The Pleasantville press. (Pleasantville, N.J.) 1912-1929, 1916-09-16
CLIFFORD PINCHOT TELLS
WHY HE FAVORS HUGHES
Philadelphia, Pa,
September 7, 1916.

Pleasantville, n. j.
Dear Sir: 1t is the duty of every
American citizen to make and support
openly his choice among the candi-
dates for the Presidency. That duty
is especially solemn this year because
great events and great decisions are
certain to confront us during the next
Administration. | am writing to give
you my reasons for my own choice.
If you care to lay them before your
readers, please do so, but not before
Monday morning, September II.
| am neither a Democrat nor a Re-
publican, but a Progressive. Yet,
there being no Progressive nominee,
unless l choose to support a candi-
date who cannot be elected, I must
vote for either Wilson or Hughes.
For many months after his inaugu-
ration, l thought we'll of President
Wilson. In many respects l liked
what he said about what he was 60
ing to do. He talked we'll and made
a good impression. 1t was only when
l began to check up what he said by
what he did that l was forced to
change my view.
In the end | came to see that Pres
ident Wilson has a greater power than
any other nan in public life to say
one thing but do another. and get
away with it.
The facts which justify this state
ment are common knowledge.
We have all heard him tell Germany
publicly that she would be held to
strict accountability; and have learn
ed afterward that he had actually let
her know secretly at the time, by the
mouth of his Secretary of State
through the Austrian Ambassador,
that what he said he did not mean.
We have all seer him prove that he
did not mean it by his total failure
to exact reparation, apology, or even
disavowal for the murder of Ameri-
cans On the Lusitania.
I do not say that Wilson should
have thrust US into war. There was
no need of war. But there was need
of courage to give US peace with self
respect. If Wilson had shown cour-
age this country would not have skid
ded from one crisis to the next, again
and again, narrowly escaping disas-
ter.
We have all heard him declare ag-
ainst intervention in Mexico, while
actually intervening to dictate who
should and who should not hold office
there; and denounce war against Mex
leo while actually engaged in q
With war on every side of US, we
all heard him, in his second annual
message, solemnly assure the country
that we had not been negligent Of
National defense. 1t was not true;
and later on he himself proved that
it was not true by proclaiming aloud
the need for what he had solemnly
assured US we already had.
For more than a year after the
world-war began, Wilson did not
raise a finger to put US in a condition
of defense. Only the proverbial good
luck of America has kept US from
paying the bitterest price for his I'M
forgivable neglect.
We have all heard him ridicule the
idea of a greater navy, then declare
for incomparably the greatest navy
in the world, and then go back IN that.
We have all heard him declare for
exempting our coast-wise trade from
tolls in the Panama Canal; and have
seen him show our own people and
the English that he did not mean it.
We have seen him elected on a
platform which pledged him to a sin
gle term as President, and then be-
come a candidate for another term.
We have all heard him declare for
the Conservation of our natural re-
sources; and have seen him neglect
that policy, and refuse his help to
defeat the Shields waterpower bill, the
most dangerous attack on Conserva-
ton since Ballinger's effort to turn
Alaska wei to the Guggenheims.
We have all heard him declare for
efficiency in Government, and have
seen him set.the pork-barrel first and
throw efficiency away. I have known
official Washington from the inside
for six Administrations. In that time
the Government business has never
been so badly done and so extrava-
gantly as it is now done under Will
son.
We have all heard him