Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1918-03-13

THERE and there on the farms of New
L l. Jersey there must be men who could
read President Wilson's latest message TO
the Russians with understanding of its
motives strangely sympathetic intimate and
personal They can look out of their win
dows any day over deserted fields down
a gray and silent road at the shabby little
schoolhouses where Mr.. Wilson first expert
mented with a method of politics that now
is involved with the destines OF civilization.
The man from Princeton went into the
first political campaign of his life without
any of the usual equipment, All he had
to depend upon in a campaign filled with
difficulties was his almost mystic faith in
the common judgment of normal people--a
faith of the sort that persists against all
tides, through all disaster and all stress, to
move mountains at the end.
I'VE shall tell the people about -" That
phrase came repeatedly at the inner coun-
ellis from the president Of Princeton when
big Jim Nugent, the Democratic State chair
man, and Senator Jim Smith started out
with him on the first stumping trip he ever
made
TNHE new candidate went about into small
l. towns and farm settlements as well as into
the cities, and he spoke to farmers and their
wives in little groups in the schoohouses,
not OF the things he hoped to do for .agri-
culture and the cranberry industry, but of
the elemental virtues. of the deep issues
troubling the republic. of the splendid hopes
Of earlier patriots that gradually were being
Chea pened and debased. He spoke as he
himself might have said from the heart.
Big Jim Nugent was "A Shakespearean
scholar, an authority on flowers a lawyer
of great ability and man with the physique
and strength that enabled him 10 frighten
Legislature with look. Yet he didn't
understand his candidate. Neither did Sem
ator Jim. But the odd thing was that the
working women of the farms, their husbands
and the hired hands, who used to gather
in little crowds when the candidate came
along in his hired automobile did under
stand what it was all about
tIJ DOUBT II they will grasp the abstract
/ Issues" big Jim used to say TO Presl-
dent Wisou--of Princeton. These things
are too vague--too involved"
It was the habit of the man from Prince
ton to say In reply that these were the really
important things and the simple things and
the things easily understood and of most
moment. 1--WE win tell the people about
II. All you have to do is TO make them
| understand
OF the ultimate outcome under these cir
cumstances the Wilson of that time had no
| more doubts than the average man has
about the coming of morning. He believed
| that people may be negligent. that they NAV
| let things drift to given point. but that
| they are ready always 10 turn the full de-
| atructve power OF mass judgment upon any
| thing truly evil or truly wrong
The Wilson of those days was a lonely
man and he grew onelier az his campaign
progressed. since the constant reiteration of
| "a revolutionary theory of political action
convinced the Democratic State committee
| toward the last that the new man actually
meant what he said. The old bipartisan
arrangement was TO have been directed
| against him on election day, according IN
common rumor. Mr.. Wilson himself kpev
| OF this, even while the managers of his
| campaign sat with him on the platform of
| one another meeting place. For some
| reason or another that ugly plan was aban
doned.
| YTJHERE Is stil much for politicians IN
i ponder on In the results Of that cam
| paign. The people understood the man who
| spoke to them of high and splendid insti.
| tutions threatened with decay and corr,,n.
ton. The politicians didn't Nor could they
believe that others would. They were dis
posed to call the man from Princeton a
| visionary when he said that II was in ths
| hearts OF all people to be right and even
neble and that all YOU had 70 DO was show
)heIp what they mare ~ B 1 3 4. Y 4 4