Life — April 15, 1920 — page 20: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

LIFE PUBLIS OMPANY Crranies Dana Gissox, President csident 7 West Thirty . Rolls Hous OOVER says he will run for President on the Re- publican ticket if the Repub- licans want him and like his ideas. It has not been disclosed yet that they do. The fact is that though Hoover is undoubtedly a good man, and able, and GX hiehly competent, and imbued with inspiring ideas about — what ought to be done to pull the world out of the hole in which the war has left it, it is not at all clear that he is much of a Republican, He doesn't pretend to be sure of it himself. He says the only political affiliations he ever has had have been Republican, but they were not very intimate, being confined to membership in a prominent Repub- lican club and allegiance to the party over years when he was working most of the time as a mining engineer in foreign parts and was not often able to get to the polls. He scems never to have done any work for the party. He docs not claim that the Republican party owes him anything on grounds of regularity or past services, or that it is warranted in expecting fat party dividends to result in coming years from employing him When Republican well-wisher trics to make him out “regular,” even in spirit, he snorts defiance and dissent When the Tribune says all down its first editorial column what a fine man he is, and suggests at the end that he is probably that he sup- ported the Wilson party in the Con- gressional elections of 1918, Hoover sorry now st Street, Enwaro S. Magtix, Editor fanaging Editor F, De Sates Casey, Art Editor New York, N, Y. answers, “It was obvionsly my duty ats an important war official to support the President without thought of any political interest to myself from the day I entered the administration until 1 left it, and I put no qualifications upon or apologies for, loyalty to one’s chiei in office.” So he will not even slug Mr. Wilson in the eve now that his energies arc impaired, What a man! The truth is he approves of Mr. Wilson a good deal and has helped him heartily in his efforts to tranquilize the world, going even to the length of telling him at times wherein he thought his plans ill-advised. He told him in Paris that he ought not to get these States too intimately mixed up with the local controversies of Europe. He differs with him now about the impor- tance of Article X, and he favors cer- tain reservations to the Treaty. But the whole point of his offering himself as a candidate to the Republicans is that he is for the Treaty, not against it. “I understand,” he said in his letter to .he Hoover Club of California, “that there is a great wish among the Republicans of California to opportunity to express themselves in favor of the League of Nations, with proper reservations safeguarding American tradition and interests, as opposed to the extreme view advo- cated against any league at all.” To meet that wish he offers himself as a candidate for the Republican nomina- tion for President. The issue, he says, is whether we should join the moral forces of the world to reduce the dan- gers again growing around us, or hug- ging a phantom insularity, sit by inert have while armics grow again wax, and watch “the de hopes for which our sons y ficed in this war.” So the rock on whic andidacy rests is the I: wants it. He is not so exa ing about on of the alleged to the phrasing and punctua Mr. Wilson is be, but he wants it just Mr. Wilson does. He y operate with Europe to ma}. irticles as as much 3s to ¢o- this earth a better place of tempora for human beings, and | most helpful thing he car residence thinks the for the moment to that end is to coine out asa candidate for the Republi on. nomina- F course, there are plenty of people who will feel and say that Hoover wants to be President and has con cluded that, on the whole, the Repub- an nomination is the best one to try for. In a way that is probably tve There comes to some men a and a call which they cannot neglect and still be true to themselves. The things that a man plans to do for his pleasure are matters of free choice with him He can do them or not and it makes no great matter. Not so when he feels a summons to a great duty. He dodge it except to his detriment declines to respond it must be for real If he gets to feel about the Presidency that it is his job, he had better try for it. The Presidency should not be won in a walk, nor handed to any one on a plaver. It is a thing like salvation or truth, to be striven for by those who fev! a all cannot If he reasons. to seek it. Hoover has ample reason such a call, It has been brov notice and impressed upon him dubitable testimonies that to of voters he has come to pers: no one else does a great duty and a great hope. He has a new house i California where the climate is better than in the District, and he does not need the White House for a residence even in the prevailing dearth of habi- to feel to his ify a8 comicbooks.com