Oct. 16.
With but three weeks to go before the people of the United States go to the polls in the presidential election the political campaign has not yet swung into full fury, though it will increase in tempo as the fateful day approaches. What is odd about it all is the fact that on the one important issue, namely the United States's policy vis-a-vis of the war, there is so great a degree of agreement between the two big parties that there is every indication that the election will be decided upon purely domestic issues. Both President Roosevelt and Mr. Wendell. Willkie. have made it quite clear in their speeches, as their parties have made it in their programmes, that the United States will continue to give Britain every possible aid, short of going to war, to bring about victory for the democracies. ' There is not then any real issue. as to how far the United States should go in this respect, and the conclusion to be drawn is that, no matter who is successful at the polls on November 5, the government of the United States will follow the policy with regard fo the war of non-belligerency, but not of neutrality.
President Roosevelt in his Dayton speech, which has created so favourable an impression throughout the world, left no doubt as to the American stand. "No combination dictator countries, of Europe and Asia "will stop the help we are giving to almost the last free people in the world beside us. The British are fighting to hold these dictator nations at bay." His opponent declares that the American people would appease no nation on earth and stood ready to give their lives to protect their democratic institutions. Despite the declarations of the two candidates, Col. Lindbergh, probably still a better aviator than a statesman, criticizing President Roosevelt's policy claims "We have alienated. the most powerful military nations of Europe and Asia,...We find the same men who led us into the greatest national debt in our! history (elling us that we are weak and unprepared and that we must spend additional billions, and devote more years, to the build ing up of our military forees." Col. Lind-borgh if he means anything at all, which is doubtful considering the manner in which he disregards the patent facts of the history of the past few years, is apparently in favour: of seeking to appease the dictator nations, and it is, perhaps, fortunate that his public utterances have done so much to discredit him in the eyes of most thoughtful Americans.
The fact of the matter is that the policy which President Roosevelt has followed while not zoing to the length of appeasement, was based upon a very real desire to secure the peace of the world. Indeed a little over a year ago he went to unprecedented lengths. to prevent the outbreak of war. He failed because of the apparent determination of Germany and Italy to entrust their destinies upon the gamble of war, and from all this emerges the fact that as with Japan, in connection with which country. American patience has been remarkable for its long! suffering, it has not been President Roosevelt who has alienated the Powers to which Col.
Lindbergh refers, but those selfsame Powers who have alienated not only the President Dut the great mass of the Amereian peopl It is, perhaps, as well that men who think like Col. Lindbergh have not a great say the councils of the United States, for he has consistently demonstrated degree s he received during his German tour. What he has failed to appreciate are the lessons which world hax learned during the last four the chief one of which is that not the a parent= ly thinks it fo be. He has not learned that those imponderables of courage and determination, of the readiness to make every snerifice For the ideals which free men hold above tial defeats and sex into final Britons have been greatly hearten practienl manner in which the United States have demonstrated their sympathy; they are. encouraged by the knowledge that, no matter: how the presidential election results, the great democratic republie"will still lend its support to them, and by the fact that the people of the United States have been brought to realize that Britain is fighting the battle of democracies including that of the United States. themselves.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.