(film clicking) (gentle music) - [Director] Take one.

(clapper board clacks) - [Narrator] Meet Richard Neuberger, Democratic candidate for United States Senator.

- A fair tax bill will put more purchasing power in the hands of every citizen.

I favor increasing personal exemption.

(dramatic music) - Neuberger was the first celebrity candidate in Oregon.

- The thing that set Neuberger apart was his life as a journalist.

- [Kerry] He was known nationally and internationally.

He transformed Oregon politics.

- He grabbed it practically by the throat and said, "We're gonna try some fresh new things."

- He was the phenomenon.

No one else could have done it.

- [Kerry] Oregon had essentially been a one-party state for more than half a century.

(dramatic music) It had been 40 years since a Democrat was elected to the U.S.

Senate.

If you're a Democrat, you go in almost, you know, you're gonna lose, so why bother?

And that's what it was for Oregon Democrats for three quarters of a century.

(dramatic music) (car whooshing) - [Reporter] As election day ends, the choice has been made.

The nation has voted.

- November of 1954, as the results came in from across the country, it was coming down to this race as to who would control the U.S.

Senate.

(audience applauding) The Republican incumbent was a senator named Guy Cordon, could not be a more typical, hard line, right-wing conservative Republican than Cordon.

And here comes Dick Neuberger, charismatic speaker, excellent writer, excellent campaigner, setting the stage for one of the biggest upsets in Oregon political history.

(bright music) (traffic whooshing) (bright music) - [Stephen] Richard Neuberger, well, he was born into an upper middle class Jewish family in Portland.

- [Earl] They were established in the West Hills.

His family had a successful restaurant.

(upbeat music) - [Stephen] He had no acquaintance with the needy who had been made that way by the Depression.

- [Brent] At a very young age he realized he had a real talent for writing.

He went to the University of Oregon to study journalism.

- That's when Dick woke up to the fact that there were people much less prosperous in the world than he was.

And then in 1933 in January, Hitler comes to power.

Neuberger saw that there was a story there.

- Here's a kid, he's 20, really not much political background.

It's the school paper at the University of Oregon.

- [Stephen] He convinced his uncle, who was fluent in German, to go with him.

(suspenseful music) (paper crackling) - [Narrator] "For a week in Paris, I listened to tourists who described Hitler's Germany in rosy colors.

(bright music) I found that they had visited only the places featured in the advertisements.

Not one had strayed to a town off the beaten track.

On the main streets of the large tourist centers, I too saw no violence.

Then I left the tourist highway."

(bright music) - In his article, he said, "The Jew in Germany is done."

And then he says, "We will be at war with Germany, that will happen."

(suspenseful music) - [Narrator] "This is not alone the battle of the Jews.

It is a fight of everyone who believes in personal liberty and civil rights, a fight for the principles on which America was founded.

- It was very rare to have someone who is as blunt and straightforward about the threat.

- People didn't do what he did.

He was deeply involved with the affairs of the moment and chronicling them, which set him apart.

- I think that reporting trip to Germany elevated his profile as a journalist.

- And before too long, the New York Times had hired him as a correspondent.

- [Narrator] "I work best early in the day.

I always get up around seven, eat breakfast, and read the paper.

Then I sit down to write.

I usually put in about seven hours at it."

- [Reporter] He had a photographic memory, and what this enabled him to do was to devour a large amount of material very quickly.

(gentle music) (typewriter clacking) He put the paper in and he started typing and he didn't stop until the article was finished.

The copy is so clean, barely edited.

(gentle music) - [Reporter] Working on environmental issues, contemporary politics, that's how he made his living.

- [Reporter] He often wrote about the very issues he cared about, public power, civil rights, the scourge of antisemitism, as well as nature in the Pacific Northwest.

He created a narrative for the rest of the country about the beauty and the splendor of this place we call home.

- [Narrator] "To stand in a grove of ponderosas is like being among the Corinthian columns of some cosmic temple."

- In some ways, he was the first leading conservationist in Oregon politics.

Public service was always at the heart of what Richard Neuberger did.

- [Narrator] "When I see Oregon's teachers paid the lowest salaries on the coast, when I see a private utility company selling the power from the dam at Bonneville, which the people built and paid for, my blood pressure rises."

(bright music) - [Reporter] He runs for office for the first time for the Oregon State House.

He ran, I think, a couple of times before he won.

- [Narrator] "I am a Democrat in a state where our party has not had a legislative majority since 1878.

We cannot even muster enough Democratic senators to be set apart by an aisle, our desks being scattered amongst the overwhelming Republican majority."

- [Reporter] Rather than just sit in the corner in the legislature, knowing that his party didn't have the votes to accomplish really anything, he became very engaged in some of the major issues of the day, taking his fight on public power, civil rights, the rights of workers, whatever it might be, to the floor of the House, in many ways making both Democrats and Republicans uncomfortable.

- They weren't topics of political discourse that you heard from most elected officials.

