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Charleston Daily Mail
April 9, 1960

16 Stops Mark Humphrey Bid For State Vote

By Herb Little
Associated Press Staff Writer

Hinton (AP) - Sen. Hubert H. Humphrey (D-Minn), rested after a man-killing schedule the first day, carried his campaign deeper into southern West Virginia today.

Traveling by chartered bus, he had appearances scheduled in this railroad center and in Princeton. Then he was to head back north to Madison, whre he will speak at a Democratic dinner tonight.

In this less thickly settled section, where it's a long way between towns, there was no repetition of yesterday's schedule of stops every two or three miles.

The two-day weekend swing in the southern part of the state is Humphrey's first serious campaigning for the May 10 primary election in West Virginia.

Opposing Kennedy

In a test of their popularity as contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, Humphrey and Sen. John F. Kennedy (D-Mass) will oppose each other as they did in the Wisconsin primary last Tuesday. Humphrey was the loser there, although his showing was better than many had expected.

West Virginia's primary, unlike Wisconsin's, will not bind any delegates to the Democratic convention in Los Angeles. Kennedy will arrive in the state Monday to begin campaigning.

Humphrey spent last night in Beckley, last of 16 stops on his first-day schedule.

After only two hours of sleep, he set out from Charleston at 7 a.m. yesterday. Sixteen hours later, and seemingly still fresh, he wound up shaking hands all around at a Bar Mitzvah (Jewish confirmation) in Beckley last night.

Attacks Republicans

Speaking to a rally crowd of about 800 earlier in the evening in the Memorial Auditorium at Beckley, Humphrey sailed into what he called the "Eisenhower-Nixon-Benson administration."

He said it "never rises to opportunities. It just lies down on them and falls asleep."

Humphrey said that Vice President Nixon, almost certain to be the Republican presidential nominee, up to now has "been spending his time at sporting events rather than debating the issues and defending the administration's record."

Humphrey had delivered shorter speeches earlier in the day, which he made standing in the back of a pickup truck in Montgomery, on the courthouse steps at Fayetteville, and on the sidewalks of the main streets of Oak Hill and Mount Hope.

At most of his other stops, in towns along the Kanawha River and unemployment-blighted mining communities on Cabin Creek, he didn't make speeches but shook hands and chatted with small groups wherever he found them.

Roosevelt In State

Meanwhile, at Monongah, W. Va. Franklin Delano Roosevelt Jr. said last night that he is supporting Sen. Kennedy because he thinks of him "as the only Democrat who can beat the Republican bosses' choice, Richard Nixon."

The appearance at a dinner in Monongah, in West Virginia's northern coal fields, was the first Roosevelt made to help the campaign of Kennedy for the May 10 primary. He will spend the next three days traveling around the state.

Roosevelt had some comment on an expression his mother used about Sen. Humphrey. She said that he had "a touch of greatness." Her son insisted she had made the same remark about some other Democrats. He did not say that Kennedy was among them.

To explain his choice among the candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination, Roosevelt harked back to the days when he and Kennedy served together in the House of Representatives. He said that then he acquired a "personal knowledge of his abilities."

As Roosevelt sees it now, "the return of America to a prosperous economy and to the leadership of peace throughout the world can be accomplished by the Democratic Party under the leadership of John Kennedy."

Today Roosevelt is going into the southern part of the state. He will make an appearance at noon in Madison, in Boone County, where Humphrey is to turn up a few hours later. At night he will attend a rally at Logan.

His schedule for West Virginia has been changed. Tuesday speeches at Elkins and Webster Springs were canceled because of commitments elsewhere. He plans to come back to campaign some more for Kennedy in the first week of May.


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