To break a deadlock at the Progressive party convention, dark horse candidate Zachary Hicks is nominated. Hicks is "so dumb that every time he opens his mouth he subtracts from the sum total of human knowledge," and the party leaders despair of getting him elected governor. Kay Russell, the secretary, suggests that they hire her boyfriend, Hal S. Blake, as campaign manager. They agree, only to find that he is in jail for non-payment of alimony. After they bail him out, Hal sets to work coaching Hicks, advising him to answer all questions, "well, yes, and again, no." When the conservative candidate, Underwood, gives the same Abraham Lincoln speech that Hal has planned for Hicks, Hal jumps up on stage and accuses him of plagiarism. Hicks continues to make public appearances all over the state without ever stating his position on the issues. Hal's ex-wife Maybelle visits campaign headquarters to demand her late alimony payment. Although Joe, Hal's assistant, tells her that Hal is not in the office, Hicks, who finds her attractive, tries to impress her by leading her directly to Hal. Hal somehow manages to come up with her weekly payment, but she is angry about its lateness, so when the opposition campaign manager approaches her with a plan to compromise Hicks, she agrees. On election eve, just after Kay finally agrees to marry him, Hal finds out that Maybelle has taken Hicks across the state line to the country, where they are to be found together playing strip poker. He manages to get Hicks away in time, but when members of the opposition discover Hal and Maybelle together, they threaten to arrest Hal under the Mann Act, and he is forced to remarry Maybelle. Kay is furious until Hal explains that he has accepted a job in Nevada and will get a Reno divorce with no alimony.