The Manchester journal. [volume] (Manchester, Vt.) 1861-current, 1916-09-14
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Philadelphia, Pa,
September Z, 1916,

Manchester, VI
Dear Sir.
II Is the duty Of every American cit
izen 10 make and support openly hi
choice among the candidates for tn
Presidency. That duty is especial.
solemn this year because great event
and great decisions are certain u
confront US during the next admins
trntion. | am writing to give you m!
reasons for my own choice. II yoI
care TO lay them before your readers
please do so, but not before Monday
morning, September IL,
am neither a Democrat nor a Re
publican, but a Progressive. Yet
there being no Progressive nominee
unless ! choose 10 support candidate
who can not be elected, | must vote fol
either Wilson or Hughes,
For many months after his inaugur'
alton. | thought well Of President VIII
son. In many respects liked what he
said about what he was going TO do
He talked well and make a good i'm
preston. 1t was only when began to
check up what he said by what he did
that | was forced to change my view
In the end came to see that Presi-
dent Wilson has a greater power than
any other man in public life to say one
thing but do another, and get away
with IL.
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 learned
afterward that he had actually let her
know secretly at the time, by the
mouth % his Secretary of State
through the Austrian Ambassador,
that what he said he did not mean We
have all seen him prove that he did not
mean il by his total failure to exact
reparation, apology, or even disavowal
for the murder of Americans on the
Lusitania.
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 disaster,
We have all heard him declare
against 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 war.
With war on every side of us, we all
heard him, in his second annual mes
sage, solemly 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 VIC
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 de-
fense. Only the proverbial good luck
of America has kept us from paying
the bitterest price for his unforgiv-
able neglect.
We have all heard him ridNule the
idea of a greater navy, then declare
for incomparably the greatest navy in
the world, and then go back on that.
We have all heard him declare for
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
platform which pledged him to
single 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 de-
feat the Shields waterpower bill, the
most dangerous attack on conservation
since Ballinger's effort to turn Alaska
over TO the Guggenheims. l.
We have all heard him declare for
efficiency in Government, and have
seen him set the pork-barrel first and
throw efficiency away. ! have known
,fBcial Washington from the inside for
dix administrations. In that time the
Government business has never been
10 badly done and so extravagantly as {
4 is now done under Wilson. ],
We have all heard him announce /:
himself as the champion Of Civil Ser 7
nice reform; and have seen him turn
he Government Departments over to /
he spoilsmen as no other President t
,as done in twenty years. 7
We have all heard him declare for h
,iuless publicity; and have seen him
,onduc, the most secret administration v