Printed transcript from a press conference with Truman held in Key West, Florida on March 20, 1968, 10 pages, signed and inscribed in ballpoint on the first page, “To Jack Sellers from Harry S. Truman.” Truman comments on his post-presidential personal life and on current events, particularly the forthcoming elections. A few excerpts follows. On RFK’s announcement seeking the Democratic candidacy against incumbent LBJ: “The Democratic Party will be all right. I am for Johnson…. No doubt [that he will get the nomination]…. [RFK] won’t take any votes away from Johnson, none of them will. The rest of them ought to stay out of it except Johnson because of course Johnson is on the inside and he will make it….” On the Republican contest between Nixon and Rockefeller: “It is very satisfactory to me. Anything that splits the Republican party and puts them in a hole is all right with me….” After avoiding a committal response to the issues of Vietnam and racial unrest, Truman comments on his and LBJ’s poor showings in public opinion polls: “I don’t pay any attention to [them]. If I had, I would have been beaten….” On draft card burners: “They ought to be punished, that is what the law calls for….” On his view of RFK in light of his negative comments about JFK prior to the 1960 election: “I think that the present occupant of the White House is the man we should vote for. He is the man to be elected and he ought to be….” On dropping the atomic bomb on Japan and the prospect of using it in Vietnam: “You know more about it than I do. I did what I thought was right at the time and I had all the information…. It ended the war…. It accomplished the purpose and that is all I wanted….” Accompanied by an unsigned photo of Truman taken outside the event; according to a handwritten caption on the reverse, the inscribee, Jack Sellers, is one of the men visible in the background. Mild even toning, otherwise fine, clean condition. Auction LOA John Reznikoff/PSA/DNA and R&R COA.
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