The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1916-05-09
OUR FUTILE POLICIES.

United States's present methods of
asserting it's rights and protecting its
interests is to be found in the news
telling of additional outrages by Mex
lean bandits against American citizens
on American soil.
Coming as it does on top of the
German bubble which is considered
in Washington as a satisfactory reply
to President Wilson'S ultimatum, but
which is nothing more than renewal
of the promises that Germany has re-
peatedIy made and as often broken
since the time of the destruction OF
the Lusitania, it serves only to inten-
sify the severity of the indictment that
the Wilson administration has drawn
against itself for floundering diplo-
matte policy that has placed the Uni
ted States today in most unenviable
position among the nations of the
world.
We are held in respect by few or
none of them.
! Germany takes such a serious me-
dunn and occasion as a reply to dip
Iomatic demand that was almost a
threat of war to chide us and very i'm
pertinently for what she considers our
sins of omission.
other of the European belligerents
take their own time about answering
such protests as we make to them, and
then dodge or deny the issues we have
raised.
And now, even the hapless and we'll
nigh helpless Mexicans flout US to our
faces
They go into battle with our SOL
diers with guns loaded with buckshot,
and our own buckshot at that; as all
the ammunition of every kind that the
Mexicans possess has come from this
country.
They seem to think that we are
towards; that we are afraid to fight
for our rights. or to protect ourselves.
And this attitude of theirs can only
have been born by the hating and
hesitating way in which we have ham
died the Mexican situation from the
time of its development until even
now.
Our temporizing with Carranza as
to how far our expedition should go
in the pursuit of Villa and what should
be its future status in Mexico even
before the task it was sent on was ac-
complished was nothing more than an
invitation to Mexican bandits to do as
they did in the Big Bend country.
General Pershing and his command
went into Mexico to help Carranza
rid his country of Villa and his
bandit gangs. And we bowed politely
to the refusal of Carranza to permit
us the free use of the Mexican rail-
road lines to sustain our soldiers with
supplies and to expedite their move
, ments.
There must be a change of front by
the United States of America in its
methods and practices of diplomacy
|
We must regain our prestige
among the nations earth.
We must let the whole world know
that while we are a nation predis-
posed to peace, we demand the rights
and respect to which we are entitled
and that we are prepared and able to
: contend for these rights and respect
; in any way that the occasions de.
mand.
t It is apparently useless to hope tha
t such a change can come to pass while
: Woodrow Wilson is president wha
he will or rather won't do can be ap
praised by what he hasn't done.
And is there any other American
e citizen who can lead the way to thi
: change with such forceful ability a
Theodore Roosevelt?
= Is there any other American either
e with such an extensive and valuabl,
# personal acquaintance with the grea
e powers of the world, with their ruler
- and their ways, and the ways of thei
peoples? Is there any other American
l. citizen so admirably equipped by train
y ing and by temperament to handle tn
II reins of our government in what ar
y going to be the most perilous and con
sequential days in the history of tn
nation; and especially in view of hi
~ seven years of experience in the presi
10 Dental office?
Is There doesn't seem to be.
IT The more the Wilson administratio
falters and blunders. the more appa1
ent becomes the need for the Reput
Ecan marty to hasten to the nation