Oct. 15, 1964 - President Johnson, with Robert F. Kennedy at his side, led a tumultuous campaign tour through Brooklyn today, the likes of which has not been seen since John F. Kennedy made a similar appearance there four years ago.
The three-hour swing through surging, sometimes uncontrollable crowds capped a day of furious and apparently fruitful campaigning in the state by Mr. Johnson and the man he wants New Yorkers to elect to the Senate.
The President ended his two days of campaigning through three states tonight with an address to a Liberal Party rally at Madison Square Garden, in which he alternated between fervent appeals for Kennedy’s election and philosophical explanations of his views on the “Great Society” he sees ahead for the American people.
But there was nothing philosophical about his approach to the job of getting Kennedy elected to the Senate in place of incumbent Republican Kenneth Keating. From Keating’s hometown of Rochester, where he started the day with an airport rally, to Brooklyn, where hundreds of thousands lined the route of his motorcade, Johnson appealed with evangelical fervor for a Kennedy victory.
Johnson called the Brooklyn turnout “the largest crowd that I have seen in all my travels from Maine to California, and I have never seen such warm, happy faces.” He halted the motorcade for several unscheduled stops, encouraging spectators to crowd around the Presidential limousine.
In upstate New York, the reception was just as boisterous. About 50,000 persons in Buffalo all but filled Niagara Square in front of the Erie County Courthouse. About 20,000 turned out at Rochester Airport.
Political experts believe that Kennedy’s close identification with Johnson may prove to be the deciding factor in his close race with Keating. A New York Newsday survey in today’s editions gives Kennedy the edge over Keating on the strength of what appears to be an almost certain Johnson landslide in the state.
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