THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, JULY 14, 1931. AMERICA AND THE WORLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20924, 14 July 1931, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS TUESDAY, JULY 14, 1931. AMERICA AND THE WORLD.

The decision of the United States to participate in the world disarmament conference next February is' announced. With the statement to this effect appears a forecast of a policy the President will shortly embody in an official message. It is suggested that relief will be offered European debtors who are not able to meet their obligations to the United States, but in assessing incapacity to pay, failure to reduce armaments will be set off against pleas of poverty. Finally these proposals will be accepted by the Republican leaders as the policy on which they will fight the Presidential election at the end of next year. Nothing could illustrate better the way in which domestic politics and foreign affairs react upon one another in the United States. There is a British tradition of continuity in foreign policy, lines once laid down being followed substantially in spite of changes of Government. This tends to keep foreign affairs out of elec-' tion controversy. The practice is not invariable, as the Labour Party's attitude toward Russia exemplifies ; but occasional exceptions do not dispose of the general rule. In the United States there is no such tradition. The emergence of that country as a factor in the concert of Powers is so comparatively recent that traditions to replace the older one of aloofness—now quietly, but for all practical purposes, discarded—have scarcely had time to grow. The outstanding instance to the contrary, one with a profound influence in world affairs, was the repudiation of the Treaty of Versailles and the League of Nations after Mr. Woodrow Wilson had, so far as possible, committed the United States to both. As the creditor nation to which half the civilised world owes huge sums of .money, the United States cannot remain aloof from world affairs. It is significant that Mr. Hoover proposes, if the forecast is correct, to use the power of his country as creditor to' force the cause of international disarmament. But, if the lesson of Mr. Wilson and the Peace Treaty is remembered, the nations likely to be affected will not build too many expectations, even if Mr. Hoover is elected on the programme outlined. They will not forget that, though the President may propose policies, a hostile Congress, especially a hostile Senate, can dispose of them effectively and rapidly. In any event, it is more interesting to consider the bearing of foreign policy on domestic politics than the contrary. There are to be announced certain proposals which the Republican leaders will use as a leading feature in the Presidential campaign. As they will come from Mr. Hoover personally, he will obtain the Republican nomination for a second term. An opinion of Mr. Calvin Coolidge, quoted recently, was that if prosperity returned to the United States before the middle of next year Mr. Hoover would gain the Republican nomination and win the ele/ition. If it did not, he would also be nominated, because no other Republican would want the honour; the inference being that the Republican chance of winning would be slender. The Republicans evidently see in Mr. Hoover their prospective candidate. Whether they have analysed the position as Mr. Coolidge did cannot be known, but there is significance in the prediction that they will turn to external affairs for their leading electoral issue and thus try to divert attention from domestic affairs.

Mr. Hoover entered office early in 1929 with many things apparently in his favour. The industrial boom, often called the " Coolidge prosperity," was at its height. It had been dinned into the ears of /the country by sedulous propaganda that the Republican Party was the ! party of prosperity, that Mr. Hoover was a kind of superman who would lead the United States to yet dizzier heights of plenty and industrial activity. Even the President himself lent his voice to the spreading of such sentiments. On the surface all was well. Before the end of the year all had changed. The depression grips the United States as it does the rest of the world. At the time of the Presidential election and inauguration, the one dissenting voice in the chorus extolling prosperity had come from the farmers, especially those of the Middle West. They had been promised relief. To meet their demands the Federal Farm Board was established. Its declared functions were to promote orderly marketing and further the co-opera-tive movement among the farmers. It has gone much further, has disregarded all the principles the President laid down for its guidance. It has not satisfied the farmer and, by using Federal funds in the endeavour to peg the prices of wheat and cotton, it has gone far toward antagonising the industrial East. These circumstances can bo, indeed have been, held chiefly responsible for the severe setback the Republicans suffered in the Congressional elections last year. They help to explain the search for a foreign policy to serve as an election appeal. If this course is followed, there are two possibilities the outside world must take into account. The first is that Mr. Hoover may be returned pledged to do certain things which a hostile Senate will not permit him to do. The second is that he may be defeated, and be succeeded by a President who will feel bound to repudiate, specifically and absolutely, what Mr. Hoover and the Republicans advocated. The electoral contest will be worth watching, but it is not wise to conclude that the debts and disarmament policy soon to be announced is bound to be adopted by the United States.