Nation: The Leader: Everett Dirkson

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Under Dirksen, Senate Republicans have worked and voted in a unity unseen in recent years. On issues of national security, Dirksen and his Republicans have gone down the line with President Kennedy. Thus, when Democratic liberals recently filibustered against the Administration's satellite communication bill — on the ground that it was a Government giveaway to private enterprise — Dirksen rounded up the Republican votes necessary to invoke cloture. "There were," he says, "questions of national security as well as the progress being made by the Soviet Union. Quite aside from the basic problem of space communication, other appeals could be made. I used them as effectively as I could." Again, during the heated debate about the U.S. purchase of United Nations bonds, Dirksen stood with the President. "We had some faith in Dwight Eisenhower," he cried. "And I have not forfeited my faith in John Fitzgerald Kennedy. I am willing always to trust the President, because I think he has a sense of responsibility." On domestic issues, Dirksen has skillfully and successfully opposed the President whenever Kennedy played obvious partisan politics. Prime examples were the Republican votes that defeated Kennedy's medicare program and the Administration attempt to set up a Cabinet-level Department of Urban Affairs (which was to be headed by a Negro). Democrat Kennedy is fond of blaming Republicans for the failures of the New Frontier's programs in the current Congress. But there is another side to that coin. It has been only with Republican votes that the Ad ministration has achieved any wins at all. The most recent instance was Kennedy's proposal to give a tax credit to businesses investing in new machinery. House Republicans had voted to a man against the idea. But Dirksen thought the plan was a good one. He made the rounds of the Senate's Republicans. "I need your vote," he told them. "Can you help me?" They could, and did—and the provision passed.

All this poses a problem to President Kennedy. He well knows how much help he has received from Dirksen. But Dirksen is running for re-election this year against Chicago's Democratic Representative Sidney Yates, a devoted Kennedy follower. Kennedy has promised to campaign in Illinois for Yates. Yet his heart can hardly be in it. Says one top Administration Democrat: "I like Sid Yates. But my party would be in a hell of a mess —Kennedy would be in a hell of a mess—if Dirksen got defeated."

Plainly, despite all the gibes that have been thrown his way, there is something special about Dirksen. Says a White House staffer: "Who could dislike Dirksen? He gets his arm around your shoulder and, well, he's a total pro, able, cute and clever." He is also—as a result of his midlands upbringing in a plain, small town—trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent. And when he traces his beginnings, as did Lincoln, in "the short and simple annals of the poor," those homely virtues take on a fresh meaning.