have been done." He believed that his supporters had acted correctly in Texas and,

rather than allowing the Democratic party to take over the Lone Star GOP and dictate

the Republican nominee, he and his followers had called for an honest and fair

hearing of the delegate controversy. The press, in Taft's opinion, had made the issue

into an emotional one. Under normal circumstances, the matter would have had a few

days worth of newspaper coverage and then died out. By keeping the issue before the

public, he believed the press handed Eisenhower his most effective weapon. Taft

reported that a number of national committeemen were not allowed to accept a

compromise because "it would deprive them of the smear issue." Taft conceded that

Reece and Ingalls should have never allowed Mineral Wells to become an issue to

begin with, but believed that the press was responsible for blowing it out of

proportion.

 Taft's post-convention analysis revealed the importance of the 1952 convention

for conservative Republicans. Going into the 1952 election cycle, Taft was the clear

front-runner. The 1950 Ohio Senatorial election had shown that Taft had popular

appeal. His allies controlled the RNC its choices of convention site and keynote

speaker show that the Taft faction had learned from their 1948 mistakes. The

campaign organization was much stronger this year as well. Polls revealed that the

nation had grown more conservative and increasingly disgruntled with the Truman

administration. Public discomfort with the continued conflict in Korea, and the

associated price controls and increased taxation, benefited Taft. His calls for a

modified foreign policy that kept one eye on the Soviets and one eye on the budget

seemed to be well-received. Gallup polls indicated that the polity had finally come to

see things Taft's way. It is no surprise then that conservatives saw the events of

Chicago as a conspiracy of the highest order. Here once again, Thomas Dewey, a