What happened? When the primary season began back in February, most of us bought the line laid down by the conventional wisdom. There would be an enervating and divisive Democratic campaign dragging out all the way to New York City, where, after another donnybrook of a Convention, one of the tired old war horses-most likely Hubert Humphrey-would finally put on the harness.
And the Republicans? Why, Gerald Ford, of course. True, Ford was unelected, presiding over a Nixonless Nixon Administration that frequently seemed to lack purpose, direction, or philosophical underpinning. Nevertheless, Ford had the White House; the pork barrel; the vast resources of the executive branch of government to draw on for position papers, speeches, and campaign personnel; the power to make or change national policy instantly; and the endorsement and active support of nearly every important party leader and of most prominent Establishment Republicans. And then there was Ford himself, neither inspiring nor consistent, but generally perceived as a decent, moral, and ethical man who had assumed the Presidency at one of the most traumatic moments in our national history and had managed, primarily because of his personal qualities, to restore some measure of confidence in government.
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