Republicans: The Citizen's Candidate

(5 of 6)

He may at that. For Romney is far from being a pragmatic politician. His politics, he believes, are neither liberal nor conservative nor moderate. He is an anti-organization man. "I believe in the deathless freedom of the individual," he said during the campaign, "and the sacred right of individual choice. I believe that these basic fundamental freedoms of individuality are in imminent danger of being smothered within the drift of our social, economic and political institutions toward impersonal organization control. I believe that one of the greatest dangers in our society comes from the concentration of excessive power in business, in unions, in the Federal Government. I am convinced Michigan is about to see a bold new dimension in public affairs: the return of their state government to genuine citizens' control."

Within that philosophical framework, Romney struck some specifics. He was against the "excess concentration of power" that arises from industry-wide collective bargaining. He opposed businessmen who organize politically "as businessmen" to fight unions. He argued for the re-establishment of the independence of state governments: "I don't talk about states' rights; I talk about state responsibilities." He criticized the G.O.P. as being identified "too much as a business party."

Destiny & Decision. Romney ran his own campaign in his own way. Recalls a Romney aide: "Whatever heights and depths our campaign reached were a result of George Romney and no one else. Sometimes we'd sit there in horror listening to a new idea from George. Then we'd all try to dissuade him. Sometimes it worked. But most of the time he'd say, 'Well, you're all very persuasive, but this is the way I'm going to do it. We've been tied to traditional methods too long.' "

Romney is an untraditional sort of politician, with a deep sense of divinely guided destiny. He prayed and fasted for 24 hours last February before announcing his candidacy for Governor. "I have a very simple formula for reaching decisions," he explained. "First, I diligently search out the pertinent facts. This means getting the viewpoints of others. The second step is prayer. I believe firmly in prayer. I believe that if we want to make decisions as wisely as possible, we can get much help through prayer."

Pressure Points. Believing that, Romney takes poorly to mortal criticism. "He is compulsively good." says a friend, "and compulsively right. He finds it so hard to be wrong, that when he is, he convinces himself that he isn't." Romney's temper is both famed and feared—yet, so far in his brief political career, he has generally managed to control it. Once, after a bitter debate at Con-Con, when Democrats impugned his motives, Romney returned home for the weekend, and that Sunday delivered an impassioned sermon at the Bloomfield Hills Mormon Church. He climaxed it with a quotation from Othello: "Who steals my purse steals trash . . . 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands—But he that filches from me my good name robs me of that which not enriches him and makes me poor indeed."