The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1932-11-02
BY HARRY ELMER BARNES


BY HARRY ELMER BARNES
President Hoover's reference to
the attacks upon his career before
1914 in his Cleveland speech and
the appearance of Colonel Edwin
Emerson's interesting book, Hoo
yer and His Times" bring I'D in
timely and cogent fashion the whole
matter of Hoover's career in rela-
ton to his fitness for the presi-
dency.
. One of the worst features of our
presidential campaigns is the de-
plorable tendency to resort to scan
dal-mongering and to the interjec-
ton of irrelevant personal issues
designed to stir emotions, impede
cerebration and divert attention
from the real issues before the cleo
torate.
l shall be concerned here only
with the facts in regard to Mr..
Hoovers professional past which
have some real bearing upon his
preparation for the presidency.
The mud singing To and fro may
be left to those interested in such
recreation.
Should Be Major Problem
There certainly is nothing even
approaching mountaineering or
hitting below the belt" in exam
lining the career of a candidate for
presidency to discover his fitness for
this high Office. Indeed, this should
be one of the major problems and
activities in any presidential cam
paign.
The essential thing is to see to
it that the investigation is limited
to those items which really have
some direct and obvious bearing on
his preparation for public life and
on the claims made for him by his
friends.
Mr.. Hoover's activities before 1914
are most certainly an issue in this
campaign. To discover how a man
behaved when acting on his own
Initiative is the best possible path
to understanding his real ideals,
motives, and conduct.
When a man is performing for
the press gallery with his eye on
political plum, he is not likely to
reveal very much Of his real per-
Sonality. We need not go as far
in this case as the psychiatriSts,
who hold that the childhood of a
person is more important in giving
us insight into his career than the
remaining years of his life.
But it scarcely can be denied
that Hoover's life from Leland
Stanford to Belgium reveals the
true Hoover.
Shaped by 1914
His personality and ideals GER
tainly were fully shaped by 1914.
Had his professional past been
carefully examined before 1928, we
would have been spared much. We
would have expected less of Hoover
and would have been far less dis
illuSioned as result of his adj
ministration.
Probably the greatest mistake OF
the 1928 campaign, both in the Re-
publican primaries and in the party
struggle after nominations, was the
failure to look Searchingly into Hoo
ver's career, though relentleSSly
suppressing the temptation to I'M
cover an iota of personal scandal.
The Hoover myth was built
around certain specific assertions
relative to his career before 1920,
and especially before 1914. The es-
sential items we're: Cd that he
was an deliberately trained and high
ly competent mining engineer; CD
that his career prior to 1914 was
the record of a great technical ex-
pert in the mining field; 90 that
his life and work proved him to be
a devoted social engineer as we'll
that he was one of those promising
men interested in reconStructing So
ciety from the point of view of the
technician, rather than the capita
listic profit-seeker; a. that he was
pre- eminently a sensitive human
itarian, bowed beneath the trials
and sufferings of his fellow-men;
60 that he had unique talent and
preparation for the tasks and re-