Untitled

Hokitika Guardian, 17 May 1921, Page 2

Tnhni-: notes, according to the Washingtot' correspondent of the “Manchester Guardian,” were struck in “that city as the new administration got to work. The first is the note.of simplicity and accessibility. The Hardings are “homey” people. They set out to restore the good old-fashioned American ways—“the same,” one paper puts it “as mother used to make.” Hence the initial symbolic act of removing the policemen from, the harriers of the White House, and throwing open the gates, so that the people may not come near, hut may “peak in at tin* windows and see the President at work. It is easy, however, to exaggerate the importance of this kind of open door. Even Mr Wilson favoured it at the beginning. The White House, he declared, would he open to all—except office-seekers. The protective harrier had soon to he restored. The Wilsonian exception is not named by Mr Harding. In the circumstances it could not be. Eight long years in the wilderness have produced a multitude of deserving Republicans to be pro-

vided for, and the President, in bewilderment beyond his open door, will soon be ready with the Biblical cry of distress, “Who are these that fly. as a cloud, and as doves to our window?” The second note to be struck is that of bustle. The Republicans are resolved to let the country know that it has a Chief Executive once more. Mr Harding is described as going very early to his desk, restoring to the White House and the Capitol a sense of something doing. After all, a whole year and a half has gone by since Mr Wilson was struck down. And the third note is that of conference and confidence. The President is ready to consult almost anybody. He begins, as befits an exScnator, by inviting one-quarter of the Senate to dinner and starting them on a discussion of a few urgent questionssuch for example, as the peace resolution, taxation, and the tariff. Thy extraordinary difficulties confronting the new Administration are at once revealed. During the election it was nobody’s business within the victorious party, to emphasise the absolute contradictions on the international issue between Elilui Root, Henry Cabot Bodge, and Hiram Johnson: Since the election people have conspired to postpone the test of policy, until the Republicans were actually in the seat of authority. Now, as they address themselves to the task, the two tilings they are made to realise are first that certain decisions on questions of immense gravity must be reached at once, and secondly, that the party has returned to poweF—and to so vast a range of power!—without having received its own inner confusions or attained even so much as a small common measure of policy in respect to the world crisis.