The situation is particularly absurd because we have American citizens who are world authorities on foreign problems, The editor of one American quarterly, devoted to foreign affairs, has the run of every chancellery in Europe, and knows the intimate details ai politics in half a dozen countries, Our newspapers are represented abroad by as distinguished a corps of journalists as any country can boast. But as newspapermen, they do not have to live on a scale representative of a great nation.
Thus the man with ability to be a first-rate diplomat has the possibility of a far more remunerative career elsewhere. A young man who enters the diplomatic service of the United States can hardly hope to earn more than $10,000 a year, and that after many^years of taining, of living outside his own country and ellucating his children abroad. He may' reach the top as a minister in some South American republic, or serve as counsellor, doing all the real work for a meagre salary under some rich bondholder and political appointee who can afford to be ambassador.
We spend more in one week for the United States Navy, in preparation for an eventual war, than we spend in a whole year for the entire diplomatic and consular service which we maintain to promote peace.
Let us demand that this nation, wholeheartedly devoted to peace, be represented as it deserves to be in the world's capitals. The money proposed to be spent on a single public-works project—the Florida ship canal, which most engineers think is nonsensical—would double the State Departments budget for the next nine years. It would make it possible for others than the rich to represent America. It would put democracy into democratic diplomacy. It would encourage gifted youth to put its talents in the service of this country and of the world.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.