BOOKS.
PRESIDENT WILSON.• PRESIDENT WILSON has long puzzled most English people. They wanted to know what he really thought about the war, and were by turns perplexed and annoyed at his reticence. Probably tho ancient Egyptians used covertly to throw stones at the Sphinx when the oracle remained exasperatingly silent in time of war or famine; and many unkind things wore said here about tho modern Sphinx of Washington at moments when the stress of our great struggle became almost intolerable. This impatience was natural enough in the circumstances, but it could have been tempered by reason. If his English critics had known more about President Wilson, they would have been more content to await his decision. If they had realized that his whole political career had proved him to be a strong man, firm of will, patient in face of obstacles but resolute in overcoming them, the doubters would have been less ready to despair of the President. The oracle has now spoken, the doubts are resolved, and all Englishmen are ready enough to agree that America has had no such President since Lincoln. But it is more important than ever that we should try to understand Mr. Wilson, now that he has brought the United States to the second great crisis in its history, and will guide its affairs for tho next four years. Mr. Wilson Harris's unpretentious record of his life and work is timely and valuable.
If there be anything in heredity, the fact that James 'Wilson and the Rev. Thomas Woodrow, Mr. Wilson's grandfathers, went from Ulster and from Scotland to America early in tho last century is worthy of note. The Ulstermen and the Scots are stubborn folk. Mr. Wilson's father was a Presbyterian minister, who hold a charge. at Staunton, Virginia—where his son, Thomas Woodrow Wilson, was born in December, 1856—and who afterwards lived in Georgia and South Carolina. The future President, after attending country schools, went up to Princeton in 1875, and graduated—last but one in the honours list—in 1879. He returned to Virginia to study law, and then for a year tried to find clients in Augusta, Georgia. As the clients did not appear, he began to teach and to write, with such success that in 1890 he was appointed Professor of Jurispru- dence and Politics at his old University of Princeton. Twelve years later he became its President, and at once showed that he was no ordinary man. In those days Princeton was rather like the unreformed Oxford of long ago. Wealthy young men wont there to have a good time. They lived in expensive clubs ; they did as much or as little work as they pleased. The Princeton inan, it has been said, was apt to devote the time he could spare from the neglect of his studies to his social advancement. As a place of education, Princeton was far behind the times, but its social tradition was vigorous and well supported by former graduates who had gone out into the world and made money which they showered on their University. Mr. Wilton, as an old student and Professor, was doubtless expected to continue the tradition. Instead of that, ho started a revolution as soon as he became President. Ho insisted that the Princeton men should work, ho restricted their liberty to choose their subjects, he gave them better teaching under what is called there the preceptorial " system. Those reforms were effected with no great difficulty, though Princeton men grumbled. But Mr. Wilson went on to attack their clubs, and to propose that the students, 'whether rich or poor, should live in common, as at Oxford or Cambridge. The trustees at first agreed, but, threatened by irate supporters with the loss of subscriptions, they changed their minds. The President had failed in his purpose, but he had won a great reputation outside Princeton for his advocacy of demo- cratic principles. He resigned his post in 1910 and accepted nomination as Democratic candidate for the Governorship of New Jersey, the State in which Princeton is situated.
His entrance into politics was the direct consequence of his display of courage and character as a University reformer. Tho New Jersey Democrats had been out of office for fourteen years. They saw no chance of winning an election unless they could find a really good candidate who was not identified in the public mind with their disreputable party machine. Mr. Wilson was just the man for them. He announced that he was opposed to the " boss " system, and that he stood for reform in administration, tho control of corporations, and the purifying of elections. Many independent voters took him at his word, and he was returned after a short campaign by a majority of nearly fifty thousand. The Democratic " boss," James Smith, had agreed not to stand as the party candidate for the Senate, in view of Mr. Wilson's disapproval. But when the Governor had been elected, Mr. Smith thought that he might, after all, take the Senatorship which rewards the successful " boss.". The Governor objected and held a series of meetings in the towns • President Wilson : his Problems and him Policy. By H. Wilson Harris. London: Headley Bros. [55. net] of the State, at which he denounced Mr. Smith for trying to thwart the will of the Democratic voters, who in their primary elections had chosen another icandidate. Tho result was an overwhelming defeat for the " boss " and his machine. The Governor then began to work out his reform programme, and by his direct personal appeals to tho better members of both parties in the Legislature he put an end to much of the corruption for which New Jersey used to be notorious. " The moment the forces in New Jersey that had resisted reform," he said later, " realized that the people were backing.new men who meant what they had said, they realized that they dare not resist them." Mr. Wilson held office for only two years, but his earnestness, his independence, and.his habit of dealing frankly with the people and trying to carry out their wishes made a tremendous impression on Democrats throughout America. Early in 1911 he was mentioned as a probable candidate for the Presidency, and his fame steadily grew. At the party Convention of 1912 he was nominated by New Jersey, and was adopted with the help of Mr. Bryan after a strenuous contest with the Speaker, Mr. Champ Clark. To an Englishman it seems almost incredible that a middle- aged politician of only two years' experience should be chosen as party candidate for the supremo office. But the Democrats were justified in their choice. As Mr. Roosevelt and his Progressives had split up the Republican Party, Mr. Wilson won an easy victory with six million votes against Mr. Roosevelt's four million and Mr. Taft's three million. Within three years the President of Princeton University had become President of the United States.
