WARREN HARDING

Evening Post, Volume CIV, Issue 7, 8 July 1922, Page 4

WARREN HARDING

THE PRESIDENT IN, HIS OFFICE LORD NORTHCLIFFE'S IMPRESSION. An interesting personal impression of President Harding is contributed to The Times by Viscount Northcliffe. The circular room at the Executive, Offices of the White House, where President Harding receives visitors,; is spacious, lofty, and almost cool, he writes. The simple and tasteful decorations, like the few pieces of-furniture,' are in keeping with its dimensions; but the impiession of harmonious largeness iliey give is effaced by the impression of human largeness made by the President's own personality. Once before, as he kindly, reminded me, I had met Mr. Harding, and I clearly remember his finely proportioned and handsome figure. Well over six feet in height, broad-shouldered, with a torso like that of a Greek athlete, vsgular aquiline features, square- jaw, sil_ll hands and feet, and the ease of strength in his movements, he is probably the most physically attractive man in the long list of Presidential residents at the White House. His tropical white suit suits him admirably. There is no pose, no affectation of simplicity, for'he is simple without affectation. '! He is conscious of tho great power and dignity of his position; but wears that consciousness as though he had been trained from youth to bear the mighty burden that lies on his shoulders to-day.

On- his desk, lay a copy of a newspaper, the 'Marion Star, with the simple slip address iiised by American newspapers that are sent through tjhe post. President Harding is probably | prouder of that newspaper than of anything else he has done, for he made it, and, in making it, learned the ways of liu-nan kind. No man can achieve the difficult task of creating a successful daily newspaper without finding out a great deal about human nature, with its strength and its weaknesses, its good sides and its bad, and, above all, the redeeming virtue of simple kindliness and commonsense in all human affairs.

I could not help thinking, as he spoke of his early life, his studies of the law, his work as■ an insurance writer, and, finally, as a journalist and newspaper proprietor, how singuarly this training had fitted him for his present task. There was almost a wistful note in his voice when he described how the thing that had given him most pleasure in life, a pleasure; that never stales, is. to stand in the mechanical department iduring tho last. hour before the paper goes.to press. The rush and the emotion of "'making up " the last page, of doing the work, or seeing that it is done, swiftly and well, the sense of triumph that is born when a well " made " page is ready for the foundry, and the pride of achievement as the presses begin to hum and the first copies are sped on their way to the distributing centres'; "It is characteristic of the man that ho has made of his newspaper a co-opera-tive undertaking, in which editors, managers, and the heads of the mechanical departments are shareholders, taking their proportion of the profits in addition to their salaries. "Sometimes," said the President, " I think they do better

when lam not there. They work splendidly as a team, and are all proud of their work." j , We passed for a moment into tho Cabinet-room, an unpretentious, businesslike chamber, where the President meets the members of his Administration in council, each of whom sits according to the seniority of the Department he represents. The President is naturally in the chair, but' opposite him at the other end of tho table sits the VicePresident—an innovation which Mr. Harding, and others with him, regard as eminently proper and useful. The United States Cabinet does not possess executive power. That is vested in the President. It is rather a council for tho exchange of ideas upon current administrative problems. President Harding loves to hear the views of others, and he gives them fullest consideration before deciding upon the course for which the responsibility is his alone. - It was delightful to hear him praise tho abilities of the distinguished men who assist him. Could they have heard what the President said of them, they would surely have felt, that they had in him not only a chief, but an affectionate friend.

I may be wrong, but I have one very definite impression, after being privileged to spend one hour and a-half in President Harding's genial company. I think he is very definitely his own,master, and. not " the man " of any section or coterie. The broad, good-humoured patience which ho displays towards everything and everybody, as' though to leave ample room for it and them to be presented to his mind in the most favourable aspect; the ready wit with which he laughs at himself and underlines the comical side of events; but, above all, the broad common-sense that comes out in the expression of his definite opinions, combine to convey a notion that here is a man who will quietly make up his mind without undue yielding to any influence, and that, when his mind is made up, it will be found somewhere very near a common-sense centre of gravity. I came away from the White House not only pleased—any man would have been pleased after so kind a reception— bnt comforted, because I felt that the destinies of the American people and the influence which' their action must have upon the welfare of the world could not be safer than in the hands of this big-limbed, well-built, and straightforward son of Ohio, whom the suffrages of ah overwhelming majority of his fellow-citizens have placed in the. chair of Lincoln.

, Lord Beaverbrook began life in a small way, for he assured the London District Council of the National Federation of Retail News Agents, Booksellers, and Stationers that he entered the newspaper business as a newspaper boy with a parcel. The first cent he ever made in his life he made out of; selling newspapers in Newcastle, New . Brunswick. j Eventually he became a newspaper publisher, and published a little paper called The Leader. He was the editor, publisher, and the printer. He set up the type. He could go back to the "case" at any time if it were not for those new-fangled machines. He also | ran the press, but he did not pull a lever to start it. He turned it with a handle.