Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 220, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 September 1912 — HAS CHANGED AS CANDIDATE [ARTICLE]

HAS CHANGED AS CANDIDATE

Woodrow Wilson’s Speeches Now Those of Office Seeker. Scattered among the platitudes of Dr. Wilson’s speech of acceptance are some truths. None is more significant than this; * "We stand in the presence of an Awakened nation, impatient of partisan make believe." Following which he makes believe that he is telling the voters of the country his position on the campaign Issues. No one has yet been able to determine from a reading of the speech precisely what that position Is. Some slight enlightenment comes from time to time in his later utterances, like, for example, the declaration the other day that Tammany is to be safe from his assaults; but none of it is satisfying. Dr. Wilson, in the preconvqntion days, was represented to the country as a scholarly gentleman, too lofty of mind to practice the wiles of the professional politician, too earnest tn the cause of good government to be aught but frank and fearless in his expression, too unselfish to put private ambition above the public weal, too idealistic in character to truckle to the forces of evil In the nation. But how singularly he has masked all of these qualities since William Jennings Bryan forced his nomination at Baltimore. There is no difference, save In the purity of the English, between his speeches and the speeches of the professional office seeker of the worst period in American politics. He steps pussy footed over all the large questions of the day. He exhibits a suspiciously broad tolerance for all elements in the body politic, even the elements which, to nominate him, Bryan fouiid it expedient to denounce by name in the convention. There is none of the rugged frankness of utterance that characterized his writings in the days before he was inoculated with the virus of political ambition. He is proving over apt as an advanced student of practical Dolitics. It is not a pleasant nor a heartening exhibition he makes of himself. The right minded citizen can feel nothing but sadness in contemplating a man of education and culture so Intent upon partisan and personal victory that he sacrifices those ideals of truth and honesty for which he has always stood to fawn upon and honeyfugle the voters. Dr. Wilson as a candidate is not in character with the Dr. Wilson that was pictured to us prior to th> Baltimore convention. This “awakened nation, impatient of partisan make believe,” detects the difference.