Meetings in America.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 23 October 1912, Page 3

Meetings in America.

TILE PRKSI DENTAL CAMPAIGN

(Bv a correspondent to tho limes)

From now ""wards till election day, with ft partial intermission <!"•- 'ins'the hot weather, the American Presidential campaign begins to go full blast. In tactics and strategy, in organisation .and methods, t is remarkably unlike a general election in Great Britain. ' 11,vo nothing at all resembling the American system of nominating candidates: our parties do not assemble in conventions and formulate platforms" that are held 1«> be binding on each and all of their members: we are far behind the Americans in the technique of electioneering. There is. however, one weapon offence which is common to the campaign of 'both nations the mass meeting. Here, again, the advantages of size and of superior organisation is with the Americans. Audiences of from 20.000 to 30.000 people are nothing out of the way. specially erectcd buildings are often run up for their accommodation, and the speaker of the evening, d he is a real "spellbinder," is not unlikely to receive for his effort as high a fee as "lOOOdol. WOMEN AND POLITICS. An English spectator at such a gathering noles at once the comparative paucity dential election women play a much less siguilicant. and effective part- than in our own political campaigns. There is notliiii" in the United States that corresponds to the Primrose League, just as there is nothing that cor responds to the Carlton or National Liberal Club: and the social earthquake that accompanies a general election in Great Britain is unknown in America, where politics and society, to the loss of both, aie all hut wholly unconnected. American women have, it is true, appealed as dulv accredited delegates to the National Convention: the Prohibitionists not merely countenance, hut welcome tlieir co-operation: in the anti-slavery agitation of tlie fifties they took an honourable and stimulating part, and of bite years they have shown an increasing desire to intervene in municipal elections in opposition to tlie regular parties and on helmlf of the independent candidate. Tint as a sex they stand almost .altogether aloof from active participation in national politics. They rarely appear on tlie platform as spectators, and still more rarely on tlie stump as speakers: and no party has yet discovered their immense usefulness and devotion as canvassers. VAR-CIUES AND CAT-CALLS. In other ways, however, the preliminaries of a political meeting in the States are considerably more entertaining than in .England. Most arresting of <dl are the great national cries and counter cries. A man gets up, wlien the spirit moves hi in. and veils. "Wliat'.s the matter with ■Roosevelt?" or whoever may happen to be his political deity. Hack conies the answer from the 20.000 long and slow-drawn, emphasising the first word ;mrt rising slightly on the last. "He's all right!'' Then a pause, and "Who's all right demands the man. "Roosevelt!" .shriek the 20.000. backing their opinion wtili volleys of cheers. Or perhaps someone with volleys of cheers the time-honoured conundrum. "'Who was George Washington r" This is the signal for an immense stamping of feet, over which surges the brisk, unanimous response like 20.000 drums beating marching time. "-.First in war. first in peace, first in the hearts of his countrymen." These cat-calls are very American in more ways than one. •They are trivial to tlie point of puerility: yet they are exceedingly effective, and they show the orderliness and good-humour of the American people in allowing the questioi to be put and the answer given with out interruption.

After an hour or so of these exercises the audience bus worked itself up into a state of expectation that on uninitiated Englishman would regard «s the forerunner el an exciting, if not a turbulent, meetitm. But the sefjuel would ver.v rarely sr|U<irc with his anticipations

It is not that the audience has exhausted its energies. The cheering and. hy the by, those who have not heard Americans cheer do not know what cheering is—anil the fia;j; waving, and the vocal outburst continue to the very end. But when once iii meeting has been formally opened, and the set. speeches are in

process of delivery, the custom ol public lil'e in America ordains that they should be listened to without open dissent. -lust when an English audience wakes up to its duty

of making things hum. and insists on winy active share in the proceedings at which is is assisting, an American audience lapses into an attitude not unlike that of spectators nt a play. They are there to witness an entertainment, not to take part in one. Tt is for the man on the platform to speak, and for them to listen.