Conservatives did, however, have more of a say in the White House than they

believed they would have after Chicago. The tension from the campaign remained,

and Taft placed the blame, somewhat irrationally, on Dewey and his associates

whenever Eisenhower deviated from a conservative position. Taft continued to view

Albany and its like-minded colleagues as threats to a Republican administration,

revealing the inferiority complex right-leaning operatives had when it came to dealing

with the White House.

 Taft also believed that the White House and the RNC were withholding

patronage appointments to punish his friends and associates. On July 1, he informed

Kathleen Kennedy Brown that "the question of patronage is still a troublesome

one."103 In January, Republicans expected to have 350,000 federal jobs to dole out to

loyal supporters, but in late February that number was reduced to 110,000.104 Since

the GOP had been out of power for twenty years, they did not have an established

patronage operation in place at the start of Eisenhower's term. As a result, the RNC,

now under the direction of former New York Congressman Leonard Hall, had to

create one from scratch and a number of positions remained open while they sought

out qualified Republicans.105 In some states, this necessitated compromises between

the liberals and the conservatives. In Tennessee, for example, Reece worked with the

state Eisenhower organization and set up a six-member commission to make

employment recommendations, with three members coming from the Reece group







103 Robert A. Taft, Quoted in Patterson, Mr. Republican, 608.
104 Washington Post, 25 February 1953.

105 See, for example, Washington Post, 10 February 1953.