Reply #17: Post convention. [View All]

McGovern had encountered difficulties getting a VP candidate as the convention rapidly approached. A couple potentially strong VP choices turned him down. Eagleton was a bit of a compromise.

Shortly after the end of the Convention, when McGovern was back in South Dakots, Eagleton began an off-the-cuff discussion with some reporters. He spoke about "rumors" that had followed him before the campaign, and that would likely resurface again. Then he said, "On three occasions in my life I have voluntarily gone into hospitals as a result of nervous exhaustion and fatigue."

The media began looking into this, and it quickly came out that he had been psychiatrically hospitalized for a month in 1962, 4 days in '64, and 3 weeks in '66. Eagleton attributed it to "working long hours" on the job.

When it reported that he had undergone electroshock therapy, which like mental illness was little understood at the time, his candidacy was sunk. McGovern, who erred in selecting him, was in a no-win situation. He knew he needed to drop Eagleton, but had difficulty in doing so. It became an ugly situation.

At this time, one can hardly say if the depression Eagleton suffered from could have been successfully treated with advances in medication. In my opinion, electroshock therapy was a rather brutal, all-too-frequently used "treatment" for depression and other illnesses.

From all that I know of Eagleton, he was a good man. His judgement in accepting the position was perhaps not the best. But for someone who suffered from serious depression, he had long periods where he focused his considerable skills and worked for a democratic society.

McGovern ran a flawed campaign, and while much of it was related to the Nixon dirty tricks, a lot was simply a result of the difficulty he had in moving up from the Senate to becoming a candidate for President. Still, he was -- and is -- a brave, intelligent voice of conscience in American society. Some of the speeches he delivered in the Senate, in opposition to the war in Vietnam, need to be read today, and applied to Iraq.