Since Mr. Wilson took office in March, 1913, he has been a con- stant object of interest to Europe, first in regard to Mexico, and then in connexion with the war. But his methods cannot be fully understood unless one studies his domestic policy, and the groat merit of this book is that it provides an intelligent summary of the measures whicb Mr. Wilson has caused Congress to adopt. He defied the conventions at the very start by making his Inaugural Speech to the two Houses, instead of sending them a written Message, as every President had done since the days of Jefferson. He called -upon Congress to reform the tariff, abolishing " everything that bears oven the semblance of privilege or of any kind of artificial advantage " ; and when the manufacturing interests in the Senate tried to amend the scheme for the benefit of this or that industry, he intervened with so sharp a public protest that the Tariff Bill was passed almost unaltered. Next, he asked Congress to put the currency on a sound basis by setting up Federal Reserve Banks with a central Board, and, despite the opposition of the bankers and of many cautious politicians, he again had his way. He went on to deal with the Trusts, whose powers had increased to an alarm- ing extent through the system of " interlocking directorships," so that, for example, the directors of tho Steel Trust controlled more than half the railways in America, and one great financial house held thirty important directorships in railway, telegraph, and industrial companies. The establishment of a Federal Trade Commission to inquire into the Trusts and control their operations was the main outcome of the President's proposals. The Trusts found it useless to fight a President who laid his programme before the nation, and asked the electors to make it clear to the Senators and Representatives that they approved of Mr. Wilson's schemes. Before and during the war he has also secured several important measures dealing with Labour. By direct personal intervention he induced Congress to exempt Trade Unions from the veto on " combinations in restraint of trade," so that a strike could not be stopped by a mere injunction of the Courts ; and he also obtained an Act severely restricting child labour, which had for too long been a disgrace to industrial America. Last summer, when he had to face the threat of a national railway strike for an eight-hour day, ho caused Congress to pass in three days an emer- gency measure granting the strikers' demands, but providing that in ease of need the railways should be put under military control. Whatever the merits of the case may have been, the President's prompt and vigorous action showed that ho has the capacity for leadership in a crisis. It is not surprising that with such a domestic record Mr. Wilson should have been re-elected last November, with a triumphant majority of half-a-million votes, though New England and the Middle West were against him. The nine million votes cast for Mr. Wilson attested the confidence which he inspires in the average American elector, and gave him full authority to continue his work.
We cannot discuss here Mr. Wilson's Mexican policy—governed always by his desire to cultivate good relations with Latin America as a whole—or his attitude towards the war. The author summar- izes the story very well, and ends at the severance of relations with Germany on February 2nd. He also gives in an appendix Mr. Wilson's second Inaugural Speech, which, as all now see, pointed unmistakably to the imminent war. We have laid stress on the President's firm and capable administration of domestic affairs, and on his evident skill in interpreting the trend of opinion through., out the -United States, because the facts show that he is an ally ' whom we can trust. When he was neutral, he maintained a rigorous, neutrality, regardless of criticism. Now that he-has come into tho. war, he wilt persevere in it to the end. The American people stands behind Mr. Wilson, and will follow him untwistionin,gly, as it has followed none since Washington. With the help of America under such a President, we can feel perfectly secure as to the issue of the war, though the end is not in sight.
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