Evening star., 1937-03-15
WASHINGTON OBSERVATIONS
BY FREDERIC WILLIAM VILE.

comes many weeks hence, may be
transformed into safe, if slender, ma
jority. For the moment the opposition
seems more concerned with organizing
delay than in mobilizing votes. Its
leaders are certain they can put off
final action for two months. They do
not abandon hope of preventing it
altogether at this session. The air con-
tinues thick with talk of compromise
on terms that will enable many a
statesman now on the fence or even in
opposition to get aboard the Roosevelt
bandwagon. Assurance of administra-
ton enmity in certain Democratic re-
election primaries is also relied upon
to have its effect.
Friends and foes acclaim Assistant
Attorney General Robert H. Jacksons
argument before the Ashurst committee
as by long odds the best plea so far
to come from any quarter. Here and
there it's even suggested that the young
upstate New York lawyer made out
more convincing case for the plan than
his White House boss himself. From
the outset Mr.. Jackson has figured in
the front rank of possibilities for one
of the new high court justiceships-if
and when Some think his ambitions
run preferably in the direction of the
governorShip of New York, with an eye
to the 1888 Democratic nomination.
Jacksons hometown background in
jamestown, N. Y. is not confined to the
law. He has been a bank director and
utility official including association with
street railway and telephone companies.
He's no novice in the field of judiciary
reform, either, having served on the
New York State commission to investi-
gate the administra ton of Justice Jack
sons chief rival for gubernatorial honors
is John j. Bennett, jr., who is serving
his fourth term as attorney general
at Albany.
Ambassador William E. Dodd, who
presented the United States protest
against anti-American excesses in the
Nan press, enjoys high repute with the
German government, which has found
him a particularly fortnight type of
diplomat. The Germans hold him in
special regard because of his scholarly
attainments and possibly also because
he did his postgraduate work at one
of their niversities-Leipzig-w he
took his Phi. D. in 1900 with a thesis
written in German entitled "Jefferson's
Return to Politics" A former president
of the American Historical Association,
DR.. Dodd has to his credit biographical
works on Jefferson Davis, Woodrow
Wilson, Abraham Lincoln and Robert E.
Lee. He is also joint author of history
of the United States and translator of
one of Germany's own standard volumes
-Lamprecht's What Is History?"
In book just off the press, Dusk of
Empire" by Wythe Williams well-known
American foreign correspondent, there's
the diverting suggestion that President
Roosevelt might go to Europe this Sum-
mer to survey the menacing interna-
tional situation on the spot in confer
ence with transatlantic statesmen Mr.
Williams, recalling that F.. D. r. loves
the sea, believes he might relish the
opportunity of an ocean crossing for
peace talk on the other side, instead of
convening round table in Washington,
as previously suggested. Stockholm, as
neutral capital, has been considered,
Mr.. Williams says, as the ideal place
for an overseas pOW-WoW on war pre-
vention. Keen student of European af-
fairs for twenty-five years, Williams
fears war may come any time after
Easter. He thinks a Nad attack on
Czechoslovakia may be the spark to
ignite the powder barrel.
Copyright, 1879