Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1920-07-24
HARDING SPEECH
PROVED PLEASING
TO REPUBLICANS
BY DAVID LAWRENCE


Copyright. 1920 for The Atlanta Journal }
MARION, O., July 23.-No one who
heard the speech of Senator Warren
G. Harding accepting the Republican
nomination for, the presidency could
have failed to be impressed with the
utter earnestness and good intention
of the man.
Entirely apart from the skillfu1ly
worded phrases and well-balanced
sentences, almost scientifically COM
Tense and the maximum of comfort
to the great body of voters whose
ballots are wanted next fall, the Re.
publican nominee revealed a person
ality Of simple but solemn appeal
He pledged himself in prayerful
but to do the best he could with
if elected.
The speech satisfied its hearers
who were mostly Republicans. II
did more than that-it thrilled and
to the length of time Senator Har-
ding has been in public life, he still
was an unknown quantity to the Re
publican leaders.
Approve Front Porch Campaign
Every man is an unknown guam
tity so far as presidential campaign
ing is concerned until he is once
here to size up Harding. Was it wise
for him to stay on the front porch?
Was he mixer? Was he capable of
the task entrusted to him by the
Republican national convention?
And the answers to all these ques-
firmative. More than one Republi-
can who had been urging that Mr.
Harding leave the front porch and
go touring, went away believing that
If the senator would confine his cam
paign speaking to a dozen or so pre-
pared speeches either in Marion or
In three or four big cities like New
York, Chicago and Boston, he would
make just as effective a campaign as
could be made by ack-platforming
all over the country.
The speech of acceptance was ac-
heard it as a masterpiece of expo
sitton, an eloquent and thoughtful
presentation not only of Republican
doctrine but of the pathways of safe
ana sound administration in a trou-
bled era.
Looks Backward for Guidance
1t was apparent that the portions
or the speech referring to foreign
policy struck deep chords of ap-
prevail: Unquestionably as time has
of the covenant of the League of
Nations, the wearlsome debate on
the Lodge reservations and the Wig
orous campaign conducted by Sena-
tors Borah and Johnson, has i'm
planted certain impressions of new
and strange ways for America in
her foreign policy under the league
so 1t was easy for Senator Harding
to touch the notes of foreign pol
Icy of Mckinley's day and gain there
by hearty response.
This was an audience that seemed
tired of present-day troubles, domes-
tic and foreign, ana appeared eager,
ever SO eager, to go back to the old
days, II 1t was only to speak of nor
nal times in a fond Renaissance
that might bring realization itself.
1t was backward that Senator
Harding looked to get guidance for
the future, back to party traditions
and party principles. And as he de-
nounced by implicit and sometimes
explicit allusion to the conception of
leadership in the presidency which
Woodrow Wilson had introduced, the
crowd seemed to grasp readily the
kind of an administration which
senator Harding was visualizing.
Hearers Satisfied
Senator Harding plainly marked
out as MS policy an unceremonious
end to the methoc and manner by
which Roosevelt and Wilson sought
TO dominate congress and those
about them. He promised reversion
to the calm councils of Harrison, of
Mckinley, of Taft-all four men in
cidentally having derived that in
SEPARATION of the presidency in this
mld-Western atmosphere.
Perhaps it was the series of par
agraphs on labor, perhaps it was the
advocacy of a return to intense ma
tionalism and an interest in world
affairs of only the most general and
least entangling kind. perhaps it was
the implied denial to railway en-
nIOVPS of t6p n ha SfI-ily
perhaps it was the peroration prom
Using fidelity and honesty--it would
be difficult to say what part pleased
the gathering of plain folk and poll