Dorothy Van Doren

"WHATEVER the other fellow don't do, we will." Thus refreshingly Will Rogers, the bunkless candidate for President, begins his campaign. It is, of course, a dangerous doctrine, but Mr. Rogers does not mean it that way. In announcing himself as the candidate of the Anti-Bunk Party, he says: "Our support will have to come from those who want nothing and have the assurance of getting it" ...

... A national committee of fifteen prominent citizens has solemnly agreed to indorse his candidacy. Henry Ford, Harold Lloyd, Nicholas Murray Butler, Roy Howard, Glenn H. Curtis, Judge Ben B. Lindsey, Babe Ruth, William Allen White, Clare Briggs, Grantland Rice, General William Mitchell, Ring Lardner, the Rev. Francis P. Duffy, Charles Dana Gibson, and Tex Rickard make up the committee. Thus it appears that Candidate Rogers has the support of Industry, Sport, Art, Journalism, the Army, the University, the Church, and the Bench. What more could a candidate ask? Radical and conservative, rich and--comparatively--poor, swell and proletarian, man of letters and ignorant financier, all these are not only among his anonymous supporters but his publicly announced committee. The Press and the People, the Catholic Church, the New York 400 -- surely no candidate was ever championed with such glorious variety from one end of the social scale to the other. And Will Rogers holds their support, he says, by eschewing bunk. "We are going to try and eliminate slogans. Slogans have been more harmful to the country than Boll-Weevil, Luncheon Clubs, Sand Fleas, Detours Conventions, and Golf Pants." Thus the candidate of the Anti-Bunk Party. "No matter what's on our platform now," he says, "on November 6 we will have a bonfire and burn the platform" ...

... Mr. Rogers has nothing personally against his rivals. "They are both able, fine men," he says, "but they wasn't chosen on that account." They were chosen because they were vote-getters, he goes on, and Wet and Dry will forget their principles in the final crisis and stick by the party of their grandfathers. "All you hear now is the Politicians of both partys hollering about what great Candidates they have. Al Smith is really Thomas Jefferson disguised in a brown derby and Hoover is Abraham Lincoln with a college education." Thus the Anti-Bunk Party tells the truth about the opposing leaders. The politicians are running them because each looks like a good bet. Party leaders want to win. Mr. Rogers says he will eliminate party leaders; "no party can be as bad as its leaders" ...

http://www.thenation.com/article/will-rogers-bunkless-candidate#