... And Promise, If Elected ...

Vanity Fair, Emulating the Other National Parties, Offers Its Own Political Platform for 1928

COREY FORD

WE, our own Party in convention assembled, pledge ourselves to the Principles of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. We also assert ourselves as strongly in favor of health, wealth and happiness, and equally opposed to lack of health, lack of wealth, and unhappiness. It is our solemn conviction that there is so much good in the worst of us, and so much bad in the best of us, that it is up to the rest of us, to something something the rest of us, or something; and if elected we promise to uphold honesty, bravery, clean-mindedness, charity, beauty, love, and the flag of the United States of America. We also endorse Mothers.

Always our Party has steered its helm straight through the shifting seas of events, let the chips fall where they may. It has stood for all that is fine in American life, and it has upheld the deathless principles of Washington, Jefferson, Stephen Decatur and Dr. S. Parkes Cadman. Such a course calls for integrity; it calls for courage; it calls for truth, and it calls for faith, and it calls for his fiddlers three. Our signature is your safeguard.

The function of a National Platform is to declare our general principles and Party Policies. Consequently we have outlined below the outstanding present ills of our Nation, all the obvious results of the untold corruption and political dishonesty of the other National Parties (nya! nya!); and if elected we promise to continue to feel very strongly about these matters, and to include them in our next Platform, four years hence.

We, therefore, declare the policy of our Party with regard to the following dominant issues:

Revolving Doors

We demand an amendment to the Federal Constitution providing for the immediate abolition of Revolving Doors. For too many years, under the sordid corruption and unabashed rascality of the great Political Parties, these doors have mashed our fingers, bumped our knees and taken off our rubbers. Either regular doors that open and shut, from now on, or else as a Party we start climbing windows.

Women in Knickers

We favor national legislation against all girls who wear khaki knickers and high French heels, and hike along the Palisades on Sunday afternoons. For stout girls, especially when seen from the rear, the penalty will be twice as harsh.

Spinach

There will be a law against spinach.

Parlor Games

Unblushingly the great Political Parties offer as their record entertainment postulate, American peace of mind destroyed, weekends without guests, everywhere disgust and suspicion and boredom unpunished and unallayed.

We take therefore an unequivocal stand against all forms of Parlor Games, including Cross Word Puzzles, Character Analysis, Palmistry, Twenty Questions, What'll We Do Now?, and any other game-books which Simon and Schuster have up their sleeve. Our slogan in the coming campaign will be: "Back to Cribbage!"

OUR PROHIBITION PLANK

VANITY FAIR presents its courageous Plank on Prohibition, as adopted recently by the Platform Committee in our own private National Convention. While we appreciate fully that such a firm and uncompromising stand upon this moot question can only result in a tremendous loss of votes from either one side or the other, or both, Vanity Fair remains true to the great traditions of honesty and courage which have already distinguished the two leading Political Parties of this Nation in their own declarations upon the subject. Like them, we make no attempt to pussyfoot or shilly-shally, side-step or straddle. Our stand on prohibition, frankly, is as follows:

"This convention, in assembled session, reaffirms its devotion to the principles of government laid down by those great leaders of the past, Washington (applause), Jefferson (applause), and Lincoln (applause). For too long our Nation has ignored the principles of these illustrious forebears. In our Platform, therefore, we wish to declare for strict Law Enforcement.

"We promise to support to the best of our ability the Law of Gravitation, which was discovered in 1687 by that great leader of the past and illustrious forebear of our glorious party, Isaac Newton (applause). It is our honest intention, if elected, to insist that all bodies, when raised into the air and left unsupported, shall fall to the earth again. Moreover, it is the solemn pledge of this party to insist that the gravitation force between two particles of masses ml and m2, separated by a distance

r, shall be equal to where G is a

constant, expressing the fact that F is proportional to and is called the gravitation

constant, as well as all other laws enacted pursuant thereto.

"In addition we strongly approve of the Law of Stress and Strain, the Law of Diminishing Returns, the Law of Capillary Attraction and Osmosis, and Boyle's Law on the Compressibility of Gases, even if Boyle was a Republican.

"This is our final stand on Prohibition, and we shall stick to it."

Fonetic Spelling

We object to spelling neighborhood "naborhood."

Asparagus Tongs

There will be a law against asparagus tongs.

Mayor Thompson

There will be a law against Mayor Thompson.

Punching Tickets

Conductors on suburban railroad trains will be expressly forbidden to punch tickets directly over the heads of the commuters, sprinkling them with tiny bits of colored pasteboard which cling like dandruff to the backs of their blue serge suits.

Folding Taxi Seats

There will be a law against those folding seats in taxi-cabs, controlled by a spring with 5oo-pounds pressure, which invariably snap up and spank you as you are getting out of the cab.

Receptions to Trans-Atlantic Flyers

Hereafter, anybody who flies across the Atlantic to Europe will stay there.

Our Policy on Angling

The angling legislation of our Party will be based on the following policies:

(A) The abolition of Worm-Fishing, and the restriction of trout-streams to anglers who use a Dry Fly.

