Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 254, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 October 1916 — MEXICAN SITUATION BY MAN WHO KNOWS [ARTICLE]

MEXICAN SITUATION BY MAN WHO KNOWS

Henry Lane Wilson, Ambassador Under Taft, Paints Vivid Picture of Conditions of That Nation. Henry Lane Wilson, ambassador Mexico under President Taft, spoke tor a crowded house at the Ellis theatre Saturday afternoon and gave a revelation of the Mexican situation as he had known it from his experience. Mr. Wilson held his audience spellbound throughout, and one coul.l have heard a pin drop while he was talking. His talk was not given over to tearing the democratic party to bits. He simply presented facts — facts that no one could dejiy. Mr. Wilson did not waste words, and everything he said was straight to the point. Following his talk at the theatre, which was cut short on account of limited time, Mr. Wilson went to St. Joseph’s college, where he made a short address. John O’Connor presented Mr. Wilson to the audience. Owing to limited space, we are only able to publish part of Mr. Wilson’s speech as delivered here. The "watchful waiting” policy of President Wilson was attacked vigorously. He showed*that it bad cost thousands of lives, millions of dollars worth of property, and the respect that America should hold in the eyes of other nations. American demands had been disobeyed, American rights ignored, and even Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of labor, had gained the release of American prisoners when President Wilson had failed, the speaker said, all because of the administration’s vacillating tactics. John Lind, President Wilson’s personal representative to Mexico, was referred to Saturday as “a Swedish gentclman from Minnesota, who would not know-a diplomatic rule or precedent were he to meet it in the middle of the road,” and the speaker denounced Lind’s advice following his visit to Mexico as ridiculous. Mr. Wilson first gave a little Hiritory of Mexico and showed that it had been ruled since its independence by seventy-one presidents, none of whom had been elected. Eighty per cent of the population can neither read nor write, and Mexicans, live to loot and loot to 1 i v?f”the"Spe?rkeT de : dared. .He called Diaz a master builder. Madero, his successor, was killed by a Conspiracy of which Huerta wasinnocent, and Huerta himself would have been killed by the same organization had he not been protected. Huerta was respected and recognized by all the nations but the United States and two or three Pan-Ameri-can republics. Huerta was the first pro-American Mexican he had ever known, Mr. Wilson stated,, and had offered to protect Americans as soon as American recognized him. The speaker displayed no love for Carranza, arid Villa* he characterized as a monster. ***»- Mr. Wilson was in Mexico City during the eleven days’ bombardment of the city by Felix Diaz and his troops. He portrayed the misery and death of that period, and told the story of Madero’s scorn of every peace plea placed before him by the embassy as the siege continued with no hopes fo>* Madero’s supremacy. Two soldiers, who were sent to him to pray that he surrender* were shot down. Finally, Ambassador Wilson made the bluff, he admitted, that frightened the warring factions into a tempor-. ary pacification, after which' 40,000 people marched the streets of the city and gave thanks to the United States. Never before has the vacillating policy of the present administration been put so vividly before the people as, it« was Saturday by Mr. Wilson. :HrTw ! ''Tf?fT'irifiiiyiit' - , af!er Incident" that had degraded this government in the eyes of the world. After a U. S. warship was ordered out of the port of Tampico by the president, while thousands of Americans and Europeans begged to be taken aboard, a German ship entered and made the rescue. The speaker was greeted with cheers when he told of president Taft’s prompt action a few years ago that brought Mexico to term s. With 80,000 troops on the way to the border and twelve! ships sailing toward Mexican waters, Madero hastened to send his own' troops into every part of Mexico to protect foreigners. Mr. Wilson was then in Mexico City and delivered the message to .President Taft in "person and return the reply to Madero. . _ “If it is going, to cause us trouble we will protect Americans,” the latter had said. But all this has changed since the “watchful waiting” policy'. Order after order of President Wilson has been disobeyed. .Note after note has been sent. Conference after confernce has been held, and the Mexican savagery has continued. Even Huerta had failed to sarate the flag, as President Wilson declared he would be forced, to do. . .