Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-09-13
A LANDSLIDE THAT NEVER
y ARRIVED

MAINE said one thing clearly. There
A'l is no landslide sentiment for Wood
row Wilson. Yet only a landslide could
overcome the odds against him and elect
him.
The followers OF Wilson are enthu.
slasts To listen TO the average Wilson
man is to hear the impassioned praise of
man and not the reasoned exposition
OF principles. It would please the Presi.
dent not bit to be rkened TO Colonel
Roosevelt or even to Colonel Bryan. But
the hero-worshipers who hailed their
Roosevelt and the Bryan devotees were
essentially OF the same temperament as
the diein.the-last-ditch Wilson men.
These enthusiasts charge their imme-
diate vicinity with an electric rapture.
The puzzled independent says to himself,
why, IL this is the way men are talk.
ing all over the country it's Wilson. that's
ALL" So they said in 1895. Republicans
who remember admit they were badly
scared for time by the hero-worshp
OF Bryan. The future historian vii find
It hard to explain 1912, for he will not
have come into personal contact with
how the Colonel could possibly lose, be.
cause they fe't In their hearts he must
win. Their political vision had become
a sensation most pleasing sensation.
In the same way we today cannot under.
stand Jackson's dictatorship or Grants
third-term boom.
Maine calls the turn. 1t puts Wilson's
personal following in the class with the
Bryan catapulters and the Grant third
term shouters It clarifies the work Of
the Republican Campaign Committee.
which can now ignore hysterical phe.
nomena and set to work to consolidate
known gains in the disintegrated Pro-
gressive territory. To further that
process it is useful to try to explain the
temporary enthusiasm OF those more or
less independently minded men who still
are swayed by the Wilson worshipers.
First, they have been swayed by the
feeling that Wilson has had mighty
| hard time. They talk of mis- terrible
crises; of the increase OF his gray hairs;
the lines in his face.
That was what the office of President
was devised to do to a man. 1t is the
pride of America that most of her Presl-
dents have broken themselves in her serv-
ice. They are meant to. America lives
hard; even the rich work hard Here
we are ready to break our hearts for al
most anything worth while, big or small.
or a Lincoln and break him as matter
of course, and 1t Is notable that our Lin
coins are the opes who do the least talk
ing about being broken.
Second, they who will not or cannot
talk principles say that Wilson has a
brilliant mind, that his patient and ap-
pealing sympathies work marvels for con-
structlve cooperation and advantageous
compromises.
But there is something greater than
the brilliancy that leaps intuitive'y' and
ingeniously TO devices. There is some.
thing better than Safety First" and that
is the safety all the time that the com.
mon. rugged majority. with their average
endowment OF mental gifts, must con.
serve II they are to continue to govern
themselves. There is even something
better than sympathetic cooperation and
shrewd compromise. and that is firm
4 progress that is not scared into conciiia
tory rcassurances, and leadership that
scorns compromise.
Said a friend of Lincoln to him: "IIow
is it rail-splitter like you was elected
and not brilliant man?" And the reply
was:
"Pm- glad the country didn't elect Z
brilliant man in its crisis. but just q
plain man who would do each days work
as 1t came 10 him" m
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