Arkansas: Opportunity Regained

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The G.O.P., as Rockefeller found it, was "a patronage party that could have held its convention in a telephone booth." He began the gestation of a new party by discarding the old. He organized a nonpartisan Committee for Two Parties and began speaking all over the state. "You are tired of this stiffling cobweb," he would say, "and so am I. Together, we can brush it away." After becoming Republican National Committeeman in 1961, he consolidated his position by hiring a professional staff at state headquarters and setting up permanent committees in each of the 75 counties. Though he established a United Republican Fund that is now raising $8,000 a month, Arkansans have left the heavy spending to him. One casualty has been the gay old social life. Between business, philanthropy and politics, Rockefeller today often works until 2 or 3 a.m.

Mottled. By 1964 he was ready to take on Faubus in the gubernatorial election. He lost, but put up such a spirited fight—getting 44% of the vote —that both he and his party were plainly in Arkansas to stay. Rockefeller never stopped running between elections, averaging two speeches a week before the next formal campaign started. By early 1966 he took the lead over Faubus in public-opinion polls, and was beginning to overcome his earlier awkwardness on the podium.

If he hardly sounded to the Ozarks born, Rockefeller had long since looked the part, from fancy cowboy boots (he has a dozen pairs) to Western-style hat (a felt Stetson for formal occasions, a ventilated straw model for everyday). Even with a dinner jacket, he wears riding boots. His embonpoint bulging over his belt, his thinning grey hair straggly in the back, his broad smile displaying teeth mottled by two packs of unfiltered Picayunes a day, Rockefeller is every inch the hillbillionaire.

Best described as a moderate conservative, Rockefeller faced something of a crisis of conscience over Barry Goldwater's candidacy. He was lukewarm toward Goldwater, while most other Arkansas Republicans were ardent Barry fans. Rockefeller supported the national ticket after the San Francisco convention, reasoning that any other course would have shattered the newborn state party, and ran 35,000 votes ahead of Goldwater in Arkansas. Like Goldwater, Rockefeller opposed the 1964, 1965 and 1966 federal civil rights bills, saying he agreed with the objectives but not the means. He also opposes federal guidelines for school integration. In his own campaigns, he has generally avoided the racial issue, while the Democrats belabored him for his alleged liberalism. When the Democrats tried to tie him to Nelson's position, Win replied: "There are obvious differences between me and my brother on race relations. You've got to be realistic about these things."