Republicans: This President Thing

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Outside Phoenix, Ariz., in the shadow of Camelback Mountain, stands an ultra-modern $100,000 house made of Moenkopi sandstone that is, by the conservative estimate of its owner, 160 million years old. On the property is a fishpond with a little waterfall. The sound of the waterfall is picked up by a microphone and piped into the house; the owner likes to sleep to its music. In back of the house is a 25-ft. flagpole hooked up to a motor with a photoelectric cell. When the sun rises over the Arizona desert, its light activates the cell, which sets off the motor-and up to the top of the pole runs Old Glory. At sunset, the flag automatically comes down.

This is the home of Arizona's Republican Senator Barry Morris Goldwater -and he loves it. Last week he gazed out at the red-glowing desert land at dusk and spoke reverently. "God," he said, "it's beautiful out here. You wonder what kind of insanity it is that makes you go away and leave it." Whatever it is, Barry Goldwater, 54, has traveled a long way from Arizona-and he may go a lot farther. For if the Republican National Convention were to be held today, Goldwater would almost certainly be its presidential nominee.

The Plunge. From state after state last week came reports of Goldwater's surging strength. Yet that strength can only be explained in terms of the plunging political fortunes of Goldwater's chief rival for the 1964 G.O.P. nomination-New York's Governor Nelson Rockefeller.

The political reaction to Rocky's recent remarriage has been disastrous. Last week, obviously striving to reverse the tide, Rockefeller and his bride, the former Margaretta ("Happy") Fitler Murphy, undertook a strenuous social schedule. In Albany, the Rockefellers were guests at a luncheon for 44 (top state officials and their wives), a press reception for 84, and a dinner for more than 400 persons. Smiling, attractive and informal, Happy charmed almost everyone. Asked how she felt about her husband's running for President, she frankly wondered whether "one would want the man she loves to have such awesome responsibilities."

At a fund-raising Manhattan dinner attended by some 3,000, Happy continued to make a good impression. New

York's Republican Senator Kenneth Keating had a two-word description of her: "Lovely, charming." Said G.O.P. National Committee Chairman William Miller: "I think she's great." The Rockefellers also joined several hundred people for a charity affair aboard a ship that steamed outside the three-mile limit for an evening of gambling and dancing. Among those present were the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, with whom the Rockefellers were photographed. The Duchess said she thought Happy was "gracious," and expressed the hope that "they will be very happy, as we are after 26 years of marriage." It was a nice, normal thought. But people kept comparing Rocky to that other man who gave up high office for the woman he loved.