THE NEW AMERICAN PRESIDENT.
SENATOR HARDING has been elected the new American President by a majority which may or may not have been a "record," but which was, at all events, overwhelming. The word " landslide " is on the lips of America in speaking of the Democratic defeat. Strictly, of course, it is not accurate to say that Mr. Harding has yet been formally elected. The elections were for the Electoral College which in its turn chooses a Presi- dent, but as the Republican members of the College were returned for the express purpose of choosing Mr. Harding, it may be said that for all practical purposes Mr. Harding is already elected. According to the curious practice of the American Constitution he will not come into office until next March. Thus we behold the anomaly of a new President having been elected while the old President representing a set of ideas largely discredited is still in office. On the present occasion the anomaly is particu. larly striking as the election has shown decisively that the vast majority of the Americans are tired of Mr. Wilson, of his ways and of his ideas. That there has been a tremendous revolt against Wilsonism is indeed the one meaning of the election. Early in the campaign it was said of each one of several important political issues that it would be the crux of the election. As it turned out, nothing mattered in comparison with the dead set made against Mr. Wilson's methods. Even the League of Nations was not the primary lase!. The tariff (Mr. Harding standing for high Protection. in the alleged interests of labour and industry), the shipping laws, the cost of living, a big navy, the Panama Canal dues, Ireland, Japan, Mexico, and many other subjects were canvassed. But each and all of them were treated not so much on their own merits as from the point of view of men who asked themselves what would happen if the spirit of Mr. Wilson still infected the counsels of the Democratic Party. What a lesson it all is for the political observer, a lesson, too, not without a very pathetic aspect! Mr. Wilson, as we all acknowledge, is a high-minded idealist. He took office brimming over with good in- tentions for the redemption of his own country, and when the war came he extended his ideas and his ambitions to
embrace the redemption of the world. He was intolerant and honestly contemptuous of the bad and sad ways of the Old World. With his fourteen points he was resolved to show the Old World how peace and brotherhood might be made and observed for evermore. Unfortunately, though his intentions were admirable and he could express his ideas with brilliant persuasiveness, he suffered tem- peramentally from a defect which could be guaranteed to bring statesmanship to ruin in any circumstances and in any country. He was academic by training, and he was academic in heart and brain. While all the time showing himself to be ethically noble, he displayed an intellectual arrogance towards his opponents. He did not recognize that a war involving all the energies and resources and requiring all the goodwill and the greatest possible unity in the nation must preclude exclusiveness. Strangest thing of all—the greater the need for co-opera- tion and for the obliteration of the party spirit the more Mr. Wilson became inclined to administer affairs with a high hand.
When he came to Europe with his programme of redemp- tion, he might indeed have been a saviour if he had taken the ordinary precaution, which would have presented itself to countless far less brilliant men, of associating with himself distinguished Americans who were not of his own party, but who were heartily at One with him about the war. The sequel is so well known that we must not return to it except in a very few words. All over the world there is a terrible discrepancy between the miserable facts and the radiant intentions of Mr. Wilson. He caused delays in the settlement because he could never persuade himself to be contented with something less than the best, forgetting the French proverb that "the best is the enemy of the good." He lectured Italy, and for our part we could not deny that there was absolute truth in his homily. 'Yet in the imperfect world in which we live look at the result 1 The Adriatic question was kept indefinitely open, and a settlement seems to be no nearer than when Mr. Wilson stated what ought to happen in a world governed by the rules of Paradise. Remonstrance left him unmoved, or, if it had any effect upon him, it hardened him in an auto- cratic habit. All this happened in the name of the Demo- cratic party. Ultimately Mr. Wilson's health collapsed under the strain, and since then we have all watched with deep sympathy and with genuine personal respect for a man of ideals his occasional attempts to stem the tide of popular feeling which had begun to surge against him.
If we have seemed to dwell at too great length on Mr. Wilson's Presidential career, it is because it is the key to the recent elections. In choosing the Republican candi- date, Mr. Harding, the American people have chosen a man who is the very opposite, politically and intellectually, to Mr. Wilson. They have chosen aman in the direct line of Republican politics with all its well-understood traditions and conventions. They have chosen a man who has spoken of himself as a harmonizer," and who could not be persuaded by any means to become a dictator. That he will be an honest, safe,ancl dignified Head of the great American people we are convinced. But he will never assert that his own opinion is preferable to that of his colleagues. He will, as it were, put the Presidency in Commission; he will be guided by the advice of his friends ; he will perhaps be their mouthpiece and interpreter rather than their inspirer. That is precisely what the American people want to-day. A greater contrast with the habits of Mr. 'Wilson can scarcely be imagined. Englishmen may receive the election of Mr. Harding with unruffled satisfaction. Indeed, we might say that we could remain unruffled whatever President the American people might appoint. Right-minded, intelligent, and well- educated Americans are all for external peace and "the straight deal" with the whole world, and it is from this Class of Americans that the President is invariably chosen. Had the Democratic candidate, Mr. Cox, been elected we Mould still have felt that Anglo-American relations were Perfectly safe.
Of course, Mr. Harding and Mr. Cox differed in their Opinions about the League of Nations, but we undertake to say that in this matter, which more than any other will Influence the future relations of our two countries, Mr. fielding will be guided by the general feeling of America
just as Mr. Cox would have been guided. Roughly it may be said that Mr. Harding wants a new League in place of the present League, and that Mr. Cox would have accepted the present League with reservations. We are not 80 fascinated by the present League as to object to any substitute for it that might be found to work better. The essential point is that we must somehow discover a substitute for war. War will not conic to an end, as some people vainly suppose, because it is too terrible—the human heart is equal to any fate, especially when men are angry— but because if it be allowed to continue as the final means of settling disputes civilization will write its own death warrant. So far as we can see at present, there is no alter- native to war except some kind of League of Nations. All the accounts which have reached us unite in declaring that there is a strong feeling throughout America in favour of the principle of associating the great nations in the common work of preventing war. That is enough for us. Those well-known Republicans, Mr. Borah and Mr. Johnson, might seem to stand in the way, though we believe that in the end they would be amenable to the strong feeling which we believe to exist. If Mr. Harding should choose as his principal colleagues men like Mr. Root and Mr. Hoover the advance of the principle of association would be much more rapid.
In conclusion, we would ask our readers not to be alarmed by anti-British and even anti-European demonstrations in America. The great work of humanity, and we might add of urbanity; will go on. It has always been dear to the best Americans, and it is secure with Mr. Harding. The malice and the misrepresentations of the Irish subversives who have always been an irritating ingredient in American life will become impotent and disappear. If the English- speaking people work together the world will be redeemed after all, though it may be done quietly, instinctively, and piecemeal, and not in the iridescent intellectual atmo- sphere which was created by Mr. Wilson.
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