Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1924-11-14
Washington ! DEEPLY
INTERESTED BUT CAN
ONLYLOOK ON EVENTS
On Election Days the Nations
Capital Is Voteless, a Mere
Spectator
BY HARRY B. HUNT
NEA Service Writer

NEA Service Writer
WASHINGTON, Nov. 14.-One
day in every four years Washington
takes back seat.
On all other days Washington
may strut and put or airs as the
nations capital, but on election dav
it becomes merely a bystander
among cities, and onlooker. watch
ing and wondering what the verdict
OF the country is to be, but itself
without any voice in the outcome.
For in voteless Washington there
Is no election. No city in the coun-
try is so intimately affected by the
results of the nations balloting, hut
the smallest town or crossroads
hamlet has more say-so in the re-
suit. The whole structure of Off
cial life, around which the govern
mental and social life cf the citv
will revolve for four years. is de-
cided for Washington by Walla-
Walla, Keokuk and Kalamazoo.
So on election day, when other
cities are rampant with the soirit
OF an enfranchised electorate. en-
powered to make or mar their we'll
being as they may choose, Was
ington plods along in its old rut
waiting, watching, wondering -
hoping, perhaps-but without a vote
to cast or word to say.
Apparently the least interested
man in Washington, during the
period when the country was ballot
ing to decide the next president of
the United States, was the slight,
severe-faced, sandy-haired man
who mthe outcome most closely af-
fected.
Whether it was his supreme
confidence in the result or whether
1t was the New England discipline
by which his mind is ruled that
enabled him to proceed with "busi-
ness as usual" possibly he him.
self doesn't know. Probably both
had hand in it.
Anyway, while in other cities
voters were rushing t. the polls
and strife and suspense regarding
the outcome were mcnopolizing
mems minds, President Coolidge re
ported at his office or schedule,
ready to tackle a normal days
grist nthe executive mill.
General Lord, director of the
budget, who Was first on the presi-
dents election day schedule of call
crs, emerged frof the executive
sanctum after an hours session
frankly flabber-gasted.
How a man running for presi-
dent can keep his mind on the in
tricate details of budget estimates
one lection day is beyond ne,
Lord declared. "But Snat fellow
did it. His brain was functioning
as keenly as if he didn't have any
interest in the world outside these
budget figures. know them
pretty well, but he caught me up
on one or two items. Relieve me,
he travels somew /.
That superstition has no part in
the Coolidge makeup also was DEM
onstrated nelection day, when
that date was chosen Cor the re-
moval of the summer decorative
shrubs around the parapet of the
wings thanking the White House and
the substitution of winter greeEery.
The summer shrubs consisted of
two score or more green bay
trees, Iworshiped by the ancicnts
as symbols of victory and success.
During the early hours of elcc.
ton day these trees of good omen
were carted from their places.
And in their stead were, placed
dozens of cedars, signif ring glocm.
melancholy, grief!
But no such interpretations
were read into them by Coolidge.
The symbolism which many saw in
the change never occurred to him.
l, ~ ,x,o,, all, ~