Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-09-21
4 Troubled Front Porch

YHEN certain R6puDllCdu JOuIudlS WSIe
M ukening their Presidential candidate
to a dignifed st. Bernard and Cover
nor Cox to an ebullient fox terrier, some Wag-
gish Democrat babe them beware lest the fox
terrier run the St. Bernard off his own front
porch.
The warning prediction has come anus
iugly to pass. After weeks Of superior Sc
;usion, Senator Harding has been constrained
by his anxious managers to go forth and
meet the people. Ponderous dignity is we'll
enough in a Wouter Van Twiller, the sedate
and corpulent Governor of New Amsterdam.
whose unvarying daily program, Irving tells
us, was to eat six hours, sleep ten, and smoke
and doubt the other eight. But in a time
tense with problems that must be solved and
thick with issues that must be met, there is
scant interest in the dignity that sits and sits
upon it's lordly launches, staring out upon an
Inferior world.
+ So, the front porch campaign has been
abandoned for those terrier-like tactics which
solemn politicians once professed to despise.
1t is not enough, they have discovered, to
keep the "gold diggerS" delving, while the
candidate himself emits an occasional plati-
tude. A fifteen or thirty million-dollar cam
paign fund can do much, but it cannot answer
those urgent, farreaching questions now up
permost in a thoughtful public's mind; it
cannot put substance and sincerity into a
political platform that was framed by shut
fling opportunists; it cannot fill the void
where constructive purpose and statesman
ship need to stand. The music of the money
will flatter some ears and the superstition
that only Republican administration can be
competent and safe will rule some minds. But
that sort of front porch" philosophy does
;not greatly impress the American rank and
if1le-as Mr.. Hardings directors have discov-
cred in this waning half of the campaign.
Thus far, however, it does not appear that
the distin guished and really delightful Sena-
t. >i,or
he did in the sedateness of the Marion piazza.
We do not mean to be malapert. We do not
mean to be ungenerously partisan. But We
leave it to any reader of fair discernment if
Senator Harding's speeches are not cut from
the very fabric of him of whom Shakespeare
said: '"He draweth out the thread of his YER
bosity finer than the staple of his argument"
Has he yet come squarely forth for single
policy in which forward-thinking Americans
are Interested? Has he yet proposed def
mite plan of dealing with one of the major
public problems of the day-taxaton, for in
stance, or shipping, or the development and
conservation of natural resources?
Governor Cox has been from the outset as
plain spoken and as comprehensive the
San Francisco platform with it's frank facing
and broad grasping of momentous issues. Not
only has he gone straight to the voters, but
he has given them no shadow of difficulty in
perceiving just what he stands for. He has
made his position so plain and his purpose
so appealing to liberal and constructive
thought, that Republican dignity has felt
the bite of the situation to it's very marrow.
Americans are a practical people, and I'M
failing admirers of one who means what he
says and says what he means. Is it to be
expected, then, that they will take the Gov
eminent out of the hands of party that has
performed with high competency the most
difficult and stupendous tasks the nation
ever faced, and deliver it to forces of reac-
ton and inefficiency? Or is it likely that
one whose skill lies chiefly in evading issues
will be accounted more worthy of the Presi-
dency than one who shows equal cearness
and soundness and courage Of convictions?