The evening leader. (Tarpon Springs, Fla.) 191?-19??, 1917-03-08
WOODROW WILSON.

Isal leader of democracy. When Eu-
rope speculates as to what the United
States thinks or what the United
States will do, it asks what Mr.. Will
son thinks and what Mr.. Wilson will
do. Even his political opponents at
home pay the same tribute to him.
! In each crisis they have looked to him
for decision and admitted that his de-
cision must necessarily be final.
In all the attacks that have been
directed aginst his foreign policies, it
is a singular fact that the republican
opposition has never ventured to for
mulate definite foreign policy of it's
own as substitute for his. Nor has
any republican member of congress
ever introduced war resolution to
force the presidents hand-although
the power to declare war is exclusive
ly a prerogative of congress.
The chief complaint of Mr. Wilson's
critics is that he is not belligerent,
that he is not warlike, that he is "too
proud to fight" For the welfare of
American institutions this is a happy
failing. A president with Mr.. Wilson's
genius for government and his power
TO impose his political will upon 9TH
ers would be a grave menace to the
republic if these extraordinary gifts
were supplemented by military ambi-,
ton and passion for military glory.
1t was the great good fortune of the
United States in the Civil war that it
had Abraham Lincoln for president,
all of whose principles and habits of
government were incorrigibly civilian.
THUS a president who might have
made himself an absolute military die
tator held steadfastly to the creed of
the Illinois country lawyer, and that
creed was the creed upon which all the
foundation stones of the republic rest
1t is still the great good fortune Of
the United States that in the darkest
crisis of modern history it has a
president with the same unquenchable
passion for justice and liberty, who
locks upon military power only as the
instrument of civil power and wor-
ships no gods of conquest or imperial
ism. .- F.....
If the world, after this war, is to
be re-established upos the basis of
democracy, the political principles of
Woodrow Wilson must prevail. Moth
ing else can save it. On the verge of
lthe crisis, when it is inevitable that
the United States must draw the
sword in defense of it's rights and its
honor, the American people can face
the future in supreme confidence that
they will enter the war under a leader
ship that knows no Interior purpose
a leadership that is wise and saga
cicus and self-restrained and that will
safeguard republican institutions as
the most precious possession of man.
kind.
No other American is so well fitted
by temperament, by training, by abil-
it and by mastery of the science and
art of government to solve the prob
lens that must confront this country
during the next four years. No other
American in the end is so likely to
dominate the political thought of the
world and guide it along the difficult
path of liberty and democracy. There
is nobody else to whom the American
people could so safely entrust their
destiny, or whose faults as well as
whose virtues so surely make for the
preservation of government of the
people by the people and for the peo-
pie.