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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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than we'd expected to. These people were much more the sober, serious Democratic voters. I remember seeing while Irene was speaking that her stuff about Katie, the way the Smiths lived, the starched lace curtains in the window wasn't going over so hot. I realized that. Although she was charming, it hadn't gone over the way it did in Baltimore.

I realized that although they wanted to be reassured about Katie and reassured about Smith, what they really wanted was old-fashioned Southern campaign oratory. They wanted the kind of a speech that Senator Pat Harrison could make. I knew what kind of a speech he could make because I had spoken with him in Boston, of all places. They had sent Pat Harrison to Boston to make a speech for the campaign. I had spoken on the same platform with him, so I had heard this magnificent Southern oratory in Boston, and been so interested and amused by it because I had never heard it before.

When I got up to speak, I did my best to give a feeble, female imitation of Pat Harrison. I knew they weren't interested in the legislation. I knew they were interested in the great and glorious South, the great and glorious Robert E. Lee, the great and even more glorious Democratic party, how all Democrats were all one band of brothers together, if the Democrats should win, people who came





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