"Everybody fixed up? Let's start the quiz. Write your name at the top of your paper. Go on-don't be afraid. I promise, cross my heart, that I'll keep the result confidential. Nobody, nobody ... will see the papers but me. But I want to be able to announce die winners and I can't do diat if you insist on being anonymous. I ought to warn you diat there won't be any prizes odier than the pleasure of winning. Somehow I've never gotten acquainted with die sort of politics diat pays off in cash. Okay? First question:
"Write down die name of die President of die United States.
(Pause)
"Write die name of the governor of our state.
"Write die names of our two United States senators."
Go on down die list. Ask for die names of die local congressman, die local state senator, die local legislator, die county commissioner, supervisor, agent, or "presiding judge" - the tides vary but you want die chief elective county executive or legislative officials. Than ask for die name of die mayor of your town or city and die name of dieir local city councilman, alderman, or selectman. Ask only for elected officials who represent direcdy the people you are questioning. You can't hold diem responsible for appointed officials. Limit it to people diey have voted for or against and are dierefore presumed to know.
"Are you registered to vote?" and "Did you vote at the last primary election?" (Voting at a general election is no more indicative of civic virtue than is standing up when die band plays "The Star Spangled Banner.")
Then gather up the papers and look them over.
The results will amaze you and, if you are not braced for it, dishearten you. If you find one paper in which the respondent has answered more than half of the questions correcdy you are justified in naming her as a praiseworthy, intelligent citizen, especially if she voted in die last primary.
But it is unlikely that you will find anyone to praise. Most of them will stop after naming the President and the governor. There will be scattered answers thereafter, very scattered and about half of them wrong. Mostly you will see blank paper.
I remember one respected matron who thought that Prime Minister Chamberlain (1938) was a United States senator and I have even found people who could not name the President of the United States - although I classed such latter cases as sheer feeblemindedness and threw them out of my calculations.
You will now extemporize for about ten minutes on the subject of civic virtue, holding them up to themselves as horrible examples. You will point out that they voted for or against, or failed to vote, for each of the persons you asked about. You will ask them how in the name of all that's holy they can expect anything but a gang of crooks in office, and thank the stars and the mercy of heaven that a number of these public officials are honest statesmen despite the fact that the ladies of the East Squamous Community Church obviously don't give a hoot what happens to the country their ancestors and sons died to protect.
You can point to the ghosts of the martyrs of women suffrage and ask if this is the equality between the sexes they fought so hard for. You can point out that more of their family income goes into taxes than goes into groceries and ask them if it would not therefore be wise to give almost as much thought to the selection of a congressman as they do to the selection of a good head oflettuce.
The results of the questionnaire will make you so tarnation mad, when you think about the weary effort you have put into trying to drag this community up out of the mud, that you will make what may be the first really good public speech of your career. You will be feeling emotional and you will know your facts; the combination automatically produces a good speech.
Don't lambaste them too hard - resist the temptation. There are brands to be snatched from the burning even here. Try to make it more in sorrow than in anger; rouse their shame rather than stir up anger against you personally.
Some forthright old gal may state that she never wanted the vote. Don't scold her; praise her as an honest women and point out, gently, that she is free to throw away her franchise, just as the voters in Germany did. She has only to refuse to register and she automatically returns to the status of a child, a slave, or a domestic animal. Point out that it is a fair comparison since women were classed as all three only a hundred years ago.
Most women don't like those classifications, no matter how lazy they may be as citizens. They like to think of themselves as free citizens and your audience honestly believed - until you held a mirror to their startled faces - that women were a force for good in politics, somewhat superior to men. When they think of a corruptionist, they visualize him as a man, not a woman.
Some serious-minded lady, honestly ashamed, may ask you what they can do to be better citizens, better informed. If no one asks, you can invite the question, or even state it as a rhetorical question. You are here to get votes, whatever the program chairman had in mind; this is your chance.
Don't invite her to join your club; you are obligated to be non-partisan before this group. Instead tell them all about the telephone book clue (see Chapter II, How to Start). But get her name, check her registration later, and follow up. It's a fifty-fifty chance you have a new worker.
Stick the papers in your pocket and take them home. At least you have a record of the persons in that group who claim to have voted in the primaries. Check to see which ones belong to your party and add those names to your card file. They are worth carrying on your mailing list and some may eventually join your club and become active precinct workers. These women aren't worthless; they are simply in a rut.
(Gather up your pencils. They cost money.)
The results of making this talk before any all-male organization will be quite a bit better and you will be able to praise several of them as being "good citizens" entitled to the vote. At any political gathering you will find many perfect scores.
This talk can be used over and over again, year after year, before any sort of a meeting; you need nothing else on your repertoire until you find other things you want to talk about-by then speaking will be easy for you. You can even use this questionnaire gag more than once to the same crowd under the pretext of finding out what progress has been made. It never Mis to hold attention and it can always be used to stir out new votes.
I feel deep sympathy for persons who are terrified at being asked to speak in public. I did not attempt it until I had been in politics quite a while. My first venture was an impromptu comment offered at a luncheon meeting. I said about two dozen words then sat down, white and shaking, so nervous dial I went away without my spectacles.
On my second attempt I was very full of my subject and managed to struggle through a twenty-minute talk, but my wife told me afterwards that I paced back and forth all the time I spoke like a caged tiger while shouting my words over my shoulder.
My own difficulties were greater than yours are likely to be; in addition to a very real shyness which I have to fight against, I have a speech handicap, partly controlled, which can leave me utterly speech-bound if I get rattled. I invented the questionnaire routine in order to give me time, while facing an audience, to regain control of my vocal chords without enduring one of those ghastly pauses. If it will work for me it will work for anybody.
Experience overcame my difficulties. There came a time, shortly before the war, when I was invited to be keynote speaker at a convention held in another state. (This is sheer boasting, under the guise of giving you courage.) The speech was electrically recorded; it is terrifying to think of that disc going around and around, recording inexorably your pauses, your errors in grammar, your word blunders. I prepared a written manuscript to fortify me.