The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-08-18

"Where is Hughes gone? The Hughes of 1908?" inquires the Times. That is what Democrats and Republi- cans alike are asking themselves--the Democrats with astonishment and de- light, the Republicans with bewilder- ment and disgust.
 The Hughes that New York used to know, the Hughes whom The World supported in 1906 and in 1908, has disappeared. In his place we have a Hughes of the Penrose-Cannon-G Gal finger type, whose mind never arises above the petty partisanship of Re- publican organization politics. The speeches he Is delivering in the West might be made by any ordinarily clev- CT young Republican candidate for the State Legislature.
 No other candidate for President within the memory of living men ever ran dowr!1ill so rapidly as MT. Hughes has done since the day fol- lowing his nomination. It is both the campaign sensation and the cam paign mystery of the country. Wher- ever men talk politics, the one ques- ton is What has happened to Hughes ?"
 Nobody has answered that question; yet it admits of an answer-and the explanation can be found in MT. Hughes's Chicago speech when he said: "As was on the bench 100 per cent. Judge, I ther. became 100 per cent. candidate"
 That is where the Hughes of 1908 has gone. He has disappeared in the Hughes of 1916, who is 100 per cent. a candidate. The country thought the Republicans were nominating a great leader who was still 100 per cent. a Judge, with all that it implfed-a leader who was wise, just, fair, learn ed honest in all his statements, up- right in relation to all the great is- sues of the campaign and fearless in
 his discussion of them. Instead they suddenly find a man who has chang
 ed himself from 100 per cent. Judge into 100 per cent. an office-seeker with all the disingenuousness, with all
 the evasions, with all the lodging and | twisting and deliberate misrepresen- tation that usually characterize the | 100 per cent. ofice-seeker. Hughes the Judge and statesman has been swallowed up in Hughes the candi-
 date.
 That is where the Hughes 1908 | is gone.
 The Hughes of 1916 is merely a partisan aspirant or office. He as-
 sails President Wilson, but he has nc policies of his own. He abuses his opponent. but he offers no construc.
 tive programme. He has even forgot. ten the courtesy that. ought to exist
 between opposing candidates for Pres.
 ident.
 The Hughes of 1918 sneers at Pres
 ident Wilson's successful efforts tc Keep the country out of war with Germany, but he is afraid to say what
 he would have done that the President
 did not do, or what he would have
 left undone that the President did He ridicu1es President Wilson's ef- forts to bring new order of things out of the Mexican chaos, but he dare
 not say what his own Mexican policy would be. He makes boastfu1 pro-
 fessions about his devotion to "Amer-
 ica First" but encourages the, Ger
 man vote to support him in order to punish the President for refusing tc yield to the Kaiser He accuses the
 President of "vacillation and timidity,
 in dealing with the gravest national and international problems with which
 any other President except Lincoln
 has had to grapple, but lie lacks the
 moral and political courage to say
 how he would meet the situation.