The Dominion TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1924. A GREAT AMERICAN

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 113, 5 February 1924, Page 6

The Dominion TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 1924. A GREAT AMERICAN

In ex-President Wilson, whose death is reported to-day, the world has lost one who strove valiantly, though unsuccessfully to lead his country into ways of international co-operation and establish the peace of the world on firm foundations. His efforts to these ends are perhaps best summed up as those of a pioneer who pursued the ideals of which he had a clear vision with little regard to the methods by which they might be approached. One of his critics has said that Mr. Wilson went to the Paris Peace Conference with “a prestige and a moral influence throughout the world unequalled in history,” but with “no plan, no scheme, no constructive ideas whatever for clothing with the flesh of life the commandments which he had thundered from the White House.” There is no doubt an element of truth is these strictures. Undoubtedly there is truth in the charge that, as President, Mr. Wilson carried personal rule to an extreme, and that in conducting the peace negotiations he rebuffdtl and antagonised many whose co-operation he might advantageously have enlisted. In Europe it was speedily decided that President Wilson was no diplomatist. In America he showed in the culminating struggle of his career no command of the arts that conduce to political success. In stating that Mr. Wilson trusted nobody but himself, the London Times goes to an extreme. It appears to be true, however, that the ex-President was inclined to rely as little as possible on any other efforts than his own, and that this in itself contributed heavily to the defeat of his attempt to lead America into the League of Nations. When all is said, however, the ex-President must be rated as one who was ahead of his time, and nowhere more* conspicuously than in his own country. Thero is much to be said of his shortcomings as a practical man of affairs, but it can hardly be doubted that with America, in the League of Nations, the peace of the world would be more secure, and the outlook for humanity would be of better promise than it is to-day. As a man, the ex-President was never more admirable than in his days of broken health and political defeat. With no hint of whimpering or complaint, he upheld uncompromisingly the policy he laid down as President, and in his infrequent public utterances never failed to reiterate a belief that America “will some day put away materialism and step out beyond her borders to share the burdens of the world.” Against the assertion of the London Times that Mr. Wilson came in the end to represent nobody but himself, may be set the view expressed not long ago by the Washington correspondent of the same newspaper. Mr Wilson (the correspondent wrote) has not changed, and it is perhaps this fact which is turning the minds of an increasing number of his countrymen towards him. In the year of the amazing. election or 1920 he was hated as no American of our time has been hated. . . . To-day the heat and the bitterness have died down, save in the. hearts ot a few. The rehabilitation of Woodrow Wilson in the esteem of his countrymen has gone on imperceptibly bu t surely, in the last thirty months, until to-day he wields an influence which only the most passionate of his disciples could have believed possibl e when he left office. His is no longer a name to frighten Republican children with, and in the Democratic Partv he has power sufficient, not to name a (Presidential) candidate of his own choosing, but immensely to weaken the chances of the man he should oppose. In the reviving esteem with which Mr. Wilson was regarded by his countrymen in his latter days optimists may find some presage of a gradual broadening in national outlook which ultimately will enable America to play a helpful part in world affairs. Time and events may yet justify the prediction of the British Prime Minister (Mr. Ramsay MacDonald) that ex-President Wilson will be recognised as one of the world’s greatest pioneers.