Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1926-01-27

Ii America energies from the late
unpieasantness on Capitol Hill a mem
Der of the World Court, 1t will not be
because the best debaters in the Senate
favored the proposition The orator
zeal big guns were all in opposition.
Borah. Johnson, Reed (of Missouri
and Moses are four horsemen not
ca silly matched on either side of the
chamber when they are harnessed to-
gether in attack. Robinson tof Ar
kansas) and Walsh come nearest to
being their equals in forensic skill.
AS a presenter of a sheerly legal as
pect of an issue Senator Walsh prob
ably is without a peer in Congress.
Joe" Robinson. the Democratic lead
er. is a speaker of the old-time school,
prodigal of gesture and lusty of lung.
But no one advocating the World
Court ever scaled the heights of elo
quence, force and invective that the
irreconcilable quartet assembled. All
of which may prove that when ma
iority Of the United States Senate
has made up its mind on a given sub
ject, spellbinding Is Of small avail.
President Coolidge has definitely
adopted the policy of attending to his
executive knitting while Congress is
in session. He has told organizations
all over the country that as long as
House and Senate are transacting
business at the legislative end of Penn
sylvania avenue he considers 1t his
duty to be at the White House and
not galliva nttng up and down the
Republic making speeches. Mr.. Cool
idge loses no occasion, when making
known his stay-at-home program, to
indicate that 1t isn't because he wants
to bestride the congressional scene
that he dislikes leaving Washington
in midsession. Indeed, the President
at such times as the World Court
snarl in the Senate is ostentatiously
on the sidelines AS mere observer.
But he Is not a disinterested observer,
and that's why he believes his place
Is at the Capital from now until
further notice, instead Of at the ban
quet table hither and yon.
Floyd Gibbons. who is proba bly,
Americas most experienced war CORE
spondent of the era, Is a visitor to
Washington, in which fair city he first
saw the light OF day some 80 years
ago. After having reported our earli-
est brush with Mexico in 1914, Glib
bons campaigned with Villa in the
Mexican revolution. Then he accom-
panied Gen. Pershing on the American
punitive expedition into that country.
Almost everything that could happen
to a newspaper man in the World War
befell Gibbons. He was a passenger
on the steamship Laconia, which was
torpedoed and sunk 200 miles off the
Irish coast in February, 1917. Rescued
after 4 night in a small boat, he cabled
4 ,000-word account of the disaster
in which Americans lost lives. Later a
correspondent with the United States
Army, Gibbons was wounded at Cha
teau.Thierry, losing one eye. He Is now
editor of the European edition of the
Chicago Tribune and director of that
papers foreign service. One day this
week Gibbons lectured before the Off
GERS of the intelligence section of the
general staff on military conditions in
Europe.
Some near-sighted Westerners were
being conducted through the Senate
wing of the Capitol. BLESS my soul"
exclaimed a dear old lady who evil
IDENTIFY was from California, III there
isn't bust of Hiram Johnson What
she saw was the bust of the late James
). Sherman, who was Vice President
Of the United States In the Taft ad-
ministration. Shernan's bespectacled
countenance was usually SO wreathed
in smiles that he became known as
Sunny jim" But no one has ever
thought Of depicting the morose Hi
ram in anything but the guise of in
vincible solemnity. Sir John Foster
Fraser, the British journalist who once
looked down upon the Senate from