While many other reasons have been cited for Truman's upset victory over Thomas Dewey in the presidential election one year later, the solidarity effort on the part of an organized labor front catalyzed by opposition to the Taft-Hartley Act might have been the ultimate spark that produced triumph.
A disagreement between Taft and General Dwight Eisenhower, soon to become Taft's opponent for the 1952 Republican presidential nomination, highlighted economic differences between the so-called party "Old Guard" wing led by Taft and the moderates led by Dewey. The Dewey wing would embrace Eisenhower's successful candidacy.
A debate raged during the period of the Eightieth Congress and the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act over how long to maintain price controls imposed during the war. Taft, as the party's spokesperson of its conservative wing, believed that controls imposed by Truman's Office of Economic Stabilization should be promptly lifted.
Eisenhower took a different view, stating that companies should be willing in the national interest to sacrifice some immediate profits to curtail a potential inflationary spiral.
Despite warnings from Truman and price stabilization director Chester Bowles, the Eightieth Congress held sway and controls were lifted. When the predicted surge of inflation resulted the Republican right would later disingenuously blame this result on the Truman Administration.
Eisenhower's role in the price control debate is significant in view of what transpired shortly thereafter as well as in the evolution of the Republican Party from the fifties onward. Eisenhower became one of the most popular Republican presidents in history with two impressive victories in 1952 and 1956. Long before the term Reagan Democrats existed that of Eisenhower Democrats was frequently used to demonstrate the strong hold that the popular war time general held within the ranks of many Democratic voters.
Strategically, while adhering to a traditional Republican position in basic economic philosophy with an emphasis toward putting business-oriented conservatives in major policy positions, Ike strongly opposed any efforts from the party's right wing to curtail or scale back New Deal or Fair Deal programs. He scoffed that such efforts were detrimental to building a majority in the name of what Eisenhower termed "Modern Republicanism."
It is easy to see why today's neoconservative Republican right has dismissed Eisenhower from its lexicon just as it has another two term president, Lincoln, who famously coined the phrase, "With malice toward none, with charity for all," hardly an operating credo for the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Glenn Beck. In the most famous speech Eisenhower ever delivered, one of the nation's most notable generals warned Americans against the "unwarranted influence of the military-industrial complex."
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