 I Yes, Walter Ruther is calling the president of line. Oh the president asked the operators to get him I've ordered. How are you fine? I? Your labor boy is giving me such push today. I haven't been on the phone I just got through and I'm going over any dinner with John Steinbeck, but I thought a better call you in between I had away a night in today and John Lewis and all of his co-workers, and so I've had a pretty rough day You had a rough day. Yeah, I want to just say first as I was so proud of you at the U of M that day That was a tremendous job you did Well, thank you, and I was real proud. Thank you. What I'm calling you about. I'll just take a minute I've been working with moon and our boys in the Texas situation We've been trying to help put that together down there You know so that the Conley forces and the Yarborough forces could work together and give you a united, Texas Which we need and I thought it was coming along and then the other day Ralph Yarbrough called me and Hank Brown has been trying to get me and he wrote me a long letter And I met this afternoon with our regional director who's a fellow that moon works under Teddy Hawks, and I Think it would be a great tragedy those boys are talking about walking out of the convention down there and so forth And I don't think there's really much difference between them as they they appear to be And Hank Brown and these fellows are talking about where they're fighting for your program and the Conley forces won't go along Well and either one of us know what our program is it hadn't been written the only thing they'd done the damn fools are letting Republicans Sick them on that's right. They want to try to take the convention away from Conley water and they can't do it He's got them beat two to one and Conley hadn't got a program of platform, and I haven't got one We're gonna write it up at the Atlantic City we're gonna write a platform and then they're gonna have another convention But all the Republicans done is they got a bunch of simpletons down there who really want to control this and the Arbors their agent he votes right up here, but he got absolutely no judgment What he ought to be doing is getting every Democrat he can Sport him cuz he's gonna wind up getting in a fight and running half of them over the Republicans Yeah, and ain't a damn thing in the world for him to gain Every delegate that's come to that convention is going to be a carefully selected London Johnson man from who laid the chunk and he's going to be ordered to instruct vote for me All the way down the line now what they're trying to make them do is say you give us a blank check To endorse platform and hadn't been ridden. Yeah, well I now they can't do that And if it did Conley would get beat by Republican right the point is the point is that why? Why can't there be somebody to work this thing out because they're fighting over nothing now number one? important thing is to get that convention United to support all the Democratic candidates starting with you Well, I'll tell you why I miss Randolph through the years is the good good soul But she ruled her runs if she can't if she can't rule it loose and then she'll run it now they have tried to figure out they went out First thing I tried to do is beat Conley, which was a terrible mistake for him to do they ought to be fighting with it Then I got in a fight with Conley because he said well if they're gonna beat me I'm gonna be in your bra, but I said you can't do that And he said well It's a hell of a thing to take my gun away from me and give them the gun to work on me with right and you can't keep down your brown But you can keep me out. Well, I made Joe kill go mad and I made Conley mad But I kept the album from getting defeated because anyone in the group Jim ride Joe kill go any of motive defeated your Conley had it right But I said why do I want to improve the situation when I get a man to vote 99 times out of a hundred Why don't want to change that kind of a man? and I Appeal to Conley's intelligence and he said well all right, but I'm still mad about it. Oh, it didn't be now Soon as they got by that thing they come out startified and say, okay We we can't run the convention. We've tried to beat you we've lost But now we're gonna tell you that if you don't do it We're gonna embarrass present by going up with a separate delegation Well, Conley don't give a damn but they take a separate delegation and I don't either for that's concerned because they got nothing to fight I had your word lunch today at White House. I said now Ralph Why in the living hell do you want to fight about something that hasn't been written yet? If you want to fight about it going to September convention in Texas after we've had Atlantic City and try to Blackball everybody doesn't support a platform. I wouldn't give a damn heart to support it. I'd say you sport Johnson period Because we haven't written their platform. I don't know what it is I want to ask them to support Conley called me and said now what kind of a program you advocate What are you gonna put in your platform? Are you gonna are you gonna balance the budget or are you gonna unbalance it and I said well We're gonna have a platform because they didn't we're gonna write a damn good platform Well, they said don't ask me though to write a blank check before you ever meet because I don't appeal to anybody Well, yeah, the Arbor's reaction is that they after him and they're gonna beat him and come is after him So he's got a fight coming now. I told come in he's got to get out there and get elected himself He's got to support your Arbor and all of us go together. I