Bisbee daily review., 1921-02-24
BY WILLIAM PHILIP SlMMS Written for The Newspaper Enter


 prise Association
 PORTLAND, Ore, Feb. 20.-Given the fiddle-string-like tension which really underlies the apparently calm surface of relations between the Uni ted States and Japan, the Pacific coast, from Mexico to Puget Sound, is wondering what the attitude of President Warren c. Harding and his secretary of state will be when the diplomatic battle begins after the fourth of March. next.
 Neither President-elect Harding nor his y-of-State-apparent Hughes so far as is known out here, has ut tered any very pronounced views on the subject This but adds to the feeling of uncertainty along what Gov. Stephens. of California. calls the western edge of Occidental civiliza- tion."
 Harding Statement When delegation from California paid visit to the well-known front porch at Marion. O., last September to tell Mir. Harding their side of the story and hear his position on the , question, he said to them: "I do not doubt that Americans on 1 the coast are troubled in their minds { about the Oriental question. as it is called. That question raises every in depreciation of our watchword, Amer ica First' for it involves several sets of obligations.
 Tt involves our obligations to the great foreign powers; it involves the obligations of all America towards one group of American states and their peoples.
 But it also involves the obligations of that group of states to the nation. There is abundant evidence of the dangers which turk in racial differ ences. do not say racial inequali- ities-I say racial differences. am ever ready to recognize that the civi- lization of the Orient is older than ours, that her peoples have their pride as we'll as their honorable traditions. Friction Recognized
 Tn spite of the honor of these oriental peoples and in spite of their contribution to the worlds advance ment, it is conceivable that they be so different in racial characteristics or in manner of life as practiced by other peoples Of equal honor and achievement that no matter whether it be on the soil of the one or on the soil of the other, these differ ences, without raising any question of inferiority. or any superiority, may createI believe they have created on the Pacific coast-without blame to either side-a friction that must be recognized"
 Friends of the Japanese here be lieve Harding will do nothing rash" as one of them put il. They see in Harding'S mention of the reciprosity of the obligations which the nation and the various states owe to each other a reminder 10 California that ii she wants the nation to stand by her, she, on her side, must not go to eN- tremes in dealing with the nationals of powers to whom the nation as a whole is responsible.
 Such is one interpretation. Another, by the antis, is that President-elect Harding has virtually pledged himself to an exclusion program.
 Cox Charges
 Still others quote Gov. James NJ. Cox. the Democratic nominee. as charging Mir Harding with a quick change of policy regarding the Japa- nese in California. Speaking in Sacra- mento two days after Harding's ut terances on the Oriental immigration problem. Cox declared Senator Hard ing had sent out to newspapers in ad' vance the speech he intended to make to the California delegation but when Gov. Stephens saw the speech he said This won't do" and the senator changed the speech while the gover- nor sat on the front porch.