Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1908-03-17
Po1itica1 sensn1innalIsm.

1t is entirely plain that President
Roosevelt intends the last year of his
administration shall be so crowded
with activities that it will remain a
memorable period in the political MS
tory Of the United States. No con-
tracted Constitution is 10 restrict the
exercise of his will. No conservative
traditions of the past are to keep MIN
from posing beside the crowned poten-
tates of other countries as a leader III
the great affairs Of nations.
Neither danger Of domestic disturb
ance nor risk of foreign enlargement
has effect on the bold plans Of our am
bilious President. So, while on nand
flourishes the big stick In the face of
japan. the other holds the same bud
Reon over the railway managers of the
United States. As our invincible ar
mazda steams In menacing column
through the waters Of the Pacific the
Interstate Commerce Commission Is or
dered to deploy In force against the in
ternal transportation interests.
The administration Is doing things
both at home and abroad that force
thinking people everywhere to sit up
and take serious notice. Yet judgment
is necessarily suspended for the good
and sufficient reason that nobody can
tell exactly what is actually planned.
That serious Developments are impend-
Ing in our foreign relations, now that
the overwhelming superiority of our
naval strength in the Pacific enables
us to talk back at Japan in plain
words, no one can doubt, but we have
yet to discover exactly what is to be
the point and purport of our talk.
That the Interstate commerce act is to
be stretched by bit of constructive
White House Jurisprudence is wholly
plain, but just how far is set to be dis
covered.
Whether the United States are to
lead the fight Of the Occident for an
open door in the awakening Orient, or
merely to back up trade of the Phil
ippines to Germany. as some wild Cos
sips suggests, is really matter of triv-
ial detail Whether investigation OF
the relations of railway companies to
their employees by the Interstate Com
merce Commission is for the purpose
of protecting this class of laborers
from capitalistic oppression or merely
to prove that the business crisis of
190T-0S cannot be justly designated the
Roosevelt panic, is, in the same sense,
a matter of relatively trivial detail.
These threatened disturbances in for
eign and domestic affairs gather most
of their Importance from the uncer-
tainty as to the future they inevitably
create in business circles.
Just now the business Of this country
demands above everything else, the
confidence that is only born of conser-
vatism. The stimulus that will revive
It's activities and restore the era of
only from assured future quiet and Sc
curity. This is equally true with re-
spect to the interests OF labor and capt.
tai. Exactly the reverse is presaged,
however. by the threatening ana belli-
cose attitude of the national admins
tration. 1t is all well enough to tell
us that what it is planning is nobody's
business, but it is really good deal OF
everybody's business, since this kind of
political sensationalism is doing meal
culable harm to the business of the
country as whole.-St. Louis Repub-
ic