AMERICA'S NEW PRESIDENT

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15265, 1 April 1913, Page 9

AMERICA'S NEW PRESIDENT

DIFFICULTIES TO BE FACED. MANY ROCKS AHEAD. '■■ .."/'■. [FROM OUR OWN" COttRKSrONpEKX.] .' ' ' ' t San Fn.wcisco, March 4. Mr. Woonnow Wii-son has replaced Mr. Taft as President of tho United States. The ceremonial accompaniments of the inauguration were very much shorn of tho braid and trappings and mummery that have usually' marked tits event in the last twenty or thirty years; in this respect it 'probably will bo emblematical of a prcco-i'tifut-sjii&shing career in the White House. President Wilson knows little of Washington customs and etiquette, and he has permitted it to become known that he cares less. He says ho is going to the Capitol to engage in tho business of being President, and for that alone. Even before ho took offico there was talk of some'things ho proposod to do ami of other things he proposed not to do that ruffled, if not astounded, the benurocrats of Washington. For one thing, he is disposed to make tho Vice-President a member of his Cabinet. Heretofore the Vice-President has been very much of an ornamental incident in the Government service, his one duty, beside that of standing over ready to etop into the shoes of an assassinated President, being that of presiding officer of tho Senate. Another contemplated innovation is even more radical. The President's official quarters are about a mile and a-half from the Halls of Congress, known as the Capitol Building. There is, indeed, a President's room in the Ccpitol Bailding, but history does not record any instances •of its use except on ceremonial occasions or on days when Congress is about to prorogue, when tho President must be quickly available to sign Bills- Mr. Wilson is going to change all this, and already the cry has gone forth that he is plarning to use the power of the Executive to overawe and bulldose the Legislative branch. The incoming President told an interviewer tho ot&ev day that during the sessions of CongtYjy> hi; proposes to spend four or five bouite » iky i;,. the Capitol building, so as to keep cioioly in touch with membere if both the House of Representatives and of the Senate, and to advise with them *t ti.o details of legislation. In this the .; rw president 13 very possibly planting the seeds of future trouble with Congress. The new President rexsandy comes into office /with a big handful of >gly problems awaiting solution. Some jf • his candid friends have been at pains to make out a list of the troubles with which he will bo faced, and they constitute altogether a string of embarrassments such as few Presidents have been confronted with on the day of inauguration. First, there is the Mexican revolution, involving the,»ecesaity of deciding for or against American intervention. President Taft has seen to it that the army and navy departments are prepared to jump in at a moment's notice. It is I for President Wilson to say whether ,Ot not that momentous step shall be taken. The dispute with Great Britain over discrimination in the , payment of Panama Canal tolls remains' unsettled. In Cuba the Gomez ;:. Administration threatens to prevent the. inauguration of President-elect fenocal, and. there are budding insurrections in Colombia and Central America,. Those mentioned are all non-domestSc tronbles, but other© ! invc!via«? domestic matters we perhaps even' mow irksome. 'First of t'liese, it ■ is generally considered, is Mr. W. J. ;, BrvGOi the Secretary of iState or ''Premier" of the Cabinet. With his unquestioned.ambition to succeed to the Presidency four years hence, it roquiree, sio ; sorcerer to foresee here endless possibilatiea of tfictiori' 7 * In point of fact," the Republican Party is secretly depending upon the supposed impossibility of Mr. Bryan and Mr. Wilson. working in harmony ai the rock upon which, it is hoped, the Administration will be wrecked. It bolls itself down to a question of whether or not Mr." Bryan will be content to subordinate himself to the President. Those who know Mr. Bryan best say that, after the first year or so of the Administration, he will bo found trying to take the lead in the eyes of the country. Another difficulty under which the new President will labour is the fact that, while his party, the Democrats, will control the House' of Representatives by a larcre majority, and the Senate by the casting vote of the VicePresident, ' there is a strong conservative band within s the party in both Chambers. Tins will throw upon him the necessity of conciliating the Progressive, Republicans. On top of all this is the grave task which the Administration has set itself of revising the tariff downward. It is said that no incoming President who has entered upon a reduction of the tariff immediately following Ms inauguration has succeeded in being re-elected four years after. Presidents Cleveland and Taft are pointed asrecent instances in proof. That President Wilson means to make the revision of the tariff an early event is shown by the fact that already: he has definitely, announced that he will call Congress together in special session for that purpose on April 1. THE MAH WHO LOST OFFICE. ; MR. TAFT'S " CONFESSION." [FROM OUR OWX CORRESPONDENT?.] San Francisco, March 3. : President Taft, now on the point of abandoning pnbl/c office, probably ever, " confessed" himself last Saturday night to a gathering of several hundred newspaper men at the National Press Club, Washington, in an altogether Temarkable speech. The appealing frankness of what Mr. Taft had to say about himself explains in great part his'personal popularity,' despite the fact that he was the worst beaten man who ever sought re-election to the high office of President of the United States. »My sin," Mr. Taft told his auditors, "is an indisposition to labour as hard as I might, a disposition to procrastinate and a disposition to enjoy the fellowship of others more than I ought." Very human faults; and Mr. Taft was not far astray in his self-analysis. He said he left offico without kicking or squealing, and so far from -complaining went on ■ to tell of the good things fortune had done for him. " I have never wanted office, but I have been in office since I was 21," the President observed. « ,' I have . served on the bench, in the Philippines, m the War Department, and in the Presidency. f There Eas never been a time when I didn't have , Presidency fs concerned it was not Mr. SS to be a candidate in 1908, but that he gave way to the importunities of SS Roofevelt.-.• His own wishes were to T<x. iustice of the Supreme Court. £T! nnque practice of fir. Taffs to . ll&itim the pulpits of various denomiSons vOn hi ß last Sunday "in WashingSn as President he delivered a sermon a? the; AU Souls Unitarian Church.