Brush them off, but politely - a practical politician should never go out of his way to make anyone sore; your purpose is to win elections, not arguments. Let the opposition hire them. They are hardly worth the low price they charge, even to him. Later on in the campaign you will find that he hired one of them a little sooner than you had expected; she worked as an unpaid volunteer all through the campaign in your office and turned in nightly reports to the opposition.

Don't let it throw you. As a politician you must learn to expect such little disappointments. And don't let it shake your faith in human nature. If you take the trouble to count up you will find that you know many more people who are certainly honest than the number who are just as certainly crooked. The crooks just seem more numerous because they get in your hair more.

I am inclined to believe, although I am not sure, that the average difference in political honesty between men as a group and women as a group in this country is actually considerable and not just a matter of a lower pay scale for corruption on the part of women. As a result of punching thousands of doorbells and talking with many, many men and women I am of the opinion that women usually know less about political issues than men and consequently are less inclined to realize that political issues are of moral consequence. This probably results in part from the fact that most women, in their daily occupations, are not thrown out into the world to the same extent as their men folk and consequently never really find out what makes the wheels go around.17

Furthermore, the husband is inclined to encourage the little woman to remain in ignorance; it gives him a chance to show off at home how much he knows without betraying just how little it is - since it is still more than she knows.

In any case, I have heard hundreds of times, in campaigning from door to door, this remark: "Oh, I leave everything of that sort up to my husband!" And she does, too - she doesn't know a filibuster from first base and she thinks an alderman is something to hang clothes on.

So, when somebody tips her off that she can pick up a few dollars in a campaign year by a little light work in her neighborhood, she is ripe for it, gullible, willing to work for low wages, and so naive she doesn't know that it's loaded. It won't even worry her to work for the candidate George is voting against, because she does not think it matters. She can work in a dozen campaigns and never find out anything about men nor issues; she just knows that State Senator Slotmachine is such a nice man and here is some literature about him and would you like to have a car sent around to take you to the polls?

Slotmachine is a nice man, too - he's an old hand in this business; his public personality is a work of art. You would enjoy having dinner with him.

After a while, if she is bright enough to mark a sample ballot, she does notice a few things, but it does not wise her up to what she is doing; it simply makes her utterly cynical about politics. She becomes convinced that the shoddy business she has been associated with is the only brand of politics in existence. Nothing will change her junior-size mind on the subject and she is forever lost to your side.

So don't hire her and don't bother to try to convert her. The women volunteers who work for you, free, can get ten votes to the one she can round up for Slotmachine.

All through it she remains a good wife and mother and a respected member of the P.T.A. You can't tell her from an authentic volunteer by sight nor, very quickly, by conversation. There is however one simple touchstone which works in nine cases out often. The sincere volunteers will look you up in person and offer their services; the political prostitutes will telephone, offer their services over the phone, and then ask you to come to see them. (I think they believe it improves their bargaining position.)

The rule is not infallible, but it will help you to be on your guard. It won't help you much when you encounter this particular bird of prey by chance, on ringing a doorbell, and it won't help you at all when the opposition hires her and then sends her to see you; nevertheless it will save you a lot of grief. After a while you will acquire a sense of smell concerning this sisterhood. In the meantime don't trust too far any volunteer previously unknown to you, who has great enthusiasm for unpaid work but does not seem to grasp the issues in the campaign. Don't put such a person to work in the headquarters; let her (or him) distribute literature - and then make a spot check on its distribution.

Still another breed of cat is the club woman politician. She organizes women's political clubs. She may not be dishonest; she is usually ambitious and stupid and she is almost never of any use in winning an election, although she may help you lose one and her enmity is to be dreaded. Look, ladies-don't be a woman politician, or a women's politician! Be a politician who happens to be female.'8 You are the equals of men-remember? 11 isn't necessary to go off and form little groups of your own; stay in the main event and start swinging.

After the above nasty cracks about women in politics I am very happy to be able to say that a sincere and enlightened female volunteer is the best political worker you will find. She is a peai-1 beyond price, but, thank Heaven, not too hard to find. She will average from twice to many times as useful as the general run of sincere male volunteers. She is not nearly as choosy as the men are about what kind of work she will do. She'll punch doorbells, and sweep the office, and type letters, and distribute newspapers, and watch the count, and drive a car on election day.

She doesn't expect anything out of it but the satisfaction of serving. Somebody told her once that a good citizen finds it a privilege to work for the betterment of her country. She believed it and she still believes.

Bless her heart - she is the backbone and sinew of every honest political organization in the country.

"Mother knows best, dear" or "Remember, Father is usually right."

It is standard practice for the elder generation to harry the younger generation with saws about "older and wiser heads." The youngsters resent it, until they get old enough to pull it on the next crop.

There is just enough truth in it to keep the practice going. Wisdom mellowed by years is beautiful to see. In public life the occasional George Norris, Henry Stim-son, or Justice Holmes are as breath-takingly inspiring as the Lincoln Memorial. However, in most cases, what passes for the wisdom of age is merely the sophistication of experience, knowledge of precedents, and familiarity with details.

In politics our senior citizens habitually assume that their years entitle them to respectful attention from their juniors on the assumption that they have mellowed, grown broader, and increased in patriotism and social responsibility through the years.

It ain't necessarily so! Although there are shining exceptions, the average run of our elder citizens are notably avaricious, self-centered, unpatriotic, and devoid of any notion of social responsibility, as compared with their sons and daughters.19

Before I am accused of personal bias let me state that I am no longer a youngster myself. I've reached the shady side of the street, short of wind, and fat in the middle. To my regret, young women now call me "sir" and stand when they speak to me.

And I do not speak primarily of political office holders. I do not refer to the congressional practice whereby senility is an asset rather than a liability in

reaching key committee posts, nor am I repeating the arguments about "The Nine Old Men." As a matter of fact old men in politics seem to keep young better than their non-political contemporaries. (Try shadowing a seventy-year-old congressman during a campaign; he'll wear you to a frazzle.)