Republicans All at Sea
In a haze of uncertainty, jealousy, hesitation, doubt and fear, the Republican party will open its national convention at Chicago tomorrow. What will come out this haze no man knows. Whether the presidential nominee will be Hughes or Roosevelt or one of the fifty-seven varieties of Favorite Son is mere speculation, based on the airiest premises. Just now the Colonel appears to be eliminated, and the pointer turns to the Supreme Court justice, but the shifting winds of political fortune may bring a readjustment overnight.
If Justice Hughes would consent to make a statement satisfactory to the Progressives and to their leader, he probably would render his nomination certain. He has said, however, that he would make no statement that he would offer no bid for support, whether of Colonel Roosevelt and the Progressives or of any one else. He takes refuge in an impenetrable silence. On the other hand, the Progressives say they will not endorse Hughes in the absence of such a declaration, and the Roosevelt forces in the Republican convention are of the same mind.
It all makes a very pretty kettle of fish. The fact is, the Republican party is a party without generally approved principles. It is divided into almost as many camps as it has leaders. The belligerency of Roosevelt and Root is matched by the pacifism of Cummins and Ford. The reactionaries like Barnes and Penrose and the other members of the Old Guard stand opposed to those relics of Armageddon that have drifted back into the Republican fold. The party that clamors—at times—for a more vigorous foreign policy—cannot throw aside the record of its effort to throttle President Wilson when he stood bold.  ly for American rights. 