such as "minimum wages, unemployment insurance, regulation of markets for capital,

old age insurance, [and] equal rights for all regardless of race, color, creed or national

origin.""17 These had all been a part of Dewey's administration and, to the Governor,

they were the primary points of difference between conservative and liberal

Republicans. Dewey's selected list of programs also made Taft appear draconian and

out of touch with the average American. Certain programs that Taft had supported,

such as federal aid to education and housing, could easily fall into the liberal category,

but Dewey did not mention them even though he had supported them in his own state.

His ticker of acceptable Democratic initiatives, designed to protect the American

public from economic and social hardships, were all things that conservative

Republicans, and Taft himself, abhorred and campaigned against. Dewey sought here

to stake out a middle ground that put the liberal Republicans between the Republican

Right and the Democratic Left.

 Dewey also emphasized differences between the liberal Republicans and the

Democrats. His second lecture, delivered on February 9, focused on "big

government," which he believed to be the by-product of nearly two decades of

Democratic rule. He contended that both parties sought to protect the welfare of the

American people, but disagreed on the means. Republicans sought protection of the

free enterprise but with limited correctives in the form of market regulation or social

welfare legislation. The Democrats, on the other hand, believed that an ever-

expanding federal government and the resulting bureaucratic system guaranteed the

way to peace and prosperity for the greatest number of Americans. Dewey equated the

Roosevelt system to the first steps toward socialism and argued that the only things to

come from the Democratic administration were high taxes, one-party government, and


1 Ibid.