The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1919-07-18
PEOPLE OF EUROPE BEGINNING
TO SEE THE LIGHT

When President Wilson told the
people of Europe that he expressed
the universal sentiment of the peo-
pie of the United States they took
him at his word. Since the fact be-
came known that there is a very pro-
nounced sentiment both in and out of
congress against his league of nations
scheme, not to mention his constant
meddling in European affairs, and
that this sentiment of opposition is
not at all confined to the republican
party the press of Europe suggests,
mind you, only suggests, that he may
have lacked "tact." The press of that
country by employment of that
quality which they suggest the pres
ident with lack of using, avoid
giving offense here, wherefore they
only mildly suggest that perhaps
President Wilson was tactless. Col.
Harvey, in a recent number of the
Weekly, in his usually pithy and
pointed way writes as follows:
at has been many times suggested
by writer's in foreign papers, notably
those of France, that President Will
son had perhaps, not been entirely
tactful in his attitude toward the
United States Senate, and particu-
larly towards those members of that
body whose views of the proposed
league of nations did not coincide with
his own.
"That Mr.. Wilson himself, even
dimly, entertained a suspicion that
his course and his utterances on the
occasion of his recent visit to this
country might possibly lack delicacay
of touch is very doubtful. His remar
kable confidence in his own self-suf
ficiency in all things makes such a
supposition highly improbable. He
was then frankly contemptuous of
senatorial opinion adverse to his own
and he put that contempt into words
which left no room for doubt as to
their meaning. In his speech on
landing in Bosom, and in His speech
on the eve Of his departure from New
York, there was not the slightest
trace of a tendency towards diplo
matte reserve in the handling of his
adversaries. His speech in Boston
was a ringing challenge He an
nounced to all the world that his
Fighting blood was up" His speech
in New York was threat. He men
toned that when he came back with
the peace treaty, that treaty would
be so intricately interviewer with the
league of nations covenant that sep
aration of one from the other would
be impossible.
In other words he threatened the
senate and the people of the United
States that they must either take the
peace treaty he, Woodrow Wilson,
presented to them, with all its inter
national entanglements for us, or
take none at all. The senate was to
have no option in the matter, save
tn option of total acceptance or total
rejection. There must be no elimi
nations, no amendments, no reserVa-
tions. The imperious order to the SEN
ate of the United States was to be-
sign therew The advice and consent
provisions of the constitution We're
distinctly defined : and restricted by
final decision thus handed down from
the Chief Magistracy Bench itself.
"There were those then, and there
are those now, who felt that this
minatory tone of finality on the part
of the president was tactless to the
very borders of arrogant insolence.
There were then, as there are now
those who thot the presidents utter
ignoring of the senate in the selec-
ton of peace commissioners was in
itself tactless, and worse than tact
less. There was and is a very wide
prevalence of opinion that the presi-
dent showed lack of tact the time of
his brief visit to his post of duty in
Washing ton, when he referred to OPP
position senators as the possessors of
"pigmy minds" and indicated a wish
to have them hanged. The feeling
that the expression of such sentiments
was not persuasively adroit method
of winning the support of either the
senate or the people of the country,
was the more intensified from the
fact that in the large group of sena-
tors thus contumeliously stigmatized
were many long regarded as among
the ablest and most soundly patriotic
members of the upper branch of our
national legislative body.
"Mr Wilson will soon be with us
again. 1t will be matter of much in
terest to note his forthcoming atti-
tude towards the rather formidable
mass Of American sentiment, both