But there was also primary competition on the Democratic side for Yarborough. This was
Gordon McLendon, the owner of a radio network, the Liberty Broadcasting System, that
was loaded with debt. Liberty Broadcasting's top creditor was Houston banker Roy
Cullen, a Bush crony. Roy Cullen's name appears, for example, along with such died-in -
the wool Bushmen as W.S. Farrish III, James A. Baker III, C. Fred Chambers, Robert
Mosbacher, William C. Liedtke, Jr., Joseph R. Neuhaus, and William B. Cassin in a Bush
campaign ad in the Houston Chronicle of late April, 1964. When McLendon finally went
bankrupt, it was found that he owed Roy Cullen more than a million dollars. So perhaps it
is not surprising that McLendon's campaign functioned as an auxiliary to Bush's own
efforts. McLendon specialized in smearing Yarborough with the Billie Sol Estes issue,
and it was to this that McLendon devoted most of his speaking time and media budget.
Billie Sol Estes in those days was notorious for his conviction for defrauding the US
government of large sums of money in a scam involving the storage of chemicals that
turned out not to exist. Billie Sol was part of the LBJ political milieu. As the Estes
scandal developed, a report emerged that he had given Yarborough a payment of $50,000
on Nov. 6, 1960. But later, after a thorough investigation, the Department of Justice had
issued a statement declaring that the charges involving Yarborough were "without any
foundation in fact and unsupported by credible testimony." "The case is closed," said the
Justice Department. But this did not stop Bush from using the issue to the hilt: "I don't
intend to mud-sling with [Yarborough] about such matters as the Billie Sol Estes case
since Yarborough's connections with Estes are a simple matter of record which any one
can check," said Bush. "[Yarborough is] going to have to prove to the Texas voters that
his connections with Billie Sol Estes were as casual as he claims they were." [fn 16] In a
release issued on April 24, Bush "said he welcomes the assistance of Gordon McLendon,
Yarborough's primary opponent, in trying to force the incumbent Senator to answer."
Bush added that he planned to "hammer at Yarborough every step of the way" "until I get
some sort of answer."
The other accusation that was used against Yarborough during the campaign was
advanced most notably in an article published in the September, 1964 issue of Reader's
Digest. The story was that Yarborough had facilitated backing and subsidies through the
Texas Area Reconstruction Administration for an industrial development project in
Crockett, Texas, only to have the project fail owing to the inability of the company
involved to build the factory that was planned. The accusation was that Audio
Electronics, the prospective factory builders, had received a state loan of $383,000 to
build the plant, while townspeople had raised some $60,000 to buy the plant site, before
the entire deal fell through.
The Reader's Digest told disapprovingly of Yarborough addressing a group of 35
Crockett residents on a telephone squawk box in March, 1963, telling them that he was
authorized by the White House to announce "that you are going to gain a fine new
industry-one that will provide new jobs for 180 people, add new strength to your area."
The Reader's Digest article left the distinct impression that the $60,000 invested by local
residents had been lost. "Because people believed that their Senator's 'White House