MR HARDING FACES HIS TRIAL.

Dunstan Times, Issue 3144, 20 November 1922, Page 7

MR HARDING FACES HIS TRIAL.

(By J. W. T. Mason).

/ , . The campaign is now 'beginning to get under way for the November elections, when a new House of Representatives and one-third of the membership of the Senate will be chosen by the people. The elections will be the first test of national opinion since Mr Harding became President. It is generally believed that the Republicans will suffer large reverses, but hardly of sufficient ' magnitude to put the Democrats back into power in the two houses of Congress. There is general disgust with the inability of the national legislators to deal with the coal and railway strikes. Extravagance is charged against Congress, and the increased tariff rates which Congress is putting into operation are believed by the public at large to have been dictated by private plutocratic interests. But this reaction against Congress l is nothing new. Whatever party is in power has to stand 1 the brunt of criticism caused by the 1 low calibre of the men who go into politics. The record of the present Congress is so poor that the Democrats ought to l look forward to a sweeping victory. Experience has shown that the party in opposition is neither better nor worse than the party in )lower. But if the Democrats are returned again, there is no guarantee times will be any better. So it seems the revolt against the Republicans, white certain to be widespread, will probably not be Sufficiently extensive to hand the country back to the. Democrats. President Harding does not share m the unpopularity of Congress. He has made few enemies during his term, thus far. He has done nothing startling, positively or negatively. When he has spoken ho has expressed the ordinary, commonplace view of the ordinary, commonplace person, and this fact has put him on a ’companionship level with the average voter. Mr Harding’s salvation is his Jack of intellectual brilliance. In a crisis he doesn’t know what to d<j. That means he does nothing, and lets nature take its course. Therefore, Mr Harding’s ways of thinking are well understood by the* mass of men. Nobody lies awake at nights wondering .what sort of a startler the President intends to spring on the nation the next day. It is generally known that under President Harding the next day will be pretty much like to-day and yesterday. Mr Harding, having gone from tin Senate to the Presidency, realises the. prerogatives of Congress as the legislative branch of the national GovernHe not only realises it, but he encourages it. Consequently, as they say in America, Congress has become the “goat.” The President is ready to administer the law when Congress makes the entry in the Statute Books. He stands waiting, hut the laws do not come. So the blame goes to Congress, and! Air Harding can look forward to the November elections, knowing that though they may go against his party, the nation will not mean to punish