New York, Oct. 4—Daniel Patrick Moynihan opened his campaign against Senator James L. Buckley of New York with an appeal to Republican “moderates.” His “strategy”—to quote his aides as paraphrased by the New York Times—is “to pre-empt the middle of the political spectrum.” Accordingly, Mr. Moynihan has gamboled about the state invoking the hallowed name of Dwight Eisenhower as a “mainstream Republican,” to be distinguished from his opponent. “I would welcome Republicans who want to save the party from its extremes,” Mr. Moynihan said.
And, what do you know, the very next day Senator Jacob Javits, who is a Republican, announced that he would not campaign for Senator Buckley. Senator Javits, hoisting his conscience up high and competing with the rays of the midday sun, appeared with “face grim,” his “voice stern” as a mortician’s. He was there not to praise the sainted junior senator from New York, but to bury him. Senator Javits once referred to himself as the voice of the Republican Party, which, if it is true, perhaps suggests the difficulties the party has. His long-time resentment of his colleague is probably the most dogged devotion to any principle, not counting Israel, ever practiced by Senator Javits, who, six years ago, alone declined to vote to admit the freshly arrived senator as a member of the Republican caucus.
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