The Wilmington morning star., 1946-11-18
MORE ABOUT
LIPPMANN
FROM PAGE ONE

much more than their stomachs
and their pocket books, and no
party can win their confidence,
and hold it, which does not cher
ish the American cause and does
not speak to their souls.
The revival of the Republican
party will, if it is successful, pro-
duce quite different results than
many today anticipate. For more
than thirty years, ever since the
political roles of the two parties
have been reserved. The Repub-
licans, who had from Washington
and Hamilton through Lincoln to
Theodore Roosevelt been the fed
eral party, the advocates of a
strong government acting posi-
lively. became in u generation
the advocates Of an isolationist
and negative conduct of govern
ment. The Democrats, by tradition
anti-federalist and ~laissez-faire,
became under Wilson and Frank
lin D. Roosevelt a federalist party
prepared to recognize that the
United States is a world power.
This reversal of roles is not nee
essarily final. 1t was in a sense an
accident that the Democratic
party was in power during the two
world vars. Had the Republicans
been in power, they would GER
tainly have defended the vital il
terests of the country as strongly
as did the Democrats. For the Re
publican tradition is not more iso-
lationist than the Democratic. and
men like Mr.. Stimson, Mr.. Austin,
and Mr.. John Foster Dulles are
not exceptions but are in the main
line of Republicanism.
Nor is it true that the Repub-
lican party is in principle or by
fixed habia a negative party Of
laissez-faire and let her rip. The
best and oldest Republican doc
trine has been since the days Of
Hamilton that the federal govern
meat has positive functions to per
form in promoting. the prosperity
and maintaining the stability Of
the national economy.
The system of free enterprise
has never meant, except to those
who ignorantly or for selfish rea'
sons misunderstanded it, a genera.
license to private interests in the
presence of a helpless nationa
government. This view is not Re
publicanism but a kind of nihilism,
which would have Mortified Alex
ander, Hamilton - or Theodore
Roosevelt. For a free economy is
not a natural order Of things which
would flourish if government dis.
appeared or we're reduced to i'm
potence. On the contrary, it il
necessary to have strong govern
ment and firm laws and a contin'
ual and progressive program Of
public action to establish a free
economy and make it work.
It could happen, of course, that
the Republicans, as they come into
power, will be unable to return tc
their best traditions and their real
principles, that they will be struck
with the ideas and prejudices o1
their recent past. But this need
not happen, and moreover, it will
not happen if. as seems not un.
likely now, the ADLER men of the
new generation join the Republi-
can party.
Their predecessors joined the
Democratic party in 1882, and this
was the reason above all others
why the Democratic party, in spite
of its inner contradictions ano
confusions, was for so long the
instrument of national action.
The natural place for the ADLER
men of the new generation to go is
at this. time into the Republican
party. If the doors r opened te
them, they will go there, and the
Republican party will be for the
next period of time the instrument
of national action.
Copyright, 1916, New4York Tribune Inc