Evening star., 1936-05-24
:FMERCILESS CRITIC" SEEN
NEEDED BY PRESIDENT
Sullivan Quotes Characterization by
"Friendly" Writers to Point Impor-
tance of Check ON Roosevelt.


the most cunning of politicians.
That Mr.. Roosevelt has tempera-
ment which needs checks from out
side himself is clear. And 1t Is
detrinent. to Mr.. Roosevelt and to the
county. that for long time, since
Howe became i'll. there is no one
within the Presidents circle Of fanlil.
lar intimates who supplies the re-
straint he needs. In the lack of crit
les or checks within the Presidents
circle, 1t is perhaps fortunate that
there is newspaper press, and also
the Supreme Court. But the Supreme
Court cannot be wholly satisfactory
as check to the Presidents impulses.
For the court can only act after the
presidential impulse has been trans
lated into presidential action.
One of the most vivid brief char
acteriZations of a part of Mr.. Roose-
velt's personality was in a recent ar
ticle by Dorothy Thompson, printed
soon after the Presidents Baltimore
speech addressed to youth. The char
acterization is written with insight
and sympathy:
More than any political spokesman
in the United States, the President
has the power to create vision, to
give form to a dream. More than any
political spokesman, he has the al
venturouSness to envisage future,
where 'alabaster cities gleam IN
dimmed by human tears Now.
as in 1882, his greatest single political
asset is inspiration And he indicated
at Baltimore that in 1886. as in 1882,
he will ride forth gallantly under the
banner: With Faith Toward the
Future. There is political percipience
in this. For one thing it diverts at
tention from good many unholy
messes in Washington. -" In hitching
the wagon of state to a clear blue
star he keeps all eyes in a convenient
directiou But there is something
more in it than this. The President
is modern man, by which I mean
that he genuinely and instinctively
feels the spirit of the times. - He
has very considerable intuition. an
almost seismographic sensibility to
tendencies of thought, and more i'm
portantly, to tendencies Of emotion,
and this gives him an evangelical
quality. 1t is not the quality of the
intellectual, for the President is not
an intellectual 1t is the quality of
the artist And it is a quality very
hard to beat"
Quality Held Dangerous.
Yes, a quality very hard to beat in
a presidential candidate-but a quail
ity very dangerous in President.
use the word dangerous" deliberately.
For some of the qualities that make
Mr. Roosevelt charming as man
certainly charming to many persons
and to most of the country as whole
those very qualities make him ques-
tionable as head of state, in a role
where stability, surefootedness and de-
liberation are important. A President
should have a clear fundamental pat
tern of fixed principles, dependable
code of permanent convictions.
The qualities that stand out in Mr..
Roosevelt, as seen by sympathetic
writer's, include zest for what is novel,
for the new just because it is new"
as seen by Mr.. Raymond Moley. An
other is boyishness. Another, kin to
boyishness, is the quality brought out
by Dorothy Thompson, the quality of
artist, of actor Yet another is the
quality Dorothy Thompson expresses
in these words: Intuition, an almost
seismographic sensibility to tendencies
of thought, and more Importantly, to
tendencies of emotion"
That last mentioned quality is what
the common man knows as "chame-
leon'-though I hesitate to use word
which has taken on family un-
pleasant connotation. AS automati-
cally as mirror, Mr.. Roosevelt
senses" and reflects the emotions OF
those with whom he comes in contact,
whether an individual, a group, or
the. whole nation. He takes on the
color of his surroundings. He senses
what others feel. and he says the thing
the situation calls for. 1t is kind of
exalted tact, a glorified agreeableness.
1t explains why two men with directly
contrary feelings about subject, call
ing separately at the White House, go
away each thinking Mr.. Roosevelt
agrees with him. 1t explains Mr.. Ar
thur Krocks observation, that Mr..
Roosevelt has an extraordinary trait
of creating an impression without
making a commitment" 1t explains
the contradiction of many of the Pres
ident's public utterances, the so-called
broken campaign promises. If Mr..
Roosevelt said certain things during
the 1882 campaign, those were the
things the public mood at the time
called for. If in the presidency he
said and did things quite different,
those were the things that changed
public mood called for. If the
present American mood should turn
conservative, Mr.. Roosevelt might
reflect that new national mood to
degree that would make the
United States Chamber of Com
merce seem radical. The trouble is
that Mr.. Roosevelts own zest for the
novel, coupled with the appeal of his
personality, tends to keep the public
in the same mood az himself.