The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1921-04-16
SENATE LoATA'
TO SURRENDER.
ITS PRESTIGE
Its Determination Causes Ten
sion-Foreign Affairs Com
mittee Would Lose in Fight
With Republican President.
|RRECONCILABLES FIRM
by MARK SULLIVAN

by MARK SULLIVAN
WASHINGTON. D. c., April 16.-
The easiest thing to understand about
our foreign affairs is the composition
and the sentiments of the senate COM
mittee on foreign relations. This
body in the past has shared with the
senate committee Of finance the posi-
tion of being the most important com
mittee in the senate. During the two
years fight on the league OF nations
the foreign relations committee ca me
into the limelight to such a degree
and by its victory over the white
house won such prestige that it now
outshadows the finance committee.
II is the determination Of the for
eign relations committee not to sur
render the prestige it recently won
that accounts largely for the present
tension between it and the white
house. In this situation there is
factor which the public may overlook
and which even the senators them
selves may, in the strength of their
feeling, ignore too much. That factor
is that, whereas the committees vic
tory last year was against president
of the opposite party, their fight must
now be, if they make fight against
president of their own party.
Different Fight
1t is one thing for Republican SEN
ators to win power away from
Democratic president. 1t is quite a
different matter in order to keep that
power to make fight against Re-
publican president Republican SEN
ators for their support in their home
states look to Republican voters, and
Republican voters may we'll give them
support in a fight against a Demo
cratic president when they would
withhold it in fight against Repub-
lican president.
The senate committee on foreign af-
fairs consists of Is members, 10 Re-
publicans and Democrats. For prac-
tical purposes all power is exercised
by the Republican majority of the COM
mittee. This Republican majority.
during the present session. except that
two changes have been made. Sena-
tor Harding has gone off the commit
>f<ssat0- become president and Senator
Fall has gone of the committee to
become member of the cabinet. The
places of these two have been taken
by Senator Mccormick. of Illinois and
Senator kellogg of Minnesota.
Majority irreconciiabIe.
The Republican majority of the SEN
ate committee on foreign affairs. is
therefore, completely. of the irrecon-
cilable attitude in its position on the
league of nations, on the treaty and
on our foreign relations generally, if
by any chance, McCumber and KeI-
logg should fail to stand with the 9TH
ers, their places would be filled by
members of the Democratic minority,
among whom there is at least one and
POSSIBLY two, who in any test vote
wcn.d probably stand with the irrecon-
cilable Republican position rather than
with their own party. The entire
Democratic membership of the COM
mittee consists of Hitchcock of Ne
braska Williams of Mississippi, Swan
son of Virginia, Pomerene of Ohio,
l>ittman of Nevada and Shields of Ten
nessee.
The irreconcilables are, therefore,
completely in the saddle so far as the
committee on foreign relations is con-
cerned Not only do they have the
numbers and the powers in a formal
sense, in addition to that they have
the conviction that their attitude is
supported by the Republican voters in
the states from which they come. For
example, the other day when Senator
New Of Indiana gave out statement
strongly favoring the Knox resolution,
he had just returned to Washington
from a three weeks stay in his home
state
Wise Politics.
Can anyone doubt that Senator New
would not have taken that position
if he did not feel that it would be ac-
ceptable TO the Republican voters OF
his state? Senator New comes up for
denomination and re eelection next year.
Within barely q year he must fight
for his political life. His opponent, it
is expected, will be ex-senator Bever-
idge, who is one of the original and
most earnest advocates of a policy of
isolation for America: under the cir
cumstances it is inconceivable that
Senator New would have taken the
position he did unless he felt it was
the best politics.
In the same way, Senator McCum-
ber is also serving the last two years
of his terms and has. therefore, what
politicians call the two year pulse"
of responsiveness to conditions in his
state. The irreconcilables feel that
the degree of opposition to the league
CT nations and TO relations with Eu-
rope in broad sense that was re-
t1ected in the election last November
has been intensified by Lansings book
and by the wide distribution of his
magazine articles, in which he gave a
most disagreeable picture of European
diplomacy and of European diplomats,
especially Lloyd George. The conf
dence of the irreconcilables that their
attitude is supported by the majority
of the Republican voters is at least
complete.
Demand Will Come
Against this is to be said that soon
Or late business conditions in the
United States will give rise to a de-
mand for some action looking toward
the stabilizing Of economic conditions
throughout the world. AS soon as the
farmer and the small business man
realize that their troubles are due to
the breakdown Of the interna tional
trade and that hrea k6ownS can most