Richmond times-dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1914-current, 1919-07-14
And Now a super.Goycrnmcnt

7 + the friends of President Wilson have any
l one thing against him that they have never
become reconciled to- it is the fact that he
listens too little to advice. follows his own
judgment too far refuses to lean sufficiently
upon other men and fixes his own policies
with too little regard for the intellectual con-
tribution of those who have right to coun-
sci with him. This has been regarded for
the past six and half years fault in
the President. His opponents have made
much OF it and his supporters have been COM
PEELED TO admit that it is true.
All this was emphasized during the course
of the war. 1t rallied against in Con-
gress and in the partisan press, and even the
friends of the President found oppor-
tunity to refute the charge that this
one-man government and one-man in
so far as the making Of a program is con-
cerned All legislation which would in any
sense affect the authority Of the President
or give him unasked assistance in prose-
cutting the war was promptly defeated by
the party in power
But the country has been all wrong about
Woodrow Wilson, if Representative Graham
head OF the House investigating committee
is TO be believed. That statesman has re-
vealed to the mind of an astonished nation
that the President did not. after all, run the
war, that he did not fix the great war
policies; that he did not set up virtual die
tatorship. as charged; that he was not the
boss of the works and that he was merely a
plant fgurehead in the hands of a group
of strong men who remained behind the cur
tains prompting the actors on the stage.
These men, it is charged composed the
advisory commission of the Council Of Ma
tional Defense. They had no standing under
the law. They could not even hire their own
stenographers. They were mere volunteers.
working without pay, without authority in
any direction and without official recognition,
but it develops, according to Mr.. Graham,
that they composed the most powerful body
OF autocrats on the American continent They
actually ran the war. They determined what
measures should be taken and what not.
They fixed the course Of the President, leav-
ing TO him only the privilege of signing his
name on the dotted line. 1t is not alleged
that they wrote the Presidents speeches for
him, but that seems to have been the only
thing the President was permitted TO con-
tribute TO the enterprise
1t is surprising that any man with sufficient
intelligence to secure and hold for more than
one session a seat in Congress, should be
guilty OF so preposterous charge as that
made by Representative Graham regarding
the super-power held and exercised by the
advisory commission Of the Council of Ma
tional Defense. 1t is difficult to conceive of
a more stupid proposition than the declara-
ton Of this arch-investigator. If there is
any one certain thing in the public service
OF this nation it Is that Woodrow Wilson is
the absolute boss of his own administration
No man or set of men has run him OF
dared the attempt. No man or set of mer
has influenced him against his own judy
ment and few have tried second time to dc
so. He was the sole autocrat of the gov
eminent during the war and to allege any
thing else is TO make oneself laughable