The Alaska citizen., 1916-09-04
Phone 262 Phone
4 CANDIDATE WITHOUT A
 POLICY.

MI. Hughes speech ul acceptance k the public confession of a eandi date who Is without an issue and without policy
 Half of t k devoted to an attack upon the foreign policy of Presi dent Wilson. but Mir Hughes does not gay what he would have done tlat Mr Wilson Jeff undone or what he would have left mndone that Mir Wilson did.
 X fourth of ii is devoted to pre- parednys~ and to cpusurn4 the President for calling out the Ma tionaI Guard, but here aigain Mr Hugnes relrains from telling rHe American people how he would have obtained d larger measure oi pre- paIedne-s than the President has wruns from Congress. or how hc would have dealt with conditions on the Mexican border without call ing cut the National Guard.
 MT Hughes Mexican policy is to be one of "firmuess and consis- tcncy through which alone We can promote an enduring friendship" But what form are the firmness and cons stemcy to take2 War? Inter Neutiua Candidates can talk about fjrmness and consistency in foreign aHaI~; but Presidents must deal wth concrete matters They must decide definitely to do this thing or that thing They must act
 In spite of Mir Hughes long and 5.ct,r indictment of the Presidents seaI7r in Mexico. he himself has aootiae affirmative 10 offer. The Republican candidate follows the same prosecutingattorn tactics in dealing with the Presidents Euro pean policies. "A firm American policy" is the thing that was need ed, but again what does Mr. Hughes mean by d firm American policy? NIT Wilson has guided the country through great crisis through a peri ed which Mr. Hughes himself de scribes as "perhaps more critical than any period since the Civil War" With out surrenderiue single American ll@Lt lo has kept rhe country out ul war and compelled the most pow ertul military government known to history to conform its submarine h-n,,, comes Mr Hughes as the arch critic of that President to say that Mir Wilson was all wrong in the way he did it. whatever the results may be
 Would MT Hughes have gone to war over the Lusitania, or would the resources of diplomacy? If he would have gone to war. he does not say so. If he would have first exhausted the resources of diplo macy, in what respects would he have handled the case more wisely and more periodically than Presi- dent Wilson handled it? Here again Mr. Hughes confesses by his silence tnat he does not know what he would have done, or that he is afraid to say what he would have done
 Perhaps nothing is more charac- teristic of MT Hughes speech than his treatment of alien conspiracies We denounce all plots and conspir-a cies in the interest of any foreign nation" and then he proceeds 10 hold the administration responsible for them Tt was its duty to stop them" as if the administration had not secured dozens of indictments and score of convictions. But there is one plot and conspiracy about which MT Hughes is discreet ly silent. We refer to the German plot to make him President of the United States because President Will son refused to permit the German government 10 dictate the foreign policy of the United States.
 MT Hughes speech will be search ed in vain for a solitary word, a solitary syllable, repudiating this in famous attempt of foreign mon archy to control the political af- fairs of the United States by pun ishing a President who has offend ed it and rewarding a candidate who tacitly invites the support of the hyphenated. MT. Hughes "domi- nant Americanism' halts when it contemplates the political possbili- ties of the German vote.
 Mr Hughes speech is all sound and reverberation. There is no substance to it, and there is no sub stance to it because MT Hughes, great lawyer that he is, could not present a case. As a party candi- date he can criticise the President and find fault with the administra- ,;np hut in cnifa of hiS hiDh ahi1jtv