Skip Convention, McCarthy Pleads

Senator Eugene McCarthy yesterday told his supporters without specific Convention jobs to "stay away from Chicago" during the upcoming Democratic National Convention.

Speaking at a press conference in Los Angeles, McCarthy said the "presence of large numbers of supporters may well add to the danger of violence" already present in Chicago.

A McCarthy spokesman said that there are no plans for any public rallies in Chicago on behalf of the Minnesota senator. "The rallies and street demonstrations planned by other organizations are not considered to be in the best interests of the McCarthy cause."

McCarthy himself made the decision, a staff member said, and it evidently reflects a personal determination to devote himself to the sensitive delegate game that Nelson Rockefeller tried unsuccessfully in Miami last week.

The last big push for public support will be Thursday on National McCarthy Day. McCarthy will address closed circuit television audiences at rallies in "41 cities across the country," a press statement said. Commercial television (channel 56) will carry the speech in Boston.

Before the address, McCarthy people will hold a rally on the Boston Common featuring speeches by Michael Feber 2G, recently convicted of conspiracy against the draft, and George Wald, professor of Biology and winner of the Nobel Prize.