- [Reporter] Early in his career in the legislature, he was kind of dismissed as immature and not really knowing how to carry himself.

But before too long, all that turned around.

Other legislators realized that he knew how to get attention.

He knew what reporters wanted and knew how to craft a story.

There are lots of accounts of Neuberger sitting at his typewriter late at night, his fingers flying away on the keys, writing yet another press release that he would release the next morning.

- [Stephen] And then at some point in there he meets Maurine, which is essential.

- For someone as cerebral and, you know, kind of in his head as Dick was to have a partner like Maurine was absolutely crucial.

(bright music) - [Kerry] Here's Maurine who's very much his equal in terms of knowing about politics, loving politics, having an aptitude for it.

Richard encouraged Maurine to run for office.

Eventually, Richard moves up to the Senate.

Maurine runs for his House seat.

- [Earl] They were on the ballot at the same time.

- [Stephen] Putting the same name on the ballot, it was a brilliant marketing.

(bright music) Farm girl to English teacher, state legislator, she had quite an odyssey in her own right.

- [Earl] Their partnership was truly unique.

- National celebrities.

There's a husband and wife team in the Oregon legislature.

(bright music) - In a way, we were lucky because they didn't have children, and so they treated us and sometimes called us their children.

(bright music) - When they arrived at our grandmother's house on Sunday nights for dinner, things were immediately fun.

(bright music) (dishes clattering) - They were talking about politics and they were also really talking about a movement, I would say, which was the rebirth of the Democratic Party in Oregon.

- Oregon was changing demographically in 1954.

- Richard Neuberger had been a state senator for three terms when the 1954 elections came around.

He had been part of this small but very effective group of young Democrats, these reformers, and Richard Neuberger saw no one else better to put to the head of that effort than himself.

- [Narrator] "Candor compels me to confess that I am one of the individuals mentioned frequently as a prospective opponent to Senator Cordon.

(bright music) (typewriter clacking) I was born in the Northwest.

It is my home.

To this magnificent region, I feel a deep sense of loyalty.

I think its economic future depends upon a reversal of the power policies set in motion by the Cordon McKay faction.

The one chance is the election of 1954.

The bell tolls, but for whom?

- [Brent] His opponent was a Republican named Guy Cordon.

- [Kerry] Cordon was a lawyer who represented the timber interest in Oregon for many years, was first appointed to the U.S.

Senate, and then elected and reelected.

- [Brent] A classic conservative Republican, the Republicans wanted to give away public resources to private corporations, whether it was timber, whether it was access to the Columbia River and its electricity from the dams.

Cordon also supported a Tidelands oil bill that would open up the shoreline for drilling, and Neuberger went after him day after day after day on these issues.

- As your senator, I will work to stop the giveaway.

- [Kerry] Neuberger's campaign, I think you could call it the first really grassroots campaign in Oregon politics.

- [Brent] He wrote press releases, put out statements every day.

- [Stephen] And the ground war was Dick and Maurine going around the state, town to town.

- [Narrator] "There were days when we started campaigning at 6:00 AM and stopped at midnight.

We spoke in locomotive road houses.

We shared chuck wagon meals with cow punchers.

She made it a point of honor to serve constantly as my conscience.

Either you told the truth about your views or you didn't.

So once I had fully made up my mind regarding a public question, Maurine held me to it."

(dramatic music) - [Kerry] Oregon's most charismatic political couple.

He was around the state.

He was everywhere, Maurine with him.

Whereas Cordon did not like campaigning.

- The public debate is part of our great American heritage, but unfortunately, my opponent has not chosen to accept my repeated invitation.

- [Brent] The Republican Party should have realized that Democrats at this point were surging, but they didn't.

And before the Republicans even realized it, Neuberger and the Democrats had bought up an enormous amount of advertising airtime all over the state.

- [Radio Announcer] Stop the giveaway.

Elect Richard L. Neuberger, United States Senator, November 2nd.

- Being a journalist, he knew how important radio was.

When Cordon figured it out, they couldn't buy any more time.

- [Radio Announcer] Here is State Senator Richard L. Neuberger, your nominee for the United States Senate.

- [Richard Neuberger] These Republican politicians have the temerity to tell you that they are trying to prevent a federal power monopoly, when at the very time that they utter these hypocritical words, 81% of all energy is generated by the private utility companies to which they are so friendly and sympathetic.

- [Radio Announcer] You have heard Richard L. Neuberger, Democratic candidate for United- - Small outward appearances, Richard Neuberger always carried himself as if he was absolutely confident he was going to win this Senate race.

But I think there was serious reasons for him to doubt that.

- This was the McCarthy era, and Dick was called a communist.

It was frightening.

As a kid, I was aware of that.

- They sort of assumed that this was going to end the race, and I believe Neuberger even worried that himself.

- I would prefer to lose this election than to rely on that kind of tactic.

My wife, Maurine, and I have made this campaign, and in looking back, we have no regrets.

- You have heard my husband, Richard Neuberger, talking to you about the issues of this campaign and your stake in this election.

