Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1916-06-14
QUESTIONS FOR
HUGHES TO ANSWER.

The exigencies of the Republican
strategical position require of the
party standard bearer emphatic
denunciation of Democratic admin
stration, and Mr.. Hughes is enough
of a politician promptly to respond
to the demands Of the situation
Accordingly he states as he
throws off the judicial robe
land with it the restraint imposed
by the SOLDERING and dignified en-
vironment of the bench,) that eve
have suffered intellectually from the
weak and vacillating course which
has been taken with regard to Mexi-
co." and that ."the high response
bilities of our diplomatic intercourse
with foreign nations We're subordi-
mated to partisan requirements, and
we present to the world humiliat-
ing spectacle Of ineptitude, 80. and
brave words have been stripped Of
their force by indecision."
Most of the democratic journals Of
the country are propounding
question to Mr.. Hughes now
that he has been proclaimed the re-
publican nominee for President. The
Philadelphia Record suggests that
the recent utterances of the candid
ate is the kind of talk best calculated
to mollify Colonel Roosevelt and his
followers, without at the same time
alternating the German-American
vote which the nomination Of Hughes
is intended to bring into the Repub-
lican fold. But the former Justice
surely is intelligent enough to UNI
derstand that he cannot hew' to this
line all through the campaign. He
can denounce the foreign policy OF
the Wilson Administration to his
hearts content, but the time will
come-and soon-when gencraAties
will not suffice and he will have TO
be specific. The voters will ask Can
didate Hughes, as soon as he goes on
the stump and gives them an oppor-
tunity to interrogate him:
"What would you have done, if
you had been President, in handling
the Mexican situation?
"What would you have done, ii
you had been President. in dealing
with German infractions of inter
national law affecting American
rights?"
Conceivably, only two answers are
possible. Mr.. Hughes would have
done exactly what Woodrow Wilson
has done, or he would have involved
this country in war with Mexico and
Germany. His criticism of President
Wilson, if honest, rules out the form
er alternative. He would, then, have
embarked upon two wars at once. Ii
this is the case, he should have the
moral and political courage to say SO
The people ought to know it.
Mr.. Hughes cannot carry water or
| both shoulders for five months with
out spilling some. He cannot rub ell
bows with the people who want wal
with Germany and with the .peopl.
who want us to be subservient tt
Germany. And even if he could, he
would discover that he was still hob
nobbing with minority. The vas
majority of the American people
want to secure the observance of Am
erican rights without resort to force
if possible; and they have secured i
through the firm and wise conduct o
foreign relations by President Wood
row Wilson.
If patriotism is to be one of tn
/ issues of the coming campaign, it j
up to Mr.. Hughes to show wherei
| he is more patriotic than Presiden
Wilson. What is his conception o
patriotism? What will he answer t
! the two questions that intelligen
! voters are sure to ask?