told you Arbor day I said I'm with you money marbles and chunk all the way all the time Now you tell me who you want me to call what you want me to do I'll do it and he said well, that's fine. I'll sure be in touch with you But so they really after me well, that's true. They are after each other Of course it was it's awful But we will get Conley and every conservative Democrat that's on that ticket connected with them They'll wind up voting for Johnson Voting for Conley and voting for the Arbor now the only one that's really important about it is the is the Arbor thing they're gonna vote for me the Democrats are and It'll pull the Arbor over but if he has a bloodlady and he gets them all mad at it And what he ought to do is start fighting the living hell out of Bush That's the man to fight not to fight Conley, but they don't do that And this is history of Texas and the liberal movement and that's why they always get back We had to we had him up when Conley was elected Where labor could make advances in Texas ten years ahead of what he'd done. They didn't wait two hours until they started threatening Yeah, well, you know are you a deputy boy support? That's right. They they have in the state problem down there now is our fellas are fine But then you got CWA and the steel workers and some other people and I and Hank Brown is calling me And I'm just trying to get these other fellas of the back sensibly what they ought to do is this They ought to realize that number one. Mr. Conley won the conventions. They had a contest over it They got 2700 votes and he's got about 1800 of them That's number one. So they They tried and the majority didn't win and they lost they tried down the Arbor and they lost Now Conley's there and the man that didn't lose was Ralph Yarber and the only reason he didn't lose because we wouldn't let a man run Against him and wouldn't let Conley and Conley's are Giving me some very bad publicity about it. They said Conley and I have fallen out and all that kind of stuff It's not true But Conley didn't like my telling him that he just absolutely couldn't Support Kilgore and then Kilgore called here and I was in the cabinet meeting and all the Jenkins talked to him And they had to make a decision at an hour before an ounce And Walter Jenkins told him that he thought it would be an insult to me if he announced So he went up and withdrew And that gave the arbor a unheard of opponent and he damn near defeated him And now the problem we've got is getting the arbor beat this attractive young boy bush And he ought to quit fighting with Conley and every democrat if a man's got democratic label on he ought to say Mr And the only ones he ought to cuss is republicans hell if I were him I wouldn't go to a county convention I wouldn't mess around the convention the convention is going to be for his candid for president His candid for president is going to win. He's going to have his program It's going to do what the arbor likes to vote for so why does he want to get Mixed off in the convention. He ought to try to win the senator ship. That's what we need Is john Conley prepared to adopt the broad general statement? Which is say they that they provide full support for president and all the democratic candidates I don't know. I don't know. I haven't I haven't talked to him because if they we could get an agreement on that hill That's all they need They don't need anything else John Conley is prepared To bring that delegation up there and support me either Who laid the hill I'm prepared to tell john Conley and everybody down there that We've got to go all out to elect the arbor, but I don't know whether I can keep them from just fighting at each other's throat because you're like two big pussycats Act like boys But connelly's been elected and connelly's got the votes and connelly's in charge And I've got to have connelly to care of the state myself and that they ought to recognize And connelly got 71 of the votes against don the arbor I didn't halfway try and didn't halfway campaign And uh a year ago. He only beat him to 26 000, but that's what they've lost In a two-year period And they'll get it down to 81 percent if they keep on but what they'll do they wind up having tower in the senate And having bush in the senate. That's the way they're going because your arbor is a very weak candidate Several rights and union labor and the negro thing is not the way to get elected in a state that elects connelly by 72 percent And your arbor votes right, but he's handicapped in that state Now he wouldn't be handicapped in michigan in new york, but he's handicapped in texas. Look what they did to eddie in alabama The only decent guy we had in the whole south on rules committee and they beat him Now they'll beat they'll beat they'll beat john young from texas because he's voting with us 100 percent of the time But give him two years They'll get him Now what we got to do the big thing that's a liberal movement are good Or to give a tinker's dam about who comes to convention on what to say about the platform There's one thing they ought to care about the people coming to that convention going to be for johnson The answer is yes every damn one of them are going to be approved by me. That's number one They're not going to send a man there. That's not agreeable to me So the the man that they claim that far is going to have the delegation they want. That's number one The second thing they ought to be concerned about is electing rap arbor and put every energy and dollar and time they can't in it Not run people off from him All they're doing is making everybody not want to vote for you arbor