The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1922-08-14
BY DAVID LAWRENCE.


pite the criticism of his forbearance in
the two strike controversies, he will not
use threats or coercive tactics.
As members of congress drift in for the
recOnvening of the house tomorrow this
very phase of Mr.. Harding's tempera-
ment is discussed almost above every
thing else. The last few weeks have adj
mittedly been crisis in Mr. Harding's
public career. Neither strike is as YET
ended but the friends of the President
expect results to carry more weight than
the processes by which these results are
achieved All of which is another way
of saying that the politicians hope the
critics will forgive and forget Mr..
Harding's slow-to-actiOn policies in the
industrial crisis and agree with him ulti-
mately that patience has its own reward.
Harding Seeks Not to Offend.
Mr.. Harding has unbosomed himself
to the extent of deploring threats and
dictatOrial language with either strikers
or employers. He has shown throughout
his conferences with all parties a DISPOSE
ton not to offend anybody or aggravate
a painful situation. His whole person
atty rebels at the idea of strife in any
thing and it is an open secret that the
responsibilities of the presidency have
weighed more heavily on Mr.. Harding in
the last month than at any time since he
took office.
Torn on one side by desire to satisfy
those big business elements in the Repub
lican party who do not want the presi-
dent TO do anything which might be re-
motely construed as trucking TO labor,
and faced on the other by a knowledge
that strikes cannot be ended quickly
unless compromises and concessions are
made by both parties to a dispute. Dir.
Harding has tried one expedient and
then another only to find his critics argu-
ing that he isn't firm enough, that he
didn't threaten and buster and get re
suits like Il. r. did"
It's one of those odd phases of political
psychology that Mr. Harding finds him
self contrasted. just as Mr.. Wilson was,
with the Rooseveltian type of president.
When AIR Wilson was slow to action,
calm and deliberate of some of the crit
zeal moments before the United States
entered the war, the cry went up that
president like Roosevelt would not have
hesitated to act.
Somewhat the same tenor of criticism
runs through the Inducements of talk
at the capitol whenever the strike situa-
more or less in response to that kind of
gossip that President Harding was
prompted to answer that he would not be
stampeded into big-stick tactics.
Demand Action for Public Veal.
In a nutshell, the demand that has
been coming from governors of states. as
well as from trade bodies and business
men generally, is that the president take
over the mines and the railroads and
operate them for the public benefit with
cut delaying further with any of the dis
mt nrFfas linz 10
and to some extent inside the national
capital, is that somehow the chief execu-
tive of the United States can become all
powerful in an emergency. brush aside
constitutional obstacles and gain the de,
sired objective-the maintenance of nor
mai transportation and the production of
an adequate supply of fuel.
It's true that since the crisis began
some of the ardent sticklers for a literal
Interpretation of the constitution have
seen the emergency grow steadily worse
and among members of congress the view
is beginning to take hold that if the
President asks for blanket authority to
deal with the industrial crisis he can get
1T and the constitutional obstacles will be
brushed aside with the same spirit of
public necessity as was the case during
the war when, in senatorial debate. some
senators went so far as to say the consti-
tuition itself is suspended in time of pub
Tic distress.
Strangely enough as Mr.. Harding's
policies in the coal strike and rail situa-
ton are revealed by the critics-and
they are not partisans but members of
the Presidents own group i'm the senate
there IS more or less uniform belief
that Mr.. Harding proceeded along the
right lines in his efforts at mediation
and Cancellation, but that he didn't inter
yene at the psychological moment and
waited too long between moves. 1t is
suggested, for instance, that when the
shopmen accepted the Presidents three
proposals and the rail executive approved
two of them, several days went by with
out decisive action from the White
House. The other course, it is being
said, would have been to summon the rail
executives to Washington at once and
work out the compromise on the spot
which is apparently being worked out
now after a week has passed and the
situation on the roads, especially in the
West, has grown worse.
Meeting Some of Wilson'S Thorns.
Mr.. Harding doesn't pretend TO be
omniscient or gifted with provision He
feels that he has done the best he could
do IN trying situation and that coercion
and threats would not have ameliOratpd
but aggravated, the disputants. Another
thing he is learning is that being presi-
dent of the United States i'm a crisis is
one thing and being a critic in the senate
or elsewhere is quite another: all of
which is reminiscent of some of the from
bles Woodrow Wilson used to have with
merciless critics when he followed the
paths of expedieuey because he thought
it would end a crisis with less damage to
the public interest than finish fight be-
tween capital and labor.
Mr.. Harding is going through an awful
experimenting painful trials of presi-
Dental responsibility in great crisis
which ought to make a man pause long
time before he ever becomes a candidate
for the presidency Mr.. Harding may
| convince himself that he is a man of pa
thence and forbeafanee and that he does
not threaten or coerce, but before he is
through with the present industrial trou-