The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1920-11-26
ROOT, KNOX OR LODGE


Cabinet is named the country viii
know what it voted for Nov. 2.
What Mr.. Harding himself says
about matters of foreign policy is GER
tain to be incoherent and is not neces-
sarily important. What his Admins
tration really intends to do will be
shown by the appointment Of Score
tary of State, and that too will deter
mine which faction of the party is to
be in control at the White House and
in the State Department.
The two names most frequently
mentioned are those of Elihu Root and
Philander C. Knox Mr.. Root belongs
to the League of Nations faction;
Senator Knox to the Battalion of
Death Each has served as Secretary
of State, Mr.. Root in President RoCse-
velt's Cabinet and Mr. Knox in Presi-
dent Taft's.
Should Mr. Root become Secretary
of State in the Harding Cabinet the
United States will enter the League
of Nations, and will discharge its in
ternational obligations in so far as
those obligations can be reconciled
with the Republican record of obstruc-
ton since the signing of the armistice.
Mr.. Root is an ardent Republican par
tisan in the midst of campaigns, but
there are long intervals in which he is
a great constructive statesman of
sound principle and enlightened ambi-
ton.
Mr.. Knox is the benevolent inventor
of Dollar Diplomacy, which makes the
United States Government a collection
agency for the Wall Street bankers.
His latest title to fame rests upon
the authorship of the Senate resolu-
ton decreeing separate peace with
Germany Should Mr.. Knox become
Secretary of State, the foreign policy
of the United States will be in the
hands of the Battalion of Death. The
Treaty of Versailles will not be rati
fled. The United States will not join
the League of Nations, and there viii
be separate peace with Germany.
The Knox appointment will easily |
rank as the most brilliant diplomatic |
victory that Germany has won since
the war
The man who ought to lie made Sec |
rotary of State, however. is not Mr.. |
Root or Mr.. Knox, but Henry Cabot |
Lodge, who is the architect of the |
moral isolation of the United States
and chief of the Senate conspiracy |
that defeated the ratification of the |
treaty of peace. More than any other
man, Mr. Lodge is responsible for the
miserable mess in which this country |
now finds itself. To him should be
assigned the task of extricating the
United States from the mire in which
it is floundering Having led the
wrecking crew that destroyed Presi-
dent Wilson's foreign policy, it is
only right that he be compelled to
devise substitute for that policy and
assume the responsibility of carrying
il into effect.
In so far as the Republican Party
has foreign policy. it is Henry Cabot
Lodges foreign policy, decorated with
an additional badge of shame in the
way of the Knox resolution for sepa-
rate peace. That policy is entirely
obstructive. and the burden of TURF
ing it into a constructive policy ought
to rest upon the boss of the wreck
iua crew.
Mr.. Root might be willing to become
Secretary of State in Harding Cabi-
net merely for the opportunity Of
rounding out his career by notable
act of public service Mr.. Knox might
be willing to serve in order to prevent
the ratification of the Treaty of ver-
sailles and to keep the United States
ont of the League of Nations. But Mr..
Lodge is the man to whom the appoint
ment belongs by all the rules of retri-
butte justice. He embodies all the pois-
on, all the malice. all the meanness.
all the vindictiveness. all the hatred
that the Republican Senate has mani
tested in its long campaign against
president Wilson. 1t is he who should
shape the foreign policy of the Hard
ing Administration World.
THE HOUSEWIFE