The Democratic National Committee and evangelist Ruth Carter Stapleton traded computerized lists of names of past and potential contributors recently, in a curious intermingling of religious and political fund raising.
Patricia Segal, the Democratic committee’s direct mail specialist, told the New York Times that her organization had traded lists with more than 150 profit and nonprofit groups in the last two years. This “even-steven” trade of 5,000 names, addresses, and zip codes each was “routine,” said Miss Segal.
The President’s sister since had sent two fund raising appeals to the Democrats’ 5,000; she is involved in building a $2 million retreat center, Holovita, near Dallas, Texas. The Democrats have given up on Mrs. Stapleton’s supporters, however. After one test fund raising appeal, which “didn’t really work,” according to Segal, no other mailings were sent … perhaps a monetary way of showing that religion and politics don’t necessarily mix.