(B) A provision requiring all Fish-Hogs to spend the following week in Fulton Market, counting fish.

(C) A strict law against all Women Fishermen.

Mrs. Mabel Walker Willebrandt

There will be a law against Mrs. Mabel Walker Willebrandt.

Bread Pudding

There will be a law against bread pudding.

Customs Regulation

We favor a National Customs Regulation against all baggage of returning tourists which is plastered with bright stickers of the European hotels which they visited on their trip.

Electric Buzzers

Any host at a dinner-party who is found to have hidden an electric servant-buzzer under the carpet, just where the toe of the guest will tread on it accidentally, will be forced to get down on his hands and knees and yank it up by the roots.

Mother's Day

The name of "Mother's Day" will be changed henceforth to "Florists' Day," and in addition will be abolished.

Railroad Ramps

There will be a law against people who walk up railroad ramps slowly.

Joke Explainers

People, under our rule, shall be required to tell a joke as briefly as possible and, when they have told it, to stop talking. For too many years, during the choking rule of the great Political Parties, our nation has been allowed to suffer under the blight of amateur joke-tellers whose anecdote requires fifteen minutes to arrive at a given point, who wait until the laughter (if at all) has died down, and who then repeat the last line with evident relish, beaming at the company and perhaps adding for good measure a brief resume of the joke itself and several words explaining the point, where they heard it, what it meant, and what other joke it just reminded them of.

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Continued from page 45

Senator Heflin

There will be a law against Senator Heflin.

Cigarette Lighters

We favour legislation which will deal promptly and summarily with friends who blow out the match which you have just struck and offer you instead, with a bright smile, their brand-new patent cigarette lighter.

Men's Straw Hats

There will be a law against stiffbrimmed straw hats.

Postal Laws and Regulations It shall be held illegal—under penalty of fine and imprisonment— according to our proposed revisions of the postal laws and regulations, to send via the United States mail any picture-postcard from Canada bearing this or a similar message: "Oh, boy, I bet you wish you were up here right now for a little sip of this Black Horse Ale!!! (See Over!) Regards to the office, Joe."

Mrs. Martin Johnson

There will be a law against Mrs. Martin Johnson.

Advertising Testimonials

We are in favour of forbidding henceforth all advertising testimonials by prominent people which show them using some prominent make of cigarettes or cold cream, with a signed endorsement to this effect: "I smoke my favorite Goo-Goo brand of mattress blindfolded because it cleared up my complexion like magic. . ."

"You Would!"

We shall conduct an intensive campaign against people who say "You would!"

Railway Car Windows

Passengers in railway cars will be equipped henceforth with fire-axes, and permitted to use them to the full extent whenever the window which the lady beside them has requested them to open refuses to budge: They have the choice of hitting either the lady or the window.

Marathon Dancers

All marathon-dancers, cross-country runners and flagpole-sitters will be charged full space-rates in the newspapers.

Bruce Barton

There will be a law against Bruce Barton.

Paper Towels

There will be a law against paper towels.

Green Eye-Shades

We shall take a definite stand against people who wear green eye-shades while driving motor-cars, playing tennis or lying on the beaches.

Home-Made Movies

The increased number of hosts who entertain their guests with home-made movies of Junior taking a bath, Junior sitting still, and Junior crawling across the yard and out of the negative entirely, demands constructive legislation that will limit their showing in the future exclusively to Junior's two parents.

Women in Politics

We shall declare an open season on all women who say: "Yes, but can you imagine Mrs. Smith in the White House?"

Bicycles

There will be a bounty of $.20 payable out of the National Treasury offered on the head of every small boy who rides a bicycle in the midst of heavy automobile traffic.

Americans Who Go To Paris, France There will be a law against Americans who go to Paris, France.

Umbrellas

We favour a national ordinance against people in crowds who carry open umbrellas that gouge your eyes, knock off your hat, and drip down the back of your neck. We also oppose people who carry folded umbrellas under their arms, projecting behind them at such an angle that the tip invariably catches in the cuff of your trousers and trips you up. In other words, we object to umbrellas.

Chain Letters

Authors of chain letters will be forced to put their names and return addresses on the envelopes, and anything which happens to them in consequence will be designated under our proposed Chain Letter Law as justifiable homicide, and a bronze medal will be awarded for the deed.

Automobile Pasters

Any automobile whose rear window is decorated with pasters of divinggirls, monkeys, or a stocking ad will be confiscated at once.

Full Dress

Hereafter men's full-dress eveningclothes will be abolished, and men will be permitted instead to wear something comparatively comfortable, like chain armour.

Babies

There will be a law against babies. (This does not apply to your oivn baby, of course.)

Political Platforms

And as a final plank in our Political Platform, this Party puts itself on record as opposing henceforth all Political Platforms; and if our Platform wins, we pledge our Party to ignore it vigorously, to the best of our ability and in strict accordance with the undying traditions established by the other great Political Parties of our Nation.