ROCKEFELLER HEADQUARTERS 715

Q. Could either Congressman or Senator Morton be involved in
this?

A. I don't know whether I could answer that or not. I have no
reason to believe that Congressman Morton will be involved in this.
Senator Morton, of course, has long been identified with the pro-
Rockefeller forces. I don't know whether he will be involved or to
what extent at this moment.

Q. Governor, you predicted a couple of days ago that Governor
Rockefeller would announce his candidacy within two weeks. What
happens to this headquarters when that takes place?

A. I would think that the minute that a formal declaration of the
Rockefeller candidacy would occur that this headquarters would be-
gin to be phased out of existence and would be replaced by a full-
time national headquarters staffed by a full-time chairman.

Q. In view of your own personal predictions of this two-week declara-
tion, would this headquarters have a chance to get established?

A. Oh, well, we think that there is a great need in this particular
case not to even let two weeks go by without doing everything we
can to stimulate and coordinate these spontaneous grass-roots grow-
ings that are taking place throughout the country. And two weeks
can be an awfully long time in a political existence. A lot of people
can become very discouraged about the lack of direction in two weeks.
We do have, in addition to that, literally hundreds of letters that we
haven't been able to answer that have come to me personally, and I
haven't felt that I could take the time or utilize the State personnel
to reply to these letters. So they all have to be answered, and they
have been lying here for as long as a month, some of them.

Q. Is the setting up of this headquarters, Governor, an effort to con-
vince Governor Rockefeller that he is wanted?

A. That's one of the primary purposes. Not only to convince — the
formation of the draft movement is for that purpose. The setting up
of this headquarters is to make the draft movement more effective,
so indirectly what you've stated, of course, is true. The ultimate pur-
pose of everything we are doing is to convince Governor Rockefeller
that he is wanted, and wanted very badly by the party as its nominee.

Q. Do his supporters feel that he needs a little shove in the right
direction?

A. Well, I think that nearly everyone who is about to undertake
running for President needs more than a shove, but probably a good