Evening star., 1935-10-11
WASHINGTON OBSERVATIONS
BY FREDERIC WJLLIAM VILE.

Abroad. especially in democratic coun-
tries like Great Britain and France,
government foreign policies are COM
monty accepted without criticism. Par
tisan politics ends at the waters edge.
That is notoriously not always so in the
United States. as the Senate fate of the
Versailles treaty and other international
pacts proves. For this reason the ad-
ministration in general and Secretary
Hull in particular are delighted over the
Nations practically unqualified accep-
ance Of the Roosevelt neutrality pro-
gram. Even Senator Borah purrs with
satisfaction. Barring a single protest
from an Italo-American quarter in New
York and the squawk Of a certain ex-
porting group on Manhattan Island
America seems to approve 100 per cent
of Washington'S determination to keep
Uncle Sam free and unentangled" in
the Afro o-European conflict, including
any complications that may flow from
League sanctions against Mussolini.
Apparently the White House and the
State Department can rely up to the hilt
on public support Of non-intervention.
unless vital American interests are di-
rectly and unmistakably involved. The
country is not so incorrigtbly anti-war
as to demand peace at any price, but
in the peoples present mood, the provo
cation for embodiment will have to be
very real-far more so than in 1917.
Protection for get-rich-quick business
will not answer that description.
Hugh S. Cumming. jr., chief admin
iStrative assistant to Secretary Hull, who
has just received watching brief at
the League of Nations in Geneva, gets
the assignment in the midst of honey
moon trip. Son and heir of the veteran
surgeon general of the Public Health
Service, Mr.. Cumming was married in
Washington on September 81 and left
for Europe few days later with his
bride He will cooperate with Consul
Gilbert in keeping tab on League efforts
to induce MusSolini and Halle Selassie
to kiss and make up. Mr.. Cumming,
v. NJ I. alumnus and University of Vir-
ginia law graduate, has had a wide
range Of experience at home and abroad,
though still young in the foreign service.
After serving in the Army in 1918, he
was purser on transatlantic liner, a
national park ranger, and then for three
years worked for international banking
firms in London, Bombay, Singapore and
Peking. He was Secretary Hull's per-
sonal lieutenant at the London Monetary
Conference and at the Pan-American
Conference in Montevideo.
X
Robert Lincoln O,Brien. chairman of
the United States Tariff Commission, is
back from a crosS-country trip through
the national parks, which he made at
the wheel of his own touring car. His
travelling companion was Albert w. At
wood, Washington representative Of the
Saturday Evening Post. They reeled on
the better part of 10000 miles. The
tariff chairman is convinced that the
only way to appreciate the grandeur
and magnitude of Uncle Sans wide
open spaces is to survey them from the
deck of the modern rubber-tired prairie
schooner.
Congress next Winter seems certain
to ring with renewed suggestions that
the United States enter the League. If
the editorial columns of his newspapers
are any criterion, Senator Carter Glass
may be found seconding such proposals.
The Lynchburg Advance, one of the Vir-
ginian'S papers, recently said: "As time
goes on it becomes increasingly clear
that the League of Nations lacks that
power which Is necessary to make 1t the
effective instrument for peace its advo-
Gates hoped 1t would be. 1t also be-
comes increasingly clear that the failure
of the United States to adhere to the
League is the principal reason why
Geneva lacks effectiveness. Great lip
service is done by citizens Of the United
States to the cause of peace, but as .
Government we have not shown much
willingness to make sacrifices to enforce
peAce.s a. s''e.'A'-' :. -. '.' - '-' :