New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-06-09
MIR. Bryan's Resignation.

resignation as SSCl tVdlN VI SN"ON' iN''
dent Wilson has performed a high public
service. He has sacrificed personal COM
fort to patriotic duty.
It would have been far more convenient
from a party point of view to have kept
the Cabinet intact, retaining Mr.. Bryan
in Office by hattering his self-esteem and
compromising with him on some details
Of the second note to Germany. The
same political considerations which in
duced Mr.. Wilson to make Mr.. Bryan his
Secretary Of State still hold good, though
70 a less menacing extent. Out of office
Mr.. Bryan may be expected to oppose
Mr.. Wilson as theoretically as he has
supported him while member Of his po-
litical family.
But such a unitarian compromise
necessarily clashed with the Presidents
higher obligations to himself and to the
country. 1t was obvious that national
interests would have to be consulted fret,
and national interests could not be served
bv the retention at the head of the State
Department man who put personal
theories above national policy and was
prepared to use his influence to make flu
tile the assertion by the United States Of
its purpose to maintain at all hazards the
rights Of Americans lawfully travelling
on the high seas.
To Mr.. Bryan's credit it must be said
that his devotion to his personal ideas
overcame his eagerness to remain in pub
lie Office. If he meant TO live up 10 his
professions a rupture between him and the
President over the Lusitania correspond
ence was inevitable.
When the first note was sent he was
only casually consulted in its preparation.
The public was allowed to know that he
was practically ignored. His warmest
friends claimed for him only that he con-
tributed one of the minor paragraphs He
signed the note, however, doubtless with
many mental reservations and contentlng
himself with the reflection that after all
it was primarily a request to Germany
for information and only secondarily a
concrete statement of American policy.
But the iron of the situation must have
entered his soul. When the time came to
frame the second note he had recovered
his self-respect and was willing to dis
close fully his radical antagonism, as a
peace-at-any-pric man, to statements Of
our position from which we could not re-
cede honorably and which we might be
compelled TO back up by force.
Mr.. Bryan never should have been Sc
rotary Of State in any Cabinet. His great
]
ever of the powder cart. With the whole
world afame with war, such an obsessitr
on the part of the head Of Department
of Foreign Affairs is a peril to the natter
which employs him. A man of Mr.. Bry
ans type is a misft in. any Cabinet IL
such a crisis.
II is a sign of Mr.. Wilson's develop
ment as a statesman that he now recog
nizes the folly of the Bryan appointment
The President was at the beginning toc
much in sympathy with the vague, i'm
practical visions which Mr.. Bryan intend
ed 10 translate into practice in the conduc
of our foreign relations. He, too, was
dilettante at the outset. But he has nov
learned by painful experience that all TIT
balance, all the wisdom, all the familiarit!
with American policy in the past which
a statesman can command are needed L
direct the management OF our foreign re
lations in a time of stress.
He must regret with a great bitterness
of spirit that ne did not set his ideal of
Secretary of State higher. now that the
ideal has been shattered into a thousan
pieces, and he must look elsewhere-po.
sibly even outside his own party-for
man competent 20 fill the place in his I'D
ministration now more than ever next i
importance 10 his own.
Mr.. Bryan courted failure when h. too
charge Of the State Department. Prot
ably no one who ever held that office W.
more untitled than he was to discharg