The times-news., 1937-12-29
NEWTON D. BAKER

In the opinion of the commentators, the
late Newton D. Baker was one of the great
est lawyers this country has produced and
he had many splendid traits of character
and talents as a private citizen and public
official which stamped him rs one of the
finest Americans of his day and generation.
One of the most thoughtful and impressive
tributes to the deceased Secretary of War
has been written by Walter Lippman, from
which we quote several paragraphs:
"At no matter what cost to himself in the way
of personal popularity ne was always uncompro-
misingly true to his understanding Of the prin-
cipeS which must govern the relations between an
army and the civsian authorities. With unerring
lucidity of mind he made his great decisions with
full knowledge of what was the business of the
secretary and what was the business of the gen.
eral staff and Of the commander in the field. He
kept the distinction clear in all matters and at all
times, in executing conscription, in his selection
of Pcrshing in his dealings with Colonel Theodore
Roosevelt and General Wood. in the relations with
the Allies. He was always simple, always lucid, al
ways definite. and never undecided after he had
made his decision
THAT made him a great administrator. and the
nous on that point But he was more than great
administrator. Because he had such thorough grasp
of the place of an army in u democratic state he
was able to raise the largest army in history
and then to demobze il without fastening upon
the nation the curse of mitarism. 1t might easily
have been otherwise For almost always in history
a victorious army comes home to conquer its own
people; the army of Wilson and Baker quickly
dissolved however, in the civilian population from
which it had been drawn.
THAT this happened was due principally to Mr..
Bakers iron resolution taken at the very begin
ming, that it should happen. Often l heard him
say, even at the most critical moments of the
struggle, that he the civilian head of the army,
and that he would not forget that after thes war
there would again be peace. He knew very well
that it is dangerous for democracy to go to war
because in winning victory it may so easily lose
its own soul. The great good fortune of this coun-
try was that Mr.. Baker understood this clearly.
And so, if his army did not make the world safe
for democracy, it did in any event do nothing to
make this country unsafe for democracy.
Mr. Baker. it always seemed to me, had the
exceptional strength of an almost Selfless man. |
do not know of any public man in our time who
rose TO such heights of power with so little per-
Sonal ambition, or gave up power so easily and
with so lttle personal regret. Tie nau lHuny eHe-
mics but he himself was almost without ennlity.
He was one of the kndest, most considerate, and
magnanimouS human beings of time He had
no vanity, no resentments, and no sense, think,
that he had been called to high place at n great
moment in history and that he had the chance to
carve our for himself memorable career and
resounding reputation. He seemed rather, to take
a certain satisfaction in the notion that he, who
had to send men to the trenches to face mutilation
and death, should not, in his place of physical
safety, be enjoying the triumphs of his power.
81 have always thought too, and from stray re-
marks which have heard him make in later years
feel sure am right, that the real reason he re-
tired from public life, though he was obviously
the heir of Wilson and for long the first Democrat
in the land was that ne could not bear the thought
of making personal capital out of his career in
the war In 1882 when he came to the
nomination for the presidency he was almost per-
versely unhelpful to his enthusiastic friends. For
in the depths of his spirit there humility
about the terror of the and pity about the
sacrifices Of the men who had gone to France
which made him feel, believe, that he could ex-
plot no part of it, and that to do anything which
brought him profit and glory from it would be
unseemly. ...
'We shall not often man of his quality,
and those who had the privilege of working for
him loved him and will think of him as one of the
most unworldly men who ever in our time played
so great part in the world