Evening Post. TUESDAY, MARCH 17, 1925. SENATE AND PRESIDENT

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 63, 17 March 1925, Page 4

Evening Post. TUESDAY, MARCH 17, 1925. SENATE AND PRESIDENT

The strong," silent man of American politics, the man who never thinks in a hurry but rarely fails to think right if you give him time, the man whose "calm, judicial ways" duly megaphoned and broadcasted about the country procured him a clear majority of more than six million votes in November last, has blundered badly at the very outset. Through the neglect of an elementary precaution which the plain 'horse-sense of ninety-nine ordinary men out of a hundred would have prevented them from missing, President Coolidge has run into trouble which has already involved him in deep embarrassment and humiliation. And after making this blunder and taking ample time to think it over he is now seeking to retrieve it by tactics which have seriously aggravated the trouble and threaten a war between the Senate and the President which, we are told, "spells virtually no legislation for the next two years." Mr. Coolidge has made much the same mistake which brought Woodrow Wilson to grief, though in a field where even Wilson's autocracy was circumspect enough to avoid trouble. Two of the matters in which the great powers entrusted to the President are limited are the making, of treaties and the making of appointments, In each 'of these eases he can only act "with the advice and consent of the Senate." President Wilson committed the grievous blunder of making the negotiation of the Versailles Treaty a party affair and to a large extent a personal affair, thereby wrecking not merely the Treaty but his party and himself in a, conflict with the Senate which a little management could easily have avoided. An infinitely smaller matter has enabled President Coolidge to provide the jealousy 'of the Senate with a grievance which has suddenly changed the face .of American politics and given the Democrats a greater advantage than they were able to derive from the colossal oil scandals of a year ago. Though the Senate had-not challenged the President's right to select his own Ministers except during its angry feud with President Johnson which was an exception to every rule, the power of veto which the law had placed in its hands, made it nevertheless a rule of courtesy, common-sense, and convenience for the President to consult the leaders of the Senate regarding all these appointments. By violating this wholesome precedent Mr. Coolidge has got himself into an unprecedented mess. President Wilson's mistake was that by failing to consult the leaders of the other side he imperilled and ultimately wrecked a great national undertaking in a bitter party fight.; President Coolidge has committed the far less pardonable blunder of failing to consult even his own people. Whether approving or disapproving, all the Washington correspondents seem to be agreed about is that "Calvin Coolidge has made a long start toward being President of the United States in his own right," said the correspondent of the "New York Herald-Tribune." The Washington correspondent of the "Cleveland Plain-Dealer" contained a similar diagnosis :—

Mr. Coolidge apparently is undertaking that his development aa President in his own right shall be a reversion to the executive type of Cleveland, Roosevelt, and Wilson. But we doubt very much whether in this particular department any of these strong men ignored not merely the bosses of their parties but their own most intimate friends so completely as Mr. Coolidge has done, and certainly Wilson alone did it so disastrously.

It seems that even the President's principal political confidant, Senator William M. Butler, of Massachusetts, knew no more about the two most important appointments made in January than the man in the street until he read them in the place where the man in the street gets most of his information.

Mr. Butler, wrote the Washington correspondent of the "Detroit News," expressed the utmost amazement when he was told after noon Saturday that the Warren appointment would come to the benate that same day, and ho was equally surprised when the announcement of the retirement of Charles Evans Hughes and the appointment of Mr. Kellogg as his successor came from the White House an hour after the Warren appointment had been sent to the Capitol.

To treat even his best friend in ion was to court trouble, and, whether the appointments are intrinsically good or bad, it is difficult to refrain from adding that the President has got no more of it thau he deserves.

To say this is not to imply that the political patronage of the boss and the machine should have been allowed full sway. Mr. Roosevelt us Pi'Dsidoiit ami Mr. Hughes ns Govei'uai 1 of New York Sfctite dc-

fied these influences, but without risking the isolation which has landed Mr. Coolidge in the present impasse. It must, of course, be recognised that his trouble is due in part to an entirely laudable independence of influences of this kind. He has ignored both machine politics and geography in making these appointments.

Incidentally, writes the Washington correspondent of the "New York HeraldTribune/ Mr. Kellogg owes nothing to anyone except Calvin Coolidge for his appointment. Neither does Charles B. Warren. The Minnesota Republican organisation was not consulted about Mr. Kellogg's appointment. The Michigan organisation actively worked for the appointment of Governor Groesbeck for Attorney-General. So that the entire loyalty of both will be to the President. They will be Coolidge men and nothing else to a degree most unusual in the history of Cabinet appointment. Unfortunately the President desired them both to be such thorough Coolidge men that one of them is likely to miss his appointment altogether. And ■ now the President has added fuel to the flames by foolishly threatening to make the appointment during the recess—in which case he would avoid the Senate's veto, but the appointment would lapse at the end of the following session. The blocking by the President of the Senate's measures, and vice versa, is gravely spoken of, and some specially frenzied Senators may even be driven to advocate the impeachment of the President! "Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth!"