People like and respect persons they have helped; it's more common than gratitude.
Large display ads in small newspapers may be a cheaper way of getting full coverage than the blanket distribution of literature. By "large" I mean up to two columns, halfa page high. If you have more money, repeat the dose rather than increasing the size.
Try to split your advertising budget among all your district editors unless a paper is actively against you. Even then it may be wise to use it if it offers the only means of reaching some area.
Newspaper ads can eat you out of house and home. The political effect of newspapers is problematical and is much less than the newspapermen think. Remember that Mr. Roosevelt won four times with about 90% of the press against him. Remember that, even if you are a Republican, and don't be stampeded into building your campaign around newspapers. A strong newspaper campaign can make you think you are winning when you are actually taking a severe licking. (See Sampling a District below.) You can win with every paper in your district against you.
The automobile sticker is good because it constitutes a personal endorsement and is cheap. Even better, and still in the economy class, is the bumper strip sign for automobiles. They can be homemade - there is a silk-screen stencil process which you can learn from any sign maker. The printed ones are cheap, however, and come with tin strips to fasten them to the bumpers. Homemade ones may be attached with large rubber bands or with string. They make a brave display and are read by everyone who sees them-which is not true of stationary signs. Your precinct workers, at least, should carry such signs, fore and aft, on their automobiles.
One-sheets, half-cards, and quarter-cards can be tacked up all over the district by your precinct workers without slowing up their doorbell-pushing. There are frequently local post-no-bills ordinances but they are rarely enforced.
But get a publicity man if you can, even on a part-time basis, or a cash-for-results basis.
Liaison and Party Harmony: In the primary campaign your opposition is Jack Hopeful, a member of your own party. Never forget that you will need the support of all your party after the primary and never let your supporters forget til
This is a very touchy, difficult matter, particularly in a volunteer organization. You are certain to have loyal supporters who are simple souls, unable to think in terms other than black and white. To them Jack Hopeful is the ENEMY-they will commit excesses through misguided zeal. So also will some of Mr. Hopeful's supporters. Bad blood breeds more bad blood; in short order you can have a situation which is completely out of hand, which splits the party wide open, and which will render it impossible for your man to win in the finals.
Since the nomination is valueless in itself, being merely a necessary means to an end, you must prevent this at all costs.
You can start out with the best of intentions, determined to run your own race, to keep it clean, and to ignore the Hopeful campaign. Then comes the day when some signs are torn down, or there is some bad-mannered heckling at a meeting, and your more hot-headed supporters will go galloping off the reservation, bent on triple revenge. They can ruin all your good work in twenty-four hours, in the sincere misapprehension that they are thereby campaigning for Mr. Upright
Even if Jack Hopeful is a bit of a heel, even if he is personally responsible for the dirty tricks (which is most unlikely!), you must try to prevent retaliation in kind. As a matter of fact the signs may have been torn down by the opposition party, rather than Hopeful's crew. It is even possible that the opposition party has paid agents provocateurs in both your group and
Hopeful's, with instructions to create party dissension by any means.
I know of two effective and sufficient methods - you will find others. Let Mr. Upright and yourself tell your supporters repeatedly that you intend to support Mr. Hopeful and the whole party ticket, if Mr. Hopeful is nominated. Base it on the idea that the whole democratic process consists in struggles for domination in which the majority decision is accepted amicably, the ranks are closed, and the new and larger groups move onto larger struggles. Therefore your opponents of today are your allies of tomorrow, against a common enemy. Mention that if Mr. Upright goes to Congress, he will have to work with congressmen of both parties for the welfare of the country as a whole.
Nothing is more destructive of democratic institutions than implacable hatred between factions.
The English have a good term; they speak of "His Majesty's Loyal Opposition," recognizing thereby that opposition has a constructive function and need not be ill tempered.
A more positive step can be taken under the safe rule that it is very hard to dislike any man you know well, unless he is that rare thing, an unmitigated scoundrel. The primary campaign period is a good time for party-wide social events.
Dances are good; breakfasts, luncheons, and dinners are even better and less trouble to arrange. In your district there will be restaurants with banquet halls of all sizes. The usual proprietor will be willing to serve groups meals without selling tickets ahead of time and with the understanding that he will collect from each just as he does with the run of customers, provided you can give him some idea of how many may be expected. Local knowledge should enable you to do this.
(Don't forget to see to it that a saucer is passed around for tips; otherwise the waitresses will be forgotten. To forget them is bad politics as well as bad morals.)
In a district in which I was once active we used to meet for breakfast Sunday morning at ten o'clock, monthly year in and year out, more frequently as elections approached. The county committeemen used to make the arrangements, though the custom was started by lay members who saw the need of party-wide liaison. (Party harmony makes a fine hobby for anyone. "Blessed is the peacemaker - " for he shall see his party triumph in November!)
We picked Sunday morning because that was the only date satisfactory to practically everyone-you will find it so. The Catholics went to mass before the breakfast; the Jews held their services on Friday evening in any case; the regular church-goers among the Protestants missed one morning service per month which they could make up that evening if so minded. Nobody seemed to feel that the Sabbath was being broken; there is excellent precedent in any case. See Luke VI-9.
During primary campaign periods a clever chairman of such a gathering will see to it that those present do not gather in cliques. "The purpose of this meeting is to get acquainted, not to huddle up with your same old crowd. I seem to see the Shannon crowd all together down at the end and up here the whole Weiss campaign committee seems to be staked out. Break it up, boys and girls! Let's find out how the other half lives. Hey-you, Joe-swap places with Mrs. Ross. Take your plates and glasses with you. Bert-gimme a hand. Tag about every other one of your boys down there and make 'em move."
They'll move and they'll like it. It is very hard to stay mad at a man when you have eaten with him and swapped anecdotes.
My wife was once a necessary factor in electing a governor; her weapons were a cookie gun - one of those aluminum gadgets which make fancy, patterned
tea cakes, an eighth of a pound of tea per week, and a supply of pseudo-engraved invitations to Sunday afternoon tea. The refreshments were just props; the guests averaged a little over a cup of tea apiece and two or three tiny cookies.
The effect on the gubernatorial election was an accidental dividend; our original purpose had been only to preserve harmony in our own rather small district. But the key personnel of the major rival gubernatorial candidates for the party nomination met socially in our living room several times - and found out that the other fellow wasn't so bad, after all.