McCarthy’s audacity was taking a serious political toll on Eisenhower. The senator seemed to be breaking the GOP apart, pushing the Old Guard into an open confrontation with the president. Eisenhower beseeched Knowland to control his members in the Senate. “If we pursue the course we have taken so far, the Republican Party will be wrecked,” he predicted. But Knowland, whose sympathies were with the Old Guard, was little help.
