,’ which stands for the Chamber of Commerce — does well mean the Chamber of Compromisers — because very few of these people do anything that I've been able to find in the state of Kansas. I can say very honestly that of all the so-called ‘right-wing’ or ‘conservative’ groups in the country that only one actually ever helped me, and this was the Americans for Constitutional Action. I think it's funny (applause) — I think sometimes some of these groups are more concerned about the dollar than they are about electing conservatives to Congress, because the only way we can stop these things is to put people in Congress who vote ‘no.’ I don't care how many emotional pleas that [evangelist] Billy [James] Hargis makes — or anyone else — we cannot change a single vote in Congress unless we change the membership. And I think it's high time we become realistic. It's high time we looked at the problem objectively. And we have people in my home county — in my hometown, in my district - who spend, probably, hundreds of dollars on material every year, reading about how our freedoms are eroding, what they can do, the constitutional rights of man. But they wouldn't donate a dime to a candidate who would vote against these things, and its, frankly, very frustrating and sometimes downright disgusting to see this happen time and time again. And until such time as the businessman and the others who talk about free enterprise will stand up with a candidate who has his neck out about a mile long and say, ‘I am for this man whether he's a Republican or a Democrat because he will vote against these programs,’ then I think we're in trouble.

But seriously, there are those of us in Congress on both sides of the aisle who believe that we've just about reached the point where we must get a majority in Congress, or start drifting the other way because we're losing people. And here again, we implore businessmen to do something. Most people who belong to labor unions contribute more financially than do the bankers and other businessmen. They don't do it because they want to, but because it's held from their check, but it's really frustrating to go around to some of these areas in my district. Maybe it doesn't happen in any other state, but it seems in my district, the business — the businessmen are a little slow on participation.

Dr. Heller told this story that we had a chance to hear him last year, and haven't had a chance since, fortunately. But he was talking about economics, and he told us a story — the only thing I remembered about the meeting — about the drunk in the back row. And he said he had to have been speaking for years and years and nothing ever bothered him much, but this one night in the back row was this fellow who apparently stopped too long in the cocktail lounge. And about every two or three minutes he would get up and say, ‘You're stupid!’ And after about the third time Dr. Heller said, ‘Could you please sit down? You're drunk.’ And the drunk staggered to his feet and he said, ‘Well, I may be drunk, but in the morning I'll be sober, and you'll still be stupid.’ (laughter) This may or may not be the case here, but I'm certainly happy now to turn it back to the moderator and get into some questions and answers after Congressman Gurney has had a chance to visit with you. (applause)

Ed Gurney: Ms. Chairman and friends of this conference, I feel highly honored to be here because I think this is a most important political action conference that assembles a whole lot of people who believe in good government from all over the country. And I commend you people for taking the active interest that you are doing by participating in this conference. Now, I don't say that simply to compliment you — believe me, I don't. Because the importance of good thinking citizens, active in government, can’t be overemphasized. And I used to point this thing out in Winter Park, Florida — where I was mayor of a city of about 20,000 — again and again in speeches at civic club meetings by illustrating this point of participation in government. I’d say now, you have your mayor up here in front of you, and you think that he’s mad because the majority of the people in your community elected him. I said nothing could be further from the truth because 23% of the people voted in the election — two to one on my side — so you figure out for yourself what percentage of the population of the city of Winter Park elected Ed Gurney. And it is important for you people to take an active interest in politics, but I'll tip you off — while this business of people not voting in politics is a terrible record on our country, you can take advantage of this thing, too. Because if you find out who your people are, if you are running a good conservative candidate, and get these people out to the polls on Election Day, just as strong as you can get them — 100% if you can, but 90% or 80% — so help me, you'll find you can win because of this business of low voting records. So, while it's a disgrace in one aspect, if you are wise, you can take advantage of it.

Now, as I understand, this is kind of a school to learn practical politics, and I would like to tell you something about our campaign so you can get some notion of how we went about it and how we won. In the first place, I'm a living example of how a rank amateur who doesn't know anything about politics, really, so far as running for a national office is concerned, can get elected. And get elected, incidentally, over an opponent who had served in the state legislature — two terms in the House of Representatives and two terms in the state Senate — so if there was a pro on this race, it certainly wasn't Gurney. It was his opponent, [John A.] Sutton the Democrat. So it can be done. So, be encouraged that a rank amateur can win in politics with rank amateurs to work for him because that's how we did it.

Now, I made the decision in January of 1962, and I mention this because this is of some importance. Most of the people in the race had started long before that. And in January of 1962, in our organization, we had three people. Gurney the candidate, his campaign manager, and a campaign treasurer — and actually the treasurer was only somebody who received the funds. He wasn't a campaign fundraiser. We had to find that fellow. Well, we lined up a few of my friends that would work well in — I thought, at least — in community drives and got them going. And I soon found out that they were long on promises and short in performance and did almost nothing on fundraising. So, we found one man who would really work. He didn't promise a thing, but this is how he went about it — and this is practical and remember this, because it's important. First thing he did was exactly as Bob Dole tells you: found some good working females, about 15 altogether. And then what he did was feed them about five cards or ten cards — never less than five, never more than ten — with a name and address on it, with a figure on it of $10 or $25 or $50 or $100 — one or two cases higher than that — of what these people might be expected to contribute based upon their financial circumstances and other things to pick that figure out of a hat. And then these people started calling, and then my campaign fundraiser would go back, and he'd call them up and say, ‘Grace, have you contacted those five people yet?’ And maybe she hadn't. He'd prod a little, he’d coax a little. Point of the matter was he got it done. And it wasn't any earth-shaking event. It was simply a way to go about it and a follow-up process, and the money came in. No large contributions, but small dribbles like that, and finally we got enough to adequately, from our point of view, finance this campaign.

Now, the next thing that we did of importance was this. Although, I’d started late in the Campaign, so far as the actual campaigning is concerned, I got off first because once having made the decision — I filed just on the first day of filing in Florida — I had my plans on what I was going to do. I got a brochure out right away, we went to the printers that morning of qualification day. We lined up two TV programs on which I went on the air for half an hour each time and stated in plain, bold, sound, conservative fashion what I believed in. I laid it right on the line. I hit big government. I hit big spending. I hit this Medicare business. I took off on the Kennedys. I took off on Mr. Freeman — who is no friend of Bob Dole's in the farm program — and I tried to tell the people what I believed in. And I also said this — and so help me this is exactly what I did say — in each of these programs I said, ‘If you want something out of Uncle Sam in Washington, don't send Ed Gurney to Congress because he's not going to get a thing for you.’ I don't know how more plain-spoken you can be than that.

The problems we ran into, so far as my opponent was concerned. Well, in the first place, of course, he was a conservative Democrat which didn't help me out too much. We had people who would again and again say, ‘You people believe in the same thing. Now, I'm a Democrat. Why should I vote for you, a Republican?’ What I had to do there was to discover my opponent in errors and point out differences between us, and fortunately he made a few errors. He made one error in the primary night, at the end of the primary, when he and I were finally chosen as the two people to represent the parties. He said this on the microphone — he said, ‘Now I'ma staunch conservative, and I will uphold all the things that Jeffersonian Democrats in the South believe in. And I'm also a Democrat and where I can, I will support the Kennedy administration.’ Well, believe me, he never forgot that. I pounded that home time and again and time and again. And I did so because I knew deep down that he was a fence-straddler, and he was not a true conservative and this thing I put it out wherever I could.