Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1920-06-20
SUNDAY, JUNE 20, 1920.
THE OLD GUARD RULES.

Everything said and done at Chi cago was based on the theory that republican success this year is as- sured, says the Post-Dispatch. That belief accounts for the platform of blurs and blotches. It explains the nomination of Senator Harding, who could not win solid delegation in his own state at the primaries. The principal concession to public senti- ment was the rejection of Gen. Wood and Gov. Lowden, not because they had used money nor because they were in any way unsatisfactory to the controlling interests, but because they had been found out.
 The convention yielded to Senator Johnson when it adopted platform 5 repudiating the league of nations, and for peace in the party it gave up' } Wood sand Lowden, both highly capi- talized, to keep Senator Borah in line;
 
 but how is Senator Kenyon's sub- { committee, which is to fix it's spot light upon all campaign expenditures until November, to be placated? With that body of ross-examiners hanging on the flank of Big Business, the scan dal of the primaries is likely to be intensified before we get to the bal ot.boxes.
 While the party appears to have escaped an open bolt, there is no cer- K tainty that it can count upon the ' favor of it's threatening elements X without making further surrenders. N A small minority in the senate made z ratification of the peace impossible \ by the persistent menace of third < party. Bullying of the same kind ' dictated the presidential nomination Sand the platform. In politics as ill other walks of life, extortion is al- @ ways practiced by those and upon Ii those who think they are dealing with M sure thing. What further capitula s9 tiOns will be demanded of the carui- date cannot now be foreseen. That they will be numerous is certain. VI From all that is known of Senator &s Harding it must be said that he is an : inviting subject for coercion and in- N the senate have had him in their own < power for more than year, although
 at one time he professed to favor the peace and the covenant w tina few reservations. They have now made
 his nomination possible and have giv-
 en him a platform to their own taste,
 which is probably the most perfidious % %declaration that ever received the in- Vi Endorsement of great party. A man
 who has proved so easy in the past lis bound to receive repeated visits M from stand and deliver faction that
 is always irreconcilable and always
 two listed in it's diplomacy.
 Although the two wings of the or ganization are more hostile today than
 ever before, there is not sincerity
 enough in either of them to dissolve an unnatural partnership and follow it's honest convictions. Hating one
 another with indescibable rancor. sasthey both are too greedy of power and Eplace, now thought to be within reach, Ato risk another separation, and so they Mcontinue to do business by terror and Ntrickery.
 MT. Harding's supreme test as a
 candidate will come when, with tho
 knowledge that the enlightened rank ! and file of republicans are not pre-
 pared to sacrifice all the moral tri Aaumphs of a costly war, the Lodge ca
 bal in the senate call upon him to
 indorse and elaborate their policy of
 scuttle. The caliber of the man ana the kind of administration, that may be expected of him, if elected, will be revealed by the manner in which he meets that tissue.
 lii the meantime our own little county election campaign continues to