There's one thing left for you to do; vote on November 2nd.

(bright music) - [Radio Announcer] President Eisenhower hits the political trail as congressional campaigning reaches a blazing climax.

And then in a final burst of enthusiasm, the campaign is over.

The nation votes, 45 million Americans go to the polls.

(lively music) - [Stephen] Using a war metaphor, Neuberger lived behind enemy lines.

He lived in Portland Heights in a Republican district.

- Dick and Maurine lived a few blocks from where Kate and I went to school.

Most of my friends' fathers were lawyers for private power companies.

- [Stephen] The Ainsworth School was their polling place.

It was about four blocks from their home, and as they walked through the schoolyard, students booed.

- [Ann] I was in tears.

(gentle music) (people chattering) - [Kerry] Ground zero was the Neubergers' house.

- [Kate] It was a hive of activity.

- [Ann] Someone would get up and announce, "Oh, the returns just came in from Benton County."

Each little data point was a cause for worry or cause for hope and celebration.

- This was an important election, not just to Oregon, but to the nation.

- [Stephen] There was considerable polling in advance.

The preponderance of the coverage was it would be close, but that Cordon would win.

- [Kerry] The results came in very slowly from around the state.

- [Stephen] Tuesday night goes by, Guy Cordon was winning, and Neuberger was ready to concede.

- [Kerry] He probably went to bed on election night thinking that he had lost.

(bright music) - [Stephen] The final vote came out of Eastern Oregon in Umatilla County.

- [Kerry] Friends, family gathering around, their emotions shifting from despair to elation.

(bright music) (audience applauding) - [Announcer] Congress, Democratic majority in the House, almost evenly divided in the Senate, has been elected the 84th Congress of the United States.

(bright music) - [Narrator] "I believe this marks the beginning of a new day for the Democratic Party in Oregon.

Healthy rivalry between two strong parties, Democratic and Republicans, will serve people of Oregon well in the years ahead."

- He won a race that was considered unwinnable.

- I think people were pretty slack-jawed.

This wasn't just a garden variety or regular election.

- [Ann] This outcome was so momentous.

- [Narrator] "Political analysts in Washington are still searching for the decisive factor which made me the first Democrat to be elected to the Senate from Oregon in 40 years.

But in Oregon, people aren't troubled by any such doubts.

When they are asked why I won, they invariably reply, 'Maurine.'"

- Once he gets to Washington, D.C., there were so many issues he wanted to get himself involved in.

- As a freshman senator in Washington now, what program are you going to advocate?

- I advocate a return to the federal power program, which built Bonneville and Grand Coulee, and which I think ought to be resumed.

I think, for example- - [Stephen] He helped get going the National Wilderness Act of 1964.

He authored a highway beautification act.

The third big thing was the Winema National Forest.

He was very productive for a freshman senator.

- As a member of the United States Senate from Oregon, I am considering the introduction of legislation which would require that all new automobiles that are sold in interstate commerce- - Near the end of his first term in 1958, 1959, there's signs that something is wrong.

- To talk about cancer in 1959, 1960 was a very difficult thing.

- The family, the political organization puts up a screen around him.

- We were told that he had shingles.

I believe that that was the story that was put out.

- [Narrator] "In those first hours when I realized I had cancer, questions of prestige, of political success, of financial status became all at once unimportant.

I worried over my cat, Muffet.

What would happen to my wife when I was gone, and how would it feel to die?"

(gentle music) (paper rustling) - The phone rang, and it was a reporter from The Oregonian, and he said, "We've just had word that Dick Neuberger won't live through the night."

(somber music) - [Stephen] When Richard Neuberger died suddenly in 1960, outside the temple were some 350 postal workers in uniform.

- There was an amazing outpouring of national figures lamenting the fact that he was so profoundly impactful in such a short career.

- [Ernest Gruening] It is my belief that no senator ever accomplished so much in his first and single term, as did Dick Neuberger.

Oregon, the nation and the world are infinitely better for his being there.

(gentle music) - What could he have done with another term?

What could he have done with the rest of his life serving Oregon?

And we'll never know.

- Most Oregonians don't know who Richard Neuberger is, and they should know who he is.

His story and his election victory in 1954, I think, sends a message that politics can change, that a one-party state for almost three quarters of a century can become a two-party state almost overnight.

- [Brent] Oregon became known for the success of its moderate politicians, whether they were more conservative Democrats or they were liberal Republicans.

- For these past quite a few years, the legislature has long been controlled by Democrats.

Is Oregon always going to remain a one-party state for the Democrats, people might ask.

The lesson of Richard Neuberger is maybe not.

(dramatic music) - After 40 years of one-party Republican monopoly of the Senate seats from Oregon, isn't it time for a change?

The time has come when we will show the nation that we, the people of Oregon, do not vote by blind partisanship or at the dictation of partisan Republican newspapers.

We in Oregon demand the kind of programs which will bring prosperity to our great state.

Thank you and goodnight.